Burnside, Rebecca, and I (Patreon)

made our way up to the city, using a route that was conveniently divulged to us by Thomson earlier. Receding into the distance behind us we could hear the sound of Meadow regaling the troubled Floozy with tales of her life story.

"The villagers wanted me to slay the bandersnatch," she was saying.

“How long you figure until ol’ Thomson falls asleep?” Burnside quipped.

“I heard that!” Meadow called down the passageway.

“You was supposed to," Burnside yelled back. "Haw-haw!”

“Burnside!” Rebecca hissed at the unmannerly raccoon. "The Mouse Queen is our ally in the service of King Adler! It won't do to antagonize her."

“Let’s just keep moving,” I whispered, forging ahead through the cobwebbed tunnel.

A few minutes later, I was pushing up a loose flagstone covering a secret entrance to the Underworks.

"I know where we are!" I exclaimed as I helped Rebecca and Burnside climb out of the narrow entrance after me. "This is the plaza in front of the Cathedral!"

The scene was grim. As we strolled slowly along, we saw skeletons laid out in ways suggesting extreme violence. Neighbors and families had obviously turned on each other. There were pie pans strewn everywhere, their contents long ago decayed to dust. Many of the skeletons still wore tattered Valkyrie costumes from the convention that had been taking place on that fateful day. The macabre display was not entirely dissimilar to the battlefield outside the wall, but these had not been soldiers or mercenaries. They were just regular elves trying to live their lives before meeting a grisly and untimely end. This was tragic as well as horrific. A pit began forming in the bottom of my stomach as the all-to-familiar tidal wave of guilt washed over me.

“Hoo-wee!" Burnside hooted as she looked around. "These folks sure look like they had one Netherhells of a hootenanny.”

“You always know just what to say, don’t you, Burnside?” I sighed. Her bad behavior was so outrageously over-the-top it was hard to even be angry at her.

“Oh dear…” Rebecca murmured in quiet horror as she stared at a skeleton of a mother draped over a pram. It was clear that the plague-maddened femme had NOT been trying to save her child.

“Let’s keep moving.” I ordered sadly. “Our goal right now is just to assess the damage. Let’s not spend any more time here than we have to."

We walked along in silence as if exploring a tomb - which in a very real way, we were. Rebecca seemed, like me, to be weighed down with a sense of melancholy and loss. Burnside was staring in reverent and rapturous awe at the carnage. I should have been used to being surrounded by death by this point, but seeing the city of my youth in this nightmarish state felt almost intolerably grim and oppressive. The farther we walked, the darker and heavier the gloom became.

"GAH!" Burnside barked, jumping back from a window she had peered into. “Sweet merciful hogwarsh drownin’ in the nine Netherhells and then some!!!”

“What??” I asked, disturbed less by her outburst of foul language than by the idea that anything that could scare Burnside would probably be VERY bad news for the rest of us.

“What happened??” Rebecca inquired.

“I just," Burnside gasped. "I just done saw a dadgum FACE a-peepin’ back at me!”

“It’s probably a ghost," I explained. Turning to Rebecca, I elaborated: "Ghosts are relatively commonplace in Faerie. Enough tragedies have happened here that there’s sure to be a few restless spirits drifting around. They're usually harmless.”

“I’m startin’ to have second thoughts about this," Burnside gulped nervously. "Stabbin' don't make no difference to a ghost.”

“Well, yeah, we’ll probably see a few haunted spots," I shrugged. "But as I said, they're usually harmless."

"Usually ain't the same as always," Burnside pointed out.

"True, but I seriously doubt things are as bad as Thomson and her skull-friend made them out to be.”

“My lord…” Rebecca whispered as she tugged on my sleeve and pointed to a building farther up the street ahead of us. I slowly followed the direction of Rebecca’s finger until my eyes rested on the building. It looked like a medium-sized apartment block with pulsating blobs of necrotic flesh bulging out of all of its shattered windows.

“What in Fuma’s name…” I muttered, then suddenly jumped as a pile of bones under my foot began rattling. I stumbled back as a mismatched bundle of bones rolled forward and began assembling itself into some grotesque amalgamation. The newly formed hideous parody of a wingless bird looked around, then clattered down an alley out of sight.

“Okay, I’ve seen enough," I squeaked. "The damage to the capital is severe. Let’s leave.”

“Seconded,” Burnside agreed.

“Yeah, let’s go!” Rebecca added, making it unanimous.

We turned as one and began a speedy retreat back the way we came. Unfortunately, about halfway back to the Cathedral plaza, we turned a corner to find our path blocked by a headless figure clad in heavy armor. This ghoulish nightmare sat mounted not astride a noble ant, but a massive winged termite-king wreathed in black smoke. The decapitated warrior held up a severed head with cold flames jetting from its eye sockets as it cackled madly.

"It's a dullahan!" Rebecca exclaimed in shock.

"Well dang," Burnside added.

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