Realms of Glomora: Whispers

             

Veran had heard the whispers in the village of Krun. In the tavern, at an old gnome's vegetable stand, among the gossiping ladies with plaits in their hair and baskets on their arms: there was a demon stalking the woods. For decades it had been taking up pretty young lasses who had just entered womanhood. It would whisk the girls away to its lair and return them…changed.

 

The villagers avoided the forest like a beggar--but not Fjorg, He did not believe in the stories, and he saw opportunity--plenty of hunting to be done in a bountiful forest where there was no competition. A golden opportunity, he had said, and any who passed it up were superstitious fools who believed in ghost stories. Whoever had made up the tale of the monster had been an old biddy who was trying to keep her daughter from giving up her maidenhead.

           

 The rumor was now that Fjorg no longer thought such things.

            

The cottage rested a mile from the village, deep in the forest. Veran knocked on its wooden door. Good, solid oak. It opened.     

            

The woodsman was short with a grey mustache. He seemed a kindly man to Veran, but even in the low light of the oncoming evening, Veran could see that his eyes were red with weeping and frantic with fear. Soon Fjorg was telling his own ghost story. 

    

"I...I found her just outside my door...as if she were a rodent that the cat had dropped off...it's like..it's like it's mocking me."

     

Veran spoke gently. "Breathe, sir. Just breathe. What happened to her?"

     

Fjorg took in great gulps of air as if he were a fish washed up on shore. He spluttered and gasped, and when the words finally came they were in the form of a wail. "He...great gods, he took her head! Her body had no head! My sweet, sweet, little girl!" He collapsed on his knees and grabbed Veran's cloak. "I'Radi! Oh, I'Radi!"

     

Veran knelt and grabbed the woodsman's shoulders. The old man buried his face into his chest as he howled like a tortured wolf. He lost all control of himself and collapsed to the dirt, his hand coming away with a scrap of Veran’s cloak. 

            

The woodsman’s voice carried to the moon that was forming above the treetops. “I’Radi! I’Radi!”

            

The wind whispered in the trees.

 

***

The hoof prints led deep into the dark, twisted trees of the wood. It was autumn, and the twilight played many shadows as dead leaves crunched beneath Veran’s boots. A few innocuous noises of small forest creatures could be heard. Veran paid them no heed. 

            

The trail of prints stopped at the edge of a brackish swamp.  Naked trees, decayed and sickly, dipped their arthritic roots into the black water.

           

Round shapes loomed in the water. At first, Veran thought they were merely stumps or large stones. Then he looked closer. The pallid faces of young women, their eyes cold and still like glass marbles, looked back. They all had red hair, drenched across their brows like bloody curtains, strands caught in the teeth of their open, gaping mouths.

            

…he took her head! Her body had no head!

 

A violent shiver passed through Veran's blood. 

 

“Come out, kelpie,” he whispered. He drew his sword, ShadowWeep, its wicked-looking blade emitting an unnerving keen. The black and blue jewels in its pommel glinted in the fast-fading rays of the sun. “Come out, come out, come out to play you disgusting bastard.”

           

 A few seconds went by. Then a few more. Then the severed heads drifted to the edges of the pool as a large form emerged from the water. A horse stepped onto the shore. It was a head taller than Veran and possessed a glittering hide of black scales, its mane a tangled clump of water weeds and slime. The kelpie snorted, smoke coming from its nostrils, its red, glowing eyes fixed on its visitor.

           

“I have a treat for you,” Veran brandished ShadowWeep. “Nice and tasty. I’m going to shove it right down your gullet.” He twirled the sword in his right hand. “It’ll be the last meal you’ll ever have.”

           

The kelpie snorted and churned up the damp dirt with a single hoof, spraying clumps of it on Veran’s boots. He did not flinch.

            

“You’ve been a naughty horse. A very naughty horse.” For the briefest moment, Veran took his eyes off the beast to look at the pool. The head of one girl, with eyes green like sea diamonds, stared at him. She couldn’t have been more than twenty. Was the girl I’Radi? The sight made him want to wretch.

 

Veran returned his attention to the horse. “I’m here to send you to hell.”

           

The Kelpie came at Veran before he could even raise his blade. The creature rammed into his chest, sending him flying, ShadowWeep spinning away from his grasp. He collided with a tree and slumped to the ground.

 

“You son of a goat whore,” Veran grunted, rising to his feet. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and it came away wet and red. He cursed. How was he going to kill this creature? 

           

The kelpie was still, watching Veran. It snorted, more smoke belching from its nostrils, and it charged once again.

Veran threw himself to the side and the black horse crashed into the tree sending up an explosion of bark and wood splinters. His eyes scanned the ground quickly, looking for ShadowWeep when he caught the glint of its blue jewel.

 

The kelpie recovered and turned towards Veran. Veran dashed for his sword, hearing the sound of the thundering hooves as they approached from behind. He scooped up his sword and turned, lashing out with the blade. He landed a deep cut on its left shoulder sending up a column of hot steam. The beast let out a cry unlike any other that Veran had ever heard, violent and sharp, like a babe being tortured. Flames erupted from its mouth licking at Veran’s face. He dropped to the ground and rolled, avoiding the solid hooves that pummeled the earth.

            Veran righted himself and came up on the kelpie’s flank. He thrusted his blade and pierced the creature’s side. More steam shot from the wound and the kelpie screamed again, turning its head to glare at Veran with fiery eyes.

 

Veran drew out his sword from the monster’s flesh and brought it down with a diagonal cut across its neck where its carotid artery and jugular were. More steam, more unholy screaming. Veran leaped back as the kelpie fell to the ground and writhed in agony.

            

He watched in fascination as the scales melted off of the beast in a pile of bubbling black sludge, stinking of death and rot. Within the liquid Veran saw faces, like those of young women, black and horrified for a brief instance before fading away.

            

Soon, there was no kelpie, only the gray, hairless form of a man, looking up at Veran with dimming yet baleful eyes. One thin, ghastly hand was reached towards him, a single word escaping from his lips over and over again.

            

“Diéne. Diéne.”

            

The word died down to a whisper, then stopped altogether as his hand splashed into the pool of black. All life passed from the wretched creature. Veran was left looking at its foul remains.

 

***

 

The whispers cradled fragments of legend. The kelpie hadn't always been a monster. No, he had once been like all other men. He worked. He ate. He breathed.

            He loved.

           

Just like him, her name was long forgotten, even by the elders. But as they huddled around the fire to speak murmurs of the kelpie to their children and their children's children, they did remember her beauty. She had had hair as red as sunset, they said. A smile just as bright. And he had loved her for it.

            

They had married and loved one another deeply. But soon, it was discovered that he had loved her sister as well. When the red-haired girl learned of her husband’s betrayal, she had thrown herself into the swamp. His love gone and his heart broken, he threw himself in soon after.

            However, his spirit burdened with guilt, never rested. It was cursed and took on the form of the kelpie. With a heart so decayed and blackened with ill feelings of love and loss, the abominable creature would kidnap young women with red hair, trying to placate its sorrow. However, none of the girls were the woman he fell in love with. He’d return them from whence they came, but always without their heads.

            

To this day, no one was sure why he took their heads.

            

Veran returned I’Radi’s head to Fjorg, as gruesome a task as it was. At the burial, Veran watched a kind of relief flicker in Fjorg’s eyes for the briefest moment as they covered her coffin with dirt. Maybe it was the knowledge that his daughter was at peace and that the creature that had killed her would never harm another.

            

As Veran walked away from the burial, he passed a headstone. The letters were worn and faded, but Veran was still able to make out the inscription:

 

Diéne Sparrowleaf

Beloved Wife and Daughter

1236-1256

 

            Veran stared at the stone for a long time. He kissed two fingers and touched them to the stone.

         

  “Be at peace,” he whispered.

            

The air was cold. Autumn wind stirred the world around him. Veran pulled his cloak with the tear in it tighter about him as he left the graveyard.

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