Chapter Three – Hiking Songs

  Warren was so shocked that he almost died again, but managed to get away with only his head falling off. He groaned and looked down at it, then picked it up and checked it for cracks. He was in luck – the white bone of the skull was as intact as it had ever been. Whatever dark magics had been used to bring him back from beyond the grave, they were really good at keeping him together.

  “Well, that could be a problem,” said one of the other skeletons.

  Warren nodded at him. He didn’t know the other skeleton’s name, because technically he didn’t have one. The only reason that Warren was Warren was because he had chosen the name for himself. From what he could tell, that was a rarity amongst skeletons.

  The battlements they stood on were one of the upper layers of the fortress. From here, Warren could see the giant dragon raging within the outer walls, breathing fire over anyone who tried to run towards it. Behind it, he could see soldiers pouring in – an entire army. It was actually impressive that they had gotten so close without being spotted.

  “I suppose this means we’ll be dead again soon,” Warren said. It was a pessimistic way to look at things, but being a skeleton didn’t really give much to be optimistic about.

  The door behind them opened, and the Master ran out onto the battlements in his nightgown. This was the necromancer who had risen Warren, as well as the other skeletons and a whole hoard of undead things. He scanned the battle happening below.

  “What’s going on!?” he screeched.

  Warren gestured with his spear. “There’s a dragon, Master.”

  “I can see there’s a dragon!” Master screamed. “Why are you all standing around here!? Go and fight it!”

  “I don’t know,” Warren said. “I mean, it looks quite dangerous down there. Someone could get badly hurt.”

  “I order you to go and fight!” the Master screamed, which really did change things. That was one of the issues with being a mindless skeleton risen by a necromancer for the purposes of war and destruction – it really was quite difficult to make decisions for oneself.

  “Jolly good, Master,” he said. He turned and raised his spear. He calculated that if he leapt over the ramparts, he could land on top of the dragon and maybe even stab it once before the impact entirely eviscerated him. It wasn’t the plan he would have made, but he supposed that it was as good as he was going to get.

  He put his leg up on the wall, ready to jump. Just as he did, an arrow emerged out of the darkness. It flew past him, and struck the Master right in the forehead. He dropped like a sack of bricks, dead immediately.

  “Wow,” said Warren. “I suppose he forgot to put his wards up before coming out here.”

  Then he realised that he hadn’t collapsed into an inanimate pile of bones. That was strange – he had always assumed that summoned skeletons would disappear when the person who summoned them was dead. True, he had never actually thought to ask, so maybe it was wrong. How did that old saying go – when you assume, you make an ass out of you and me.

  He turned to ask one of the other skeletons what they thought of it, and realised that they actually had collapsed into piles of bones, some of which were already starting to dissolve. Well, that was even stranger. Warren couldn’t think of any reason why he would go on existing if the rest of his skeleton friends didn’t.

  Another thing, he no longer had the urge to follow orders. That was quite liberating, at the very least. For the first time in his death, Warren had freedom, and self-actualization. Of course, it would have been nice for this to happen when the fortress wasn’t under attack, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.

  “So Warren, old chum,” he said out loud. “What are we going to do?”

  He didn’t really want to fight in the battle. He was quite durable, especially for a pile of bones, but he didn’t fancy his chances against a dragon. Even the average soldier could be too much for him, since the type of strategy that skeletons were usually employed for was overwhelming opposing forces with sheer damage.

  Perhaps he should leave. This would be a new beginning for Warren the skeleton. Maybe he should take up pottery, or something like that.

  He made his way down the steps of the Master’s tower, which was full of undead that were no longer undead. Was it best to just call them dead? It seemed a bit reductive – just calling them dead left out the context that there had been a time when they weren’t dead, after the first time when they weren’t dead.

  Warren decided that he would find one of those philosopher people and ask them about it. Those types were always thinking about things, maybe they would have an answer for him.

  By the time he reached the front door, the pathways of the inner fortress were mostly deserted. Everyone had either descended to fight in the battle, or they were hiding away somewhere with strong doors. Warren head for the sewers.

  The pipes into the sewers stunk. Warren didn’t have a nose, but he also didn’t have ears or eyes, so he didn’t think not having things limited his ability to do the things that they would usually do. The pipe was blocked by a grate, but he pulled it off quite easily and stepped in.

  It was about waist height, and would have been quite uncomfortable for anyone with muscles to walk through, so it was fine for Warren. He saw some rats, some of which were quite large, but they left him alone.

  “Okay,” he said. “Which way?”

  He wouldn’t be able to get outside of the fortress from this pipe. The sewers had a closed system that meant they couldn’t be used to infiltrate the fortress. He knew where they would come out on the lowest level, but he would have to get past the outer wall on his own.

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  What would be the best way to do that?

  By now he was almost to the exit, and the pipe above him suddenly split open as a claw raked through the earth in front of him. Someone in armour fell through and landed in the shallow water in front of Warren. He stabbed them with his spear without even bothering to identify what side they were on.

  Oh, perhaps the southern gate wouldn’t be guarded. It was only small, and practically invisible from the outside, and he knew that if it was up to him he wouldn’t keep guarding it when there was a dragon in the courtyard. He peeled the grate off of the exit and stood up to his full height, taking in the chaos. This was a battle alright. The dragon was tearing its way through the defensive lines, even as dozens of spears and hundreds of arrows stuck out of it. Around it, both sides were locked in battle. Bodies were everywhere.

  A skeleton advanced towards him. He had no way of knowing what side it worked for – they didn’t typically get standards.

  “Flank them!” the skeleton ordered. “We’ll win this yet!”

  Warren nodded. “Yes sir,” he said. It occurred to him that with how vague those orders were, he wouldn’t be able to follow them even if he tried.

  Making his way through the battle was actually surprisingly easy. People were usually too busy to deal with a lone skeleton, and nobody seemed quite sure which side of the battle he was on. He held his spear like he meant to use it, and occasionally waved it non-committedly at people, and that seemed to be enough. He got to the wall and made his way south in its shadow. There were still people here, but if anyone got too close he just stabbed them through the heart and kept on going!

  “Help! Help us!”

  Warren would have frowned if he had the ability. People calling for help in a battle wasn’t unusual, but this didn’t sound like a soldier.

  Of course – he had ended up near the slave pens. There were half a dozen cages in this area, and he had been so focused on getting himself out that he had forgotten they were here. He made his way to where he knew them to be. When he came upon the nearest cage, a child was standing at the bars as though she could tear them off. When she saw him coming, she screamed.

  “Hello,” Warren said. “Do you need help?”

  The little girl was quickly hidden behind a group of adults. “Begone, foul creature!” one of them cried. She was holding some kind of totem made out of sticks that almost resembled a religious effigy.

  “That’s rude,” Warren said. “I can get you out of those cages if you want.”

  The woman with the effigy scowled. “Never! You’re an aberration on this world!”

  “Now now, Midge,” said another woman. “If the nice skeleton is offering to help us, then why not let him?”

  “Gerry, he’s a creature of darkness!”

  “And a very polite one too. Come on dear, we’d gladly accept your help.”

  Warren decided that was enough of an invitation. He grabbed the bars of the cage and pulled. They bent quite easily, giving the prisoners a large hole that they could crawl through.

  “Well if that’s all, I’ll be on my way,” he said.

  “Wait!” One of the women, whose stomach had an unusual bulge to it, staggered towards him. “The other cages! Can you open them to?”

  “I can,” said Warren. “Would you like me to?”

  “Yes!” said the woman. “Please!”

  He nodded. “I will.” He went to the next cage, and opened a hole like the first. The first person to come through the hole was a young man who ran to the bulge woman and embraced her deeply. He moved onto the next. There were between eight and ten prisoners per cage, so by the time Warren was done there were half a hundred people embracing one another and talking like they weren’t in a battlefield.

  Someone yelled that the prisoners were escaping, but he was killed immediately by the dragon’s tail and nothing came of it.

  “I’ll be going now,” Warren said to the woman had been called Gerry, because she seemed like the leader of this group. “I wish you all luck.”

  “How are you getting out?” she asked.

  “The southern gate,” Warren said. “I think it should be quite easy to get out that way. Farewell.” He started to walk away. He could hear the prisoners arguing behind him, but he didn’t bother to listen to what it was about.

  One of them, a fey-kind, flagged him down. “Undead!” he said. “Undead, I must speak to you.”

  “My name is Warren,” said Warren. This was actually the first time he had said this to anyone, the first time he wouldn’t have been punished for deciding on a name for himself. Saying it out loud only cemented in his mind that he was supposed to have this name.

  “It is?” The fey-kind made a face, but Warren did not understand facial expressions. “I need your help. I need you to protect me. These other prisoners hate me, and perhaps they have reason to, but I wish to stay alive… no offense. I can offer you money if you can escort me back to my homeland.”

  Warren stared at him.

  “And of course, anything else you want. Clearly you are strong, so why not lend me some of your strength.”

  “No thank you,” said Warren. “I don’t think that I need money, but thank you for the offer.”

  He started walking again, but the fey-kind got in his path. “Perhaps then, you would agree to shepherd this people! If they thought that I did something good for them, then their grievances against me might seem less important.”

  Warren hadn’t really experienced being annoyed before, but he was sure that was what this feeling he was having would be.

  “I’m busy,” he said firmly. “I’m trying to leave this place. That said, if you really don’t want to die then I can try not to make it happen. And if you want to follow me to the south gate I won’t stop you. But I’m too busy to be making a deal about it, so don’t try and give me things.”

  The fey-kind was silent for several seconds. “Well, okay then,” he said.

  Warren kept walking. He soon realised that the prisoners were following him, some of them trying to be stealthy and some of them going out of their way to collect weapons and tools. Warren just focused on moving forwards. If anyone tried to stop him he engaged them in combat and ended up winning.

  By the time he reached the south gate, he looked like he was leading a small army. There were less people than before, but he didn’t know what had happened to the others because he hadn’t been watching.

  The south gate had a few guards left on it, so Warren killed them before they could let him through. Funny, these guards really weren’t so good at their jobs. Or perhaps Warren was having a good day, because normally any one of them would have been more than a match for him.

  The gate was operated by a chain and lever system, but Warren didn’t know how to work it. He tried pushing on the gate, but it wouldn’t budge – he should have known. Luckily one of the prisoners seemed to have worked it out, and the gate opened. Outside, the mountain path was dark and unlit. No-one was waiting for them outside. It was likely that the attackers hadn’t known about it, or just hadn’t considered it important. He stepped out of the fortress into the cool night air. The prisoners followed him, clutching torches, and swords and spears, and axes and pickaxes and kitchen knives and hoes.

  Warren was outside, but where to go first? This place would be a battleground for a good while longer, so it would probably be best to get away from here. The forests a few dozen miles away would be a good place to hide, and after that he could make a decision over where to go next.

  He had the idea that he should be singing a hiking song. The only problem was that he didn’t know any. He turned around, and Gerry was standing just behind him.

  “Do you know any good hiking songs?” he asked.

  She nodded. “I’ll tell you what dear, once we’ve made it a few miles I’ll teach you some.”

  That sounded quite fair. The night would turn into the day soon, and Warren wanted to be far away when that happened. He made his way along the path, away from the fortress, and the clump of unprisoned prisoners followed.

  Was it best to just call them free? It felt reductive; calling them free missed out the time when they hadn’t been free. He felt like that should be important. That would have to be another one for the philosophers.