“And you!” Hegel’s pick spun through the air, the point sinking in Vittorio’s stomach. He was knocked to the ground, and several more Grossbart-born missiles struck him before he could rise. A dagger once used by Captain Barousse to end his own life flew from Hegel’s fingers and sunk into the Road Pope’s chest.
“Ain’t suffer no demons to live!” Manfried shouted at the pincushioned corpse.
“Witches neither!” Hegel hollered. “When yous get to Hell tell’ em Saint Hegel put you there!”
The first demon shook with laughter, bouncing atop the corpses and chastising its fellows as they burst from their hosts’ buboes. These two were smaller but equally vile, and they at once skipped to the first, their sharp digits, pointy horns, and hooked feet scratching at skin and plating that strained to contain the greasy fluids within. The first continued to reprimand the others, easily evading them with its longer legs as the organ crowning its posterior fired spurt after chunky spurt of rank discharge into the air.
Nothing stirred on the sands for leagues and leagues save the encircled men, all living things fleeing at the first whiff of Heinrich’s rank retinue-even the maggots had abandoned their rotting hosts as the demons wreaked the full extent of their evils upon the flesh of their human mounts. The demons sprang toward the Grossbarts, bringing their stinking miasma with them. Even this could not penetrate their circles, and the Grossbarts heckled the demons and spat upon them until they realized this pleased the creatures. As the darkness dwindled and light began to creep over the sands a strange transformation in attitude took place, all three demons piling against each other and frantically bartering with the Grossbarts to leave their circles.
“I know where riches beyond counting lie,” the first demon squealed.
“I know where there are more,” the second countered, “and I’ll leave you intact as soon as we find another body for me!”
“Please,” the third whined, “if you break the circles of your fellows we shan’t touch you, and may part in peace!”
“Balls,” snorted Hegel. “Cockcrow’s at hand, so yous best set to prayin. To me.”
“It’s gonna hurt,” Manfried said excitedly, “ain’t it? It’s gonna hurt worse than I can imagine, bein sent back down!”
Rodrigo and Raphael were barely awake but dared not rest until the fiends departed for good. The last prisoner shifted from foot to foot, ineffectively trying to banish the cramps that plagued him. Like the Grossbarts, he had drawn a narrow circle that did not afford him enough room to safely sit within its boundary. The demons also hassled him, Raphael, and Rodrigo but none would bargain.
The sunlight crested a dune and the demons groaned, clumsily hurling themselves away from the glow, too weak to move with more than staggering bounces. Then they ceased their moaning and all turned toward the light. The Grossbarts perked up, for all three snuffled the anteneae-ringed weeping sores they had in place of mouths and pushed themselves toward the rising sun.
Tears of pus dribbled as the sunlight descended upon them, two curling their legs underneath themselves and covering their eyes with their skeletal paws, but the original demon forced itself forward. Then a beam touched its loathsome body mid-hop and its exoskeleton shattered with a thousand fissures. The swirling miasma became a black cloud of smoke issuing forth as it shriveled to nothing in the sand, only a scorch mark on the earth denoting its passing. Manfried felt the sunlight envelop him and stepped out of the ring to better taunt the last two demons.
One mustered its strength and flew at him, howling his name as it entered the sunlight and burst, rancid liquids staining the sand at his feet. The last gave a final desperate push into the shadows and then was overtaken, belching pestilential fumes as it deflated and spun in the sand. Then they were alone in the desert, the demons forced back into their pit to scheme and moan and curse the Grossbart name.
XXXI. The Final Heresy
Of Raphael and Rodrigo little more is recounted here, for the men parted ways with the Grossbarts after their battle with the demons. Rodrigo sought to liberate Barousse’s bones from the Hospitallers’ cemetery on Rhodes, wishing that he might rest in a holier place-a goal the Grossbarts heartily approved. Raphael wanted only to leave the miserable country that had shaken his spirit and stolen his fist, and so he accompanied Rodrigo on the long, limping trek north to the Holy Land and beyond. Mary willing, their fresh wounds did not fester and their path remained clear, but the Grossbarts did not know, for they turned south as they always did.
The sole surviving prisoner, a hardened killer named Hassan, led them to Cairo, and while the sun scalded and the sand chafed and Hegel’s three-fingered hand itched and Manfried’s punctured gut throbbed they at last stood on the dunes overlooking the great tombs of Gyptland. They could not verbally communicate with Hassan, referring to him as Arab in Al-Gassur’s stead, yet through pantomime and prayer he had brought them to their destination. No tears of joy or shouts of triumph passed through their beards, only smug mutters of satisfaction.
They spent several days scouting the stone monoliths, choosy as nobles about their grapes. All the pyramids appeared too exposed to still hold riches, but eventually they stumbled across a stone arch half-buried in the sand. They spent all night clearing out the entrance and bickering.
“This Arab done us better than the last,” Hegel panted.
“Least he don’t talk all that rubbish. Be nice if he talked proper though, so we could explain why his share’ll be less than ours.” Manfried dumped another helmet of sand out of their excavation.
“He’ll get the point in one fashion or another.” Hegel spit on his hands. “Think we’s bout ready.”
“Yeah.” Manfried removed his prybar. “Let’s crack it.”
“Wonder what befell our Arab. The other one, I mean.” Hegel jammed his tool into the slight seam in the stone.
“Sandy-eared fuck.” Manfried strained. “Told you. Got carried off long with that other monster. Seen it myself.”
“Yeah, I mean after that, though,” Hegel grunted.
“Well it was either demon or angel, so Heaven or Hell.”
“But which?”
“You’s the damn saint.” Manfried felt the block shift slightly. “Ask Mary.”
“It’s there!” said Hegel.
It actually took them the rest of the night to wedge it open enough to slip through. Before they entered they called Hassan down from his sentry position on top of the dune to have a drink. While the three laughed and rubbed their hands in anticipation light crept up the side of their dune, and the Grossbarts ate the last of the camel they had stolen from a Bedouin several days before. The beast had struck Hegel as even more suspect than a horse.
“What you reckon’s inside?” asked Hegel.
“Witch’s gold,” Manfried belched. “If we’s lucky, regular gold if we ain’t.”
“Why’d I want some gold touched by a witch?” Hegel demanded.
“Cause then we’d never be able to spend it all.”
“But if a witch grubbed it up-”
“Then you bless it pure, thickhead, I swear, you’s…” Manfried trailed off, his eyes trained on the beams of sunlight brushing the top of the arch.
“I’s what, bath-mouth?” Hegel asked. “Answer up, son, and lose your holy station.”
“Shut it.” Manfried dropped his meat and slowly stood, brushing the weathered stone. “Brother,” his voice shaking along with his shoulders, “what you make a this?”
Hegel set down his wine but before he could reprimand Manfried he saw it too, and slumped back in the sand. “What the shit?”
“It’s it, ain’t it?!” Manfried turned away from the rough G chiseled in the stone, the symbol clearly fresher than the worn bas-reliefs. “That’s our goddamn mark!”
“Yeah.” Hegel felt sick. “Damn if it ain’t.”
“What in Hell!?” Manfried kicked the sand and threw his prybar down. “Lousy old fucker! All the goddamn tombs in Gyptland!”
Hassan stood and gestured to the engraving, shrugging his shoulders. Manfried sucker punched him and when the man fell he booted him again. For several minutes Manfried raged and swore and Hegel drank.
“Our grandad,” Hegel explained to the contorted guide. “Truth finally be laid bare, I’d kind a doubted he ever made it.”
“Pack it up,” Manfried said. “Let’s get movin to the next one.”
“Hold a tic.” Hegel held up his hand.
“Why? Why the fuck-”
“Cause I said so!” Hegel jumped up. “You know that feelin I get when somethin don’t wash, or we’s liable to get some ill our way?”
“Yeah?”
“Well, I ain’t got it.” Hegel scratched his beard. “Anythin, I feel, I dunno, good bout this here crypt.”
“Eh?”
“Yeah!” Hegel picked up the prybar and offered it to his brother. “I mean, he might a carved it fore he went in, and dropped dead at the sight a all the loot. Or he couldn’t carry it all, meant to come back for it but didn’t want our cunty da slip-pin in fore he could get back.”
“Suppose the possibility exists.” Manfried stroked the end of his beard to remind his brother that with half of Hegel’s in a monster’s gullet, there could be no denying the superiority of Manfried’s silver bush.
“Can’t hurt nuthin.” Hegel stood up. “Get with it, Arab.”
Hefting their gear, Hegel lit an oil lamp taken from the same unfortunate traveler whose camel they had killed and squirmed inside. Manfried followed with Hassan close behind, only his fear of the saint preventing him from knifing Manfried in the back. Stone stairs led down into midnight, and with each step Hegel felt more confident. Then the stair underfoot gave a soft click as he put his weight on it, and even without the goosepimples exploding on his neck he would have known to run for it. A thunderous crashing echoed after them, and reaching an opening Hegel ducked around the corner followed by Manfried. As they looked back for Hassan an explosion of dust and rock shards exited the stairwell, snuffing out their lamp.
“Feel
“Stow it,” said Hegel, “I’s relightin the lamp so’s we can find a way out.”
When Hegel finally got it lit they saw the entire stairway was choked with fallen blocks from the ceiling. They stood in a massive stone chamber far exceeding any sepulcher they had previously pilfered. Amidst grumblings they agreed there must be another stairway or exit somewhere in the vault. They were wrong.
