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Weird West Tales:
The Witch of Simone
Simone, forests of North Carolina, November 27th, 1866
„Is that here?”, asked his superior Igor Bursche, a bandage-wrapped undead mercenary.
„Precisely. The abandoned town of Simone…”, replied Ferdinand Orquish, a tall and very much human man not long before his forties. „Here is our goal.”
„But where exactly?” Igor loaded his rifle.
„We’re about to learn…”
Ferdinand reached for the pocket of his long coat to take out a herb pouch. He snapped his fingers, threw the pouch up – and it was immediately swallowed by flames. Dried herbs fell out and went along with the slight wind to rise above the dead town. All the burning particles headed for the mayor’s house.
„So, it’s somewhere over there.”
Ferdinand and Igor slowly walked along the muddy path. Barely had they reached the house, something like a thunder strike hit it and a wave of magical Energy knocked both men back.
„Agh… There she is…! Sly broad…”, groaned Igor.
Vicious screeches and rasps could’ve been heard. From the falling houses the contorted remains of what used to be the citizens of Simone, South Carolina, started coming out.
„And so, the wild ones are here too… Igor, get on some roof and try to take those well-conserved out. I will take care of the rest.”
„You got it, boss!”
The undead merc jumped off the ground, shortly hanged off a roof of some porch and quickly climbed up. Got up, reloaded and started shooting the zombies.
Ferdinand, meanwhile, took a short stick out his pocket. Knocked on it twice, and the stick got fifteen times longer. The hunter drew a small pentagram on the ground with it.
„Tuvell, dahess.”
A wave of energy blasted out from the pentagram. Those zombies that could immediately were blown to rotten pieces. The survivors were quickly loaded with lead by Igor.
Ferdinand ran towards the slightly crumbled mayor’s house. What he saw outside hasn’t surprised him too much. A tall women standing over a much, much bigger pentagram. Her black hair and long dress were blowing in the breeze.
„Ferdinand Isidor Orquish! I should’ve expected you to deal with the locals so quickly…”
„Mona Lisa Valerie. Beautiful as always… And, as always, sentenced to death for practicing black magic.”
„Where this time?”
„In Bread Rock.”
„Oh, of course. I believe the sheriff wants revenge after I gave his dauther a set of cat ears. And he sent the best man at service?”
„As you can see. I’ve come to bargain: give yourself up to justice, and I will make sure it won’t hurt.” He reached for his pocket again, this time for a pair of handcuffs.
„I have a better idea”, she laughed adorably. „Go back and tell sheriff to make this incident never happen again, or I will switch his teeth with thumbs.”
„Oh, I have to go back? Without a goodbye hug?”
„Boss…”, whispered Igor, cringing.
„So you deny. Shame. Kallam suest raelium! Inge shual koremi!”
„Uh, oh…”
Mona launched herself into the air, her eyes shining bright with light. Pentagram shined too, and a hole appeared in it. And ever so slowly, a set of tentacles began to emerge.
„Oh… This is not good…”, mumbled Ferdinand, as he darted behind the saloon. Right next to him appeared Igor.
„What’s going on, boss? What is it?”
„She summoned a kraken… It will kill us, if we don’t do anything. This will require advanced magic, and I genuinely can’t tell if I can handle it.”
„Weren’t you prepared for this?”
„Of course not. Magic used by witch hunters isn’t as powerful as the one handled by our prey. At least as long as it’s a pretty… new profession.”
„Alright, great. So, any ideas?”
„Let me think…”
„Boss…” Igor felt something warm and slimy on his shoulder.
„Moment, I’m thinking…”
„Boooss…”
„I’m telling you to wait…!”
„Boss!”
„What?!”
„Get this thing off me!”
„For Christ’s sake!”
A spark jumped from between Ferdinand’s fingers. A fat tentacle slid off Igor’s skin, leaving bleeding holes in places where suckers were. They fleed a few buildings away and hid in the basement of the general store.
„Is everything alright? Does it hurt?”
„It buuurns… And I feel kin… da… dizz… zzy…”
Igor collapsed on the floor. Orquish checked his pulse – he simply fainted. „Some sort of poison”, he thought upon getting up after placing some herbs on the wounds. „It’s bad, really bad…”, his mind was racing, „Valerie used powerful magic to open this gate. Closing it surely will tire her and make her collapse, giving me the opportunity to bring her to Bread Rock for trial. But how do I defeat this monster? I must avoid the tentacles, certainly. Nor let myself be eaten… But does it have any visible weak spots?”.
He climbed a lader and left the basement, reentering the forest-and-rot-smelling surface. One glance at the mayor’s house – from each window, each door, every visible hole were coming out the kraken’s colossal tentacles. Above it kept hovering Mona Lisa Valerie, tranced by keeping her magical portal on a leash. „Killing her will not help, only make the portal open faster”, realized the witch hunter, „But closing it should make her snap out and eventually tire enough to stop resisting…”. The plan would be perfect hadn’t it been for Igor out of picture. His marksmanship would be of great help. „But in this situation I can only rely on magic and a few accessories…”, thought Ferdinand, taking two short swords out from their sheaths. Sparks were jumping from rune to rune on their handles. The Stings is what they were called – a gift from the pope himself.
Cut off the kraken’s limbs, weaken, add some magic and kick down back to its dimension. This was the plan.
„URAAAAA!”, he screamed, as he jumped onto the monster, wielding the Stings.
Two small tentacles blasted towards him. Slash, slash, two short cuts quickly drained their energy, as black blood gushed out. And next slashes, and next!
Ferdinand felt more confident. That is, until two arms caught his shins. As he attempted to cut them off, two more caught his arms. „Why’s there so many of them suddenly?”. No need to wait long for an answer. From the injured tentacles the new ones emerges, while the limbs that were cut off healed and gained their own lives.
„Asexual reproduction, but so incredibly swift… This monster has to have some energy source on the other side. Jump!”, he stabbed another tentacle, leaped from the ground and, supported by magic, landed on a nearby roof.
He knocked on it twice with his staff, a thunder stroke, and the sentient tentacles turned into ash. „So, it’s fire…”, he thought. Quick dive into another pocket for another pouch, full of herbs and powdered sulfur. He jumped off the roof, hid behind a corner and used the mix to make a pentagram on the floor, and the stuck the end of his staff in its middle.
„It’s my time to shine.”
A loud thunder ripped the sky again, a strike hit the monster straight from heavens. It begun to emit smoke and shake like a leaf, and it lasted for a moment, before the spell’s energy depleted, the thunder disappeared, and so did the mix of herbs with sulfur.
„This should do it…”, he thought.
But this absolutely did not do it. From between cracks in the monster’s skin liquid flesh emerged. It covered up the wounds, shed off the burned up skin – the kraken was returning to life.
„Oh, for Christ’s sake… It regenerates and eats its own dead skin? How strong is that energy source on the other side?”
Another tentacle hit his back, then the stomach and groins. He fell, winced in pain. His wounds were charred and stinking of burned flesh. „I loaded it…”.
Enormous tentacles raised up several yards into the air, sparks jumping between the suckers. Ferdinand pulled out his third pouch – herbs mixed with three grams of gold. He spit inside, mixed all together using his finger, kneaded and swallowed. Defensive energy filled his body.
„I’m tired of you, to be frank.” He pulled out two swords, touched the runes and whispered a few spells to enhance metal with durability. „I can see your eyes! URAAAAA!!!”
With a battle cry bursting from his lings, he ran towards the monster-filled building, aiming for a light, cloudy orb of the kraken’s eye glancing at him from one window. He felt non of the electricuting directed onto him, for the protective spell neutralized it. He jumped, grabbed onto the windowsill, climbed up and stabbed the kraken’s eye (one of eyes?). Blue liquid gushed out on his coat.
The whole area shaked. The house began to rise up.
„What the…?” Orquish climbed the rotten roof.
Ground under the building started rising along with it, flesh poured from every possible hole, desks cracked, bigger and bigger parts of the house fallen apart. Roof slipped from under the hunter’s feet, he grasped on the monster’s skin.
The portal widened even more. The kraken moved through it freely. Ferdinand could look into the infinite deepth of the dimension of darkness this portal led to. This is where the remains of the mayor’s house fell.
Ferdinand Isidor Orquish felt cold sweat on his back. Whatever he was fighting, wasn’t even a quarter of the monster. He looked at Mona Lisa – she was convulsing, losing control over the portal that kept on growing, swallowing greater and greater area of the town. Its border was slowly reaching the house where Igor was.
„For Christ’s sake… Igor will be swallowed, Mona ripped apart, and me…”
Yet suddenly a tentacle wrapped around him. Points contacting with the monster’s suckers burned bad. No spells worked. The kraken was sucking out his life through little, bloody wounds.
The hunter felt weak. The tentacle brought him closer to the monster’s gullet, on the other side of the dark portal.
He lacked the strength to defend himself, lacked the strenght to think
He even lacked the strength to love.
As the arm brought him through the portal, his mind drifted into darkness.
A few minutes passed from the consumption before Ferdinand woke up. He found himself surrounded by the remains of any physical sustenance the kraken ever ingested in his certainly long life. Bones of unknown creatures, blood shining with all colors in the rainbow… „Digusting, all this, stink like sulfur…”, Ferdinand thought.
And then he got it. „Sulfur…”
He looked around. Approached the gizzard’s wall, inspected it. Under the thick layer of mucus huge veins and arteries pulsated. The bending was barely felt, which correctly emphasized the monster’s stomach size. „A huge gizzard, full of sulfuric gas… Now where is my… Ah, here!” – from between the remains of some monster he pulled out his staff.
One glance at the runes – untouched. The defensive spell was still protecting his body. The trick should work…
He stood exactly where he woke up earlier. Leaned forward, kept his hand just above the ground. Peacefully closed his eyes, focused, snapped his fingers…
The rumble deafened him momentarily, the recoil immediately broke his hand a few ribs, his whole skin burned, the staff was swallowed by flames – but it worked. He shot out into the monster’s gullet like from a cannon and went along the wall like on a slide. Eventually he emerged from the mouth and landed back in his own world/
The monster loudly coughed and rasped. Each of its throats emitted black smoke and flames. The kraken roared, rised, shaked and fell back inside its dark dimension. The portal clossed immediately.
„Oh… for Christ’s sake…”, sighed Ferdinand. He slowly got up and looked around.
The town of Simone was gone. Everything disappeared after falling down into the other dimension – buildings, trees, ground. All that remained was a circle of smooth ground of about a kilometer-wide diameter. And on its border layed unconscious from magical exhaustion Mona Lisa Valerie, currently tied up by…
„IGOR!”, screamed overjoued Orquish, running towards his friend.
„Ferdinand! You made it!” Bursche tied the last knot and looked back at the witch hunter.
„WHAT?!”
„You made it!”
„I CAN’T HEAR YOU! THE BLAST DEAFENED ME! IT WILL PASS! I THINK…!”
„Of course…”
* * *
Bread Rock, North Carolina, November 28th, 1866
The next day both were sitting on the balcony of Bread Rock Grand Hotel, patched up by local doctors.
They’ve raised a toast for their health and started sipping whiskey, looking over the city square, where in the middle of executional stake the remains of the witch were just finishing burning up.
„Oh, Igor… For views like that it is worth to tire yourself out sometimes, is it not?”
„Absolutely, boss… Absolutely…”
And they raised their glasses with laughter. Another victory on their account.