Chapter 129

Lyra’s breath became a little heated, exhaling and inhaling faster than normal. But that was just from the run, there was no way she was more than just a little excited about the coming feeling of letting Rain out, that was ridiculous!

She bit her lip and white knuckle gripped the railing as she felt him start to emerge, trying desperately not to whimper as black fur slowly, then more quickly, pulled from her black wool, her legs wobbling like jelly, her knees turning inward as that special magical link between herself and the giant wolf monster was greatly stimulated by his passage.

Rain crawled free and got to his feet, turning to see a shivering Lyra barely hanging onto the railing as her legs half-collapsed beneath her, little rivulets of wet running down her inner thighs from her shorts.

Rain spread his paws in outrage at the shakey little sheep girl.

“How are half the cleaning potions gone?!! What did you do!!”

Lyra breathy and limp lifted her head and glared back at him.

“Do you know what your creation did to those Drakes? It exploded them into blood and little tiny bits! It got absolutely everywhere! Do you know how much blood and bits are in a Drake? A lot!! Someone stumbling across the scene would think half a hundred people had been killed there!”

Rain’s paws lowered slightly.

“What was I supposed to do? Just leave a blood covered alley to be found by the city guard?”

“Well, no ... but still.”

She wiped a stray strand of hair away from her sweaty face.

“It’s fine, Rain, we can always find more later,” she managed to get her shaky legs under her and rose. “For now we really really need to look for food. You are hungry, aren’t you? You’ve barely eaten today, call me crazy but with you that is an extremely dangerous thing to happen.”

Rain’s stomach growled in answer.

“Hmmph, that’s what I thought.”

Despite himself Rain had to agree, the point where he would lose control was starting to get dangerously close, maybe an hour away, he could feel the hunger pressing down on his mind, suppressing his conscious thoughts in favour of the ravenous predator. He might have been pushing his luck by staying in the library all day, the few snacks that Lyra brought back from her information hunt had only muffled the need for so long, a dozen pigs from a butchers shop weren’t going to cut it.

“Then where should we go?”

Opal lifted her arms and gestured broadly in every direction. “What do you mean where? There’s food all around us, look, buildings and buildings full of delicious people, start here and work your way out! They’re all probably in their beds too, all convenient to gobble up!”

“Aheheh, no, that’s not what we are going to be doing,” said Lyra. “This is my city you know, I don’t particularly want Rain rampaging around eating innocent people who have never harmed a fly in their lives.”

Opal crossed her arms. “How many of these people have gone down into the dungeon and slaughtered countless thinking feeling monsters to gain a few numbers?”

Lyra wilted a bit hearing that. It was difficult to have the moral high ground when the people she was defending were mass murderers when looked at in a certain light. Worse a little part of her agreed with the Goblin, and even worse than that she herself was included in that certain light. She had gone down to the dungeon and done violent things, violent things that had made her feel good, proud even, at the time. Not so now.

She wondered how long her moral compass was going to survive being around the Goblin.

“I don’t- Look, we’re going to find a stable, we will be less likely to be discovered that way, no people to flee and tell the guards what happened. It just makes sense alright.”

“Okay.” said Rain. He turned on Vash. “You, get back inside of her wool space. We’re no longer in the library.”

Vash crossed his bony arms and raised his bony chin. “I do not need to be put back inside that space, I see no need, I am of more use outside.”

“An undead necromancer isn’t going to be particularly appreciated by the city, if anyone sees you bad things are going to happen, and as you told us, especially if the priesthood catches wind of you...” murmured Lyra.

Still, Vash resisted, drawing his arms closer.

“Whether or not that happens seems irrelevant considering the chaos that will happen if the city sees the brute here, both scenarios will very likely lead to my demise. Thus it makes sense for me to be available to help.”

“He doesn’t want to go back into your wool space. He is afraid of it.” said Rain, furrowing his brow in thought. “That is also why he volunteered to help assassinate Lord Wranvyre, he doesn’t actually care about whether Wranvyre lives or not, he just doesn’t want to go back into you and wants an excuse to be allowed to stay outside.”

“That- that is an utterly outrageous lie! I am only trying to make myself useful since I am seemingly attached to your fortunes for the foreseeable future. Your success is my success, and that is something I cannot help with trapped alone inside that deafeningly silent place!”

Lyra squinted up at the skeleton. His flame eyes carefully avoided her gaze.

“You can come for now,” said Lyra after a moment.

“He cannot, he needs to go back inside.”

“He- he may be of use, a few rats looking out for anyone, uhm, getting near while we raid the stables...?”

“Yes!” said Vash, seizing on the idea, “That is something I can do that no other can. You need me.”

Rain gave them both a displeased look, lips thinning, but in the end he decided to relent.

It was getting dark in the city now, the luminous many coloured moon rising high in the sky.

It wasn’t lost on Lyra that she was currently riding on top of a giant wolf monster who held a Goblin in one arm, while beside them stalked a living skeleton, one boney hand resting awkwardly on Rain’s other arm. She wondered what her parents would think of her these days, she had left the city such a different person, now she was marching with at least two things that would make most people piss themselves in fright. It was a good thing they were invisible.

What she had thought was a stable turned out to be more of a general pen, a huge thing significantly larger than even Lythnia’s stable, one massive rectangular building with multiple floors. Over the front entrance was a sign that said ‘Calum’s general animel storage’.

They passed around the side where Rain crushed the lock and handle of the back door in one paw and let the twisted metal fall to the floor.

He squeezed down inside and entered the pens.

“This isn’t going to work.” growled Rain looking into the dark, the sound of braying or squealing animals filling the air. He had become markedly more feral since they had begun walking, increasingly struggling to control himself with every passing moment, claws twitching.

“Why?”

“We don’t have enough cleaning potions to remove the mess.” Rain paused as he looked around. The pen seemed to offer a shodding service too as there was a backroom separate from the rows and rows of box stalls. “But if it was done in one place...”

He reached out and grabbed for the nearest horse, paw wrapping around its head, then his other paw for another horse.

He quickly pulled the two horses off their feet and disappeared through the wide door. The horses were unable to do a thing as they were dragged bodily across the stable floor, the urgency with which Rain moved showing just how close he was to losing it.

The sounds of horsey panic were quickly cut off in that dark place and then followed the sounds of teeth moving, incising.

Lyra shuddered a little, still not quite used to that. Then she turned and looked at the pens. There were a lot of animals in here, some box stalls were just crammed with horses, others had been converted and filled with pigs or cattle, some had their walls knocked down for more space, more animals. It seemed like the merchants who worked the markets rented space here to keep stock close at hand. For Rain it was a buffet.

Obviously she just had to get all of this through the door Rain had disappeared through.

She blinked in surprise as a horse near Vash bucked backwards in fright when the skeleton took a step closer.

“Ah. That’s how it is. Vash, I have a job for you.”

The skeleton tilted his head in polite question.

“I want you to take your rats and scare all of these animals through that door over there, where Rain is.”

The necromancer considered this.

“You want me to use my legendary ability as a necromancer, the greatest necromancer of his century, to ... herd farm animals?”

“Yup.”

“I- That is there is no-” the necromancer sputtered.

“Do you want to go back inside of me?”

“ ... No.”

Reluctantly, very reluctantly, the necromancer set to work. Rats poured amongst the box stalls, picking apart ropes and harness and locks and soon the animals were spilling out into the main corridor. At one end was a terrifying storm of moving rats and bones, boiling across the floor, at the other was a large open door they could pass through. The choice was easy.

Soon the entire stable was on the move, a solid river of animals pouring into the shodding room. The cattle went through the door, a sound of animal alarm came from within, and then silence.

The stream of cattle continued on, dozens, then over a hundred, cows, pigs, horses all directed inward. The long ramps leading up to the floors above were packed too as it all flowed down. It was a sight to see, a river of bodies filling the space wall to wall all pouring through into one small room at the back of the building. The stables held an incredible amount of stock, it was a popular service after all.

Bit by bit the entire contents of the structure were moved into the back room. Hundreds and hundreds of animals disappearing into that carnivorous place to never come back out.