Revenant vs Seth, part 3

The revenant raised an arm and pointed a bony finger at Seth. The shocking cold hit him as completely as if he had fallen into an icy lake. He gasped weakly and his muscles tightened. At his core there remained a warm, confident center, but it was being rapidly eroded. Irrational, gibbering terror was assailing him at the fringes of his focus, trying to smother his self-assurance.


Part of him wanted to collapse and quail. Seth gritted his teeth. Potion or no potion, magical fear or no magical fear, he wasn't going to succumb, not this time. He willed himself to take a step toward the revenant. His leg refused to function at first. He was numb to the hip, and it felt like heavy weights were holding his foot down. Leaning forward and grunting, he managed a single ponderous step. Then another.


The revenant was still pointing at him, and still coming toward him. Seth knew he could just wait for the revenant to reach him, but something told him it was important to keep moving. He took another step.


The revenant was now within reach. The vaguely malevolent eyes held no personality. A putrid stench polluted the air. The arm of the revenant remained outstretched, and the pointing finger was nearly touching him.


Seth's confidence dwindled. He knew his body was about to shut down. He eyed the black, ragged fingernail drawing closer to his chest. The warm feeling had shrunk to a fading spark. Horrors began to fill his mind. Gripping the pliers tightly, Seth lifted his arm and, with a choppy motion, brought the pliers down on the bony finger. The revenant displayed no reaction to the blow, but the arm lowered a bit, and the finger had obviously been dislocated.


Teeth clenched, Seth fought against what felt like tremendous gravity to take a step to the side. Mustering all his strength, he kicked the revenant in the back of the knee. The knee buckled and the revenant fell. Seth stumbled forward and knelt on its chest, feeling prominent ribs against his shins.


The revenant glared up at him. Seth could not move.


His arms trembled. The final spark of confidence was dying.


Seth could feel the deluge of irrational fear waiting to overwhelm him. In a moment it would. The revenant reached up, both hands moving slowly but purposefully toward Seth's neck.


Seth thought about all the people depending on him.


Coulter had sacrificed himself for him. Kendra was alone in the cottage. His grandparents and Dale were trapped in a dungeon. He could do this. Courage was his thing. It didn't have to be fast. He just had to get there.


Seth focused on the nail and began moving the pliers toward it. He could not move quickly. It was as if the air had become a gel. If he tried to go fast, his progress halted.


Pushing slowly and steadily, the hand with the pliers gradually advanced.


The hands of the revenant reached his throat. Fingers so cold they burned pressed into his flesh. The rest of his body was numb.


Seth didn't care. The pliers kept moving. Strong, merciless fingers squeezed his neck tighter. Seth gripped the wooden nail with the pliers. He tried to yank it out, but it would not budge.


Seth felt like he was drowning. The spark of confidence was gone, but grim determination remained. The only sensation was the searing pain in his neck. Ever so slowly, his arm feeling distant, hardly connected, Seth began withdrawing the nail, watching it slide out centimeter by centimeter. The nail was longer than he expected-it kept coming and corning, bloodlessly emerging from the hole it had long inhabited.


His hand slowed. It felt like the air was congealing from a gel to a solid. The strangling grip of the revenant prevented him from breathing. Sweat beaded on his brow.


With dreamlike slowness, the last of the long wooden nail emerged from the neck. He saw a tiny space between the tip of the nail and the empty hole. For an instant, Seth thought he noticed something flicker across the revenant's face, relief in the eyes, the hideous smile becoming slightly more sincere.


And then the air was no longer solid, and he was falling, and everything went dark.

Chapter 18