SHORT STORY: FLOWERS OF THE GRAVE

Been a while since I've written some fantasy. A lot of writing paralysis and procrastination are a cause of this, but I'm happy to provide this new chunk of short story to you, my audience. This tale is set in the same world that I normally write about, but takes place a couple generations in the future. Without further ado, this is the tale of four adventurers as they try to locate potion reagents in a haunted location of the badlands.

In case it's needed -- this is the first part of the short story; will be writing the next half in the coming days. Contains violent descriptions of combat, as I don't beat around the bush when it comes to that stuff. Also, three-quarters of the main characters are furries. :v

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The stench of death wafted in the air of the Elephant Graveyard, an odor of both fresh and aging corpses mingling into a putrid potpourri for any who dared wander its forsaken territory. Many who tried to cut a path through the ivory-strewn wasteland did so out of necessity, for even the most faithless of bandits knew that events beyond mortal understanding could happen there. For those who believed in the otherworldly, these inexplicable events weren’t a possibility, but likely happened on a regular basis. Some tried to explain away the disappearances of the boneyard’s travelers on monster attacks alone, but the superstitious of the badlands could rattle off hushed rumors of fearful happenings regarding that haunted locale like the back of their hand.

For better or worse, Asha and her squad-mates’ beliefs ran the gambit between atheistic and god-fearing. All four of the young warriors, however, knew to keep their heads down, eyes peeled and words hushed as they traversed the dread landscape. Surely somewhere in the Elephant Graveyard was a sample of the potion reagents their base of operations needed. An outbreak of the Blight had been reported by contacts in settlements elsewhere on the mainland; the Proving Grounds would surely wrought the paranormal pestilence before long, and the town of Veil Grove would need to be prepared.

The human member of the four-person team scoffed quietly, crossing his arms on his march. “This is hopeless”, Nathan groaned. “We’ve been here nearly an hour I’d wager, and what little greenery we’ve seen won’t cut it. Nothing but dried grass and weeds, not counting the mold on that wild dog’s carcass a few paces back. We’re screwed if we think we’ll find enough to make so much as one damned dose of--”

A feminine voice left the lips of the vulpine woman leading the youthful pack. “I’ve heard enough”, Flora sternly barked. “One more word, Nathan, and by Vera--”

“Flora”, Asha the lioness spoke in a diffusing tone, “Calm down. And you too, Nathan. Even if we don’t find what we’re looking for here, I know we can find Fiends’ Primrose on the other side of the Graveyard. Worst case scenario, we’ll have to scrape together what we’ve got and shell out for it. But that intel on the flowers being here is reliable, mark my words”.

Nathan scowled. “Horse shit. You’d believe anything your boyfriend tells you, Asha”.

The boyfriend in question, a leonine lad named Faraji, grunted as he shifted the long haft of his battleaxe across his shoulder. “And I’m wrong? I don’t know why we brought you along, hairless ape. All you do is bitch and moan when we’re not spelunking through the Hollow”.

“Because I can’t stand a wild goose chase”, scoffed Nathan. “Most missions down below are straight-forward. But out here, we’re baking in the heat of the dry season, on the vague notion that we’ll find enough freakin’ flowers to keep the Blight out of Veil Grove. What a crock”.

Flora’s footfalls ceased. Turning on her heel, the vixen pointed a dark-furred finger toward the bronze-skinned human. “I’d rather chance it than let my people die by the Blight, you fool! Last I recall, I was the one in charge. If you’re so quick to question my orders, you can pack your ill-gotten tools and shove off from Veil Grove, starting with marching your sorry ass back to town alone. Savvy?”

Nathan grunted back, unfazed by his leader’s flash of aggression. “Whatever. But if we end up getting devoured by ghouls for nothing, don’t say I didn’t tell you so”.

Flora scoffed. “Considering you’re the godless sort, I don’t think we’d have the chance in you eyes”. Turning back around, the vixen’s boots carried her forward once more.

“And I’ve told you a thousand fucking times”, Nathan shrugged back, “Ain’t nothing wrong with a little skepticism in this day and age”.

As this was unfolding, Asha and Faraji continued to advance in the back line of the small sortie, naked and shod feet respectively making tracks in the dust behind them. Her maroon eyes glancing around her spear to Faraji’s dark-furred countenance, Asha mumbled toward the taller lion-folk, “I don’t doubt what your contacts told you, Faraji. It’s just something Nathan wouldn’t understand”.

Stoic as ever, the leonine warrior replied back to his mate as the two felines advanced, saving his gaze for his surroundings and any signs of danger. “No need to tell me that”, he spoke softly, “The lad’s still convinced I do too much of the spice when speaking with the spirits. But there comes a time when you can’t blame all my visions on my vices alone”.

“Right”, Asha sighed. “Thing is, I don’t think Nathan’ll ever come around, even if a devil dragged his sorry ass to Gehenna’s depths before our very eyes”.

“Well, he doesn’t have to”, Faraji responded. “He just has to do his job and work on keeping his lips shut. He’s by far the mouthiest scoundrel I’ve ever heard, and I’ve known quite a few from my upbringing”.

With a grimace, Asha glanced ahead like her lover. She knew he had a point, but the devout lioness knew that the squad’s sapper had upset her with his views on more than one occasion… and sometimes unintentionally. As her tail hung low, ears folded to the sides of her short, dirty-blonde mane, she stopped in her stride.

Something was amiss. She could tell, although she had trouble conveying it to the others sometimes. A sixth sense bestowed by her divine patron; a sense to tell when the otherworldly was an immediate threat.

It was one of those times.

Stepping abruptly forth and softly clapping her hand to Faraji’s shoulder, she whistled like a songbird to the human and vixen a pace or so ahead of them. It was the team’s code, suggested by Flora long ago to warn of danger when out in the wilderness. In swift motion, the others readied their weaponry; Faraji his axe, Asha her spear, Nathan his darts and Flora her hunting sword. With their main armaments at the ready, all four reconvened around each other, backs toward the others’ backs and scanning the scene for trouble.

Thus the throaty cackling began, coming from a natural ledge above the young warriors. Spilling out from behind an elephant’s sun-baked carcass, the hideous hominids slid down the sandy slope not far from the short cliff and barreled toward them! Emaciated and pale of skin and hair alike, the fiends’ sexless forms moved with ravenous haste, stumbling and snarling in hunger for their next meal, senseless of the killing tools clenched in the hands of their victims.

The four broke their back-to-back cluster in a moment’s glance, their movements seemingly rehearsed from untold hours of training to work as one under duress of violent death. Shoulder to shoulder they stood their ground, preparing as the first of the ghouls came close enough to strike.

Mere seconds later, the first of the devils leaped into the air; Asha was the first to act, stomping forth as she snarled and swept her body into a forceful spear thrust. The ghoul’s cackling ended in an abrupt shriek as Asha’s blade plunged into its ribs and burst from its scrawny back. Its foul-smelling lifeblood dribbled away from its innards once it hit the dirt, the lioness wrenching her spearhead from the ghoul’s dying body.

Undeterred by the loss of its fellows, the next two ghouls scampered forth, only to meet their own violent demise. A brutal vertical chop from Faraji’s arms was matched by the precise aim of Nathan’s wrist, and the paired ghouls stopped in their tracks and howled in agony. Faraji’s victimized monster fell in a heap, arm and shoulder cleaved from it as the remaining hand grasped at the stump. Nathan’s opposition instead clutched its right eye, the shaft of a long, lead-tipped dart poking out from its socket.

The two lads followed up on finishing off their quarries as the remaining two ghouls made their way to attack the team. Peering from around the side of the formation, Flora murmured with clipped words in a strange tongue, staring daggers into the remaining ghouls. Taking a couple steps through the dust, Flora advanced while Nathan’s sidearm dagger was plunged into his victim’s throat, Faraji’s ghoul being put out of its misery with a beheading sweep.

Turning her body to the right and raising three fingers on her left hand, Flora fearlessly stared down the ghouls now heading her way. A feeling of air leaving her lungs, a tingling surge down her left arm, an uncanny warmth in the tips of those extended digits: Flora was ready for them as her hushed chanting ended in a sharp cry. Sweeping her arm forth to point at the ghouls, the strange heat shot up the digging claws of her fingertips and burst forth in a hail of bluish sparks.

Blazing into existence and howling like fireworks in their flight, one mote of smokeless blue fire per finger whizzed forth erratically at the monsters, erupting into streaking marine fireballs the size of shooter marbles during their flight! One fireball per ghoul collided with the devils’ chests each, but the orb from Flora’s middle finger instead sailed past between the beings’ heads before whirling backward, keeping its velocity as it smashed into the back of the ghoul to Flora’s right. It was over in mere moments, but the horrific damage of the spell was done; smoke billowed from gaping burned holes in the monsters’ chests, and the hapless ghoul to be struck by that third fiery bullet was now missing the crown of its head!

The fifth ghoul fell to its knees, holding the horrible wound in its ribs with a shriveled hand. As Flora swept her right wrist to the side, she grit her fangs while winding up to end the fiend’s suffering. A sharp exhale hissed through her teeth as her short sword’s edge met meager resistance, her nose crinkling at the smell of the rotten blood gushing from the monster’s throat. The five ghouls were no more, Flora’s quarry falling face-first into the dust of the Elephant Graveyard with a severed jugular to match its sucking chest wound.

Letting her hunting sword drop to the side of her victim, Flora’s palm met her forehead as the bone-handled weapon left her grasp. “Well”, she gasped, “That ended quick, but was unpleasant as always. Is everyone alright?”

Slowly dragging a blood-spattered cloth across the blade of his dagger, Nathan glanced up toward Flora’s distressed gaze. “No need to be dramatic”, he shrugged. “They’re dead and we’re not. Not even a scratch on any of us”.

Asha sighed softly, drawing her spearhead from the dirt she’d plunged it into. “Ought to be thankful I sensed them coming”, she quietly remarked, “Or one of us might’ve been the first Blight victim from Veil Grove this year”.

Faraji sat cross-legged as he tended to cleaning his axe’s edge. “Grateful as always, love”, he replied, his voice eerily calm. “It’s a shame that ghoul blood stinks up a blood-rag so easily, though”.

A concerned groan left Flora’s lips as she picked up her sword. “At least Asha isn’t as jaded as I to fighting”, she uttered. “One of you lads has ice in his blood, and the other is probably a sociopath by now. I have trouble discerning who’s got what condition sometimes”.

Getting to his feet, Faraji indifferently shouldered his axe once more. “If it helps you decide”, his deep voice rumbled in a soothing voice, “I’ve seen worse things happen to a team of fighting men and women than having to bear the deaths of inhuman enemies”.

Thank you for reading, Cap, and glad you liked the tale! The setting's been something I've been fussing around with for a while, so I'm glad the world feels rich with its own rules~

For any interested, here's the second half of the story, fresh off the keyboard.

~~~~~~~

After taking a few moments to catch their breath and clean the steel of their weapons of fetid blood, the four continued on their uncertain mission. Their trek fell back into silence after the dreadful rush of the ghouls’ attack, but Asha’s mind was aglow with thoughts while the others kept to their search.

Knowing Faraji for a good chunk of her life, Asha knew that the spirits he communed with weren’t always clear on what was ahead. After all Aralisi, her patron deity, didn’t hand straight answers to her on a silver platter either. She wasn’t expecting to have impressed her goddess by any means by the combat Aralisi adored, especially given the reckless nature of the fiends her squad had just slain, but Asha hoped the flawless performance against the monsters would be enough to bring honor to the fiery immortal.

A question lingered in the head of the leonine lass, however: was the fight a fluke encounter, or was there more going on in the Elephant Graveyard than the team first considered? After all, eerie happenstance was commonly spread by word of mouth in the boneyard’s region. On top of that, Aralisi had a habit of leading her devoted into acts of glory and daring-do; what better a deity to offer lip service and the occasional sacrifice to for the aspiring adventurer than her?

And for those truly devoted to Aralisi, peaceful segments of life always put them on edge, not knowing when the Queen of Beasts would call upon their fervor to strive and slay.

“Hey”, Nathan called back to the lions behind him. “Stick closer, Asha”.

Shaking her head as she snapped back to reality, the lioness realized she was falling behind even the back ranks of the marching order. “Ooh, right”, she sheepishly replied. “Any signs of the flowers yet, gang?”

With a shrug Nathan replied, “That proves it. You’re deep in thought again, aren’t you? You always get that distant look on your face when you’re thinking of things”.

Chiming in, Flora elaborated, “The grass at our feet is starting to become more common, and even healthier-looking than the scorched patches we’ve passed. Faraji’s hunch just might pay off soon”.

“Faraji”, Asha asked as she gazed upon the darker-furred feline, “How much do you remember about that vision? The one we’re following to try and find the primrose?”

His free hand scratching at the scruff of his chin, Faraji began to think out loud, “Well, we’re surely on the right track. But the last thing I can recall was one last elephant corpse. Bleached white bones are the last image I received”.

Asha grimaced, “That’s all? No emotions, no feelings toward the bones?”

“Nothing”, Faraji sighed. “Before you ask, no, I didn’t get any warning about the ghouls we’d encountered. Nothing explicit, anyway; just feelings of dread across the sights shown to me, like being stuck in a bad dream”. His gaze finally left his immediate surroundings, focusing at last on Asha. “Why do you ask? Are you not feeling right about this?”

Asha sighed. “I don’t know. I just feel like… like there’s more to this mission than we’re expecting”.

A sigh left Nathan’s lips, followed by another shrug. “The sooner we find out if those flowers are here”, he groaned, “The sooner we can leave. I don’t know about you, but I’m spending the rest of the day indoors, dimly lit. I’ve had enough sunlight and dry heat”. As he looked ahead, he stopped in his tracks. “Flora?”

The vixen had taken point during the conversation, but her march had stopped abruptly. Ahead of her was a natural slope leading downward, a field of greenery ahead. Greenery, that is, spattered with dark crimson stains across the patches of grass. But despite the patches of bloodied grass, there were no signs of the victimized beings’ remains; just a small pond of water.

And yet among the gruesome signs of recent bloodshed grew the very thing the team sought – patches of Fiends’ Primrose grew a few paces around the pond in the miniature oasis, some even growing along the slope leading to the pond. A short distance beyond the natural pool yawned the mouth of a cavern, taller than a person and five times as wide.

“I don’t like this”, Flora softly spoke. “I really, truly don’t like this”.

Nathan, having walked over to her side, whistled long as he gazed upon the red and green before him. “Damn. I’ve got a feeling those plants aren’t growing from the pond alone”.

“Fiends’ Primrose”, Faraji recited as he advanced to the human and fox, “It’s named that because it grows dramatically better in blood compared to water. The carnage that must have happened to get all that blood to feed the plants, however… it’s disturbing to think about”.

“That’s saying something”, Asha remarked as she padded toward the others, her gaze also cast upon the sanguine oasis, “Coming from you. But what cruel being’s been feeding the primrose like that?”

“I don’t know”, Flora sighed as she reached for the handle of her short sword, “But we’d best stay observant while we head down there”. Half-walking and half-sliding down the steep slope, Flora’s pointed ears twitched as she descended into the macabre meadow. She held out a palm toward the others. “Wait”, she barked, “Don’t come down yet. I’m hearing something… creaking”.

Looking ahead, Flora’s heart sank. Something glimmered in the darkness of the cavern. The creaking, just barely audible for her sensitive ears, was growing louder. One heavy thud followed another in a steady rhythm – footsteps. The glimmering, previously two pinpricks of light in the black of the cave, now became larger and brighter.

Once the being in the darkness finally revealed itself, Flora’s jaw dropped and body quivered. The pale skull of an elephant peered out from the shadows, whitish-yellow spheres of light glowing at the back of its eye sockets. Splashed across its ivory tusks was a smattering of deep red blood; Flora, unable to move in terror, knew in a moment the answer to Asha’s question at last.

“Flora!” Faraji’s riding boots skidded down the slope as he ran to the side of his terrified leader. “You have to move, now! If that thing rears its--” The lion’s words abruptly stopped. He and Flora alike felt a sharp gust blowing toward the animated elephant’s skeleton… almost as if the bones were performing a tremendous inhale without lungs.

The lion-warrior knew the danger ahead. As Flora shook in her boots, the tall fighter charged ahead and grabbed her lithe body, diving to the ground just moments before the skeleton’s eyes shimmered a pale blue. The second the living ivory’s iridescent eye sockets changed color, its jaws opened wide and a gout of cold air rushed forth, carrying snow and hailstones in a great gust!

What Flora saw next finally snapped her out of her fearful paralysis: the slope was now covered in a sheet of ice, vapor billowing up from the dry season’s heat across the point the snow-gout struck. Had Faraji not acted, she knew she would have been frozen solid by the skeleton’s dreadful breath. “Asha!” she cried. “Nathan! Get out of here, now! It’s not worth it!”

“No need to tell me twice!” Nathan gasped back. Having helplessly watched the horrors of the skeleton’s power, he knew his darts and dagger would stand no chance against something that couldn’t bleed. But as he began to turn tail and flee the scene, Asha’s hand clapped hard onto his shoulder, grabbing him tight.

“We can’t just leave them down there!” the lioness snarled. “Don’t you have a bomb or something you can chuck at that thing?!”

“I, I might”, he stammered. “But that’s all I’ve got against that thing”.

“It’ll have to do”, Asha sighed, abruptly making her way down to the deathly field below her. “Try to find it! I’m sure I can help”.

Gritting his teeth, Nathan hit the dirt and began to rifle through the pack on his back. He hated being stuck in dire straights he knew he stood no chance in. Nevertheless, the lad managed to find his tinderbox among the junk in his rucksack immediately; now, where did he leave that black powder grenade?

By now, Faraji had let go of Flora, trying to prove a distraction against the elephant skeleton. Roaring a war cry, he swung his battle axe in wide, circular swathes toward the moving corpse, trying to keep it occupied and from advancing forth. By the time Asha made it to the vixen, her axe-wielding lover had already dodged a few jabs from the blood-strewn tusks. Try as he might, Faraji’s swipes failed to find purchase against the calcified bones, the weapon’s edge plinking harmlessly off them.
“Flora”, gasped Asha, “I’m here. Any arcane distractions you’ve got up your sleeve?”

“Negative”, the vixen groaned, “Most of my enchantments won’t work on the undead. It’s all you this time, dear. Call down a miracle, and quick”.

Asha sighed. “Thought you’d say that”. Plunging the tip of her spearhead into the grass, Asha peered toward the fruitless struggle before her as she spread her arms to her sides, palms open. “Mighty Aralisi”, she muttered in prayer, “I know you love to witness a good fight, but we all know Faraji can’t fight it alone. I commend my strength to my beloved’s aid – call down your wrath from the holy skies, no matter the cost to my mortal coil”.

Raising her hands to the sky, Asha roared out the moment Faraji barely dodged a tusk jab aimed for his guts. “Do it now, to your honor, Aralisi the Fire! Cast this walking ivory into cinders and ashes with a flame strike! Let it be so!”

The second her prayer ended, Asha’s upward-reaching hands clutched at her throat and belly. Coughing horribly and stricken with a sudden bout of terrible nausea, she crumpled to her knees as Flora looked on in fright for her friend’s health. Out from above, heat lightning flashed across the holy sky, the crack of thunder erupting across the Elephant Graveyard. The blessed one’s prayer was answered.

“Faraji!” Flora cried to the warrior. “Get out of there this instant, before you get fried!”

The sudden thunder alerted the lion-man, and egged on further by Flora’s warning he fled the scene, despite feeling the elephant pulling him backwards with another sharp inhale. The ivory monster would get no chance to assail its intruders once more, however. Plummeting from the heavens with great speed and force was the skeleton’s demise, incarnate as a hail of burning fire. Diving out of the way of the incoming blaze, Faraji tumbled forth and hastily crawled, feeling the great heat of Aralisi’s wrath bursting behind him and the skeleton’s intake of frigid breath abruptly ending.

Asha was barely able to witness the conflagration she’d called down, her voice rasping a sickly groan while her vitality, offered to focus the divine magic, left her body rapidly and in sickening agony. The others of her squad instead bore witness to the rain of fire. The flames smacked into the elephant’s corpse with fierce speed and force, smashing bones apart as they baked from the intense heat of the holy fire. The monster’s funeral pyre seared the tiny oasis, making the present heat of the dry season unbearable. And thus the squad sweltered and stared in fearful awe, watching the great beast’s bones crumple to cinders and ashes for seconds that felt like hours.

With one more flash of heat lightning in the heavens above, the smiting flames snuffed and stopped falling as suddenly as they appeared. The threat was wholly cremated, charred fragments of ivory lingering in the scorched, ash-laden crater left by the martial miracle. Flora stood crouched by the overwhelmed lioness that summoned forth such a spell, rubbing over her back as Asha retched.

“I”, gasped Asha, “I’m--” Her body swiftly lurched forward, and she threw up on the ground ahead of her, emptying her sour belly of the spiced gazelle she’d eaten before the excursion. Panting for air once more after vomiting, Asha mumbled weakly to Flora, “I’m going to need help getting back to the outpost. There’s…. there’s no way I can trek all the way back home like this”.

Flora patted Asha on the back, commending, “After all this, we’re not marching back to Veil Grove the whole way. I can pay for a wagon back home. You’ve earned it, soldier”.

Nathan, having made his way down the slope, now trotted over to Asha’s side as Faraji advanced as well. “That’s ballsy stuff”, he commended, “Getting that spell to work”.

Faraji chuckled deeply, jabbing Nathan in the ribs playfully with his elbow. “What’s your skepticism now, given the power she’d called down to destroy that undead threat?”

Nathan shrugged. “It’s whatever. I’ll leave most of the magic stuff to our lovely ladies, but I’ll confess I could never BS a spell like that on my own”. Kneeling before Asha to get at eye level, the human added, “I’ve also never seen anyone do something like that before, a slave to a god or otherwise. How much ass-kissing did you have to give your sky-mama for all that?”

Asha weakly giggled in spite of herself. “Quite a bit”, she joked, “Though I think I’ll owe great Aralisi a costly sacrifice at the closest shrine. The priests will be thrilled”.

Nathan nodded. “Hey, whatever floats your boat. But hey”, he chuckled, looking toward the pond. “Talk about a precision strike. That fire rain spell didn’t hit any of the flowers, and the fire didn’t spread either”.

“You of little faith”, Flora sighed in relief, “I think we should all thank our lucky stars that Asha knew what she was doing. Come, we need to harvest the primrose and leave before we run into any more trouble. We’re playing man-down with Asha’s backlash; I don’t want any of us to be in danger”.

“So”, Faraji grinned to Nathan. “Are you going to stop berating me for my visions, friend?”

Nathan chuckled back, kneeling before the Fiends’ Primrose as he began to gather samples in a small sackcloth pouch. “Heh. Don’t push your luck, Faraji. Anyone who’s been in this business as long as I knows when to hold ‘em and when to fold ‘em. At this rate, I have to agree with Flora – we’d best piss off as soon as we can. But hey!” A glance back to the others, and Nathan offered up a rare smile. “I’d say the first rounds are on me tonight. Nothing like a desert-dweller’s honey-wine after a harrowing mission accomplished in the heat”.