"Humour is never explicable", said Goober, "it comes in sideways to logic, and that's what makes it funny".
There was silence in the room while everyone considered this.
Having all stopped talking momentarily they realised that there was also a silence outside as well.
Biff was imagining a whole bunch of clowns now down there waiting for him - "terrific" he thought to himself, "just terrific, ghouls and now clowns". This was not turning out to be the party he had imagined.
"Something to tell the folks at home about I suppose" he further thought - they love this stuff. By 'home' he had meant their little chapel.
Bart could be heard yelling from somewhere down the stairs "Help! Quick! Brogan's gone outside and they’re attacking him".
Marley looked anxiously over to Puck who was peering through some binoculars into the crowd. He was scanning for a pulsing light that came from the tag he had placed on him back when he had died. He located it soon enough to find that Brogan was dead centre of the swarm.
-Gabriel Brunsdon, Puck in Hell, Azlander Series
"Oh!" shrieked Jobe at the top of his voice, "there's a clown at the window!"
"Easy boy" said Nervina parking himself on the window seat in between Jobe and the face peering in.
"It's only another ghost" he said - shaking his head at the reaction.
"Looks like a clown to me."
"Aren't clowns meant to be funny?" Goober asked joining them with a dish of fried potatoes.
Nervina explained: - "Every now and then a plague comes to the world and the mortals end up in a terrible mess just before they pass over ... with sunken dark circles and bleeding from their eyes, rashes around their mouths, all dribbling down. At that point their minds go and they start stumbling around. Well, clowns were fashioned on this type of ghost - and not the other way around. That is why so many folk have a morbid fear of them - because they aren’t so funny at all."
He'd been talking above the Priest who had continued to pray, and only now had just stopped and was walking towards them.
Nervina blushed with embarrassment realising that his talking had interrupted the effort.
Father Tooke shook his hand warmly and said: "Never understood the clown thing before - thank you".
-Gabriel Brunsdon, Puck in Hell, Azlander Series
Brogan had recognized one of the men he had seen at the window - he knew that face with a fond feeling of recollection and something within his heart compelled him to go and greet him, face to face.
No sooner was he outside and into the grounds the clamour began. Wraiths came to him from all over and like an enormous bee stack attached to the hive, layers of ghostly beings clung to each other around him.
He felt nothing ... It all went dark ... Brogan faintly heard a squeal coming from high up in the house, and it sounded like Marley.
-Gabriel Brunsdon, Puck in Hell, Azlander Series
The child ghosts were unnaturally aggressive - they were biting one another. The women were tearing at their dresses and beating at their husbands. Their ribs showed through with hunger, their breasts hung like an old woman's sack, and their babies had turned blue.
Brogan strolled over to the side window - twenty or more faces were pressed up against the glass - their bony fingers were rapping and tapping on the panes.
"I didn't think that this was ever meant to happen,” said Bart looking over his shoulder.
"It's not" Brogan replied, "It's not".
- Gabriel Brunsdon, Puck in Hell, Azlander Series
Father Tooke could be heard on the floor above, praying out loud from up the main staircase. The insane wails persisted in relentless waves.
The shadows had infiltrated the walls, showing all terrible scenes that gave a pictorial account of hundreds of final moments. These ghosts were more than restless; they were trapped in anguish, and overwrought with the pain of it. Something or someone had stirred the phantoms from their places in the ground.
"Do you think that the Priest will be able to annihilate them all?" Bart asked timidly.
His fear had got the better of him - as this generation of the fallen ghosts were a far wilder lot that even he had been used to. The streets of Medieval England must have truly been a rugged place to survive in.
"I don't know" Brogan considered "he has some powerful magic I have heard, and that is why Puck did bring him to us. His strength is the kind that could reduce ghouls into dust I don't doubt. When all settles we can go back to our party.” Although he said this reassuringly, he had never known anything like this before, and it worried him.
-Gabriel Brunsdon, Puck in Hell, Azlander Series
After the King's army had departed, the Monks rose from the ground and brushed the dirt from their cloth. They neatened themselves as best they could; their tears making trails on their grubby faces.
Robin had been there with them all of this time, lain amongst them, and was wearing the same robes, as he did, when in their company.
"There is a challenge of a man to pray for" he said sarcastically.
He turned to the Monk beside him who seemed stricken with melancholy. He was trying to pull the shortened cord back around his waist - it had been cut with the Sheriff’s knife to expose his nakedness, before being forced to the ground.
"What now Brother Tooke?" he asked gently.
Satisfied that the knot would hold, he then looked back up at Robin and answered stoically: "My guess be that it is time for us all to take our leave" his voice went quieter at the end of these words as the two looked out over the fields.
-Gabriel Brunsdon, Puck in Hell, Azlander Series
"You cannot kill the Monks!" a voice shrilled bitingly.
"No, but I can castrate the bastards! I assure you it would be doing the Holy Church a service increasing their virtue..." the Black Sheriff sneered, and then spat, pacing around the twelve that were lying face down on the ground in front of his men.
The figures were motionless, helpless in submission, with their hoods over their heads and long brown robes, and just ankles and sandals bared.
"This Order harms no one Sir" the knight persisted bravely in his dangerous protest.
"Perhaps. Yet they contrive against me all the same - with their insolence. They endeavor to heal the foe we strike down - what madness compels them to nurture our enemy? It is contrary to law, and they needs be punished for their fickle humors."
Sweat drinkled down his neck, as the heat of the day had set upon them. Their tunics were weighing heavy, as none had slept and plainly his men had become weary.
"I will give them but one day to produce the traitor Robin or I will cut them all" he then added to pepper his threat: "Their hymns will be sung all the sweeter."
-Gabriel Brunsdon, Puck in Hell, Azlander Series
