Stench from the South Pt. 01

"Would you like me to accompany you, Captain? If there are any wounded still alive-"

Bacceus was quickly cut off. "No, not this time. I need you to take care of Mister Fessely, Bacceus. His attackers may still be there, and I will not risk the life of a veteran healer by pulling him recklessly into unknown danger. I am not doubting your ability to defend yourself," Balthus said firmly, noticing that the Healer looked as if he were about to protest, "but as I told troopers Maelee and Gravin, this is purely a scouting mission-I want to know exactly what we're dealing before I even consider a plan of action. I will send word immediately if there are survivors who need your help, however."

That seemed to mollify Bacceus. "As you wish, Captain. I defer to your judgment, sir."

The healer bowed his head and returned to his patient, as Balthus turned back to the door and made his way back to his quarters. There would be no more chewing on the good people of Ralleah; it was time to find out exactly what was going on, so that he and his troops could put a sudden-and violent, if it came to that-stop to it. As he donned his set of leather travel armor, strapped on his sword, and swung a heavy black cloak over his shoulders, he steeled himself for the horrors that he and his companions might find at the farmstead. If the bandits were now willing to...cannibalize their victims, then who knew what various insanities they might visit upon other innocents? It was a grim prospect, and it worried Balthus greatly, but he made a point to hide his concern as he left his quarters and started back toward the front.

"Ready when you are, Captain, sir." Gravin greeted Balthus with a nod as the officer approached the main entrance. He and Maelee were both waiting for him-cloaked, armed, and ready to ride.

"We leave immediately. To the stables!"

The trio ducked into the nearby barn after jogging quickly across the training yard which lie between the front gate and the entrance to the main building, the light rain pattering upon their cloaks the whole way. Balthus found and saddled his horse, a great black stallion named Halberd, as Maelee and Gravin found steeds of their own. Maelee's was jittery, and took a moment of sweet-talking and soothing before it calmed down enough to saddle, but soon they were mounted and waiting in front of the gate. Maelee and Gravin's shift replacements were now at the top of the structure: a short, strong Rallean lad named Crasslen and a jolly, towering M'zaeran transplant named Mosullah.

"Mosullah!" Balthus called out to the giant man, who looked down upon them with a smile. "Open up, would you?!"

"Aye Captain, luck to you! Hope you don't catch your death of cold on account of this rain, sir!"

Balthus decided against telling the man that the cold was the least of his concerns-it would not do to worry anyone just yet. As the heavy wooden gate swung in, Balthus called out "yah!", and Halberd darted forward, followed quickly by Maelee and Gravin. As they took to the path, Gravin spoke up, struggling to be heard over the wind.

"Captain, what do we do if those brigands are still skulking around that farm, sir?"

"Hopefully get away unseen so that we can bring back the rest of the detachment to finish them, soldier! But if we're cornered before then, I expect you to do whatever you must in order to survive!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Excellent! Maelee, once we come to the main road, you'll take point! No scenic routes, either-I want us at that farmstead as quickly as possible!"

"Yes, sir! It's only a few miles, as I said earlier! We'll be there in no time!"

And so, as the rain fell upon them with slowly increasing intensity from the slate-grey clouds above, the southern winds whipped at them with little in the way of mercy as the scouting group rode southwest toward whatever bloody and treacherous unknown awaited them.

*****

"Remember, you two: fifteen-foot spread, stay as low as you can, and draw swords only if you're caught and cornered. Keep one eye out for archers in particular, and the other on me. You remember your hand signals?"

Both the young man and woman next to him nodded to the affirmative.

"You will not move into the open until I order it, is that understood?"

The small party was crouched next to the border fence which surrounded the Fessely property. It was comprised of a series of long, stripped, and sealed cedar trunks which had been lashed and nailed together, then propped up on X-shaped wooden crosspieces. It stood about five feet high, rising and falling gently in each direction with the sloping of the low hills it had been built upon. Upon coming within a quarter mile of the fence, Balthus had commanded his charges to go off-road, opting for a stealth approach as opposed to charging in through the front gate. This wasn't a death-or-glory mission, after all-they needed to be careful. Therefore, they had tied their horses to the fence and huddled up to plan their infiltration.

"Should've brought a bow," Maelee grumbled, looking around the woods beyond the fence apprehensively. "Three only know what might be waiting for us in there."

"Well it's too late now," muttered Balthus as he began to climb over the fence, "so your blades will have to do, soldier." He climbed over the top, and landed effortlessly on the other side without a hint of a stumble. "Now get your asses in gear; you're out in the open!"

The two troopers slipped over the simple cedar fence, joining their commander. "All right," he whispered over the rain, "when we reach the opposite edge of the treeline, take cover immediately. I'll go in first."

"Captain, no! What if you-" Gravin began to protest before being swiftly interrupted.

"Are you disobeying a direct order, trooper?"

"No, sir. Apologies, sir" He bowed his head in shame.

"I'm no spring chicken, soldier," he snarled, his left hand resting upon the pommel of his cruel-looking steel longsword, "I've been on missions far more dangerous than this, and I make the calls I do for a reason-never forget that. Now both of you, spread out on either side of me! Move, damn your eyes!"

They ducked beneath the limbs of the tall, forbidding trees, moving as quietly as possible over the mossy forest floor. None of them spoke, their eyes darting to and fro, their hands never straying too far from the handles of their blades. Balthus' ears strained, listening for anything out of place: shouting, screaming, banging...anything that might hint at what lie ahead. As they approached the opposite side of the treeline which lined the Fessely property, however, he was troubled by the fact that he heard nothing at all other than the soft pattering of the rain and the low moan of the wind. No voices, no commotion of any kind, which led him to wonder if perhaps they'd somehow been spotted, and that the madmen in question had prepared an ambush.

There was no time to speculate, however-they had arrived at the edge of the farmyard. The group's members each immediately ducked silently behind the cover of a trio of broad trees, Gravin and Maelee immediately looking to their Captain for further instruction. He flashed them the 'hold' signal, then cautiously peered out from behind the width of the large redwood he'd slipped behind. His hand instinctively found the handle of his sword, his grip tightening. From his position, he could see that they'd ended up only a hundred or so feet from the back side of the farmhouse itself; the fields themselves lay beyond it.

After only a quick scan of the premises, Balthus knew immediately that something was very, very wrong-as first evidenced by the fact that, only twenty feet away, a huge ox lay dead in the mud. Its' eyes were bulging, tongue lolling from its' open mouth, and the animal's belly had been torn open, its' contents strewn about the carcass in a mire of foul viscera and bloodied earth. Its' limbs, ribs and neck were missing massive sections of flesh, exposing the bright white bones beneath. Balthus' thoughts ran wild: what kind of bandits were they dealing with?! What kind of twisted psychopath brings down a living beast, guts it, and then peels the flesh right off its' bones?! What kind of lunatics were they dealing with?!

He slipped out of cover, staying as low as he could. As he slunk through the open area, he took note of the utter chaos and disarray which surrounded him: bales of hay and barrels of crop were knocked over, their contents strewn about the rain-saturated ground, while various tools and pieces of equipment lay discarded and broken. There were more dead animals as well: a group of gutted, mostly defleshed pigs lying in their shattered pen, a few chickens which had been mashed into feathery pulp, as well as a young foal whose remains were in a similar condition as that of the ox. All over the ground-especially surrounding the animals-were countless footprints, all of them seemingly left behind by men. Some had even been made by bare feet-which, for some reason, struck Balthus as particularly strange. Even the dullest bandit skulking around the countryside wouldn't just walk around in this weather without boots on, he thought-what in the name of the Father was that about?

Balthus didn't have time to stand around pondering the various intricacies and shortcomings of the criminal mind, however. He needed to investigate that farmhouse before he even began to consider the fine details. As he passed the halfway point between the trees and the two-story structure, he was mightily unnerved by the fact that not only had there been no welcoming committee of any kind, but that he was still hearing nothing at all besides the rain and the wind. If these brigands really were planning an ambush, then they were taking an awfully long time to get to the point...

His back was against the wall of the building, his armor scraping softly for just a moment against the rows of overlapping wooden shingles. One of the windows was just ahead, and he was careful to keep an eye on it as he ducked down and passed beneath it; the last thing he needed was to be suddenly snatched up and pulled through its' opening, only to receive a blade through the eye for his troubles.

Carefully stepping over several pieces of debris (as well as a mangled, bloody mass which he barely recognized as the remains of a rooster), the Captain passed beneath two more windows without incident before reaching the nearest corner of the farmhouse. He spared a glance back at the trees, and was pleased to see that Gravin and Maelee had remained hidden. Good, he thought; if I get necked, at least they'll be able to slip away...

Hand still on his longsword, he peered around the corner, half expecting to end up looking into a brigand's nocked arrow. Instead, he was greeted with nothing other than the sight of vast fields full of seedlings, along with a wide dirt path which led away from the farmhouse toward the main road. He noticed that it, like the farmyard out back, was covered with countless footprints, imprinted in dirt that had been softened to thick mud after several days' worth of rain. Just how large had this attack been? There had to have been dozens upon dozens of assailants in order to create such a swath, Balthus thought as he popped around the corner, moving low and slow along the wall while keeping an eye on the dark windows above his head.

He approached the next corner and cautiously peered around it, finding himself at the edge of a modest porch. There had once been simple railings erected along its' edges, but now they lie smashed and splintered upon the porch's simple plank floor. In addition, the remains of what appeared to have once been a pair of wooden rocking chairs were strewn about, the sight of which had an upsetting effect on Balthus. The serenity of this once peaceful setting had, in his mind, been desecrated by a roving horde of brutal, unrepentant maniacs-all of whom would, Three willing, end up tasting Rallean Army steel before too long. A flash of anger surged through the Captain's veins as he gripped the handle of his sword with his right hand, steeling himself for whatever he might find inside the farmhouse itself.

As the rain pattered softly against his travel armor, he rounded the corner and deftly hopped up onto the porch, the planks emitting a barely-audible creak as the sudden addition of his weight caused them to shift ever so slightly. Before he could take another step, he was stopped in his tracks by yet another strange and utterly disturbing sight: that of the front door (or, rather, what remained of it). It had clearly once been a stout piece of carpentry-built from good, solid hardwood-but whoever had broken it down had managed to smash the thing into multiple pieces all the same. Roughly a third of the door itself hung pathetically from two of its' three hinges, while the rest lay across the entryway, scattered about in a series of jagged and splintered pieces. A window, set a few feet to the left, had been smashed in, a few errant pieces of glass jutting from its' frame like broken teeth. Along the bottom of said frame, Balthus also noticed that much of the casing had been stained a deep crimson, and that a few small pieces of organic matter clung to the remaining glass. He stared for a moment, refusing to believe that they were chunks of flesh. No, he did not even want to entertain the possibility at that moment; he was still trying to come to grips with the sight of the mutilated farm animals, after all.

But as the Captain stepped through the doorway and took in the sight of what had once been the farmhouse's family room, he could not help but stop dead in his tracks and stare, utterly horrified and totally transfixed, at a scene which made everything else he'd already witnessed look like the sweetest of dreams.

*****

The rain was growing heavier, and Gravin was only getting wetter and wetter; even the thick canopy above did not quite protect him. He spared a glance over at Maelee, who met his gaze and gave him a slight shrug. He smiled, she smiled back, and he blew her a kiss. She rolled her eyes, then returned the favor before grinning sarcastically.

Though neither could express their concerns verbally, both troopers were mired in worry. Crick had been out of sight for well over ten minutes, and the rest of the property had remained deathly silen. It felt strange, almost unnatural. Sure, Gravin thought, sometimes brigands would pose their victims' corpses as warnings or calling cards, but he'd certainly never heard of a gang who preferred gutting and stripping the flesh from their victims' livestock and taking mouthfuls of flesh from men's limbs...

Just as Gravin was starting to consider slipping out of cover and going to look for his commanding officer, there came a barely audible scraping sound from across the expansive farmyard. It was followed by a long, low whistle that pitched up sharply near its' end. Maelee shot a quizzical look at Gravin, who raised his eyebrows before they both peered out from behind their respective pieces of cover. They were greeted by the sight of the Captain leaning out of the window closest to the rear corner of the farmhouse, one of his hands up and making a clear beckoning motion. After he'd apparently been sure they'd seen him, he disappeared again.

They really were all dead, then, Maelee thought bitterly as they crossed the damp, muddy expanse of the farmyard. The two troopers caught sight of all the same horrors that Crick had, Gravin feeling nearly ill at the gruesome sight of the mutilated and disemboweled hogs and sows splayed out within the ruins of their pen. They were used to seeing scenes of madness left in the wake of brigand attacks, to be sure, but again, neither could shake the feeling that there was something...different about this one; something wrong, something that just felt...off, for lack of a better term.

Past the debris, past the animal corpses, and past the shattered porch railing and shattered door the pair of thoroughly confused and very worried troopers walked before stopping so abruptly that Maelee ran right into Gravin, causing him to stumble. Their eyes flew open and their mouths hung like nooses as they took in the impossibly brutal and senseless scene before them.

"Captain...what-?"

"I don't know, Maelee."

The entire living area was in shambles. Furniture had been overturned, various belongings and decorations lie scattered and destroyed across the floor; on any other day it might have come across the result of a simple ransacking, were it not for all the blood. Three above, there was so much blood-the place absolutely reeked of it. It covered the walls, the planks covered with a gruesome mosaic of smears, streaks, and spatter. Even the ceiling hadn't been entirely spared, though none of the newcomers thought to look up in search of them. Had they done so, they would have noticed a multitude of fine spray patterns staining the dark wood.

But if the walls of the living area were covered, then the floor was positively saturated with the deep red water of life. It stemmed from four bodies that they could see: two were splayed across the floorboards, one sat half-propped up against the far wall, and one more lie partially obscured in a doorway to the left which led, Balthus assumed, to the kitchen. From what they could tell (and it truly was difficult to be certain), the bodies appeared to have once belonged a woman, a man, a young girl, and...well, as for the body in the kitchen doorway, only the legs were visible from where they stood. With a quiet sigh, the Captain took a few steps toward the closest body: that of the woman. His boots made a barely-audible squelching sound as they waded into one of the massive and entirely unavoidable lake of blood. He stopped just short of the woman's remains, then squatted down to get a better look.

From what remained of her body and face, it could be discerned that she had once been middle-aged, dark blonde of hair, and roughly five feet, seven inches tall. He eyes had also been a pale grey-blue-though only one now remained in its' socket. The remaining example was now wide open, eternally staring off into nothingness. The other had been pulled out-leaving only a dark, gaping hole in its' place. Entire sections of flesh on her face and neck had been torn-not cut-away from the skull beneath. Most of her forehead had been stripped away, the flesh of her right cheek had been torn off (likely in one fluid motion, from the look of it), and her nose had been severed entirely-exposing the hollow, crushed nasal cavities beneath. Her chin and lips had been ripped off, the teeth and bone forming a hideous, nightmarish grin.

The rest of her remains told a similar story. Almost all the flesh on her body had been torn away from the bone in a manner similar to that of the animals outside. Very little was left-she'd been almost entirely skeletonized, her organs pulled violently from their places and leaving only a grisly, blood-soaked husk in its' place. Her entire right arm was missing, pulled from its' socket and whisked away to parts unknown. The same went for her right foot and left forearm, neither of which remained (at least, that he could see) in the bloody muck that surrounded her.

"This was probably the wife," Balthus said quietly, standing up and backing away. "Trooper Maelee, can you confirm? You seem to be at least somewhat familiar with this place."

"Not with any degree of certainty, sir; I merely knew the location of the farmstead itself. But I-well, how could I-"

"Tell?" Gravin's voice was grim, quavering with shock and disgust. "That's the real question."

"Keep it together, trooper," Balthus said softly, giving the young man a sympathetic glance. "We need to piece together what happened here as best we can."

"It's pretty clear to me, sir," Gravin said, cynicism creeping into his voice. "The bastards tore the place up and then ripped these poor people limb from limb! They pulled the flesh from their very bones, Captain-!"