A Wolf's Kiss

Chapter XI - Berserk

The fog was thick over the mountains. Traces of snow from the storm were still stuck to the rocky terrain. Jagur was careful where he stepped, everywhere there were slippery cliffs, jagged rocks, and of course the ever looming threat of the enemy. He knew they were close. The Berserkers were brutal fighters, even more than the wolves, but their true strength was in how they used the rough land to hide. One of the savages could have been hiding behind any single one of those rocks, waiting for them on top of one of the cliffs, and they would have no idea until it was too late.

Sieger and the Crown guard had taken a different route through the higher cliffs, in order to make sure no ambush came from above. Jagur took the lower route with the Gerolf, they were joined by the Krigians and Gerolf's men.

Jagur gripped his ax with both hands, though there was not yet any sign of danger, he was going to be ready for anything.

Suddenly the air grew thick with some sort of fowl smell. Jagur looked around confused for the smell's source, but he couldn't see past the fog ahead. The smell... it was somewhat familiar, but still it was new to him. At first it smelled like dried blood and rotting flesh, but it was much less heavy than that... then Jagur remembered where he had smelled it from. It was the scent of that monster that Sieger had captured in the dungeons of the Crownhold.

"They're here!" Jagur cried out, but it was too late.

Arrows came flying from all directions through the fog. Rocks were hurled from the over the edges of the cliffs, and suddenly they were surrounded by the unmistakable war cries of the Berserkers. But they were not alone.

As the savages came into view, Jagur saw the same hideous creatures he had seen in the dungeons, there were hoards of them!

Jagur could do nothing but cut down the seemingly endless attackers, swinging his ax left and right. All he could see was red. Blood covered his ax, stained his clothes, and even was thick in his hair.

He watched many of his own men, some of them friends of his, go down fighting only to pop back up and continue fighting. Others were not so lucky. Jagur's mind always went back to Gerolf, he was getting older in his age and Jagur could only hope that he could still stand his ground. Every few seconds he would catch glance of the old Lord fighting with his long sword, he fought just as he did when he was young.

It inspired Jagur a bit, and he felt a new rush of strength surge through his body. He lunged forward, against the oncoming hoards, and charged at them with ax in hand. With every muscle in his body pulsing, Jagur slashed through the flesh of the Berserkers with all the viciousness of a wolf mulling a doe. The monsters they fought with, Jagur discovered, bled just like men... they were only twice as hard to kill. Sieger was right, those creatures, whatever they were called, would have been hard for a man to fight off... but Jagur was far stronger than any man.

The monsters relentlessly fought back against him, moving mindlessly like sacks of flesh and muscle held together by nothing but hate. They're eyes were a terrible yellow color, they're skin was swallow and at times almost purple. They were clad in no armor, not even sack clothe to cover they're rotting skin. The creatures tried to sink their jagged teeth into Jagur's skin, but he was far too quick to let that happen.

The Berserkers fought much like their monstrous allies, though more intelligently. They had armor, they had weapons. However, the Berserkers were devoid of the humanity that the Jagur had seen in the North men. They fought like animals. Those savages had spent their entire lives hidden in the mountains, only to go out to challenge the hold of the North Lords on their shared ancestor's land. It was quite often they would come from over the mountains and steal from, burn, rape, and slaughter nearby villages. When the plundering was over, they went back over their mountains and hid in their caves, and there was hardly anything the North men could do to stop them.