Ulgrom

Introduction of something I'm in the middle of doing at the moment

Slave

Pushing his foot hard against the shoulder of the downed and dying man, he pulled hard with his left hand, trying to wrench the blade free. The bones it had bit through groaned and then, with an audible crack, the axe came free. Blood came shooting from the gouge in thick spurts, covering the now dead man and the sand in which he fell. Raising both arms in the air, holding axes high, a cheer erupted from the crowd. He closed his eyes and drank in their applause. Ulgrom lived for the adoration heaped upon by the spectators and he had known but a few short months. He was a slave. Sold to the highest bidder and then owned till they saw fit. In younger life he'd tended stabled, cooked, cleaned, waited on fat and pompous earls. None of it was like this. He was loved by the masses and he revelled in it. Now Ulgrom was a pit fighter.

His first bout had been hard fought. He was not expected to last long. After all, who would wager an unknown slave to beat a monster in the arena. Sold cheaply to be rid of the beast who'd defied his owner, he was brought by his new master to the Blood Pit, a coliseum in a dry port of some hell forsaken town on the fringe of the world. Fighting was in his blood they'd said after that first match. They'd seen his sort before, though not for ages past.

Some of the matches that took place, the early ones, to whip the crowd into a frenzy, they called “Bout of the Doomed.” No one survived. They pit slaves against all manner of beast in those fights and there was always gore. Great cats would shred them limb from limb and feast on the corpse. Rabid dogs would surround them and tear at arms and legs and overwhelm the combatant. Sometimes they would arm the slave and set him against a proven gladiator, who would hack then to pieces and cover the ground with their blood before crushing the skull between their hands. They even had huge birds, wings the size of grown man crush the ill fated creatures with their mighty talons. Of course they always needed to keep the beasts clipped, to stop them flying away.

Ulgrom thought of his first bout now. Walking into the pit full of fear. His eyes darted between the rocks on the sand, until he heard the jeers from the crowd above. Disgusted shrieks of children, boos from the elderly, insults from young men that would bring a mother to tears. Ulgrom turned back to the door to leave. He'd seen what happened in arenas before and he'd never been in a fight in his life, unless you counted the beatings from previous owners, and there were many. Guards were raising the door from the ground, pulled up with the chains that held it in place. He was overwhelmed, fell to his knees in the sand. Boos resounded about the place and calls of craven and weakling echoed in his ears. He wished for the home he'd never known.

That was when he heard the doors on the other side crash down, and the excited roar from the crowd. He turned his head to see before him a spider taller than a man. He'd heard tales of the giant spiders before, but they seemed a far cry from the households he tended. He got to his feet, looking about him for somewhere to run or hide. There were boulders around the arena, left about in place for beasts to hide and catch their prey unawares. This beast had no need to hide and play games. Huge eyes the size of a man's fist glared. Black, soulless eyes, a void in the huge skull of the creature. Covered in coarse, tan hair, each spindly leg moved of it's own accord it seemed as it moved closer to Ulgrom. But worst of all, the huge dripping fangs in that terrible mouth.

Fight or flight he thought to himself, and there was no way he could fight such a beast without some sort of weapon. This was a cruel joke. He ran at full sprint for a boulder on his his right, hoping he could find a way to escape the beast, or climb up. It echoed him, it's movements awkward in the sand, not able to get the purchase it needed. Ulgrom's hands found the boulder and he looked about from some way to climb, but it was smooth enough to the touch that he could find no purchase. Keeping his eyes on the beast again he edged around the boulder, the boos of the crowd echoing in his ears, but all he heard was the clack of the spider's joints as it moved closer to him.

He was not one to panic, but his mind was in tatters, unable to think of a way out. He wished he'd not defied his last owner, wished he'd done as was asked. He could have never done what he was asked though and now he was going to pay with his life if he couldn't think of something.

Ulgrom edged around the boulder, his bare feet painful with the sharp of the sand against the soft skin. He lowered himself, squatting as he moved around, putting any distance between himself and the spider he could. He could hear the beast on the other side of the huge rock. He let out a whimper and closed his eyes. His eyes stung from the heat of this place, the dust and the wind. He rolled his eyes within, trying to wet them on the inside and then opened them, blinking them a few times and looking about again. A great hiss from above made him look sharply up, to see the creature climbing over the top of his rock to get at Ulgrom. He turned to the right to run but a huge leg was batting against it for some purchase. Looking left, the way he had come around he saw the same. Above him the dripping fangs, wet for his flesh. He had to choose. Left or right.

He pushed off to the right, bashed his hands against the leg, hitting it into the rock as he moved past. The leg recoiled and the spider clambered from the rock, away from the pain that had shot through it's leg. Ulgrom turned and ran as fast as he could to the next rock he could see, this close to the wall. Looking over his shoulder as he sprinted he could see the thing regaining balance on the sand. It seemed he had done nothing to the leg as the spider started after him again.

He slid to the ground near the boulder as he'd finished his short, sharp flight. It was close to the wall, but there was room for him, just barely, to slide behind. Surely his pursuer would not be able to get at him from behind here. He pushed his weight into the gap, on hands and knees stinging now from the hot, shard like sand. In his hiding spot he allowed himself to breathe, trying to think. He was in an impossible situation. He sobbed quietly, the arena shook with the boos of the crowd. They wanted to see blood. His blood or the spider's, and most matches he'd seen it was the slave thrown in the pit who died.

It was dark and shaded from the sun here. He wiped his eyes, brushing almost made tears from them. He did not want to die here. He wanted his freedom. He wanted children and a home and a wife. Forbidden him as a slave and a lesser being.

A scrabbling leg of the spider was behind him, he could feel the pounding of it on the sand, but could not see, now looking through out onto the other side of the arena. It was there he saw it, near the wall, half covered in sand. The glint of metal was it? He edged out more, still feeling the banging on the ground behind him as the spider tried to pull him from his hole. Drawing closer he saw it clear, even a hairsbreadth from the boulder he lay under, a knife. Did the god's smile on him or was it sheer dumb luck? This was his answer and his salvation.

He crawled forward the last feet and darted his hand forward to brush off the sand and pull the blade toward him. It was small, but it was sharp and it was a weapon. He felt renewed. He'd butchered animals before. To be sure a spider was different, but in essence he didn't think it would want stabbing. He pushed out from the boulder, could still hear the monster on the other side, desperately scraping inside the hole to get at him. He could see legs outstretched, supporting it while it was trying to coax out it's dinner.

The side of this boulder he noticed wasn't quite so smooth. While there was no purchase it was so close to the side of the arena he was sure he could push himself up on top, so he could leap on the creature. Then it would be a matter of jabbing it in the skull and ending it's life. He thrust the knife between his teeth and began to push off the arena wall onto the side of the rock, using everything he could muster to get atop. His back scraped and he could feel his skin coming away on the surface. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he grasped hands for something to grip, finding the top to be far rougher and then he saw it, bashing at the ground. It was far more horrifying up close than he had anticipated. He felt his stomach turn in knots and all the courage of finding the knife was fast leaving him.

Getting to his feet, Ulgrom steadied himself, pulled the knife from his teeth and jumped onto the body off the spider. It reared back, nearly tossing him to the ground, and he stabbed. The carapace of the monster was too thick for such a small blade to pierce and it was angry, tossing him around trying to shake him. Ulgrom clung on, his dignity being flung away as his pathetic cloth tunic tore, leaving his nether bare, but he didn't notice, so was he fighting to stay on it's back. He grabbed a leg with his other arm and kicked at another, pushing himself to one knee. The rear of it's abdomen was raised and puckered at the end. Ulgrom jabbed with the blade and it bit into soft tissue. Black blood spurted across his hand and the knife and pissed across the floor, as the beast started backward and spun, trying to meet the attacker. It shot across the close wall of the arena and it tried to shake him off again.

Pushing the leg with all his strength, Ulgrom managed to get around some and there it was staring at him, one of the huge black eyes, and they were black. Pools of the darkest depths of the hells. He startled and recoiled back as much as he could in his awkward position, then looked at his knife. Bringing it down hard, it bit into the hard jelly of the eye. He pushed and tore and the sound of it tearing was like a snap. He bashed the point of the knife into it, juice and blood flying out and into Ulgrom's face, and the spider reared back with a screech made by man nor beast he'd ever heard. His body was in the air for a moment but he held fast and crashed back into the spider's hairy spine. He grabbed again at another leg and dragged himself up and brought the knife down into the eye once more. Again the spider reeled in pain, screeching and spinning. This time it shook Ulgrom free, and he flew through the air, bouncing hard against the wall of the arena, a good way from the monster.

Pain shot through his back and side, as he tried to get to his feet. The spider still spun on the spot, blood soaking the ground beneath it. His side was on fire as he found his feet and blood dripped from his nose. His jaw ached and his teeth felt looser than before. Realising he didn't have his knife, Ulgrom looked about himself. It was nowhere to be seen. Then he heard the sound. Or more, didn't hear. The crowd was dead silent and the spider was rounding from where it stood, to fix it's eyes on him. And there on the ground between him and it was the knife.

He ran and as he pushed off so did the monster, rushing toward each other, murder in all eyes. Ulgrom slid again, scrabbling hands grabbed the knife and then the spider was on him. It's forelegs grabbed him, as he slashed every way with his blade, and brought him to it's mouth and those horrid fangs. Ulgrom kicked out hard at it's face, again and again but the spider brought him closer. He kicked and slashed, trying to keep his flesh from the dripping teeth. As panic set in, and fear engulfed him, Ulgrom saw the chink in the spider's armour. In the arms that held him, the cracks in the carapace at the joints looked soft. Grabbing the left forearm, still kicking at the face, his blade dipped into the crack and he twisted. It threw him again, and his leg gashed deep against one of the huge fangs as he tumbled from the air to the ground beneath the spider flailing it's injured leg.

Face impacted sand and Ulgrom felt his nose burst blood. He grabbed his leg, dropping the knife. Not bitten, just gouged, he scraped at the wound with his hand, flicking blood to the floor, hoping to stop the poison taking. His eyes watered and blood streamed across his face. His leg was agony, his nails biting into the gash, fresh blood pursing up to fill what he flung out. Looking up was when Ulgrom saw, the fleshy crack in the underbelly of the spider. Bloodied hand grabbed knife as he pushed to one foot and he thrust up with his last strength, straight up and into the soft and wet. Ulgrom roared and pushed harder, the spider wailed it's otherworldly scream of pain, feeling the knife and hands inside it, cutting into organs and flesh.

Ulgrom set himself on his other leg and dragged down the knife, bursting it out of the creature arms length away, still roaring at the top of his lungs, covering himself in blood and bile and bile and shit. The spider's wail stopped and it reared, shaking hard, as Ulgrom panted below, then it crashed down too heavy for Ulgrom to stop it. There in the middle of the pit lay a huge spider, spilling it's wet guts out across the floor, soaking into the sand. It was a horrid, bloody mess for the first bout of the day. The crowd was still quiet, every eye on the monster. They loved the blood and the pain and the sport, but they wanted a victor.

Of a sudden the spider shuddered and the crowd gasped. A leg lifted and then a bloodied hand clutching a knife emerged. Ulgrom pulled himself from beneath the corpse, covered in all manner of puss and juice, and got to his feet. Eyes opening he looked at the fallen beast and roared in triumph, at which point the crowd roared with him. Stunned he looked up at the people stood above him, cheering and clapping. Standing there, his tunic torn in half down the front and back, leaving him all naked but for his shoulders, the strangest feeling washed over him and he started to wave with his left hand, still clutching the knife in his right. Waving and looking at all of the people in the rounded arena, he began to smile.

Ulgrom remembered that now as the people chanted his name. They threw flowers and money into the pit in front of him and he stood, tall and proud, much more than the slave who had come into the arena on that day, which seemed to have been a lifetime away, despite being only a few months ago. He dropped his axes to the ground and waved again, like he had waved in his first bout and he roared at the top of his lungs again as he had done then.

The door to the combatants cellar opened and he dropped his arms to his sides and walked toward it. Strange how now he went down of his own free will, when back then they'd had to drag him back in a net after knocking him down. He'd taken down three men with his knife before they finally threw the heavy rope web over him and beat him into a senseless slumber, dragging him into the cellar below. His master had told him he'd held that knife throughout the days he'd slept. He wondered what happened to that knife now as he entered the entryway. Turning around he raised his arms once more to the crowd, erupting even louder as he went inside to the echoing cries of his fans chanting. Ork, Ork, Ork, Ork, Ork.