Murder the Heroes

Chapter Five; Section Two

The Krull's clicks and thrills were pitched too high for mortal ears. Eckelbert heard but didn't answer. His mandibles were damaged - one was even missing. It was a horrible embarrassment to him. He could no longer form his words correctly. The other Krull thought this was horrendously funny and were savage in their glee. So he stayed quiet. A solitary mote of silence among the constant chatter of the Ice Lords, as they watched the Draugr leap into the Mage Killer's smoke screen.

Something on the battlefield - though he knew not what - had triggered memories of his maiming day, and thus he was partly lost in reverie. He knew now that he had been too confident, too eager to prove himself. All the same, to be outwitted by a boy, to be mutilated like he had, was a terrible burden. It was a constant irritant, like a loose tooth that he couldn't but wiggle. Not that it really mattered. The others wouldn't let him forget it anyway.

It was a tragedy. Before that day he'd had real promise, but in one fell stroke that had all been taken away from him. He'd tumbled to the bottom of the Krull hierarchy. Would he ever be able to climb back up again? Even if it was possible, the Krull were a long-lived race and so it would take centuries.

That rankled. In their eyes Eckelbert was now nothing more than a simpleton; and that while he had so much to offer that they so desperately needed - creativity, intuition, empathy. But they didn't see the value of such things. The running gag was that his words had been just as meaningless before the accident as they were now. If he would only have known all this before his transformation! He might well have chosen a different path. He would have stayed a man. No matter that man only got one lifetime, at least you could achieve something in that time - at least humanity understood the value of both guts and brains. They should have warned him, he thought bitterly, they should have told him what he was getting himself into.

They certainly hadn't done that. They'd only told him about the good stuff - the power, the bond, the immortality, the knowledge. None of them had mentioned the drawbacks, like the eternal cold, the stultifying hierarchy, the atrophy of empathy and sympathy, the ever-growing hatred of the living. Had he been a fool to jump in so willingly?

Not that it mattered anymore. There was no going back.

The Grand Meister clicked at him, his language painfully slow - as if he'd damaged not just his speech but his very understanding. Eckelbert clicked back the phrase he'd practiced so many times in front of the mirror, so that it at least might be comprehended. "I understand and obey." It was a good phrase, much needed in Krull society. And yet still some of the others snickered evilly. Eckelbert tried his best to ignore them as he hurried to take his position; though he didn't run. Krull never ran. It was beneath them.

A new cloud of smoke - black smoke - roiled up into sky from where the Mage Killers had last been. There were the flickers of flames, and the screams of beasts and men. Something was going on in there. Eckelbert opened his mouth to tell the others. His single mandible worked silently in the wind. They wouldn't understand him and even if they did, they'd act like they didn't. One of the others would spot the black smoke and recognise its significance. Let them mention it, he decided.

Roars of pain and defiance joined the smoke - the sound of Draugr suffering. Two came leaping back out. The first dove down into a snow bank, its fur hissing as it extinguished the flames. The second couldn't do much more than stagger a few paces before it collapsed. Pale blue blood stained the snow. A last shuddering breath, then it fell quiet. Slowly its features transformed, changing into something ever more humanoid.

Eckelbert stared at the white haired woman's corpse before him. So the legends about the Krull women were true! They had been turned into nothing more than beasts and servants! What was wrong with these things?

He shook himself. This wasn't the time for such thoughts! He turned back to the smoke and gazed at it in Othersight to get some inkling at what was going on - his hands came up, he splayed his fingers. He wasn't supposed to use physically gesture, but sometimes instinct got the better of him; like counting on your fingers when doing math. He added his own efforts to the magical net that warred with the Mage Killer's smoke. It wasn't easily dispelled.

Damn Mage Killers and their magic-nullifying effects.

Finally, with a mighty tear the cloud of smoke was ripped away and the flames smothered. Suddenly it was plain for all to see what had been going on within the cloud. Understanding took a little longer for the conservative Krull minds. Few had seen anything like this before. In stunned silence they stared. Why where there so many Draugr bodies? How had these Mage Killers come out victorious this time when every time before they'd been annihilated?

Understanding tore through Eckelbert's mind. The snow was gone and with it the Draugr's protection. They'd been forced to fight tooth and nail against sword and shield. To make matters worse, the Make Killers had lit the ground on fire - turning a difficult confrontation into an impossible one. The Draugr had been vanquished - to a woman - by blade and flames.

But why hadn't they stopped? Why had they continued their charge when they'd come to the edge of the fire? The answer was immediately apparent to him. The Draugr had been ordered to charge. And, like every rung in Krull society, they always obeyed the orders they'd been given. So they'd charged even when it was suicide - probably aware of what was to come, but unable to do anything about it.

And then the Krull had compounded the error. Eckelbert understood in a flash of intuition that they'd played right into the hands of the Mage Killers. They had extinguished the flames and thereby giving them the opportunity to advance unopposed though what would otherwise have been a wall of fire.

"Stop suppressing the flames!" Eckelbert screeched, "Stop killing the flames!"

"What is that mumbles?"

"We can't understand you!"

"Stop slurring your words! Speak clearly!"

He tried again, desperately, but his agitation made him even less intelligible. "The enemy is coming! They tricked us! Stop!" But still they didn't understand. He didn't get any further, as a line of pure light struck his wards. Desperately he fought to control and deflect the lance of power, but he reactions weren't quick enough. His wards crumbled. He screamed in agony as the light punched straight through him.

As his life faded he thought he saw the boy who had mauled him - the boy with the white streaks in his hair - come charging at him. For a moment Eckelbert was stunned. Then he grinned. "Kill the bastards," he muttered to the lad, "Kill them all." It felt good to be revenged, even if he wouldn't be alive to enjoy it.