Citadel of the Undead

Going back to the present day, our protagonist's continues his hunt as an older man and has a dream of an impending threat.

Steel towed boots clawed at the ground beneath them.  The footsteps grew coherently greater in length and stride.  Placid blue jeans clung loosely to the thickness of the man’s legs giving sway in only a couple of angles.  An oversized winter’s coat covered his shirt drenched in sweat.  Even as snow stuck to the ground the warmth of the day’s journey stung his body.  Dark brown hair just received a haircut but still left long sideburns which led into a bristled beard.  Tempered breaths exited his mouth as he huffed and puffed from the winded run.

Eyes dashing in all directions purveyed the scenery before him.  Shaking twigs held no mystery of where this predator could have gone.  This lurking almost haunting being could have been anywhere but leaving traces behind was a downfall to gain the upper hand.  Moving briskly forward the man made his pilgrimage through the white tundra.  Trees stood tall in their aloofness, a hazardous sway left no thought to a route.  Hiding its footprints came along with this ghastly entity leaving a thought to its damnable nature.  But the scent proved to be unbearable and gut wrenching, which left the man only to wander ahead in quick silence.

Tethering away the vile creature increased in speed, yet the man seemed to keep pace.  Leaving behind stains due from a previous lash to the abdomen only made the hunt easier and more appeasing.  The trail leading even further into the woods that separated the whitened hills to the forest below.  The tundra kept riding on for miles as the creature panted, gripping its side with talon-like hands.  Hedonistic breaths exhaled into almost a growl, and the man tailed the ghostly figure even more.  Blending into the environment its pale skin mixed in with overgrown whitened brush cascading shadows along the trees.  Deeper in the forest the pair went, the one catching up with the other.  The sun settled instantaneously leaving nothing but night embers to coarse through the sky.

This had not been a hunt as it was catching up.  A catching up with the night.  Beckoning to its moonlight master the creature slunk to and fro between the trees, dodging fallen logs, passing through the flurried foliage.  The snow lit the man’s way even more so keeping the ground an opaque white.  Even with the setting sun, bluish night hues embroiled the coming dusk.  The man’s boots clunked through the deepening snow as he heard the creature bellow out heaving hoots.  It was close as it circled its way through the white maze.

Raising the curved edge of the crossbow, he took a long awaited breath behind the trunk of a tree.  Tirelessly he loaded one bolt into the draw, bringing back the hammer hearing it lock into place.  The creature stumbled forward, the crimson bleeding through its stomach left larger imprints in the snow.  It was becoming tired, sounds of deep heaves left patterns in the cold.  Its circling halted a bit now striding in an almost linear line.  The man turned from his destination to capture the creature in a dead aim through a scoped sight.

One fatal shot led the bolt coursing through the snowy air, landing a mistaken placement upon the creature’s forearm.  It screeched with a painful growl, its red glare peering at the man.  Stopping in its running escape, it turned to face its hunter.  Wolf-like fangs protruded out from his drooling intense mouth.  Gripping its arm he dashed towards the man, the prey becoming the predator.  Startled the man threw down the crossbow as the increasing speed of the creature lunged at him.  As in a flash of lightning the creature bore upon him, one clawed hand raising in attack motion, its hind legs pushing forcefully off the ground.

The kukri came from the man’s backside as he stood his ground, hoping with all of his strength he could subdue his prey.  As the creature moved in for the final kill, a quick swipe traced etches across the creature’s throat.  More crimson bled from the gouging thrust flailing some across the wintered ground.  The cut from the blade broke the lunge, the creature bellied up, turned, and fell face first within a snow bank.  Gathering itself up as if a man arose from becoming winded, the hunter pulled out a long metal rod.  The rod came to a fine point, its handle wrapped with a roped grip.  He huddled over towards the creature who gripped its own neck, feeling the life escape from his already undead form. 

As the man rose the staked rod, the creature held out a yielding hand.  Gasping for breath, his other hand covered the bloodied wound across his neck.  The man froze momentarily knowing too well that the more he hesitated the more creature would return to its previous strength.  A cowering madmen laying on his back pleading for his life, that was what the creature appeared to be doing.  Its hush breaths could be seen in the coldness of night.  Pulling out a flashlight from his belt, he illuminated the dying creature.  It seemed almost human, the way it writhed in pain, its back twisting, the way it grasped for anything to protect itself.

In some odd mystical way, the hunter pitied the creature.  Its red eyes took upon a crystalline blue flashing its weariness.  Its clawed finger tips still halted the hunter from its impending doom.  It squealed from the depths of its throat, “You…found…us.”  The man nearing his downed enemy came to kneel beside it, hovering the rod over its ungodly heart.  A quick and easy deception nonetheless, the hunter’s towering frame now becoming the ruthless killer.  

“She…speaks to us…in the night.  Whispering…calling…this is…only the beginning…for you, lonely hunter.”  Taken as a given threat the man dove the rod into the creature’s chest cavity, blood oozing from its incision.  A geyser of bodily fluids exhaled, leaving a mixture of red blackness to dispel whatever type of morbid energy the creature withheld.  Slowly rising the rod of the gaping hole, the body of the creature began to steam.  Wailing echoed through the forest and beyond radiating across the tundra that started this chase.  The skin began to peel and cake away, the flesh burning slow at first but increasing in dimension.  Bringing out a match and igniting it from his boot, he only quickened the burning corpse.  Its bluish eyes burnt down to blackened embers and the pale skin took on a dark burnt tone.

The man regained his composure releasing a sigh of relief.  Using a different match, he lit the butt end of a cigarette.  He found a nearby tree log and sat upon it gazing up at the dusk ridden sky.  Soon the moon would be out to fall its obsidian glow upon the world.  And out here he knew was somewhere he should not be.  The darkness would creep its way in, finding a secret entrance and indwell upon this earth.  Who knows what kinds of things lurked within the encasement of night, and the man knew all too well what it would bring.  Rising from a minute or two’s rest, he began to make his way back the way he came.  Back to a more civilized world where he chose only to exist in the way others expected him to.  To be a normal average Joe walking down the street, off to catch the next cab or managing to grab a bite to eat.  Back to that world of the living, where not a single soul knew what lingered beyond their own little quiet domain.  

Five year passed since he had left.  The stench of his previous hunt still clambered on his skin.  Putrid and revolting he had to take a long hot shower to absolve him of what occurred just hours ago.  He could feel the creature’s wrath hazing over his mind, something he thought he left five years ago.  But over that time that wrath just grew stronger, more omnipotent.  That darkness felt deeper and longer coming out in the water itself.  He thought he could put his past behind him, all those years ago and he could not bring himself to toss it under the rug.  He dragged it out for way too long, some may even say to the point of no return.  And that was where he traveled to, past the breaking point into another world, a chaotic tumultuous world of the unbelievable.

Drying himself off and putting on a fresh pair of clothes, he kicked his feet up on the sofa he lied upon.  Letting his wet hair dampen the soft cushion below his head, he thought of what the creature said.  “She speaks to us.”  Now what in the world could that he mean?  Driving down deep into his brain as a hot searing iron, he immediately got to his feet.  Walking past the small kitchenette, he made his way to the small fold out table that the rented room had available.  All lain out across the table even encompassing half of the living room floor were maps, diagrams, hand written scribbles on torn notebook paper, and plenty of books that even a librarian would have a fit over.  All of them splayed out in intricate patterns making obscure and nonsensical diagrams, he sat on the lone chair staring awkwardly at the work he had accomplished over those last five years.

Looking in the mirror that hung adjacent on the wall ahead of him, he took a long time to reflect on what he saw.  An aging man almost hitting thirty yet appearing as an old graying hermit.  His beard completely unkempt, his sunken eyelids showing nights of barely any sleep, along with creviced cheeks and lined wrinkles on his forehead making him seem a lot older than he was.  Another sigh escaping tired lips he muttered the words.  “What have I gotten myself into.”

Nitpicking through a lot of books on the table, he opened three of them in a row, eyeing words that stood out but never reading a complete sentence.  He gone over this dialogue plenty of times, close to a hundred maybe even a thousand.  The sound of nagging neighbors only made the apartment even more gloomier in appearance.  The hissing of broken pipes and crackling of broken electrical wire behind decaying walls added to the despair he himself grew accustomed to.  This is the life he led now, only to be wasted away in books about nocturnal folklore, myths about the rising undead, diaries and journals of his own describing all the monsters he had butchered over the course of this crusade.

At times he wondered what it was all for, putting on a pair of reading glasses, lifting up a pencil and jotting down what the creature had told him.  “Her?”  Now there was a new word never uttered by one of these creatures.  Throughout all the literature he managed to read and put to memory, never once had a female pronoun ever been mentioned.  Reaching for a green binder with words HISTORY written on the front, he opened up the spiraled notebook and went over his notes.  All of his killings never made it to press or ended up in a newspaper let alone the tabloids, but neatly compiled in a journal of his own accord.  The last five years took him on a path well beyond one might call a vacation.  More like a quest for judgment, for atonement, of finding out the truth behind that unrelenting darkness.

Opening up another journal than another, he compared his notes as he made his way to the couch once more.  Starting first with his friend than his sister, moving onward in his old suburban neighborhood, all those festering nest gathered in some kind of occultic circle.  He made the distinctions before leading him further outside the city he was born in well across state lines.  Drawings of migrated patterns were etched with number two pencil, signifying the route that these creatures of the night seem to follow.  Almost as if they slept unaware behind closed doors according to custom, a ritual of some sort.

This horrific route spelled out common behaviors, some type of hive mind leading this undead minion to an unheard call.  Maybe some sort of telepathic link to a much more prolific entity.  The word the creature uttered before its death “Her” was all that he could think about.  His mind went in every direction, touching on this and that but never coming to a complete understanding.  A clockwork in motion always circling but never stopping time itself.  “Only the beginning” was the next thing it spoke.  Everywhere he seemed to set up shop, hunker down, set up base, and become comfortable, that unparalleled schism took him someplace else.  Somewhere so close yet so far away.  It all seemed to jumble in a non-coherent maze, one that was meant to be walked and never understood.  Maybe that was what his crusade became, an endless fight in an unflinching war.  A war he himself started when he first pounded the stake through his sister’s heart.

Eventually the man fell asleep due to strain of exhaustion.  Passing out on the couch his head dipped into his chest breathing heavy yet rhythmically.  That was when the dream set in.  Like the sweltering rain coming over the hills, the dream state carried him to a different place…to a different world…to realms untouched by human hands.  There he awoke only to find himself back home.  Blue eyes scanned the interior of the house he grew up in only to realize it had not been abandoned but looked as if someone lived there.  He could smell the aroma of freshly cooked bread, and outside the window he saw the trees in his yard bend to the winds of spring.  How pleasant and exciting it was to be back home.

Raising from the couch he ran up the stairs toward his room.  Just the way it had always been.  His bed unmade just the way he left it every morning when he returned from school.  A set of posters hung on the wall of his favorite movies growing up, his old Sony TV set hummed to life playing an old cartoon from the 80s, and his old jacket he wore to grammar school tossed over his desk chair.  Everything seemed to be in place, everything seemed to be right, until he gazed outside his window.

That spring afternoon gave way to a hazy shade of gray.  Clouds hid the sun from behind their ominous masquerade.  Even the rays shrunk and skidded behind darkened thunderheads.  No thunder could be heard signifying rain.  Only a dead silence came to set upon his bedroom and he could hear it echo throughout the entire house.  That was when the thuds rang from the wall adjacent of his sister’s bedroom.  The thrash of furniture could be heard as if someone tossed her bed upside.  Drawers were being flung at the wall only to terrorize Philip in his slight reverie.  

Knowing he was no longer that naive teenager when the creature had tortured him and turned his life upside down, he gathered all the courage he could muster and stormed into his sister’s room.  His jaw dropped in horror as he noticed an inverted pentagram drawn on the floor with five candles erected on all five points.  The room cascaded in the darkness, the only light radiating from the candles.  And in the middle sat a figure with its back towards Philip.  The steadiness was terrifying, holding a morbid curiosity to the older aging man standing in the doorway.  A high pitched screech went off in the horizon as if a car alarm went off down the street.  The sound was deafening as Philip cupped his ears from the antagonizing ring.

Collapsing to the ground the door to the room shut behind him.  Into a corner he crawled over and wrapped his arms around his legs.  Tears began to trail down his cheeks as the figure remained motionless.  Death tinged the air between them holding that surmounting terror as a pool of blood emanated from the never moving entity.  The skin ghostly white, its hair the color of night, its fingers elongated coming to sharp fingernails, and he could have swore it had a tail, one that came to a point lathering up and down.  And all the while he could not wake himself up, it felt too real, to livid to be dream, knowing full well this was reality in its sharpest form.  

Unable to grasp the mundane from the supernatural, the figure quirked its head to its side.  The visage held no eyes and no nose, just a grinning toothy smile.  The opposite wall gave way heaving head first into a long gutted tomb.  The candlesticks blew out leaving the tomb appear to be cast into eternity.  The room maniacally changed from a harmless bedroom into some sort of rugged cement casing.  Walls bled the same color crimson leading into streams that converged on the eyeless figure mouthing its fanged grin at Philip.  Sounds of screams could be heard coming from the tomb on the opposite side.

In a flash of blinding light the tomb widened its doors letting the scared man just to have a peek.  Out from its sides crawled a series of hooded creatures that walked on all fours.  Their hands resembling hooves, their spiked tails caressing along the rugged cement, horns jutted out from the top of their black cloaks.  And in the middle stood a beautiful woman baring nothing to tempt the naked eye.  Her own pupils somber melting from shades of amber to bronze to silver.  Golden locks draped the sides of her perfect face that was alabaster in tone holding no semblance of something heretical.  A perfect woman clad in the light laminating from behind her. 

When Philip turned his eyes toward the figure in the middle it no longer resembled that faceless enigma but his sister dressed in all white satin.  The horde of hooded creatures circled his sister, raising their hands toward the nude woman who appeared to glow with the sun behind her.  The whole of all eternity emptied out behind her as she stepped closer to his sister who in return bowed her head.  The smell of freshly strewn lilies and lilacs erupted his senses just then as the woman’s ever changing eyes centered on him.  A delicate smile came to those plush lips showing no signs of fanged intrusions.

“We have a guest.  A witness.  A spectator.”  From behind her back emerging apparently out from nowhere she brought out a long thick branch.  The branch was cut jaggedly coming to a point reminding him of the countless stakes he constructed.  Puncturing her wrist and showing no signs of pain, she allowed the droplets of blood pour on top of his sisters’ head.  Pools of blood soaking her hair and her face and her shoulders.  “A sister bathed in the blood of the nocturnal fire.”

A black flame arose behind the woman cascading bluish glints along the rugged cement walls.  The creatures howled and grunted in unison.  His sister jolted in spasms, her back arching backward, her hands gripping the ground as if holding on for dear life.  Her eyes bare nothing but black open orbs.  The woman laughed hysterically, jerking in monotone motions.  Bones bending, elbows separating, knees buckling, neck giving sway, head bobbing up in down in some chaotic rhythm.  Snakes glistened atop her head instead of those golden locks, her naked body leaving nothing to the imagination of something every mortal man would die for, even in its contorted state.  A pair of tattered and torn wings pierced through her back extending further and further on both her right and left sides.  A church bell clung in the room once again blistering his sense of sound.  And that was when the room bathed in utter darkness, all eyes looking at him bleeding out that red tint, and the image of an oak tree automatically took place of the devilish woman.  A tree garnered in white varnish withered in time standing eternally in its resting place.  The scent of days long gone passed away in the centuries of unwelcome catastrophe.  How old that oak left its imprint on Philip’s mind burrowing deep inside his soul, moving across time in unbridled passion.

That was when the dream ended and he jumped from his sleep.  That image of the pentagram and the tree had to be drawn.  Racing to collect one of his scrap books he drew the picture that was fresh in mind.  That of the woman and of his sister, the hooded monstrosities walking on all fours.  And in the corner of the picture he wrote down the words the beautiful woman spoke.  Another clue to a piece of a broken puzzle.  That was when he realized he was bathed in sweat, an almost waking nightmare, a puzzling night terror.  He grabbed a glass of water from the kitchen sink gulping nonstop.  Another glass made him feel more like himself.  Yet that image still plagued his mind.

Walking over to the corner of the rented apartment, he rummaged through his weapon bag.  That same old duffel bag he used so many times, how many bladed and speared weapons he either forged or bought from hardware stores had he collected.  At the bottom, he found his old rosary, the one that belonged to his grandmother.  The silver cross never looked so great to him, the same shine held its vigor.  That sacred symbol he made the sign of the cross with made his heart race even less returning to a steady pace.  He sat upon the cold floor welcoming the comfort that the coolness brought.  He prayed a small easy prayer for guidance, for a sense of deliverance and sacrifice.  All to himself he gathered his thoughts and peace of mind came to settle in his nerves.

“That tree,” he said and thought to himself, “As old as time.  Leading me somewhere, but where?”  And that was when he made the connection between what his dream entailed and what the creature spoke about.  “She speaks to us…the woman…or…my sister.  But that can’t be.  I buried her.  I remember.”  He got back up on shaky legs and staggered over to the table to confront two books that made perfect sense now.  His grandfather’s journal and the book detailing the O’Rourke ancestry.  “Somehow…Sarah is the link between the past and the future.  And what I did to her died with her.”  With a shocked look on his face as he read his grandfather’s words how to dispel the nosferatu power, he shook his head in despair.  “I never completed the procedure…the ritual too expel the darkness from its carrier.”

His apartment door opened violently, the dead lock exploding from a gun blast that permeated through the apartment complex.  Three people stormed in brandishing pistols, two of them readying and pointing at Philip.  All three stood in a straight unifying line standing in front of the doorway just in case he decided to run or escape.  The three wore similar hoods all tied at the neckline, each of their cloaks blowing breezily then coming to rest as the scene disheartened in tone.  No eyes or faces could be seen and all three remained dead silent.  Philip jumped up and stood his ground.  His features at first startled and terrified turning into sternness and rectification.  His eyes bore a deep heated glare as the four them recreated a clip from an old western.  Only one would survive, and Philip had a bad feeling that it would not end in his favor.  

“Mr. O’Rourke.  We have much to discuss.  Come with us or die.”

May 7, 2021

Author's Note

What do you think of me jumping back and forth from the past to the present? Should I write more short stories of the past/history? Or should I write more modern day stories? And what would you like to see in upcoming stories I have in mind?