Chapter 9
The old elven warrior turned to his Princess and shrugged his shoulders, in essence saying, I don’t know for sure. He pressed his ear to the closed door, drew in a quick breath and held it as he listened. Nothing could be heard for the first few moments, then, he heard some faint voices on the other side, someone was coming, and they were getting closer! Quickly he turned to the princess and raising his finger to his lips motioned for her to be quiet, then he grabbed her by the arm and they both scurried over to a dark corner to hide, very soon they could hear the door lock jiggling and the massive door swung inward, two burly dwarves came stomping through, with fire in their eyes. The dwarf in the lead was Or’acke, the captain of the guard. They must have grown suspicious of the guard being so long in bringing Davkas to see him that Or’acke had grown impatient enough to want to investigate himself.
Hiding in the shadows Davkas quickly stiffens as Or’acke stepped through the door, Princess Lunansa also froze and quietly started to shake in fear of the evil dwarf, but Davkas placed a comforting hand upon her arm and squeezed to reassure her. They both watched as the two dwarves hurried up the corridor to the cells where they once were held, Davkas let out his breath and motioned for the Princess to follow him. He peaked into the doorway the dwarves just came through and found no guards on the other side, so both he and the Princess went through, shutting the door behind them. Davkas quickly looked around and found something that could be jammed against the door to keep it from opening back into the guard area, so thus preventing Or’acke and the other guard from coming back through.
“We must hurry Princess and find a way out of these dungeons before Or’acke returns and alerts the dungeon guards of our escape. Even now I’m sure he has discovered the dead guard sent to bring me to him.” Davkas quickly whispers to the Princess, he then grabs her by her hand and begins to lead her away from the door and the now trapped guard captain and his minion.
Soon they come to an area lit with the soft glow of torch light, straight ahead held a set of stairs going up, the corridor to the right leading off into darkness, and the one to the left leading to steps descending down. Davkas reasoned that by going up at this point would lead them straight into the waiting arms of the guard room, but of course beyond that was their ultimate freedom, the corridor to their right didn’t seem very promising at the moment, but the one leading down may lead to some natural caves in the base of the mountain fortress they were being held at, so Davkas took a deep breath and lead the way to the left, downward deeper into the mountain, hoping to throw the dwarves off their trail.
“I don’t understand Davkas. Why are we going this direction?” the Princess Lunansa whispered to the older elf.
“It is the only way my Princess for us to have any chance of escaping I fear. By myself I will not be able to over power the guards up above, for by going up the stairs back there we would run directly into the main guard room. I know this because I have been taken there many times for questioning.” Davkas explained to the Princess as they hurried down the flight of stairs.
“I see, well you have been here longer than I, so lead on.” She replied to Davkas.
So Davkas and the Princess Lunansa continued on in the dark, depending on their low light vision to help them along the way. Soon they came to the end of the stairs and found themselves facing a closed and barred door. Davkas approached the door cautiously, he pressed his ear to the door to listen, hearing nothing he slowly raised the bar securing the door. Setting the bar to the side he tried the door, it seemed to be stuck, probably from long disuse thought Davkas. So he tugged a little harder, this time the door cracked open suddenly, and Davkas had to catch himself before his momentum threw him off balance, in the end he was able to open the door only barely wide enough where he could slip through.
Just then they heard a loud thumping sound in the general direction they had come from, most likely it was Or’acke the guard captain and his cohort discovering the door being blocked, it may take them sometime before the other guards notice they were missing, so Davkas was thinking fast. He quickly slipped through the open door and took in the situation on the other side, using his scouting skills he began to examine the surrounding area in detail. There appeared to be some signs of someone or something approaching the doorway, he couldn’t tell exactly what it was though due to the accumulated amounts of dust and dirt. He quickly went back through the door and motioned for the Princess to follow him, she came running since the thumping sounds from up the corridor were growing louder.
“We need to move quickly Princess if we hope to have any chance of escape!” Davkas said to her as she slipped through the open door. After she was on the other side, Davkas pulled the door shut behind them, there was no way for him to block it from this side since it opened inward, so with that he turned and grab Lunansa’s hand and move quickly down the new corridor.
They soon came to another junction and had to choose whether to go left or right, after examining the area again for tracks in the dust, Davkas picked the right corridor. They began trudging in that direction when they started to hear a new noise, something that just didn’t sound right to Davkas in all his past experiences. It seemed to him to be a shuffling sound, or perhaps something being dragged, the trouble was it seemed as if it was getting closer!
“Davkas what is that sound?” Princess Lunansa asked him.
“I’m not sure Princess, but I don’t like it.” Davkas responded back to the Princess, purposely withholding what he feared inside. “But we she keep moving, hopefully we will find someplace to rest soon.” Davkas added.
So they continued on their current path keeping a constant watch for whatever was making the noise. Soon they came to an area with an opening on their left, the corridor itself continued further on, Davkas checked out the opening and motioned for the princess to follow him, ducking inside they found themselves in a closed area, roughly carved out of the rock, approximately 20 feet wide and 20 feet deep. Inside this room there was scattered piles of dirt, rock and in one corner of the room a few wooden crates, oh and also a rat or two which soon scurried away at the approach of the two elves. Davkas had the Princess duck down behind the pile of rocks in the far corner, while he positioned himself close by the doorway, with the mace in his hand.
It wasn’t long before the shuffling, scraping sound got even louder as whatever was causing the noise drew near, then the smell hit him and it almost caused him to gag and retch, but then he knew what it was, a Carcass Beast! One of the most dreaded monsters to encounter underground! It was a living nightmare, a long worm-like creature which would search out the dead and dying and feed on them, thus the name and the stench from the rotting corpses that comprised its food. Davkas wasn’t sure what he was going to do. He knew that fighting the beast with the mace would be a difficult task, yet what choice did he have? He also knew that running would be pointless, the beast would just continue to track them until they became exhausted, so standing and facing it now would be their best hope.
Davkas turned to the Princess and said, “Princess, I fear I know what is making the sound now, it is a dreaded Carcass monster which is probably been tracking us since we entered this area through the closed and barred door by the stairs.”
“W-what can we do?” the Princess stuttered in fear.
“I will make my stand by the doorway to attempt to kill this beast, or at least drive it off, hoping that by doing so it won’t threaten you.” Davkas said in response to the Princess.
“I-I c-can help Davkas.” The Princess replied back to Davkas and then slowly stood up. Davkas noticed that she held a board in her hand that she must have found behind the rock pile.
Davkas was slightly amused and smiled back at the Princess, but he cautioned her to stay back and down so that the beast would not notice her, he hoped! Soon the stench and the noise coming from the corridor drew his attention back to the entry way. Davkas steeled himself for he knew that the beast was working its way up to the threshold. He braced himself as the front portion of the Carcass monster came into view, with a savage war cry he attacked!
The monster was truly horrible to look at, let alone smell, it was almost 8 feet in length, with a girth to match that of a good sized bear, it had no feet, but crawled around like a huge ugly worm, which was a fortunate thing at the moment. Davkas used the mace clumsily, for he was not used to such a weapon, he preferred his long sword which had been surrendered to the dark dwarves when they had captured him, yet he did manage to strike the beast, which caused the thing to rear up and make a sound like a squealing pig! Davkas lunged backwards, and the swinging head of the beast barely missed him!
Looked down at the mace in his hand Davkas saw that the strange blood of the creature covered it, it was a greenish blood, which too had a foul odor. Davkas watched as the enraged monster used its senses to locate him, and then it turned towards him, beginning a series of faints and lunges, similar to a striking snake. Davkas took measure of the situation and leaned in to strike again, only this time the beast proved faster and lunged at him clamping down hard on his exposed arm!
“Aaaaeeeeeee” Davkas screamed in agony! The monster had bitten into his arm and left a bloody deep gash which now began to throb with pain! It was all he could do to not drop the mace in his hand!
“Davkas are you alright!” The Princess screamed at him.
In pain and with the wound in his arm dripping blood, Davkas danced backwards away from the stinking beast. Then he gathered himself, gripped the mace with both hands this time and swung down hard at the thing! He felt a satisfying crunch as he did, and glancing down saw that the head of the thing was cracked open! Yet it was still moving! Again he danced backward as it lunged at him trying to clamp down on his arm a second time, but this time he proved faster.
Glancing back at the Princess he finally answered her, “Princess, I am fine, just a little blood is all.” Yet the wound was agonizingly painful. “There must be some kind of poison with the bite of this creature.” He thought to himself.
Shrugging aside the pain he continued the fight, dodging left and then right he found another opening and struck hard at the exposed head of the creature, taking careful aim to try and hit the same spot as before. The beast squealed again, it was just then that out of the corner of his eye Davkas saw a blur move in! It was the Princess and she had found a very long spear-like piece of wood which she used to impale the monstrous beast! Davkas screamed at her to get away, but this time it hit the floor with a thud, and lay very still.
Davkas not sure if it was dead yet or just mortally wounded motioned for the Princess to stay back, Davkas approached the monster cautiously. Taking the bloody mace in both hands again he smashed down hard on its head, again and again, almost hysterical in his actions, this thing had put a scare into him for sure! The beast never moved, it was truly and completely dead! Davkas sighed in relief.
“Well I think that this monster won’t be following anyone any more, I just hope there are no more of them out there.” He said to the Princess as she came to stand next to him. She reached over and took his injured arm in her hands and gasped! When the Carcass monster bit him the saliva from the beast was starting to have its effect on his arm and it was slowly turning green and swelling! But Davkas strangely was thinking about his daughter Lizzy and was wondering how she was doing, a smile came to his face at the thought of his lovely daughter, his pride and joy, “Oh Lizzy he thought, I just hope I live long enough to see your beautiful face again.”