The Thrall (The Viking Hero Series Book 1) (13 page)

Nothing.

This time he stood on the mound and kicked more
rocks off of it. Hoping to disturb it. He knew it was in there. He
knew that was where it came out from when it formed from a strange
mist.

Rowan stood on the mound for a few minutes,
turning in every direction. He watched for the beast or any mist to
come up. There was still nothing. This wasn't going to plan in any
shape or form.

He simply wasn't going to be able to lure the
beast out of its mound. A huge part of him was glad for that. Even
though he'd show up and carried out the plan with a mockery of
bravery that really didn't exist. It was more in desperation that
led him to carry out this plan brought to him by Tom - a creature he
wasn't even sure about.

There was only a few hours of daylight left and
Rowan figured it would probably be best to gather the iron back up
and carry it back down before his mistress Gwenda came back home.

Being that he wasn't successful in getting himself
killed with this hair-brained plan, he may as well not get in trouble
for taking the iron and going into the forest as well.

Rowan started walking back to fetch the items he
used for his trap, but as he started walking through the passage
through the bush, he noticed the tell-tale mist forming from the
creature.

"Here it comes!" Rowan thought as his
heart sank. He'd already been grateful that the creature didn't
show, now it's here and it's go time.

Rowan slowly turned around and looked tow
ards
the mound. There it stood, the grotesques dead walker the elders
called a draug.

It had formed in the
mist when Rowan had his back turned. Apparently, it sought to ambush
him.

Rowan looked directly
at it as it looked right back at him.

This was a VERY bad
idea.

Rowan
im
mediately darted off at full speed towards his trap. If he
could get to the rope before it reached the drop spot, he'd have a
chance to trap it. It was the only chance he had. He knew he'd
never outrun it and escape. It had to be trapped otherwise he was
now trapped.

Rowan ran with everything he had. He could hear
the beast howl angrily at him and its footsteps stomping behind him.
It was chasing him.

He got past the passageway and was heading to the
rope. He had to get to it. Rowan never ran so fast in his life. He
was in sheer panic. But just as he was stepping over the chainmail
hidden under the leaves, his foot caught a piece of rope and he
tripped.

Rowan tumbled face first over his trap and rolled
out of control on the ground, dropping his ax and everything.

He quickly recovered and looked for the ax. It
was on the ground next to the chain mail snare trap. He ran to grab
it and seen that the beast was charging straight for him.

As soon as Rowan picked up the ax the beast was on
him. He recovered and stood back up just as the creature swung at
him. It barely missed his head as it drove its monstrosity of a fist
into the ground.

Rowan swung the ax and hit it in the leg, cutting
it deeply. It was a panic swing, but he hit it soundly. The
creature roared in anger as Rowan turned to swing his ax and cut the
rope so he could snare the beast.

Unfortunately. when Rowan hit the rope with his ax
it didn't cut the rope and only bounced off of it.

Thinking quickly while the creature was still in
the trap spot, Rowan turned and pulled the other rope and released
the fisherman's net with the iron ties on it.

The net dropped as planned, but did not land on
the creature completely. Part of it fell to the side, but enough of
it fell over the creature's head and shoulder, allowing the net to
cover half of its body.

The iron trick was working. The beast was
furiously howling in pain as the iron laid on its flesh and burned
it.

It swung around madly trying to get the net off of
it. Rowan noticed it was standing directly over the chain mail snare
with both feet now. He tried to cut the rope with his ax again. The
ax bounced off the rope once again, only cutting a few threads of the
rope.

Frustrated, Rowan swung the ax and cut the rope
where he had it tied down. This time it cut through and released the
snare.

The tree Rowan bent down sprung back up, puling
the rope and thus pulling the chain mail up and around the creature's
feet.

It screeched in a furious madness as the chain
mail wrapped around its legs and feet. The iron burned it wherever it
touched the creature's cursed dead flesh.

Remembering the rope strung with iron, Rowan
quickly grabbed it from the ground and threw it around the dead
walker as it was trying to get itself lose from the netting. Rowan
managed to get it around it legs and ran around the creature as it
roared at him. He wrapped the roped around the beast several times
and then pulled at it taut.

He was trying to knock the creature over but
failed because it was too heavy to even budge. It was like trying to
pull an oak tree down, the forsaken being was extremely heavy and
stood soundly firm in its place.

Rowan ran around the other side of it to grab his
ax once again and try to hack it down.

However, as Rowan picked up the ax from the ground
where he'd tossed it to pick up the rope with ax heads ties in it,
the creature made a move for him.

The draug tried to step towards Rowan and swing at
him, but tripped over the entanglement of chain mail and iron laced
rope wrapped around it.

The dead walker fell to the ground and howled as
it struggled to get itself free. This was the opportunity Rowan
needed. He picked up the battle ax with both hands and lifted it
above his head. He took one last look at the creature before he
brought the ax down on its head with all his might.

The dull thud announced the ax hitting its mark.
A grotesque sight indeed as the undead thing emitted a low growl.

Surprisingly, it was still alive. Such a direct
blow to the head like that would have ended any living being. Yet
this thing wasn't even really alive. This cursed thing shouldn't even
be walking around in the first place. It had been already dead at one
time and then risen again by some unknown strange reason to reap its
malice upon the world.

With difficultly, Rowan pulled the ax from the
thing's head. It was too deeply embedded and he had to put his foot
on the thing's chest to gain leverage as he freed the ax.

The creature, although greatly weakened from the
iron, persevered in its struggle to get free.

Rowan knew what he had to do; there was only one
way to end all of this madness. Gulping in disappoint to the task of
which he had to preform, he raised
the bloodied ax over his head once again and this time aimed for the
creature's neck. He swung down with all his force and struck the
draug's swollen, unnatural neck.

It took Rowan two more
chops to separate the creature's head from its body. The
abomination's body was so large and had swollen to such an unnatural
size, there was nothing simple about it.

To Rowan's relief,
once the head was detached the creature's body stopped moving and
went limp.

Horrifically, even
though the body appeared to be dead, the creature's head was still
alive!

Rowan grabbed the head
by its hair and lifted it up to look it.

Its dead, lifeless
white eyes were still open as was the mouth as well. The thing was
actually trying to growl, although the only sound emitting from it
was a drowned incongruous gurgling sound.

Repulsed by it, Rowan
tossed the head on the ground. He rolled it over with his foot so
that its face was towards the ground so he didn't have to look at it.

He knew what he had to
do at this point. The burden of his dirty work was not yet complete.
There was simply too much risk of this thing coming back alive. The
only way to make sure it was dead and stayed dead was to burn it.

Rowan began gathering
dead wood that was around the area and started stacking the firewood
on top of the creature's corpse.

At first he was
going to dig a hole, roll the creature in it and then burn it in the
hole so it could be easily covered up. But when he tested out this
plan he disco
vered that the beast simply was too great in
weight. The thing's headless body was uncannily heavy. He wasn't
able to budge it in even the slightest manner. It was like a solid
rock that would take a team of horses to move.

So he decided to burn it on the ground where it
laid.

He would need proof of killing it however.
Although he was not happy about having to deal with its still-alive
head, he really had no choice. He would have carry it back to the
Jarl as proof of the creature's demise.

Rowan gathered the ghastly still active head with
its dull gurgling growl and placed it in one of the buckets he used
to carry the iron scraps up the mountain.

Having gathered enough firewood to make a fire big
enough to burn the creature's body to ash, Rowan set the hastily
built funeral pyre on fire.

He watched the black smoke of the great fire roll
into the sky for a couple hours until he was satisfied that the
corpse was going to be reduced to ash, never to rise a again.

The Sun was only an hour or less until it was
going to set for the day. Rowan made a torch and lit it from the
bonfire's blaze. He gathered his things, including the bucket with
the moaning head in it, and made his way down the mountainside
towards the village.

Rowan arrived at the village's edge just a few
hours after night fall. He pondered for a moment trying to decide
where to go. Either to the longhouse of his mistress, the
blacksmith's wife and wait until morning to announce his defeating
the dead walker; Or to continue on and go to the Great Hall of the
Jarl now.

One thing was for certain, he needed to take a
short break first. He was exhausted. Even though he killed the
creature, he didn't want to be in the mountain's forest at night. The
now defeated creature wasn't the only threat that laid within the
forest and on the mountain. Rowan had come to learn there were many
things in the wilderness that were more of a threat than wolves and
bears.

He set his bundle down, thankful of the moonlight
that lit the way. The moonlight enabled him to trek through the last
stretch of forest. His torch had burned itself out already and he
didn't make another because he was somewhat still able to see without
using a torch. Even though he could have devised one rather quickly
with a dried branch before the previous one burned itself out, he
decided not to bother and keep going.

Feeling rested enough from taking a short
'breather,' Rowan gathered up his things and made his way towards the
Great Hall. He knew the Jarl and a majority of the men of the village
would the there. There simply was no better time to do this than now.

It wasn't long until Rowan was standing just
outside the Great Hall. He could hear the muffled voices of the men
inside. He set everything down by the outside wall and retrieved only
the bucket containing the head. He could still hear its muffled
groans. It was strange how this body-less head was still alive.

He walked up to the doorway and stood there a
moment. He was still hesitant to just walk inside. As he was just a
lowly thrall and wasn't exactly permitted to enter without a master
or without a really good reason.

Silly thought. This was reason enough, he
reassured himself as he gathered the courage to enter.

As soon as he stepped foot in the Hall, his
presence was immediately noticed by men near the door. One was about
to confront him, but another man standing next to him, seeing what
Rowan was carrying in the bucket, stopped him.

A guard that was standing by the door who had also
seen what Rowan was carrying, called out loud enough to be heard
above the other conversing voices and merriment in the Hall, "My
Lord!"

The hall quickly went quiet as everyone turned and
looked at Rowan. The guard motioned Rowan to go to the Jarl and
followed behind him as he walked towards the Jarl.

As Rowan walked toward the end of the Hall where
the Jarl was seated, men stepped aside and allowed him passage.
Whispers and murmurs grew among the men, as they inquired amongst
each other as to what was going on and why the thrall was in the
Hall.

With a degree of uneasiness Rowan walked past all
the gawking men, whom at first looked upon him disparagingly until
they seen what he was carrying inside of his bucket.

Rowan made his way past everyone and stood before
the Jarl, whom was sitting in his throne looking at him with a
questioning expression on his face. Rowan tried to keep his eyes
lowered, not wanting to provoke anyone's wrath upon him, especially
that of the Jarl.

As soon as he got in front of the Jarl's throne,
he set the bucket down before the Jarl's feet and took a step back
before he kneeling down.

"My Lord, I present to you the dead walker's
head."

The Hall lit up in an almost instant roar upon
hearing Rowan say this. Some voices cheering the creature's vanquish,
while others contested it with their doubts.

The Jarl leaned forward in his chair and looked in
the bucket. Seeing the back of the grotesque bloodied head of the
creature, he was immediately revolted by the sight of it.

Even though the Jarl was a seasoned warrior who
had seen many battles, he still didn't like the sight of blood or
dead things. But he was the leader and he couldn't show even an ounce
of weakness, no matter how much this thing repulsed him.

Needing to verify the thrall's claim, he reached
down into the bucket and flipped the head over so he could see its
face. As soon as he flipped the head over, he quickly pulled his hand
back and stood up.