Tales of Ruuin - Homecoming

Why me?

Something smacked Echser in the face, rattling his brain like a dice in a cup. His eyes popped open – then he had to squeeze them shut again. Bright. Everything was so bright! Was this heaven? Or hell? Echser gulped, squinting fearfully at what might be the rest of eternity.

Eternity is rather blue, he decided, almost like the open sky.

A handsome face with a fake smile and two pits of darkness where eyes should be came into focus. "Back again? Good, I was worried you might have left your sanity down there. How was your first adventure as a lich hunter?"

"Craven...?" muttered Echser, then he growled, "Craven!"

Then – to his endless surprise – he balled his right hand to a fist and swung it at the lunatic's face.

The bounty killer caught his punch with a gloved fist, his arm hardly rocking, the smile never wavering. "Now, now... No punching if you please. We are friends, after all."

"Friends?" Echser spat, pulling his hand free. He crawled back until he was with his back against a gravestone. "Friends!? You lunatic! You monster! I almost died down there! I—"

Craven pushed himself up from his kneeling position. "It seems you have braved your adventure well enough. A few scrapes and bruises and those split and torn fingernails... Why, pray tell, did you fight against me when I was pulling you out? Did you forget the rope I tied to your ankle?"

Echser blinked and then groaned. The rope. Of course...

Craven turned away from him, staring pointedly at the open grave. "Anyway, I see no smoke bleeding from this particular wound in the earth. I thus gather you failed in your assigned task? Where you at least successful in retrieving your precious book?"

"No!" shouted Echser, clambering to his feet. "I didn't! A ghoul took it – snatched it away." The alchemist pinched his fingers together so that maybe an inch remained free. "That's how close my face was to this filthy monster's claws. That. Close."

"A ghoul?" somebody asked.

Echser whirled around, startled, and would have fallen into the open grave had Craven's hand not shot out to steady him. Two figures in dark garments and spades in their hands stared at him. It was the old undertaker Hornbach and his assistant – Stefan or somesuch – a brawny youth on the brink of manhood, desperation etched onto his dirty peasant features. According to Craven, the lad had not only discovered the tunnels but also lost his little brother to them.

"You are certain that it was a ghoul?" said Stefan "Could it perhaps have been a child's hand? A boy's? Maybe five years of age? About that tall?"

Echser freed himself from Craven's steadying hand and drew himself up to his full height. "Of course, it was a ghoul! I'm a man of Science! An alchemist well versed in these things! Do you think me a fool?"

The young man's face fell. "No. I... I... I understand."

The old undertaker lifted a gnarly hand to pad his assistant onto the back. "Told ye not ta get yer hopes up, boy. Them ghouls might prefer corpses, but they are not above—"

"I don't want to hear it!" barked Stefan. "Not now, not ever. I know he's still alive, still down there. I just know!"

"Course 'e is," muttered Hornbach. "Course 'e is. Forget I said anythin'"

Craven watched it all with faint amusement. "Be that as it may, since my companion failed in the one task he had" – Echser glared bloody murder at the bounty hunter – "I fear we have to retrieve the bomb."

The alchemist blanched, stumbling back. "Oh no! I'm not going down there ever again. Shoot me if you must, fiend, but I won't do it!"

Craven smiled. "Not even for your precious book?"