Forest Kingdom Trilogy 3 - Down Among the Dead Men

“I’d hate to think you were going soft on me.”
    Wilde met Hammer’s gaze for a moment, and then his eyes faltered and he looked away. “Have I ever let you down?”
    “Of course not, Edmond. You never let me down because you know that the first time you do, I’ll kill you. You don’t want to worry about what happened here, my friend, you want to worry about what I’ll do to you if you don’t stop wasting my time. Now then, we go that way to get down to the cellars. You go first.”
    Wilde looked at the door Hammer indicated. A wide, dark stain had soaked into the wood, and the heavy metal lock had been smashed apart from the other side. The bowman handed his torch to Jack without looking at him, and walked slowly over to the door. He drew his sword, hesitated for a long moment, and then suddenly pulled the door open and stepped quickly back, holding his sword out before him. There was only a dark corridor, silent and empty and daubed with old blood. Wilde hefted his sword but made no attempt to enter the darkness. Jack stepped forward and silently offered Wilde his torch back. Wilde took it and briefly nodded his thanks without looking around. He started down the corridor, and Jack followed him. Hammer brought up the rear, carrying his lantern in one hand and the sword from his hip in the other. The long sword hilt above his shoulder glowed very faintly in the dark.
    Shadows swayed menacingly around the three outlaws as Wilde led them deeper into the border fort. Their footsteps echoed loudly in the quiet, and the air grew steadily colder. Scarecrow Jack looked warily about him, wishing he was back in the Forest. Ever since he’d entered the fort his instincts had seemed muffled and confused, but still he was sure that something awful had happened here, and not that long ago. The bloodstains bothered him. With so much blood spilled, why weren’t there any bodies? Maybe something ate them… . Jack frowned and shook his head. Being indoors was getting to him. He hated being inside any house or building, behind walls and under roofs. They made him feel trapped, hemmed in. That was partly why he’d left his village all those years ago and made his home in the Forest. The Forest was alive; the stone and timber buildings were dead and silent. He felt more alive among the great trees than he ever had among his people. He went back occasionally to visit his family, but he always slept out of doors and he never stayed long.
    The border fort worried him in many ways. He found the thick stone walls oppressive. He kept feeling that they were crowding in around him. The ceiling was uncomfortably low, and he kept wanting to duck his head. It hadn’t bothered him too much the first time he’d entered the fort; he’d been so involved in his mission he hadn’t had time to think about where he was. But now he couldn’t seem to think about anything else. And above all that, there was a feeling … a feeling of something terrible, somewhere close at hand. Even with his instincts clouded, Jack knew it was there, just as he always knew where the hidden trails were in the Forest or what the weather was going to be. He tried to get some kind of feel for what it was he found so threatening, but his mind couldn’t seem to get it in focus. Whatever it was, it was very old and very deadly, and they were getting closer to it all the time.
    Scarecrow Jack wiped at the cold sweat on his face, and wished he was somewhere else. Anywhere else.
    Wilde led the way around a corner, and then stopped dead in his tracks. Jack and Hammer moved quickly forward to stand beside him. The corridor ahead was choked from wall to wall and from floor to ceiling with a thick, dirty gray webbing. At the edges it frayed into delicate individual strands, but the rest of the web was a sprawling, chaotic tangle that thickened at the center into a pulsing, solid mass. It was impossible to tell how far back the webbing went, but it looked to be several feet at least. Shadows moved in the web, dark shapes that came and went with unnerving speed. Some were small, barely a few inches wide, but others were easily the size of a man’s head, and a few were larger still. Every now and again Jack thought he caught a glimpse of burning blood red eyes. He sniffed cautiously at the cold air. It smelled foul, as though something dead and unburied lay close at hand.
    “Did you come this way earlier?” Hammer asked Jack quietly.
    “I think so, but … I never