With the man’s every step, a flat note tolled. An iron bell bounc­ing heavy round his neck. Faces turned, star­tled, shuf­fled away from his path.

Stoat turned from the bar, star­ing, wrin­kling her upturned nose. She leaned to her friend, a lass wrapped in green silk. “Can’t believe they allow that, here.”

“What?” said the lass, dis­tract­ed from her beer.

“Look about, Lilé.”

“Oh.”

“See?”

“I have rarely seen one, in the North.”

Lilé sur­rep­ti­tious­ly watched the man, fol­lowed his swad­dled face and stiff, slow move­ments. He leaned at the bar, mas­sag­ing his blunt, ban­daged hands. With an uneasy wave, he caught the atten­tion of the bar­keep, a mouse. When he bent to speak to the whiskered pub­li­can, a line of black­ened skin showed at his neck. Spongey, knot­ted skin, puck­ered like the flesh of a plucked duck.

Stoat nudged Lilé, shook her head. She hunched her shoul­ders, uncom­fort­able. “Puts a per­son off her food. Shouldn’t be allowed here.”

Lilé’s green eyes nar­rowed, askance at Stoat. “You know, Love, that is very much the way we ragged folk are treat­ed, by many Firls.”

“Aye, but you’re not dis­eased.”

“He might have been born with it. And he’s cov­ered up. They are not so catch­ing as you might think.”

Stoat glanced at the man, not­ed the bell, the ban­dages, the smell of grey salt. She not­ed his belt­ed side­sword, his cut­ter’s pack.

“Eh. Sup­pose he’s ply­ing the same life as us.”

“To many, he is more valu­able than us.”

Stoat unknit­ted her brow. “Aye, you’re right. Can’t blame a blighter for mak­ing the best of things.”

Bones crunched under­foot. Sul­furous tears dropped from the rot­ted stone ceil­ing, rolling down their dirty hel­met visors. Eyes puffy with exhaus­tion blinked, twitch­ing, behind slits of steel. Watch­ing the hall, ner­vous. Down that low and putrid tun­nel, many some­things shift­ed just beyond the lantern light.

“Hold,” barked a low and bro­ken voice. The cut­ters stopped.

“Van­guard up.”

From the colum­n’s rear, a bulk of armor pushed to the front. Shoul­ders clad in a quar­ter inch of steel. Spike-soled boots crushed wet bones to slur­ry. Thick, dis­tort­ed arms heft­ed a tow­er shield near as wide as the hall. Eyes, blue and rimmed by puck­ered skin, showed neath her hel­met grille.

The cut­ters shied away from her. Their uneasy eyes watched the bell, silenced by a daub of wool, hang­ing silent from the hulk’s neck. Only by their lead­er’s insis­tence did they hud­dle close behind her, point­ing pikes and heavy gun­springs round the slab of shield. A scent of salt, lymph, and rot float­ed from the fig­ure, heavy in their nos­trils.

“Advance.”

With a rus­tle of steel, the cut­ters took a col­lec­tive step. The lantern light crept a meter. Some­thing with­drew a pale limb into the unnat­ur­al dark. Anoth­er step. Some­thing hissed, eyes flar­ing in the light. Anoth­er.

Sud­den­ly, a thin and lip­less shape burst from the dark. It sprint­ed, limbs wild, spit­tle flow­ing from white gums. A crack resound­ed in the cramped hall and a flechette dis­ap­peared through its eye. It top­pled, spun out, slid­ing to the tow­er shield­’s lip. There was silence, save for the high slith­er of a gun­spring rewind­ing.

Then, there were more. Count­less grey, bare-toothed fig­ures. Their thin and bloody feet skit­ter­ing over ancient bones. A vol­ley of gun­spring retorts echoed in the long cham­ber, strik­ing bloody lines through their veiny skulls. Dozens fell. More fol­lowed.

A dozen bod­ies slammed against the slab of steel. It quaked, but held fast. The van­guard mere­ly blinked. Past the hunched, armored hulk, the pikes struck out­ward, meet­ing flesh, with­drew, and stuck again. Spit and sour gore spat­tered round the curve of the mobile bar­ri­cade, speck­led the van­guard’s already-filthy armor. The pale, crooked crea­tures fell, pil­ing bro­ken at armored feet.

More seethed at them, scrab­bling and drool­ing. The col­umn began to waver. A long-clawed arm whipped round the shield, caus­ing a cut­ter to cry out and clutch her wet, ruined eye. Weird cast-iron spears of an ancient mold jut­ted round one side, held by bone fin­gers, stuck­ing one man in the neck and groin. He fell back, mewl­ing.

“Assume rear shot posi­tions!” called the lead.

The cut­ters peeled back from their van­guard. Unhin­dered by ward­ing pikes, the toothy crea­tures squirmed through around her. Many fell to bit­ing flechettes. Oth­ers slipped by unas­sailed. They struck at the van­guard’s sides and arms, sink­ing time-hard­ened points into soft elbows and joints in armor. Chain mesh tore. Steel plate buck­led. Dis­eased, sense­less skin split.

The blight­ed van­guard felt noth­ing at all.

Blight

From the dust­lands south of Baramec­ca comes a nox­ious mold. It is no com­mon pesti­lence, no pest to twigs of trees or gar­den fruit. It prefers more hearty fare: The trunks and limbs of humankind. It is blight.

Symptomatology

Blight dis­torts, con­sumes its vic­tims. A new infec­tion is naught but a patch or two of wide, black­ened pores. This patch spreads over months, years, slow­ly becom­ing an oily, spongy lesion. Infect­ed tis­sue grows knot­ted, black­ened, puck­ered and holey, like the plucked flesh of fowl. Quick­ly, that flesh turns numb and sense­less. Vic­tims’ extrem­i­ties become like dumb weights, obliv­i­ous in all but sight and smell to leak­ing, accu­mu­lat­ed cuts and rot­ting sec­ondary infec­tions. * In time, those limbs with­er, shriv­el up, and fall away. 

For­tu­nate blights vic­tims die of sec­ondary caus­es. The most mis­er­able live to see them­selves become dis­gust­ing, shrunk­en stumps.

Crea­tures affect­ed by blight are shunned, avoid­ed. They are known as blighters. **

Blighters

Wise folk beware the blighter’s bell. That flat, iron tongue pro­duces a clap­ping deeply asso­ci­at­ed with death and dis­trust. Its tone will clear a ten-foot radius in even the most crowd­ed mar­ket. † 

Most blighters wear bells. In North­ern realms, where blight is uncom­mon, the law will imprison those who do not warn of their con­di­tion. †† In South­ern Alagór, where beg­ging blighters prowl the gut­ters, the bell-less are met with death.

Though blight does not twist the mind, its vic­tims are treat­ed as mad­men or mon­sters. Though many fear to even breath near a beg­ging blighter, there are some who would kick the bowl from their shriv­eled hands. If ever a blighter is strung up for some crime, crowds will cheer all the more as they twitch in the noose’s grip. 

Though blighters may not be true mon­sters, some change to fit per­cep­tion. Some begin to rev­el in their hor­rif­ic image, con­struct ban­dit packs from fel­lows who would pun­ish the soci­ety which shuns them.

Only in the law­less reach­es of the Wilder­ness do blighters find accep­tance. As cut­ters, blighters are valu­able assets. The numb­ness caused by their con­di­tion cur­tails pain, allows them to serve in assault or van­guard roles too pun­ish­ing for any­one else. Though such roles lead them to the most awful, fatal depths of Tombs, the blighters who sur­vive are paid rich­ly. Such coinage funds med­ical treat­ment and plen­ti­ful salt, which stems the pro­gres­sion of blight. So long as they remain in one piece, a blighter with a shield may lead a long and prof­itable life.

Note

If the par­ty tank is a blighter, they can tank all the hard­er. They also might not notice when their nose falls off.