Ander - Part 6: Subchapter 121
121
Kiana barely had enough time to register the dirty, mangy fur and the dried splatters of blood across its bony knuckles before she was yanked right off her feet. She yelled and tried to pull away, but she wasn't touching the ground anymore, so she could only kick uselessly, making herself swing back and forth. Pain tore through her shoulder in oscillating waves.
The other hand grabbed at the flap of the tent and threw it wide, revealing the face behind the curtain like a grim magician's trick.
"Hello, Foxy!" It was the chewer, and up this close, Kiana could see exactly what he was chewing on. It was a dirty brown chicken bone, all cracked and splintered, swimming in a sea of frothy drool. It clattered against his teeth as he moved it from one cheek to the other, sucking on it and playing his tongue over the bumpy ends.
"Let go of me!" Kiana screamed. His fingers were biting into the soft meat of her arm, and it was all she could do to keep herself from panicking completely.
"Whacha doin' in here?" the bone-chewer asked, peeking at the blankets strewn about inside the tent. "Ooh, this sure looks cosy. Plannin' on taking a little kip? Mind if I join you?"
The chewer began to push her back inside and, realising what was happening, Kiana screamed so loud it felt like her throat would tear itself right down the middle. This only seemed to amuse the chewer, however, and he broke into a huge smile. Thick runners of brownish, chicken bone-flavoured drool ran down his chin. "Tryin' to wake your friend?" The chewer gave Dorin's leg a little tap with his foot. "Sorry, but he's been having a really rough day. Best to let him sleep. Best to be... quiet." He raised a finger to his wet, scummy lips. "Shh..."
Kiana squirmed as hard as she could, trying to work herself free. When that failed, she brought up her legs and kicked out with both feet, hitting the Wolf squarely in the stomach, but she might as well have tried to kick a boulder for all the good it did her.
"Let me go!" she screamed. "Dorin! Dorin, wake up! Doriiin!"
The Wolf slammed her down among the crates and boxes hard enough to make her teeth rattle, and suddenly he was right on top of her, straddling her, pinning her down with his weight.
"No!" She tried to wriggle free, but she couldn't move! The bone-chewer was looking down at her with those awful yellow eyes and she couldn't move!
"This is what you get, Foxy," he said and crunched the remainder of the bone between his jaws with a wet, splintery crack. "Guess you shoulda let us die, huh?"
It leaned in close. Thick brown ropes of drool hung from incisors the size of carpentry nails. She could clearly see the bubbles trapped inside before they broke off and splattered against her cheek. She could feel his hand crawling down her side, tracing the curvature of her waist, her hip...
Kiana reached out with her free hand, looking for something, anything, pawing along the floor just like this animal was pawing at her body.
He reached her stomach and, suddenly, he stopped. He looked down at her and lightly squeezed her belly like a baker testing the freshness of a loaf of bread, a frown slowly spreading across his brow. "Wait a minute. Are you...?"
Kiana's fingers closed over something smooth and hard. Without checking to see what it was, she swung it directly at the pervert's face.
It turned out to be the broken bottle she had brought in earlier. The jagged points sliced into the cretin's muzzle like a set of razor sharp teeth and shattered against his head in a shower of glass.
Kiana closed her eyes on instinct as those shards pattered down from above, and when she opened them again, she saw the Wolf, still straddling her, holding the side of his face with both hands. Streams of blood poured between his fingers in crimson rivulets and dripped down onto his thigh.
"You!" he gasped, slowly pulling his shaking fingers away. The entire left side of his muzzle was a shredded mess. There were shards of glass embedded deep inside his lips, glittering in the dirty orange half-glow of the tent. His bleeding lips pulled back into a ferocious snarl. Even his gums had slivers of glass sticking out at odd angles, as if he had grown a brand new set of shining teeth. "You stinking BRAT!!"
Kiana tried to sit up, and that was the moment the world flashed a brilliant white. All the sound in the world, all the shouts, the screams, the weeping, became strangely dampened, as if someone had stuffed her ears full of cotton. She had enough time to wonder what was happening when her head struck the floor and all the sound came rushing back in, along with a few brand new sensations. Her cheek was a throbbing ball of agony, and the bitter taste of blood was oozing over her tongue.
The bone-chewer was still straddling her, nearly crushing her with his weight, holding his shaking fist up for her to see. The knuckles now had a fresh new layer of blood dripping down from the shaggy tangles of his fur.
Her blood.
No... Kiana didn't know if she said that out loud. Her mouth felt swollen. It hurt just to breathe.
"YOU BRAT!!" he screamed in a shower of blood. Pieces of broken glass fell from his lips and dropped onto her chest. "DAMN FOX BRAT!" He struck her again, moving so quickly she couldn't even hope to defend herself. The pain was like a fiery explosion inside her head, wiping out all thought and sensation, leaving only a brilliant scar of blinding pain in its wake.
She tried to cover her face, but the mouth-chewer grabbed her by the hair, wrenching her head upwards, and smashed her again. She could hear the impact as if it was coming from inside her skull.
"Damn brat!" he screeched, and was he smiling? Smiling even with all that glass in his mouth, smiling even with blood raining down from his teeth, smiling even with all those cuts running down his face?
Yes. He was.
The bone-chewer raised both fists high above his head, clasping them together, and Kiana could already see those hands swinging down toward her face like a vision of the future, could already hear the crunch of her nose reverberating inside her head, could already feel the slivers of bone slicing through her muzzle, could already smell her own blood, pouring down her throat, choking her, drowning her.
"You shoulda let us die, Foxy," he said through a grin of crimson teeth. "You really, _really_shoulda -"
A black hand ripped through the side of the tent and clamped shut around his neck, trapping his words inside his throat, turning them into a wet gargle. It was so sudden Kiana didn't even realise what was happening until he began to grab at the hand, spluttering and coughing, his fingers slipping through coarse strands of fur.
That arm. That massive, black arm, covered in burns and puss-weeping gashes, streaked with blood that reeked of death and disease. Kiana gasped in horror and she could actually taste that greasy, coagulated smell on her tongue, invading her lungs with its putrid stench.
The bone-chewer was trying frantically to get away, but those long fingers had wrapped around his neck like a collar, holding him in place. Kiana could feel his struggles against her body; heavy paroxysms of pain and panic.
"Geeerhk!" He tried to speak, but could only produce inarticulate garbles suffused with a filthy foam of spit and blood, dribbling down his chin as he gasped for air and tapped at the giant hand around his throat, tapping and tapping, faster and faster, creating something that sounded uncannily like applause, as if he were applauding his own imminent death.
Kiana watched in absolute horror as the tendons in that hand began to stand out and the claws slowly disappeared into the chewer's neck. She wouldn't have been able to move even if she hadn't been pinned down.
He tried to pry those fingers loose, but it was no use. His eyes went wider and wider as those fingers sunk deeper and deeper into his flesh. Gouts of blood ran down his neck and dripped onto Kiana's dress.
"Stop it..." Kiana whispered, unable to tear her eyes away. "Stop it... Stop it!"
The hand closed into a fist and the bone-chewer's neck simply exploded, not unlike the bottle Kiana had shattered against his face mere minutes ago. Blood splattered down onto her face in a sickly torrent, burning hot, steaming in the cold. Kiana clamped her mouth shut, but she could feel it on her nose, inside her nostrils, on her lips, on her eyelids.
The chewer's mouth dropped open and a piece of chicken bone rolled out along his sagging tongue and fell to the floor, trailing a long, thin line of blood behind. His eyes were completely blank, staring straight ahead at nothing.
The hand opened with a nauseating squelch and Kiana could actually see the shapes of the delicate bones that had kept the chewer's head attached to his shoulders his entire life, completely useless now.
She wanted to scream, but she couldn't find her voice. Her voice was like the chewer's eyes; empty, hollow, gone...
Dead.
The Wolf began to pitch forward, and the sight of that ghastly hole in his neck coming straight for her did something to unlock her voice. She pulled in air, unmindful of the ropes of blood stretching over her parting lips, and screamed as loud as she could before all that weight came crashing down on her, pinning her, crushing her, smothering her in warm, stinking death. Those empty eyes were barely an inch away from her own, looking right through her, perhaps into infinity, perhaps into nothing, just staring, and she couldn't stop screaming. Blood poured out over her neck and chest, sticking her dress to her body. She pulled in more air, breathing in all that death, and screamed at the top of her lungs. She tried to push the brute off her body, but he was just too heavy for her. She pushed at his arms, but they flopped right back down on top of her. She tried to push his head away, and at first it seemed like she was making progress, but then that hole in his neck opened up like a second mouth, yawning wide, showcasing all the crushed muscles and tendons, all the severed veins, all the bony ridges of his neck bones and Kiana couldn't handle it. She screamed and his head dropped back on top of her, knocking all the wind right out of her sails.
Oh gods, oh gods, please...
The black hand was hovering above her head, the fingers splayed out like the bars of a cage, absolutely coated in blood all the way up to the third knuckle. Crimson droplets accumulated at the tips of claws as sharp as daggers - bright red spikes shining in the dark - and pattered onto her face like rain.
Kiana's eyes travelled along that arm of their own volition, right up to the side of the tent, where it fused together with a massive shadow as black as pitch. It was the same shadow she had seen emerging from the bushes on the stormy night she first met Ander. It was the same shadow that had sunk down into the muddy depths of the river. It was the same shadow that had returned from the dead and blighted the snow of the pass.
Caught in the grip of panic, Kiana tried to push the bone-chewer's body away once again, but her hands were slick with blood and kept slipping through his sodden fur. She tried to roll him off, but he was like a giant sand bag on her body, nothing but dead weight.
Dead weight... Dead weight... Truer words have never been spoken, Kiana. Now you'd better get out of here or you'll turn into dead weight, too!
The shadow reached up with claws like daggers. They dimpled the skin of the tent and pierced right through, becoming real, gaining form. She tried to scream as those claws worked their way down, ripping and tearing, but she could only produce a fearful croak. Tears streamed down her face as the tatters rippled in the wind. There were glimpses beyond that skin, glimpses of black fur and putrid, festering wounds.
An eye appeared above those claws, an eye as black and oily as drowning coal, surrounded by broken veins of red. And a set of teeth, spreading wider and wider, growing into a monstrous smile, dripping blood from a crimson maw.
"You're welcome, Foxy..."
It was Banno.
If you enjoy my story, please help keep my face un-mauled by irritable ostriches by dropping me a donation.
Thank you! ^_^
Paypal:[email protected]
Donation Progress $239 / $300 (Unlock Sunday update)
How and Why: The Story behind "Ander" (Journal): https://www.sofurry.com/view/517234
Special thanks go out to the following furs for helping me keep this project afloat with their generous donations. I couldn't do it without your support.
- Mystery fur
- PyrePup
- KmlRock
- Faan
- Sunny-Fox
- Mystery fur #2
- Sky Star
- Claybrook
- 1_2Punch
- Cahal Silverpaw
- TheLoneDriftor
- Ariedren
Thank you! You guys are the best! ^_^