the seven devils [completed]

chapter thirty-seven

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

The crows had started nibbling at the corpse's flesh, and one poked at its eye relentlessly until it fell out of its socket and dangled by the hold of the optical nerve. The head itself was barely strung by a few tendons, almost completely cut off from the neck up, and the blood had dried to a dusky color. There was a putrid odor in the air, and the students that gathered around the chapel to stare at the cross that the body had been impaled on.

It stood on top of the chapel like a scarecrow in the fields, almost as if it were supposed to keep something away or to send out a warning to whatever roamed around Scholomance. The garments on the body had been ripped by the birds, or maybe something else, and shredded skin peeked through the material's holes.

It was a summer day, and in the Carpathian mountains, that meant that there was barely any wind, and yet the reek of mortality seemed to envelop Scholomance as the body of Ivan Oleh stood against the harsh solstice sun.

There was nothing but taciturnity amongst the crowd, a few sobs, and yet the children had grown so accustomed to death that it no longer seemed to bother them as it once had. After all, they had been taught that death was as feeble as life.

"Nothing to see here," came the call of the Dark Priest as he pushed through the students, a few seventh-years trailing behind him and trying to scatter away the younger apprentices, "Just another monster attack, this is why you should never wander outside in the dark. As long as you are inside those walls, you are safe. However, I cannot speak for whatever might tempt you to step outside."

The words fell on the ears of the innocent children, and many of them wept at the sight of their fellow classmate so brutally massacred. It had not been that long since they had lost Ecaterina, and none of them were ready for another funeral. Her body had barely been buried, and the tomb still had green flowers placed on it daily. Not many plants grew around Scholomance, and some wondered how they could cover two graves.