Page 43 of No Man's Land

Through the shifting mist, he saw the cursed phosphorescent gleam of eyes, a dull glint of the tin mask, andan officer’s khaki uniform. His boots and puttees were caked in mud.

“Who the fuck are you?” Josef shouted, backing up, his hands raised defensively. “What do you want?”

The man, if it was still a man, didn’t answer. He only prowled closer. That dreadful, familiar stench came with him, and now that Josef looked, he could see that it wasn’t mud on the man’s legs but blood.

“My God,” Josef said, pity vying with horror. “What have they done to you?”

No answer came to him, but the creature coiled, and from behind the tin mask came another snarl. It pounced, but Josef was ready, ducking under the creature and jamming his shoulder up into its ribs. The stench was unbearable, and Josef retched as he pushed up with his legs and vaulted the creature over his back. It was a move he’d made a dozen times in a dozen street fights as a boy. He could hardly believe it had worked, but the creature landed with a wet thud on the street behind him.

Josef didn’t stop to see whether it got up again; he knew it would. He just ran.

Keeping the railing on his left so he didn’t lose himself in the fog, he sprinted north. Some small analytical part of his mind, the part that had kept him alive for ten months in Flanders, tracked his location and alerted him when he reached the curving sweep of Wilton Crescent.

The man—the thing—was behind him still, gaining ground. Josef could hear its wet, rasping breaths, feel its relentless pursuit. Its relentless hunger.

He couldn’t go much further, though—his lungs were on fire, legs burning, but if he stopped, it would kill him. Or worse.

There are worse things than death, Alex had warned him that first day among the dead.

In his desperation, he tried to shout. “Alex…” It came out a gasp, a breath squeezed from empty lungs. “Alex!” Louder this time. “ALEX!”

And then the thing had him again, its inhuman hands scrabbling at his arms, his back, his hair. Josef spun, fighting it off like a cornered cat, spitting and hissing, lashing out, screaming Alex’s name with his last shreds of breath.

The officer lunged, and they went down together, rolling, Josef on top and then beneath, punching and kicking and gouging. In the fight, the creature's mask came loose and fell away, hanging from one ear, swaying as the creature glowered down at Josef through spectral eyes. The face beneath the mask was nothing but gore and white bone, half the jaw missing, his teeth sharp and bloody spikes.

Josef screamed his horror, hands locked on the creature's coat, arms shaking as he struggled to hold it at bay, the ravening ruined mouth lunging and snapping at Josef’s throat…

Then, a sound.

A silver whisper, like a sniper's bullet, and something flashed past Josef’s eyes.

The creature’s head landed on Josef’s chest, spattering his face with gore. Then it rolled off onto the pavement with a sickening thud and lay there staring at him with doused, disturbingly human eyes. A moment later, the rest of the creature’s lifeless body collapsed on top of Josef, and he found himself staring up into the stern face of Lord Alexander Beaumont.

He wore a fashionable slim-fitting suit, and a fedora cocked at a rakish angle. A gentleman on his way to the office, except for the sodding great sword clutched in one hand.

“Well,” Alex said, slightly breathless. “Perhaps this time you’ll believe me.”

Chapter Fourteen

“Get this fucking thing off me!”

Crawling with horror, Josef pushed at the corpse, the headless bloody corpse, that pinned him to the ground.

“Easy,” Alex said, shoving the body with his foot until it rolled aside, flopping grotesquely onto its back. Then he reached down to offer Josef a hand up.

He glared at the strong, elegant hand stretched out towards him and ignored it, rolling onto his hands and knees, gasping for air. But the stench of the creature made him retch, and only his own bloody obstinacy saved him from vomiting.

Shakily, he tried to rise, but his legs were like jelly from running and his lungs still burned, so despite his fury at Alex, he didn’t object when the other man took hold of his arm to haul him up.

“Steady on,” Alex said quietly. Kindly, even.

Josef stared at him, at his handsome face creased into a concerned frown, at the stupid bloody sword. His head swam,and he heard a clatter of metal on stone before two strong arms wrapped around him, pulling him close and keeping him on his feet.

“Easy, now.” Alex’s voice was oddly shaky. “Take another breath.”

Josef did; it didn’t help because of the stench, and he retched again.

He was drenched in gore and the stench of the creature, his head a swirl of horror and fear and fury. He hardly knew which way was up, and the only thing keeping him anchored to the world were those sure arms about him. Somehow he remembered the feel of them, as if despite everything that had happened since, Josef’s body recognised the embrace that, for one night, had brought him respite from the war and its horrors.

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