The Boneyard

    															The Boneyard
                                            By Onyx for the /trash/ Halloween Extravaganza 2017

    Markus tightened his grip around the shaft of his short spear and gulped deeply. He looked up and down the forest path, searching for the source of the strange noise. He was certain he’d heard it just a moment ago, but now the forest was quiet. The trees still groaned in the afternoon breeze, but now the birds that had been singing a moment ago had gone silent. Markus stood still for a long moment, spear at the ready, ears and eyes scanning for any sign of danger. When nothing happened, he continued along the path, cautious and watchful, keeping his spear in his hand.

    There was nothing about this lonely, under-used forest road that struck him as menacing. It was even pleasant. The forest was lush, colourful and filled with life. The road took him through open meadows filled with wildflowers and over streams packed with fat salmon. If it weren’t for the stories that surrounded this road, Markus would have enjoyed his stroll through the woods a lot more. Those stories replayed in his mind now, annoyingly. He’d never believed any of the stories the townspeople had told them, dismissing them as the superstitions of countryfolk, but it was hard to shake it off the lingering fear they inspired.

    People vanished on the forest road, the stories said. They simply vanished without a sign of violence or accident. They just evaporated into the hair and were never seen or heard from again. Sometimes it was lone traveller like Markus. Other times, it was a trader who was taken. His wagon and goods were left untouched.

    People disappeared on the other roads too, but they could usually be attributed to a wolf pack, hungry bear or bandits. Only the forest road had a reputation for total disappearances. Markus reminded himself to ignore this. The search parties who started these stories were mostly farmers who couldn’t follow a line of thought, let alone a trail over 30 miles of winding road. Still, it was hard to remain rational when unseen things started making strange noises in the forest. Markus started to walk a little faster.

    Sometime later, he heard the noise again. A sudden buzzing filled the air from all directions. It was not a bee hive. Markus knew what a bee hive sounded like and it was certainly not what he was hearing. He held his spear under his armpit, the spearhead raised, ready to strike at whatever thing was lurking in the woods around him. The buzzing suddenly reached a peak and quickly faded away. Something crossed in front of the sun directly above him, casting him in its shadow for a fraction of a second. Markus’ eyes snapped upward to catch the thing in the sky, but saw nothing but blue sky and the noon sun. He looked away quickly, but the sun had already blinded him, smudging the centre of his vision with a dark shadow. He blinked and rubbed his eyes, but the smudge remained across the centre of his vision.
To his left, something heavy landed in a tree. He heard the branch shake and groan under the new weight. He pointed the long spearhead in the direction of the tree, but he could see nothing through the dark shadow across his eyes. Feeling the urge to run fill his body, he backed away as his eyes darted from side to side, trying to detect movement in his peripheries. His vision finally began to clear and he could just make out something in the tree. It was large, the size of a man, crouched on a branch, unmoving. He couldn’t see its face, but he felt it watching him. It was making a strange sound now. A cooing, chirp that sounded both human and animal. Markus brought his spear up once again, aiming at the thing in the tree as he backed away slowly. The creature chirped and mumbled as Markus’ vision gradually faded back in.

    His eyes were locked on the creature in the tree as he walked backwards, he didn’t notice the rock behind him until his foot hit it and he stumbled backwards. He threw his arms out to catch himself but before he even hit the ground, the creature was on him. Wings filled his vision as a pair of outstretched talons grabbed him. A piercing shriek echoed through his head as he was pulled off his feet and yanked into the air.

    The ground fell away beneath him and the treetops soon followed. The beating of powerful wings carried him higher and higher by the second. He tried to fight but razor-sharp claws sunk into his shoulders, hooking his clothes and breaking the skin. He had managed to keep hold of his spear and thrust upward with it, into the belly of the beast. In his panic, he thrust with the wrong end and merely prodded the creature with the blunt end of his spear. It was enough to make the thing cry out loudly and release him, but now he was falling. Wind whipped past his face as his limbs flailed and the ground rushed towards him.

    ‘No no no no no!’ he cried as he saw his death surging forward to embrace him. He would hit the trees first but from this height, he would be battered to death by the branches long before he hit the ground.

    Seconds before he hit the top layers of the forest, he was grabbed again. Large talons sunk into his flesh and he screamed in pain as his fall was suddenly, violently arrested. His spear fell out of his hands, continuing its downward fall until it embedded itself upright in the top branch of a tall oak.

    Markus watched the forest road disappear beneath him as the beast carried him away, into the mountains.

                                                                    *

    The creature released Markus several metres in the air, letting him fall into its large twig nest. He landed flatly, winding himself. His shoulders were in agony but he managed to push himself upright, grabbing a stick as he did so. The stick, it turned out, was not a stick but a gnawed femur. Markus nearly dropped it when he realised, but he needed a weapon and this would do for now. It wasn’t a human bone, he told himself.

    The creature landed on a nearby rock, the sun at its back, and looked down into the nest where Markus now stood. Markus looked up at the creature, his arm ready to strike with the bone.

    It was a harpy. A bird-woman. Humanoid from the knees up and with large, taloned wings instead of arms. Instead of human feet, from the knees down she had two powerful, hawkish feet with three front toes and one rear-facing toe, all ending in long, curved talons, painted red with new and old blood. Her face was human, that of a young woman, but her hair was a mix of normal human hair and long, colourful feathers that flowed backwards on her graceful head. Her eyes, solid yellow, and ears were larger and sharper than a human, but her nose was small and flat. She would almost have looked cute if it weren’t for the bloody mess around her mouth and the sharp, ragged collection of teeth inside it. Markus noticed she was wearing clothes over some of her human parts. Made from leaves, twigs, bones and some kind of leather, the primitive clothing hid her small breasts and lower regions, leaving her narrow, muscular abdomen exposed. Markus could spot the tell-tale scars of swords and arrowheads that the creature had survived. She was making that same cooing, chirping noise she had made in the forest as her head tilted from side to side.

    The harpy and Markus stared at each other for a long moment. Markus was too scared to look away, in case the almost-cute bird-woman attacked him again. The harpy just watched him curiously, looking him up and down and making those chirping sounds with her small mouth.
After a moment, the harpy looked away, over the vast forest that her mountain nest overlooked. She opened her wings, stretching them to their full length. 10 feet from wingtip to wingtip, and backlit by the afternoon sun, the red, blue and purple feathers glowed brightly. She stretched her wings and back, making pleased purring sounds as her multi-jointed wings and legs snapped and popped. She folded her wings and smiled down at Markus, flashing her mouthful of dark, jagged teeth.

    ‘Hello, human,’ she said. Her voice was human with a very unhuman undertone.

    ‘What the hell are you?’ Markus asked, tightening his grip on the femur in his hand.

    The harpy made a complex chirping sound that Markus guessed was her name, but it didn’t answer his question.

    ‘Are you going to eat me?’ he asked.

    ‘Eventually,’ the harpy answered, smiling.

    ‘What if I don’t want to be eaten?’ Markus asked.

    The harpy touched her face with a small talon at the joint of her wing while she thought about her answer.

    ‘I’ll eat you anyway,’ she replied after a moment.

    ‘What if I try to escape?’

    ‘You can try,’ the harpy smiled.

    Markus took a second to look over his shoulder. The nest was built on the edge of a tall cliff. Behind him was a drop of several hundred metres straight down. If there was anywhere to run, it was behind the harpy.

    ‘I’m not tasty,’ he said, remembering the stories his mother had read to him as a child. This line always annoyed or confused the monster in the stories and allowed the hero to escape.

    ‘You look tasty,’ the harpy chirped, smiling.

    Damn. Markus tried to remember other stories that might have helped him, but he had no magic amulet or secret power that would help him. He was starting to suspect that the authors of those stories had never been in a situation like this. Probably because most people who found themselves in a harpy nest never left to talk about it, judging by the unsettlingly-human bones that surrounded him currently.

    ‘I’m really not,’ he tried again.

    ‘I’ve eaten people like you before. They were tasty,’ the harpy replied, adjusting her footing. Her talons tapped on the rock and Markus felt an attack about to happen.

    ‘What if I told you a story? In exchange for my life?’ he said, starting to feel desperate.

    ‘I don’t care about stories,’ the harpy said, moving her wings.

    Markus knew she was about to strike. He dropped the bone to his side and shrugged.

    ‘Fine, just eat me then. I don’t care,’ he said, gambling once more.

    The harpy frowned and narrowed her eyes.

    ‘What?’ she asked.

    ‘Just eat me. You’re hungry. I understand. Do it,’ Markus said, looking around the view.

    The harpy made a strange hissing sound and tapped her talons harder against the rock. She opened her wings and lunged. Markus made a powerful underhand swing that connected with the harpy’s skull a fraction of a second before her talons sunk into his belly, knocking her across the nest. Markus didn’t waste a second and scrambled over the rock the harpy had occupied a second earlier. The harpy shrieked and hissed, rubbing her head with the end of her wing.

    Markus jumped from the rock and landed on a slope on the far side. He fell, tumbled and kept rolling. He bounced and rolled down the rock face until he came to a sudden stop, colliding with a boulder. He gasped for hair, hugging his aching body. A rib must have been broken in the fall. He could feel it in his side, throbbing and burning with each breath. Scrapes and grazes covered his body. He wanted to lie there until the pain subsided, but the screams of the harpy forced him to move. Pulling himself to his feet, holding onto the boulder for support, he looked around at where he was. He was standing on the edge of another cliff that the boulder had prevented him for flying off of. There was space here to walk and what appeared to be a path carved into the cliff face. Markus held his ribs with one arm and followed the path, hoping it would take him to safety or at least further down the mountain. The views from here were dizzying.

    There was a loud shriek from above that echoed outward, covering the forest. Markus looked up and saw the outspread wings of the harpy. She had taken flight and was swooping around the mountaintop towards him. Her eyes locked onto him and she zeroed in. Markus broke into a run that ignited the pain in his side, but he pushed through it. Ahead of him was a small alcove that would protect him from the approaching talons and vicious mouth. He heard the strange buzzing sound again. It was her wings, he realised. When the harpy entered a dive, her wings began to vibrate and buzz loudly. It was her terror song and hearing it now sent a drip of dread down Markus’ spine.
He reached the alcove mere seconds before the harpy landed on the cliff face. The beating of her wings kicked up a cloud of dust as she arrested her sharp dive to avoid colliding with the rock face. Markus scrambled on his hands and knees into the alcove to get away from the attacking talons. The harpy was reaching in, trying to grab him. Her cries and hisses echoed into the small cave. Markus pressed his back into the wall at the back to stay out of reach. The harpy broke off her attack, leaping from the cliff face and soaring away. Markus moved quickly. He was out of the alcove and running as fast as he could stand down the mountain path. It led him along cliff faces, through valleys and into narrow passages, all the while the buzzing noise never ended. The harpy was circling, diving and swooping every few minutes. When she could, she grabbed him with her talons and tried to pull him from the cliff. She tore his clothes to shreds and covered him is bleeding cuts and grazes.

    After what felt like hours, in a small valley, Markus stopped to catch his breath. He was covered in sweat. It dripped off his noise and chin as he panted. His lungs were burning and it felt impossible to draw a full breath. He was thirsty. Desperately thirsty. He had discarded a lot of his clothing, some of deliberately, others were ripped off during a harpy attack. Currently, he was stripped down to just his boots and trousers. His shirt had been torn to shreds and what was left of it had been repurposed as hand wraps and bandages. His torso was covered in scrapes and cuts from the rocks and harpy talons. It glistened with blood and sweat.

    Another buzz flew over his head and he forced himself to move. She could reach him here if she tried. He must have been over halfway down the mountain by now. Just a little further and he’d be safe, he told himself, but the constant sound of the harpy’s cries and the buzz of its wings made him feel like safety was an impossibility.

    The path led him through a tight crawlspace under a fallen boulder. He had to lie flat and shimmy his way under the rock. His chest and belly rubbed against cold, smooth stone as he inched his way to the light at the end of the tunnel. He paused for a moment, pressing his body and cheek against the dusty stone, letting it cool his sweaty, exhausted body. There was a small breeze running through the crawlspace that ran over his skin. He wanted to stay there. He was safe here and the harpy couldn’t find him. He was so tired and just wanted to sleep. He was exhausted and the blood loss was starting to get to him. He shut his eyes and enjoyed the coolness of the stone.
There was sudden gust of wind that ran through the crawlspace and an uncomfortable clicking sound came from ahead of him. He opened his eyes and looked towards the end of the tunnel. Two hawkish feet were standing there, talons tapping against the bare stone excitedly. The harpy’s smiling face came into view. She was looking directly at him.

    ‘I can smell you,’ she said, and made an amused chirp.

    Markus rested his head on the stone again, sighing. He would stay. She would wait. It would be a test of endurance. Who would starve first? Markus didn’t feel much confidence.

    ‘You can’t stay there forever, human. You must come out eventually. I can wait. I am very patient,’ the harpy chirped and made a sound that Markus guessed was laughter.

    Suddenly, there was a barking. The harpy looked away, made a high-pitched shriek and was gone. Markus heard her cries echoing around the land as she flew away, pursued by the barking creature. Markus seized his chance and quickly crawled to the end of the tunnel, filled with a renewed energy. He emerged into a circular arena. High stone walls too steep to climb surrounded him. At the far end of the arena space was a gap in the wall, wide enough for him to pass through if he walked sideways. Standing between Markus and the exit was a field of bones. The remains of hundreds of creatures lay scattered on the ground, bleached white by the sun and picked clean by scavengers. They lay in piles or scattered about randomly. Some were still stuck together in limbs or partial skeletons while others had been broken apart or shattered. Markus stepped carefully through the arena, examining the bones as he went. Among them where the remains of horses, deer, rabbits and humans. Many humans, large and small. Empty sockets over screaming jaws stared up at him. The unmissable sign of the harpy’s teeth covered them all. Markus looked down at his near fate, then up at the cliff. Far above, he thought he recognised the harpy nest.
There was no sign of the barking creature that had rescued him from the harpy a moment ago. Whatever it was, it must have possessed incredibly climbing skills or wings of its own to be able to escape the high walls of the boneyard arena. He had no desire to meet his saviour and increased his speed to the other side of the arena.

    When he was 20 metres from the gap in the wall. He heard the sound again. The buzzing. It was increasing in volume quickly. He looked up just in time to see the outstretched talons of the harpy rapidly descending on top of him. He threw himself backwards, dodging certain death by mere inches and landed on the remains of a long-dead horse. The harpy took several long strides towards him, her mouth held open in a wicked grin, saliva dripping from her mangle of teeth.

    Markus grabbed a rib from the horse, yanked from its socket and threw it at the harpy, but she simply knocked it away with a swipe of her wing. Markus grabbed another bone and wielded it like a club, rushing at the harpy. She beat her wings in a single powerful whoosh that knocked Markus onto his back. She leapt onto him, landing on his ribs, forcing him to cry out in pain as she pressed onto his broken bones and sunk her talons into his bare flesh. She leaned in close, grinning into Markus’ face, her jagged teeth glistening in the light of the setting sun. Her breath stunk of rotting meat and a long, black tongue emerged to paint a trail of noxious, slimy saliva across his forehead.  His hand scrambled for anything in his grasp, finding another horse bone, a broken femur. He gripped it tightly and plunged it into the harpy’s human torso, between the ribs.

    She screamed and threw herself off him, writhing on the floor, beating her wings and clawing at the floor, a squirt of bright red blood quickly appearing on her pale torso. Markus rolled onto his stomach and pushed off the floor. He was up and running within seconds, but the Harpy was on him soon after. She lunged at him, sinking her talons into his back and biting at his shoulder. Markus felt the jagged, rotten teeth bite into him and he cried out in pain. The harpy throttled him, wrapping her wings around him and shaking him violently as her teeth sunk deeper and deeper into the meat of his shoulder. Driven by the pain and fear, Markus pushed himself off the ground and deliberately fell backwards. Several delicate bones in the harpy’s body broke as Markus’ weight landed on top of her. She released his shoulder and screamed. Her cries echoed throughout the arena, reverberating several times before they faded.

    Markus staggered to his feet and tried to run but his legs were feeling heavy. He clutched his bloody, ragged shoulder as he closed the gap between himself and the exit. He made it less than five metres when his path was blocked by a shadow incarnate. The beast appeared from pure darkness, stepping into the light in the form of a giant black wolf. Markus froze as the beast lumbered toward him. As tall as he was, iIt walked passed him, growling loudly and flashing a row of marble-white teeth. Markus backed away cautiously. The harpy stood on the bones of a horse, panting and hissing, holding her damaged wing closely.

    The wolf closed in on her. She hissed at it and backed away, unable to fly or flee. The wolf and harpy circled each other, Markus seemingly forgotten.

    Markus didn’t care to watch the confrontation. He had no idea what this creature was and had no intention of finding out. He backed away into the gap in the wall. Blood coated his right side and the multiple weeping holes in his shoulder were throbbing. He slipped into the gap and made his way through. The screams of the harpy followed him until he emerged on the far side of the tunnel and into the forest. He limped away, while behind him, the harpy’s screams where reaching a crescendo and were suddenly, finally silenced.

                                                                    *

    Several days later, Markus sat by the fire of the inn. He stared into the flames and let his mind drift as far from the pain in his bandaged shoulder as he could. In his hands, he was nursing a cup of warm water with a herbal mix to sooth the pain. His ordeal with the harpy was over, but the fear still dwelt within him. The sound of its scream still echoed in his head. He still kept his eyes on the trees and watching the skies when he was outdoors. Sometimes he could still hear the buzzing of the dreaded creature, or felt the shadow beast watching him. He still knew nothing of the mysterious shadow wolf that had saved him, but he had yet to mention it to anyone who might know more.

    He hadn’t spoken of the incident with anyone yet. He claimed his injuries were a wolf attack, which kept the questions of the healer at bay. He just sat and stared into the flames, feeling the safety of the roof above him. He would never take the forest path again, or travel without company. He felt tired and wanted to rest. He got to his feet slowly, every bone and muscle in his tired body aching, and made his way to the exit.

    Outside, the air was cool and the town was quiet. It was late now and many people would be in bed. That’s where Markus wanted to be. He turned to follow the road home. It was only a short walk but he did not want to dawdle outdoors. He looked up at the stars, scanning, listening. There was hushed whisper above him and he froze. He turned his neck slowly around the sky, feeling his heart begin to beat faster. Had it been an owl or just the wind?. There was nothing there. The air was quiet again. He breathed out and told himself to calm down. Let the herbs do their work. Just get home, to bed.

    A sudden clang of metal on stone made him jump and he turned around to see it sitting on the road behind him. His spear. The one he had lost in the forest when the harpy had taken him. The one he had dropped into the forest. He swallowed hard and looked around, his eyes darting here and there. Nothing was moving and the skies were clear but there was a sound. It was distant but he heard it, carried on the towards him. Down the road was the town square. In the middle of the square was the town oak tree. Sitting on the top branch, lurking in the darkness, was a figure, hunched and still. It chirped.

                                                                    END