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Ivy held her knife ready. “Don’t cut it, until I say,” she said.
George took a wary step across the wooden planks of the rickety bridge. The boards strained beneath his awesome weight. He was halfway across.
“Now!” cried Ivy. They each slashed the ropes and the bridge buckled.
Zombies fell like stones, but George leapt, and incredibly, his fingers caught the edge of the boardwalk on which they stood. Who would have thought a monster that big and clumsy-looking could be so agile?
They stomped on his fingers, but he gave no indication he felt any pain. An elbow slammed onto the boardwalk, then he swung a leg up and over and suddenly he was on the balcony facing them.
They backed away but felt trapped against his horrible menace.
He roared.
Then something roared back. A great dark brown thing all covered in hair moved like a whirlwind and tackled George. It was as big or bigger than the gargantuan zombie was. It looks like a werewolf.
Daemona ushered Ivy away from where the two titans struggled against each other.
They hammered at each other with tooth, fist and claw. Audible blows rocked each opponent and the whole of Tall Town. One went crashing through a wall, only to emerge and do the same to his opponent.
“Where did a werewolf come from and why is he on our side? I thought such beasts would serve Ghul Tark?” asked Daemona, perplexed.
Ivy shushed her. “I think I know.”
The werewolf caught George’s arm in a terrible bite and shook its head like a dog with a bone. George howled in pain but reached up and brought his giant fist down on the werewolf’s skull. Dazed, the werewolf let go and backed away a step. It howled at the rising moon and again assaulted the rapacious foe. They hit through the boardwalk, which creaked beneath their weight until finally snapping. They crashed through to the next floor down. Just as quickly, they were up and trading blows again. The werewolf slashed his claws across the zombie’s chest, while the zombie punched the wolf hard enough to draw blood across his muzzle.
Daemona noticed the Necro Priest watching, rubbing his hands with glee. She knew what he was thinking; he couldn’t wait for George to defeat the werewolf so he could turn the walking canine into one of his undead slaves. She wasn’t sure George could defeat the werewolf, but she wasn’t about to risk it.
She ported to the Priest’s side and sunk a dagger into his abdomen, but he whipped around and struck at her fast as lightning. Daemona had not expected that. Her dagger was still stuck in his ribs!
He casually reached over and drew it out, then licked the blood from across the blade. “You don’t know me, Daemona, but my master knows you,” he said, pointing the dagger back at her. “He has sent me to reclaim your body and soul, that you might serve him and the Grey Empress beneath the impenetrable glory of the Grey Sovereign. You will join us.”
Daemona snarled, “I’ll never join you,” and ported, returning to stick him again and again from multiple directions as she circled fast as the wind, cold as the north. With the thought that no one could have withstood such an attack, Daemona paused a few feet away from him.
His skull face only grinned at her. “You can’t hurt me, Daemona, not with such parlor tricks. I am undead and cannot be harmed by things as simple as a knife thrust. Unfortunately, you can!” He charged at her with Daemona’s own blade, and she ported away just as the tip of the blade scratched her arm.
She reappeared a good twenty feet away. I’m getting better at this.
He wheeled to face her. “You’re quick, that’s good. But you’ll only die tired. Maybe while I wait to finish you, I’ll take the rest of these as my servants first. Hmmm?”
Daemona glanced behind him and saw George and the werewolf still beating each other senseless while the zombies swarmed over the town and forced the people to retreat.
“There is a way to beat him,” said a soft voice.
Daemona looked over her shoulder to see Esmerelda hiding in a clump of bushes. “How?”
“Life takes away the power of the undead.”
“What does that mean?”
“Use your gifts, your talents,” said the little witch.
Daemona looked back to face down the skull-faced Necro Priest. He grinned at her, thinking himself invulnerable, but she had a new plan. She ported to the Necro Priest, gripped him tightly across the coat, and ported just a few steps over, beside a tree. The Necro Priest was stuck halfway in and out of the tree’s trunk. His eyes bulged and then he was still.
The glowing green skull that he held like a lantern went out. As the eerie light faded, the massive hoard of zombies suddenly halted and fell, back to being the corpses they truly were.
All except George; he fought on against the werewolf. They were a bloody mess, but still they grappled on. He caught the werewolf in a headlock and squeezed. Ivy ran up behind them and smacked her rolling pin repeatedly against George’s head, distracting him just enough that the werewolf broke free of his death grip. The werewolf, in a burst of energy, took hold of the monstrous automaton and lifting him up, slammed him down on the crossed railing that Daemona had set up earlier. Gruesome George met a gruesome end as he was pierced by no less than ten of the sharp stakes. He whined for a moment, then went as still as his master.
All that was left was the handful of witches that still flitted about the night sky sending curses and blasts at the townsfolk. Now, with no zombies to worry about, all the archers and folk could throw stones and arrows at them and they too began to retreat.
