Away, O Serpent Shade

Grimard scowled while around him, the entire alehouse joined their voices to song. “In moonlit fields, where shadows play,” they began, their voices joining as one, “We lift our voice to keep at bay. O creature of the night, beware, Our melody will fill the air.” Angrily, Grimard stood, swaying as he did, and knocked over his ale. Heedless of the liquid which soaked his sleeves, he staggered towards the door as, in slurred words, he muttered, “Enough of this nonsense.”

Roughly, he yanked the heavy oaken door open, a rush of cold wind sweeping into the alehouse, chasing away the heat and comfort of the taproom. With a deep breath, he plunged out into the bitter night, the cold sliding down his body causing him to tremble all over. Behind him, the words of the song continued, “Away, away, O serpent shade, By this tune, be thou afraid, With notes that pierce the darkest veil, We sing to make your powers pale.” Grimard staggered away from the alehouse, his breath producing small tufts of air as he trudged through snow on unsteady legs. “Your hollow eyes, and clawed hands…” were the last words he heard, the singing lost to the wind and the snow crunching beneath his boots.

As he walked, Grimard’s already dour mood soured further. He had made the four span trip to Villers to get away from that superstitious nonsense and was none too pleased to find the whole alehouse filled with whispers and tales. He had barely been through the door before he heard Adeline whispering about seeing a malakar. As if he didn’t get enough of that mire from his own Dhaara-damned wife. And why did Blaise let her come down to The Hole anyhow? A woman’s place was at home.

A sound brought him to a sudden stop. It was dark on the road. Very dark. In the sky overhead, a tiny sliver of moon shed a pale, cool light while around him, on either side of the track, thick trees towered up menacingly. It had been from these trees, now just an expanse of black, that he had heard the sound. Grimard stood, the cold forgotten, straining his eyes as he tried piercing that impenetrable darkness. At his side, his right hand twitched, and his middle finger drummed on his thigh. “You old fool.” he growled after a time, “jumping at shadows.”

He began moving again through eerie silence. Each step rang out like a gong, the snow crumbling beneath his tread, and his breathing, increasingly short, ragged breaths, echoed back to him from the imposing wall of darkness that marked the edge of the wood. His head swivelled first left, then right, and Grimard knew that something watched him from behind. He turned suddenly, but the road was empty. Just a long, snow-choked path bracketed by walls of black. Silently, he cursed Mireille. It was her fault he was here. If she hadn’t been on about Collete’s sickness, if she hadn’t insisted she’d actually seen a wormspawn in their house, he’d have never had to slap her, and if he hadn’t had to teach her that lesson, he’d not have needed the drink.

The eyes returned, he could feel them, burning a hole in his back. Again he whirled about, certain this time to see it. And again the road was empty. He cursed himself a fool, and turned towards home. He was running now, or at least as best he could do, which was more a half-step shuffle than a true run. How far had he gone? A span? Two? Was that a sound? His head turned left, there had been the crackle of something moving there. Now he fled. Conscious thought forgotten, he ran.

Behind him, Grimard heard the creature which pursued him. He heard the snow crunching beneath its feet and its hissed breathing. He felt its hot breath on his back. Eyes wide, he staggered forward and turned his head back, determined to see it. To see this monster which had come for him. As he did, he slipped, his feet went out from beneath him and he tumbled to the ground. WIth a strangled, “No!” he looked. But there was nothing, not even footprints in the snow, just an empty road stretching into darkness.

For a long moment, he stared down that empty road. Was that movement? A figure? So distant, just the edge of his vision. He scrabbled forward, pulling himself to his feet, stumbling back to the ground, and pulling himself up again as he looked backwards. “No!” he tried to shout, but the sound he made was closer to a whimper. No! He thought, a heavy weight settling on him.

He ran, but he could not help but look back. The shadow was nearer now, slipping through the darkness. It was big, bigger than a man. And its hands, there was something wrong with its hands. He began to cry, tears welling up and freezing on his face as he scrambled away from the thing which hunted him. His foot caught something in the road, buried beneath the snow, and he went down, sprawled in the snow. Even as the cold, wet snow filled his mouth and eyes, he turned over, panting.

He tried to stand, but couldn’t. His body wasn’t working. All he could do was stare at the shadow. It was no more than twenty reaches from him. He was certain of it. And then he gasped and choked, his eyes bugging out. A thing had detached itself from the wall of blackness. It had the general shape of a man, though it was a head and shoulders taller than any man he had ever seen. It wore darkness like a cloak, but that darkness didn’t hide the churning mass of segmented worm-like things that roiled where its stomach should be.

As the thing glided towards him, somehow moving both lithely and with unnatural, jerking motions, Grimard remembered the song! The song was proof against this monster. He opened his mouth, and sputtered out the first verse. Then the chorus. The monster continued forward. Why wasn’t it working? Everyone knew, the nightreavers were driven away by the song. The words died in his throat as it came to loom over him.

Its body was emaciated, grotesquely so, and its hands were two or three times larger than they should have been, long, segmented fingers ending in terrible claws. Sickly white scales covered most of its body, save the open hole in its distended abdomen where thousands of worms writhed atop one another. And its eyes, empty black voids which pierced him.

Grimard felt the warmth of his urine as the thing towered above him. “Not me,” he cried, “not me. He looked up the road, the glowing windows of his home visible less than a quarter span from where he lay. “There,” he said, hope surging in him, “Mireille is there. And Collette too. Take them, but don’t take me, please not me!” he wailed. The creature bent forward, its clawed hand opening as it reached for Grimard, “Please, you can have them. You can do anything you want to them!”

“I already have.” was all it said before the darkness swallowed Grimard forever.

Away, O Serpent Shade In moonlit fields where shadows play, We lift our voice to keep at bay. O creature of the night, beware, Our melody will fill the air.

Away, away, O serpent shade, By this tune, be thou afraid. With notes that pierce the darkest veil, We sing to make your power pale.

Your hollow eyes and clawed hands, Shall not haunt our peaceful lands. The ancient song we sing aloud, Will send you fleeing like a cloud.

Away, away, O serpent shade, By this tune, be thou afraid. With notes that pierce the darkest veil, We sing to make your power pale.

From times of old, this chant prevails, A safeguard told in village tales. When danger lurks and night is near, Our voices rise, you disappear.

Away, away, O serpent shade, By this tune, be thou afraid. With notes that pierce the darkest veil, We sing to make your power pale.

So heed our song, depart from here, And take with you the night’s cold fear. Until the sun brings forth the day, O serpent shade, be on your way.