The Forgotten God

Chapter 26

The crow flew brazenly over the decrepit scenery, occasionally offering a mocking cry if it spotted movement. A piece of paper, a feral cat, nothing more.

The wing of the Falcon brings to the king, the wing if the crow brings him to the cemetery.

Through its eyes, Am-Heh was watching the shambling forms of his resurrected servants, unimpressed at their progress and already considering replacing them with some of the living. A taxing project but one that would yield far more stable results.

Their pace was unsteady and their limbs weak. Decay set in so easily in the damper ground, even with the protection of the wooden surround. In the sands of Egypt, the body became like leather, hardier.

Quietly he surveyed the ground, still allowing the overhead images to remain in mind, quite a skill and one that could be highly disorienting the first few times.

The rain and lack of care had made some areas a quagmire and he could almost see the bodies beneath slipping from their crude beds to huddle together as the mud forced them out.

Dignity in death was not a quote that made any sense.

To think that the stumbling female had once danced on west end stages and performed to whistling gentlemen in the less modest theatres was almost unbelievable.

A former socialite and part time entertainment, she had become a retiring grandmother in later years to seven grandchildren and held in high regard in charity circles.

Now, along with a man who had been a hard grafter in the mines, she moved to do what she would never have thought of doing. Or at least her shell did. Her soul, wherever it lingered would doubtlessly be unimpressed by the need for death and flesh.

Their condition did not go unnoticed by Ash or Marie and a slight ray of hope emerged from the growing darkness that surrounded them.

"They'll fall apart getting in," Marie said quietly "or even if they don't, they aren't the rabid Walking Dead monsters."

The connoisseur of zombie films and programmes, she knew what she was talking about.

"My bet is that they'll follow," Ash answered glumly "that thing isn't stupid, more's the pity. He wouldn't be a God if he was."

"I don't know, some were pretty dim when it came to certain areas,'" Mr Montford countered, his eyes fixed on the objects he'd recovered, cradling them tenderly as if they were new-born kittens. They were just as precious to him, relics of the past and the life he loved, the tools to teach the future. "Finding the weakness is somewhat tricky though."

"If he has a weakness, I think Isaac is it, or part of it." Marie and Mr Montford starred as Ash spoke the thoughts he'd been holding onto. He gave a shrug, unperturbed by the looks. "Why would he have taken him otherwise? He seemed to recognise him. If he wasn't a weakness then he'd have ripped him apart, he could have done." He gestured to the sticky wounds coating his employers face. "Look what he did to you!"

"You do have a point. However, unless we know about where he came from or speak to Isaac, then we might know. But the way things are, that's doesn't seem likely."

The dull thud echoed in the room as the male corpse bumped into the door outside. It faltered back as though drunk before walking into it again with whatever force it had.

He was well built from the hard works in the bleak pits and even though his muscles and limbs had wasted away during his slumber he still held a degree of power, those old habits never truly dying.

A grunt left compressed airways each time, eventually becoming frustrated. It could sense the power from the relics that its master had commanded it to retrieve and smell the sweet flesh its rotten teeth craved.