Tomas and Landry cowered down as the ghouls headed in their direction, attempting to hide as best they could amongst the shadows of the fallen bookshelf. Lynn was speechless and refused to duck until Tomas pulled her head down beside his.
The things shrieked like birds of prey as they tore towards the others. They were faster than they looked. Their bones clattered against one-another, the chains hanging from stakes in their bodies chimed. Their eyes were unblinking, a fierce red.
Gharland took a huge swing of his sword at the first skeletal being. The ghoul leapt out of the way inhumanly fast before hissing and charging back at the captain.
He had no time to react.
The skeleton’s pointed arm bones pierced into Gharland’s side, knocking him back into the bookshelf with a wail. He rose his sword-wielding hand, blood spitting from his lips, before knocking the pommel of the sword into the bony face of the ghoul attacking him.
The pommel smashed the skeleton’s warped cheek bone, shattering a large part of its ring of spikes attached to its skull.
“Help me, you fools!” Gharland shouted to Ref, Styna and Smiling John who were still paralysed by what they were seeing.
Ref and Styna rushed towards some of the other running skeletons, blocking crazed blows from the sword-like forearm bones.
Smiling John, still recovering from his burns, lumbered over to Gharland. The captain continued striking the skeleton’s face with one hand and using his other arm to keep the horrific thing back at a distance.
Yet, the skeleton kept pushing Gharland back against the bookshelf, sticking its jagged bones deeper and deeper into his flesh.
Smiling John shoulder-charged the figure, giving the captain a chance to escape. His side was ripped open and bloodied, but the captain did not appear to be badly wounded.
The ghoul screeched at Smiling John before leaping several metres into the air like a pouncing cat and landing back down on top the soldier. Several of the spikes jutting from its bones speared into Smiling John’s flesh as he cried out.
“Help! Please!” Smiling John wept.
The ghoul began bashing its own skull against the trapped Smiling John, piercing his face and head with its bone spurs. Blood spat out with each impact, his one scarred face continuously punctured and left with dozens of ghastly holes.
The ruby-eyed freak screeched but did not slow as it headbutted Smiling John. His screams were filled with anguish.
Landry went to stand and help, reaching to his side for his sword. His fingers were met with nothing. Landry looked down at his belt, stunned; his scabbard was missing.
Tomas realised that the squire must have put it down somewhere. He held on to Landry’s forearm, tugging him back down into the shadows. They had no weapons to use against the creatures… there was nothing they could do.
Landry bowed his head in despair, clenching his jaw to try and drown out the harrowing screams.
Ref and Styna engaged two of the ghouls together, fighting as viciously as they had the night their camp came under attack by the hyena-like monsters.
But even they were quickly outmatched, as the freaks were relentless in their assault. Each strike the ghouls took seemed to do little harm to them.
Styna stuck his sword in to where the heart would be… nothing happened.
Ref punched the warped teeth from the other’s jaw before bringing his sword down and lopping off its lower leg below the knee. The thing fell but did not stop, crawling maniacally towards him with its gut-wrenching shrieks.
Smiling John kept begging for help as he lost his strength to fight back the freak on top of him. It relentlessly bashed its own spurred skull into John’s. His face became a mound of unrecognisable, bloody, fleshy pulp.
“Captain! Help!” he managed to cry as his lips burst and teeth shattered.
Gharland, hunched over and leaning against the bookshelf for support as he bled, refused. He took a few frightened steps back before turning and running for the main doors to the inner sanctum.
“Captain! Wait!” Smiling John shrieked. “Please! Help me!” His pleas went unanswered as his skull completely shattered.
Tomas heard wailing and frenzied shrieks from around the library as the other ghouls caught up with members of their company who had fled into the darkness.
“We have to get out of here, now!” Lynn demanded in a hushed tone.
“We won’t make it ten paces out of the sanctum without those things on us,” Tomas whispered.
“Let’s get some weapons first,” Landry suggested, pointing towards the set of tables not far off in the darkness where their belongings were. “Over there, that’s where the company’s gear is.”
The skeleton atop Smiling John leapt up from the dead man’s body, its ruby eyes scanning the darkness before rushing for Ref and Styna.
“Quick, now’s our chance,” Tomas said.
He patted Landry and Lynn’s backs to signal for them to run for the tables. They sprinted with their heads down, trying as best they could to not make a sound.
Fights were breaking out throughout the sanctum as the Gharland’s soldiers were hunted by the skeletal ghouls. Ref and Styna were slowly being worn down by the three attacking them nearby, trying their best to use their thick, brutish bodies to stand tall. Their strength would be their only hope against the onslaught.
Tomas, Landry, and Lynn raced through the shadows towards the set of tables covered in weapons, books, gear, backpacks, and supplies.
Another soldier from the company ran screaming through the halls of bookcases nearby with one of the ghouls shadowing him, gnashing its blackened teeth.
“Hurry! Hurry!” Lynn said, but the woman froze upon spotting something on the table.
“What is it?” Tomas noticed her sudden, direct stare.
She pointed to an old, dusty book, set amongst the company’s gear, bound in dark leather with strange, unrecognisable
