To my right, the building Pestilence is on groans.
“Brother!” Famine shouts with more emotion than I thought he was capable of.
Before he can say more, a portion of the high rise collapses. Corpses fall with the rubble, and at the very top of the structure, I see Pestilence lunge for the edge of the roof as the floor falls away.
Famine throws out a hand, and a line of twisting vines sprout from where we stand all the way to the base of the building, rising and weaving themselves together to make a bridge of sorts. On the other end of this makeshift bridge, a thick, vined monstrosity slithers its way up the building’s walls. Halfway to the top, it slows.
“I can’t make it any bigger!” Famine shouts. I doubt Pestilence can hear him, but it’s clear enough that this is the limit of the Reaper’s help.
Pestilence pulls himself to his feet and, slinging his bow across his chest, he moves directly above where Famine’s ropy bridge of vines has attached itself to the plant growing up the building’s walls. The high rise groans again, and then the rest of the structure begins to collapse.
I suck in my scream as Pestilence leaps, his body plummeting towards the earth. Before he can hit the ground, Famine’s plants reach out and catch the horseman. The foliage rustles as it deposits him onto the far edge of the bridge.
It takes Pestilence a moment to get his bearings, but once he has them, he moves across the ropy bridge with surprising agility. He steps off of it, giving Famine a nod.
“Thanks brother,” Pestilence says, lifting his bow off of his chest.
“Just doing my job,” Famine says. “Ana tells me we must take care of our elderly.”
The Reaper seriously does not know how to handle gratitude.
But Pestilence guffaws and claps him on the back. “I hope you get the chance to experience it too, brother.”
Famine’s expression grows serious. “I will.”
Now that the horsemen are all safe and accounted for, we take in the carnage around us. Hundreds—if not thousands—of corpses are wriggling around, either caught in Famine’s plants, or lying in piles. One decaying hand latches onto War’s ankle. The horseman punts the appendage clear across the highway, the thing smacking into the face of a trapped revenant.
In the distance, I can see more undead scaling the foliage, and while the plants make quick work of these new corpses, there’s no way they’ll be able to hold off the horde for long.
The Reaper grimaces at the bodies. “They smell … like shit,”
“They’re corpses,” Pestilence says, digging through the dead. From beneath them, he grabs one of the bundles of arrows he had set aside earlier. “Did you expect them to smell like your precious purple roses you like to rub all over yourself when you think no one is watching?”
In response, a bush near the horseman opens, releasing a mostly pulverized revenant. The creature lunges for Pestilence.
“Whoops,” Famine says.
Cursing under his breath, Pestilence drops his weapons just as the creature collides with him. Grabbing it with both hands, Pestilence tosses the undead over his shoulder, aiming the body right at the Reaper.
The corpse crashes into Famine, nearly knocking him off his feet. The Reaper begins to swear when War steps up and swings his sword, cutting the undead off at the knees.
In the sky, Thanatos falters. He looks downwards at the sight before him. If he notices me at all, he makes no sign of it.
Instead, all around us, the plants Famine had grown wither away. They don’t release the trapped revenants, but then they don’t need to. Hundreds more are already climbing past the wall of plants.
“Shit,” the Reaper curses. The ground trembles as more plants push through.
While Famine’s focusing on regrowing our defenses, the bodies around us begin to vibrate.
“Pestilence, Lazarus, Famine,” War calls, “ready yourselves.”
My gaze sweeps over the dead just as piles of severed body parts rejoin, corpses fitting themselves back together as though they were never cut apart. I’ve seen this before with Death’s servants, when it seemed as though magic and nothing more stitched their forms together. But never have I seen it with fleshy bodies.
The severed appendages don’t physically reattach; instead magic seems to hold them in place. Within seconds, legions of dead are whole again. Teenagers, adults, children and the elderly. All of them stare at us through rotted eyes.
Then, as one, they attack.
I kick out at the previously severed arm of a nearby revenant. My boot meets resistance, but then, not a second later, the appendage falls away. I wait for it to reattach itself. Instead it gropes around on the ground.