The Roman - Part I - Short Story
Beware what spells you buy online, you never know how powerful they can be.
Chunk, chunk is the only sound in the cemetery as Doug and Brendon dig away at an empty plot of land. They had heard rumours over the years that Manchester Cemetery of Peace was filled with unclaimed bodies lost centuries ago to the peat fields. They also wanted to see if the resurrection spell they bought online would actually work.
“This is going to work, right?” quivers Doug, hesitating for the first time tonight.
Brendon didn’t dignify it with a response, keeping his head down until he struck something metallic. They both stood in shock as they looked down to see a body, contorted but perfectly preserved.
“What the hell is it, a vampire?”
“Seriously, you think this Roman soldier is a vampire. Are you sure you didn’t buy something else along with that spell and smoked it before doing this?” Disbelief and frustration peered through Doug’s voice.
They crouched down to get a better look. They had only seen Roman armor in the museum, never attached to a body. The scaled metal plates of their armor rusted, but covered the corpse where the cloth under the armor had decayed over the years. What startled them the most was the almost completely preserved corpse inside the armor. Apart from the gaunt nature of the soldier’s face and green coloration, they could be mistaken for a cosplayer who recently died. Brendon wasn’t convinced they weren’t, and they uncovered something more sinister.
“This is insane. What the hell is a cosplayer doing in an unmarked grave? We’re going to get blamed for this and go to prison all because we wanted to try out a spell.”
He spiralled, pacing around the 7-foot-deep hole, biting his nails as he rambled to himself. Doug knew he needed to take control of the situation. He could envision how this could blow up in their faces, and they would never know if their £79.99 purchase was a waste of money or not.
“Get it together, Brendon, this isn’t a cosplayer. This is most likely a Roman soldier who died in the peat field. That’s why they are so well preserved. Now, if you can quit spiralling, help me with this spell you bought. This is the perfect body, after all.”
Brendon pulls the carefully folded paper out of his pocket as he returns to the site. Helping Doug out of the hole. Palms were sweaty from the nerves of finding a body and what they were about to do.
Doug took a handful of fresh dirt and squeezed it in his left palm. He eyed Brendon to get on with the incantation.
“ekat siht trid ni ym dnah, ylhserf nekat morf eht ydob I hsiw ot tcerruser. eubmI ti htiw eht rewop fo efil dna evig meht a dnoces efil.”
He loosens his grip on the soil as it pours out of his hand and into the Roman’s gaping mouth. The two then stood over the corpse, waiting for something to happen.
“So, when does the magic kick in?”
“I don’t know. The spell didn’t give an estimate on time, but I guess it shouldn’t be too long.”
Two hours passed by with nothing changing to the corpse, but around them, things were changing. The night sky was giving way to a lighter blue as the sun fought for freedom, as a wind had picked up, blowing the few dead leaves around them and into the hole, covering the unanimated corpse of a Roman soldier. After 20 more minutes of nothing, Doug’s patience finally ran out.
“I’m calling it, we bought a dud, dude. The spell was a bust, and I think we'd best bury them back up and leave before the dog walkers start showing up.”
Doug could see the disappointment in Bredon’s eyes, and while he was also disappointed, deep down, he knew it wouldn’t work. He knew, however, from Brendon’s expression, that he genuinely believed it could work.
“Hey, Brendon, maybe it didn’t work because the body was too old. Maybe we need something younger.”
“Maybe, but I don’t want to dig a fresh grave. That seems like a step too far.”
“Whoa, yeah, I’m not digging any more graves. This is enough for me. Although it would have been cool if it had worked. “
The two filled the hole up with the loose soil, but somehow left the soldier’s left hand exposed. They turned to head back into the city, unaware of their mistake.
#
An hour after the two left, the index finger of the mummified hand exposed to the elements began to contract into a hook shape, as though it was digging in the soil. A moment passed before the other fingers also started to curl as they hooked into the dirt, repeating the motion.
The hand slowly dug away at the soil until enough was loose that the arm adjoining the hand could burst through the layers of soil, reaching out for the freedom it had long been denied. The arm swung around like a ragdoll, searching for the ground to grip onto and digging their nails into the soil, pulling the rest of themselves out of their resting place.
The teens had left before they could witness the mummified remains of a Roman soldier, reanimated and pulling itself back into the land that had long moved on but not forgotten about.
Free and standing, the soldier stared at himself, dazed and confused. He could not understand why his skin was a dark seaweed green and gaunt, exposing the bones and ligaments in his arms. Staring at his legs, he could see that his greaves, beautifully engraved plating protecting his shins, were now loose.
He looked around, getting acquainted with his new surroundings, different from the things he remembered. What was once empty marshland ripe for the Roman Empire to take was now woodland surrounded by death. Large oak trees bare of life with branches like fingers interlock with each other, casting a web of wood over the stars and shadows over the rows of gravestones and monuments to the dead.
The soldier, confused by the monument, staggered forward to get a better look. He believed these monuments were for fallen legionnaires like himself and wanted to pay his respects to those who had fallen in service of the emperor; only the dates made no sense to him. These numbers were too distant for them to be real. He counted on his decayed fingers, trying to work out how he could be here when the last thing he remembers is the year 80 AD. He had been a part of the legion under the rule of Gnaeus Julius Agricola. He had been tasked with patrolling the Mamucium and protecting the other garrisons stationed here.
Thoughts begin to race through his mind, ideas of the dangers his absence could have brought to the garrison. Fear pumped through his dry veins at the idea that those he knew he loved were in danger. Fear turned into adrenaline as he dropped to his knees and furiously dug away at the ground. Soil flung in all directions as his busy hands searched for what he thought was lost until he hit the metal curve, breaking a finger of his shield and underneath, and protecting his broadsword.
He raises both in the air, grunting in triumph, which echoes through the still, silent cemetery as the early dawn lights up the sky with a cocktail of red and pinks. Feeling complete, they slowly stagger through the cemetery, dragging their feet, looking for the exit.
The surroundings had changed in the centuries since his death, but his sense of direction was anything but dead. He knew where he was going, even if he didn’t recognize what he was seeing along the way.
End of Part One