The sky had become leaden with flies. The sun had already begun to set, bringing with it a reminder of God's beauty and perfection in His creation. A grim mummers farce during this most desolate age of His Benighted Ape. It was almost awe inspiring, the mixture of a fiery red sunset accenting the smattering of white clouds, losing their shape and brightness due to the slow decline of the sun, contrasted by the darkness of the biting insects.
The wind picked up, bringing with it a stench so vile that even the lowliest peasant whose only lot in life was to slog daily through the pestilence ridden filth of both human and animal, fell to his knees and began ferociously vomiting from the putrid stench. The constant smell of shit, piss, blood and rotting animal carcass was nothing new to these lowly fools, it was part of their miserable lives as much as was watching children die and women raped. Their eyes had become accustomed to the horrors of war, their ears desensitized to the cries of starving children, their hearts turned to stone by the callousness of an indifferent God. But this stench, this miasma that rode the north wind, it was something more. It was the stench of walking rot, of death undying, of melting skin and brittle bones, and of sorrow made manifest.
It seemed all life stopped. All that could be heard was the buzzing of the flies. People stopped their menial tasks and looked in the direction of the stench. They knew the stench, but never without the site of the Walking Ghosts, as they had taken to calling them. They looked, wild eyed, trying to see if one had fallen dead in some bramble of bushes, or been thrown out of some inn. Even the local chapel had stopped taking them in, for fear of reprisals from the townsfolk. The belief was let them rot and die in solitude, they were a symbol of God's unrequited wrath, a stark reminder of the omnipresent manor lord above they served. Soon, the feral hogs and canines that roamed the streets lifted their heads and sprinted off in all directions, squealing and yelping along the way, knocking over anything in their path. Murmurs started and slowly erupted into cacophonous chatter, fear slowly infested vocal chords, worrisome questions and children's cries. The sun slowly continued its decent from the world of man, when suddenly, the first bell chime was heard. And terror gripped their hearts, one and all.
