Chapter 132: Stress Test

The trees closed around Rook before he had gone twenty paces. He could still see the road beneath the roots, though calling it a road was generous. Broken stones marked its edges, the middle had sunk beneath a thick layer of leaves, and branches hung low enough that he had to turn sideways to keep them from catching the coffin.

Gascoigne had followed it for a while before stepping off between two trees. Rook stopped beside the larger boot prints and examined Mara’s uneven steps behind them. Ahead, the road continued through a narrow passage between a fallen trunk and a bank of exposed roots. It looked easier than the route Gascoigne had chosen, which gave Rook enough reason to raise the lantern.

“Why’d you go that way?”

He studied the leaves first, finding nothing obvious, then lowered the light until it shone almost level with the ground. A thin line caught the blue glow. Wire stretched across the passage, little higher than his ankle, with dirt rubbed into its surface to conceal it. One end had been fastened behind a root, while the other disappeared beneath a loose patch of bark beside the fallen tree.

Rook crouched without touching it. Farther back, a bent sapling stood under strain, with narrow pieces of sharpened metal fixed along its length. Anyone catching the wire would release it across the passage, driving those points into their legs. It sat low enough to miss something tall, and most large Abominations would probably break through without suffering much. Someone walking along the road would fare considerably worse.

“Lovely.”

He checked the ground around the tree before following Gascoigne’s detour. The larger prints curved around the trap without pausing, and Mara’s stayed close behind them. There were no marks showing that she had approached the wire, crouched to inspect it, or tried to cut it.

Gascoigne had guided her past without telling her it was there. Had Mara noticed a trap meant for an unsuspecting traveler, she would have insisted on doing something about it. Probably while explaining to Rook why leaving it was a terrible thing to do, as though he had personally installed it.

“You managed to keep her from asking questions. That’s almost impressive.”

The thought did little to improve his opinion of the man. Rook went around the tree, checked for a second wire, and found none. From behind the bent sapling, he cut through its restraining cord with the scythe. The wood snapped upright, whipping the metal points through the empty passage and into the fallen trunk with a series of hard knocks.

He waited and listened to the noise fade between the trees. Something shifted deeper in the forest, but nothing approached. Rook stepped over the slack wire and returned to the footprints.

The forest offered too many routes. Small gaps opened between trunks, some wide enough for a person, others worn smooth by bodies that moved much closer to the ground. Whenever the trail met one, he stopped long enough to establish which prints crossed which.

Gascoigne had avoided several obvious passages. Rook found reasons for two of those choices: a dark hollow beneath tangled roots, and long scratches on the underside of a branch above a narrow path. The third seemed perfectly harmless, but he followed the boot prints anyway.

His cigar had burned down to a short, bitter stump. He took one last draw, crushed it against a stone, and slipped the remains into an outer pocket. With the smoke gone, he could smell the wet soil more clearly, along with something beneath it that made him stop.

Old blood hung in the air. Ahead, a strip of bark dangled from a tree at shoulder height, exposing pale wood beneath its torn edge. The damage was fresh, and whatever had made it had crossed Gascoigne and Mara’s trail.

Rook lowered the lantern just as a branch cracked to his right. He turned toward the sound, bringing the scythe around as something came through the trees. Its first blow caught the shaft and drove it against his chest, sending him backward until the coffin struck a trunk. Claws scraped down the wood beside his head before he could recover.

The creature landed on four limbs, then stood on two. It was taller than him by almost a head, with broad shoulders beneath tight grey skin and a second pair of arms hanging from the sides of its ribs. The upper arms were long and thick. The lower ones ended in narrow hands with hooked fingers, already reaching as it advanced.

Its face looked as though someone had pressed a human skull into wet clay and pulled it out badly. A deep hollow occupied the place where its nose should have been, and its mouth opened vertically through its chin. Rook pushed away from the tree as the creature gathered itself for another rush.

“Third Rank. Of course you are.”

He threw himself sideways, keeping the lantern raised as the creature struck the trunk behind him. Bark burst from the impact. One lower hand caught the chain across his chest and pulled him back, forcing him to cut through its fingers before it could drag him closer.

The grip loosened, but an upper arm swept toward his head before he could retreat. Rook ducked, and the blow struck the coffin hard enough to knock him onto one knee. This one was neither light nor slow. He set the lantern behind a raised root and rolled as its claws drove into the place where he had knelt.

He came up with the scythe in his left hand and drew the edge across his right palm. Blood gathered beneath his fingers while the Abomination pulled its claws from the earth and turned toward him.

“Fine. Let’s do this properly.”

Rook reclaimed the handle and kept the coating thin, barely extending it beyond the iron. When the Abomination lunged, he let it reach before stepping outside the upper arm and cutting through its elbow. This time, he kept his shoulder out of the swing. The blood edge passed through, and he stopped the weapon before it could pull him off balance.

“Better.”

The severed forearm dropped, but the lower hands were already reaching for him. Rook backed between two closely growing trees, forcing the creature to turn its shoulders as it followed. Its remaining upper arm came forward before it could bring the others into reach, and he cut that one at the wrist.

The creature screamed into his face. Rook kicked its knee sideways and felt the joint bend without breaking, but it drove into him anyway. One hooked hand tore through his sleeve, dragging four hot lines across his upper arm.

Rook swore and slammed the scythe’s handle beneath its jaw, shoving its head against the tree. He could not hold it there for long, but he only needed enough room to lower the blade. His next cut passed through its leg above the knee.

The creature fell against him. He twisted clear before its weight could pin him, then cut through the other knee as it tried to rise. It landed hard among the roots and immediately began dragging itself forward with its lower arms.

“Oh, give it a fucking moment.”

He hooked one beneath the scythe, severed it at the elbow, and stepped around the remaining hand. The creature turned with him, giving Rook a clear view of the first stump. Flesh had already begun pushing out from the ruined upper arm, answering one question before he had properly started testing anything.

He cut the last grasping hand away, then backed out of reach and unfastened the coffin. With the creature still trying to drag itself across the leaves, he took out a length of cord and looped it around its torso beneath the upper shoulders.

Binding it took longer than cutting it apart. It threw its weight against him twice, and the second time its teeth caught the edge of his coat. A strip tore free before he could force its head back with the scythe’s handle. Rook hauled the cord around a tree and pulled until the creature’s back pressed against the trunk.

He secured another turn around its hips, then stepped out of reach to examine his work. The Abomination snapped at him and strained against the binding, pulling the cord tight enough to bite into its flesh.

“Yes, I’m sure this is very upsetting.”

Rook looked down at the blood coating his weapon. The fight had already cost him time, and he could not afford to spend much more here. He could afford even less to discover the limits of this ability while facing Gascoigne’s gun.

He crouched near the severed upper forearm and nudged it over with the scythe. Its fingers still moved, but nothing reached from the cut surface toward the body. Behind him, the stump on the bound creature continued growing.

“So you replace it. You don’t need the old one.”

He cut the discarded forearm in half and watched the fingers curl against the leaves. Neither piece tried to join the other. Rook glanced toward the creature as it threw its weight against the cord again.

“Not bad… Now let’s test the limits of this imprint. I hope you have medical insurance.”