Murder in Cormyr - Chet Williamson [74]
Several Purple Dragons were clustered at the gate, staring into the rapidly fading blackness. Captain Flim pointed a gloved hand and shouted, "There!"
I saw the dim and shadowy figure of Tobald then. He was moving into the Vast Swamp, and, during our search for a light, had gone nearly a hundred yards through the mire. He seemed to be moving slowly, his feet sticking in the black ooze, but he pulled his boots out and continued to stumble on, toward the heart of the swamp.
"After him!" Captain Flim cried, and his men complied, following him down the few stairs that led from the piazza to the ground, but Benelaius called after them, and Flim paused.
"Wait!" Benelaius said. "Not without a light. There are sinkholes and quicksand everywhere." Lindavar passed down the light to Flim, but as I looked out at the swamp, I could see that Tobald was already nearly lost in the darkness.
It didn't stop Captain Flim, though, who moved as quickly as he could through the muck, his men behind him. If he could keep Tobald in sight, I had no doubt that the soldiers would apprehend him.
But then the light of the lantern started to fade, not from any gust of wind, but as though someone were slowly turning off the oil supply. Flim paused to examine it but jerked his head up again when Rolf shouted, "Look!"
Something was beginning to glow out in the Vast Swamp, at the spot where I had last seen the vanishing form of Tobald, and I could see that it was the figure of a man. Even from a hundred yards away, he looked like a giant.
In the cold blue light that radiated from his entire frame, I saw a mane of long hair falling about his shoulders, a gleaming shirt of mail over a broad, muscular torso, and legs as thick as tree trunks. The features of his face seemed magnified by the eerie light that streamed from him. His cheeks were gaunt, his mouth looked as though it had never smiled, and his eyes… let me just say that they had seen things I pray mine never have to look upon.
The sight of him was bad enough, and the huge war axe he held effortlessly in his right hand made him not a whit less frightening. "Fastred's ghost," Benelaius said, and although I heard no fear in his voice, I could tell he was as surprised as the rest of us at the appearance of the apparition.
The sight had frozen the Purple Dragons in their tracks, and I could see their forms against the constantly brightening light the ghost exuded. I could also see Tobald.
He was standing only a few feet away from the ghost. My fear at seeing the ghost at a distance was so great that I could only imagine Tobald's terror at such proximity to the creature. He was brightly illuminated by the blue light of the ghost itself, and I saw him throw up his hands as if to ward it off. He stood there, face-to-face with it for a long time. Then it took a step toward him.
Tobald backed away, his head still up, transfixed by the apparition's baleful glare. His arms were up as well, as though he were being accosted by a highwayman. But Fastred's ghost was far more terrible than any mortal brigand.
The ghost advanced, and Tobald continued to back away, until I saw his left foot sink into the black ooze. His fear had usurped his strength. He could not pull his foot out, could only step back with his right foot as well, so that now he was completely mired in the clinging muck.
Slowly he sank down but did not take his eyes away from the unhurriedly pursuing wraith. He never looked down once, but kept his gaze fixed on the ghost of Fastred that now stood directly over him, its axe by its side, watching the man sink lower and lower into the mire.
Soon only Tobald's head and hands were visible, the fingers moving feebly as they were sucked under one at a time. Then there was just his face, and finally that vanished too, like a tiny moon eclipsed fully, sliding ever so slowly into the dark sky.
The ghost looked down at the mire into which Tobald, his lungs filled with swamp mud, had gone forever. Then the phosphorescence that