Metahumans vs the Undead: A Superhero vs Zombie Anthology (8 page)

When sundown came, Old Jack was sitting on a log by the entrance to the tower. One of the double doors was held closed by a wedge. A torch, set just inside the doorway, burned brightly. A second lit torch was set into the ground close to hand. The base of the Crusader’s shield was driven into the ground as well, with his sword and dagger leaning against it. Another sword leaned against the wall inside the tower.

When the first of the revenants appeared, Old Jack took up the torch and lit the firewood he had laid out and smeared with pitch that afternoon. Two walls of fire rose up, starting on either side of the tower doors and extending out for some twenty paces. The distance between the two lines of flame increased gradually until they were eight paces apart. He had no intention of fighting in the dark, and no wish to be surrounded. If the revenants burned easily, he reasoned, they would not want to walk through fire.

He replaced the torch and waited until the revenants reached the mouth of the fiery walls. Then he pulled down his cowl to effect the transformation. He tucked his dagger into his sword belt and took up his sword and shield, all the while watching the approaching group of four creatures. He took note of where they were when they sorted themselves into single file. This was as far forward as he could safely fight without risking their getting behind him.

The revenants advanced like stiff, clumsy sleepwalkers, their arms held out straight in front of them. The Crusader used his shield to deflect the right arm of the first one away from him, and swung down hard at the extended left arm. It fell away, severed at the elbow. Lowering his shield by a foot, he used the space thus created to take a wide backhanded cut with his sword at his opponent’s neck. The stroke decapitated the creature, which fell in a heap.

The next revenant in line stumbled over the no-longer-animated corpse and staggered sideways. The Crusader raised his boot and kicked him in the side, causing the revenant to lose his balance and fall on one of the flaming logs. In an instant he was a mass of flame. The unfortunate creature looked as if he was trying to flee the fire that consumed him, going through running motions while writhing on the ground on his back, but soon he moved no more.

With this the remaining revenants became agitated, and the Crusader took advantage of their distraction to behead them. Judging by their clothing, both had been among Sir Hugh’s soldiers.

By this time another group of revenants was approaching. Their leader had been Sir Hugh, for he wore full armor and carried a sword. The Crusader backed off a few paces and waited as the undead knight approached.

It was a prolonged and frustrating battle for both combatants. Sir Hugh’s great helm prevented the Crusader from beheading him, but at the same time it negated the undead knight’s most potent weapon
—
his bite. Although the Crusader managed to inflict several wounds which would have disabled a living opponent, they did no visible harm except to Sir Hugh’s
surcoat
, which fell from his body, hacked to shreds.

On the other hand, the revenant was too slow and clumsy to wound the Crusader. Although he still carried his sword he did not use it effectively, and the Crusader’s shield kept him at bay.

Still, the Crusader realized he was going to lose this fight, for time was on the revenant’s side. The Crusader had only minutes left before the Scabbard of Excalibur ceased to sustain him; Old Jack could not hope to defend himself against the least of these undead monsters. It was time to retreat.

Backing off several paces, he picked up the torch and flung it at Sir Hugh. Although his mail kept the fire from igniting him, he instinctively recoiled from the flames. Using the time he had gained, the Crusader ran for the tower. Slamming the door shut, he heaved at the beam and seated it firmly in its brackets. Tossing his shield into the cart, he seized the torch from the wall and raced up the stairs to the top of the tower. He had barely reached the top when he saw his cowl reappear.

The Crusader had run out of time.

Old Jack lit two more torches from the one he carried, and set all three through
crenelations
so they illuminated the ground below. Then he took up one of the longbows and a fistful of arrows. He had prepared the arrows by wrapping cloth around their shafts just behind their heads and then dipped head and cloth into a bucket of pitch. He spent the rest of the night shooting flaming arrows at the remaining revenants whenever they approached the tower. He didn’t try to take down Sir Hugh; as Old Jack, he couldn’t draw a longbow far enough to put even a bodkin arrow through mail. Instead, he targeted the foot soldiers and the villagers. As long as he could hit one of them, the arrow would stay put long enough for its target to ignite. While the revenant burned, the remaining ones would back off. As the ashes started to blow away, the rest would return.

Old Jack quickly learned to shoot at revenants in groups. Not only did this increase the chances of a hit, but occasionally the one struck would manage to set one of his companions on fire as well.

By the end of the night, only a handful of the undead creatures remained, among them the one that had been Sir Hugh. As soon as they retreated into the forest, Old Jack emerged from the tower. He had a lot of work to get done before nightfall.

Over the day Old Jack used his cart to move the supplies he needed from the tithe-barn to the tower. After his preparations were complete, he got back into his cart and drove it around and around the village to build up time. He had very little of that commodity left, especially since he had become the Crusader several times that afternoon to do heavy lifting. By this time, however, he had been awake for the better part of two days and a night, so he dozed off. When he dropped the reins, the horse stopped as well.

He awoke with a start late in the afternoon. He drove the cart into the tithe-barn and barred the door, securing the bar in place with spikes. Then he walked back to the tower, castigating himself for falling asleep when he should have been keeping the cart moving. He would never have done such a thing, he knew, when he was younger. Getting old, he decided, was a sad fate for a warrior; the only thing worse was the alternative.

He prayed he would not experience that alternative tonight.

As he had done the night before, Old Jack lit two lines of firewood when the revenants appeared. There were no more than ten of them now, with Sir Hugh leading. Old Jack waited until the last possible minute before becoming the Crusader; when he had checked the wheel at the tithe-barn, the golden sword had pointed almost straight up.

After a single pass of swordplay, the Crusader threw his shield at Sir Hugh and ran for the tower. Without pausing to close the doors, he raced up the stairs. By the time he reached the top, he heard them thumping slowly up the stairs after him. He looked down to make sure all of the revenants had followed him in, and then dropped the torch to the ground, where it landed near the doors. He picked up a coil of rope and threw the free end over the wall; the other end was tied off around a
merlon
. He backed through one of the adjacent
crenelations
and dropped over the side.

Climbing down a rope would have been a difficult feat for an armored knight, but it was no problem for the Crusader until he became Old Jack again halfway down. If he had not had the foresight to tie knots in the rope every foot or so, he would probably have fallen. Even so, the remaining climb was painful and exhausting.

Once on the ground he half limped, half ran to where the torch had landed. As he picked it up he heard the revenants coming back down the stairs. Suddenly one of them fell from the open stairway, missing the half-dozen open barrels and landing instead on the thick bed of straw that covered the stone floor. Unhurt, the revenant rose and turned toward the open doors. Old Jack threw the torch through the doorway and backed away as quickly as he could.

The dry straw caught fire immediately, and flames took over the inside of the tower. They ran up the stairway, the outside of which was liberally coated with pitch, and spread across the wooden floors and beams, which Old Jack had given similar treatment. He felt the heat from the fire as he continued to back away from the tower. By the time the barrels of pitch caught, he was far enough away from the tower to stop and watch the spectacle.

The fire’s intensity was limited by the amount of air that could get in through the doors to feed it, but it still did a thorough job of incinerating everything in the tower that would burn
—
including the revenants trapped inside. When the upper floors collapsed and fell to ground level, Old Jack took station in the solar of the manor house, now the most defensible building in the village, and kept watch for the rest of the night.

He stayed in the village for three more days until the remaining villagers returned. Although no more revenants appeared, the threat was not entirely abated, so Old Jack gathered the details he needed before setting out for the abbey.