Boudica
English Yao Ming
He had to stay quiet or they would find him; find him laying amidst the rotting bodies of the deceased whos putrid smell was the only thing keeping them from finding him alive after all.
Them...
The Vampires.
Rolf could hear them, milling around, laughing and clashing their tankards together in post-feast jubilation. With what those tankards were brimming with the young Nord had no idea but could take a well educated guess whilst he lay prone in the crude earthen pit.
The undead beings frightened him more than anything nature could deliver because they were just so...unnatural, so foreign; like a disease infecting a healthy body and they just didn't belong here.
The dead should stay dead, honourable in their tombs, caskets and urns, not continuing their unearthly existence off the life of others, sucking the life essence from the living like leeches.
What was that?
The familiar shot of panic streaked through him, paralyzing the young Nord as the sound of close footsteps crunched over the dirt floor near the precipice of the great, horrid pit in which he hid. Each nearing footstep felt like it was personally stamping onto his chest and Rolf found it difficult to hold his breath to stop his frantic lungs giving his mortality away.
Blood rushed to his ears as he saw one of the pale faces leer over the egde of the pit, blotting out some of the light emanating from the candles dotted around the cavern. Shadowed and menacing, Rolf struggled to maintain a still profile, beads of sweat gathering at his hairline slipped down and stung his eyes, making his eyelids want to scrunch up protectively.
But he couldn't move, otherwise they'd know...
Yet the way that vampire was leering into the pit and, seemingly, straight at him...
Did they know already?
The idea terrified him and shook him even more intensely underneath his failing facade of death. So when the liquid was poured from the vampires tankard and hit Rolf squarely in the face, he spluttered and squeezed his eyes shut. The blood stank like old septims that had been left in the rain and tasted as such when a few rogue splashes infiltrated his mouth before he gnashed his teeth together shut his lips.
His eyes were closed...
So he didn't see the vampire smile that horrible, sharp smile of death...
"We have a live one brothers!"
The next thing he knew, they had encircled the pit, black clad bodies all looming over to stare at the living human in their pit of the drained. Their eyes were terrible, red as hot coals and boring into his soul with their hellish, hungry expressions. If they had been loud, Rolf would have said it would have been the worst thing...yet it was their current silence that unnerved him and struck him vocal cords unable to process any form of sound, be it a scream or cry for help or mercy...
But then they descended like vultures onto a vulnerable and doomed animal...
And then he screamed..
"Rolf? Rolf!" Came a concerned feminine voice and Rolf started awake; eyes snapping open to reveal dilated pupils, and his body jerked into an upright position. Beads of sweat that had collected in the dips and planes of his bare body, ran down and made tracks in the previously undisturbed sheen of perspiration that shimmered whenever any light hit him.
Suddenly, he was no longer the boy of his memories, trapped in that pit of death and decay surrounded by ravenous monsters; no, he was once again awake and a grown man of 26 summers, laying in bed with his wife who was presently settling her hands on the back of his damp neck and tense shoulder.
"Rolf..." she crooned softly, trying relaxation by rubbing gently, "Rolf, my love, was it the dream again?"
His breathing had finally stabalised and he rubbed his calloused paws over his face as if to rub away any remainders of tiredness and fear; digging his thumbs into the sockets with a little more pressure to alleviate the sleep and stress on his eyes.
"Yes..." he sighed, as he started to relax under the gentle touches, before he turned to face the sweet face of his partner, "I'm sorry to have disturbed your sleep..."
"Oh shush shush," Sylgja chuckled softly, continuing her tender ministrations on her husbands tight back, attempting to loosen the hard knots and coils that had formed beneath the skin. Eventually, under his lovers touch, he uncoiled himself, knots unwound in his tense muscles and he started to lay back down onto the hay mattress next to his love, allowing himself a reprieve from gripping fear to enjoy the small things that helped to comfort him back into a sleepy, comfortable lull; the touch of soft, warm furs in an otherwise cold room for example, his wives skin against his own, reaching through his flesh and warming his bones and also the faint whisper of trees outside one of the windows.
Sylgja planted a kiss on his shoulder and lay a pale arm on his broad, scarred chest. "Sleep well my love, in the comfort that no one here will harm you, for tonight you are with me and I with you...body and soul..."
A smile tugged at his mouth and he shifted so his head rested on the dark, cropped hair of his wife and he could press an earnest kiss to the crown, on the chestnut locks. "Body and soul..." he murmured happily and incredibly softly yet...despite his current comfort...
He still couldn't sleep...
TBC
Reviews/comments are greatly appreciated
Them...
The Vampires.
Rolf could hear them, milling around, laughing and clashing their tankards together in post-feast jubilation. With what those tankards were brimming with the young Nord had no idea but could take a well educated guess whilst he lay prone in the crude earthen pit.
The undead beings frightened him more than anything nature could deliver because they were just so...unnatural, so foreign; like a disease infecting a healthy body and they just didn't belong here.
The dead should stay dead, honourable in their tombs, caskets and urns, not continuing their unearthly existence off the life of others, sucking the life essence from the living like leeches.
What was that?
The familiar shot of panic streaked through him, paralyzing the young Nord as the sound of close footsteps crunched over the dirt floor near the precipice of the great, horrid pit in which he hid. Each nearing footstep felt like it was personally stamping onto his chest and Rolf found it difficult to hold his breath to stop his frantic lungs giving his mortality away.
Blood rushed to his ears as he saw one of the pale faces leer over the egde of the pit, blotting out some of the light emanating from the candles dotted around the cavern. Shadowed and menacing, Rolf struggled to maintain a still profile, beads of sweat gathering at his hairline slipped down and stung his eyes, making his eyelids want to scrunch up protectively.
But he couldn't move, otherwise they'd know...
Yet the way that vampire was leering into the pit and, seemingly, straight at him...
Did they know already?
The idea terrified him and shook him even more intensely underneath his failing facade of death. So when the liquid was poured from the vampires tankard and hit Rolf squarely in the face, he spluttered and squeezed his eyes shut. The blood stank like old septims that had been left in the rain and tasted as such when a few rogue splashes infiltrated his mouth before he gnashed his teeth together shut his lips.
His eyes were closed...
So he didn't see the vampire smile that horrible, sharp smile of death...
"We have a live one brothers!"
The next thing he knew, they had encircled the pit, black clad bodies all looming over to stare at the living human in their pit of the drained. Their eyes were terrible, red as hot coals and boring into his soul with their hellish, hungry expressions. If they had been loud, Rolf would have said it would have been the worst thing...yet it was their current silence that unnerved him and struck him vocal cords unable to process any form of sound, be it a scream or cry for help or mercy...
But then they descended like vultures onto a vulnerable and doomed animal...
And then he screamed..
"Rolf? Rolf!" Came a concerned feminine voice and Rolf started awake; eyes snapping open to reveal dilated pupils, and his body jerked into an upright position. Beads of sweat that had collected in the dips and planes of his bare body, ran down and made tracks in the previously undisturbed sheen of perspiration that shimmered whenever any light hit him.
Suddenly, he was no longer the boy of his memories, trapped in that pit of death and decay surrounded by ravenous monsters; no, he was once again awake and a grown man of 26 summers, laying in bed with his wife who was presently settling her hands on the back of his damp neck and tense shoulder.
"Rolf..." she crooned softly, trying relaxation by rubbing gently, "Rolf, my love, was it the dream again?"
His breathing had finally stabalised and he rubbed his calloused paws over his face as if to rub away any remainders of tiredness and fear; digging his thumbs into the sockets with a little more pressure to alleviate the sleep and stress on his eyes.
"Yes..." he sighed, as he started to relax under the gentle touches, before he turned to face the sweet face of his partner, "I'm sorry to have disturbed your sleep..."
"Oh shush shush," Sylgja chuckled softly, continuing her tender ministrations on her husbands tight back, attempting to loosen the hard knots and coils that had formed beneath the skin. Eventually, under his lovers touch, he uncoiled himself, knots unwound in his tense muscles and he started to lay back down onto the hay mattress next to his love, allowing himself a reprieve from gripping fear to enjoy the small things that helped to comfort him back into a sleepy, comfortable lull; the touch of soft, warm furs in an otherwise cold room for example, his wives skin against his own, reaching through his flesh and warming his bones and also the faint whisper of trees outside one of the windows.
Sylgja planted a kiss on his shoulder and lay a pale arm on his broad, scarred chest. "Sleep well my love, in the comfort that no one here will harm you, for tonight you are with me and I with you...body and soul..."
A smile tugged at his mouth and he shifted so his head rested on the dark, cropped hair of his wife and he could press an earnest kiss to the crown, on the chestnut locks. "Body and soul..." he murmured happily and incredibly softly yet...despite his current comfort...
He still couldn't sleep...
TBC
Reviews/comments are greatly appreciated
