Orwell Durr was an insufferable cunt. Bale preferred to avoid that particular word, but in all the years he knew the vile thing, a better descriptor hadn’t presented itself. On the surface, Orwell was the picture of perfection. His eyes were bright and keen like a fox’s. He wore a crisp, white suit that seemed impervious to wrinkles or any form of blemish. It was the same suit he’d been wearing since Bale met him. Of course, it couldn’t have been the same exact suit. He must have had hundreds of thousands of them, and they all looked the same. His hair and perfectly trimmed goatee were as white and bright as his clothing. Neither made him look elderly. His skin was youthful and taut, like a twenty-something who’d witnessed a thing so utterly terrifying it shocked the color from his hair.

Beneath that flawless façade dwelled the vilest, most conniving scum to ever tarnish the face of reality. His heart, if he had one, must have been the blackest, deadest thing to ever rot inside a carcass. He was absent even the minutest speck of patience and housed equal amounts of compassion and empathy. He was a void who cared only for perfection at any cost.

Orwell’s office echoed his personality. The glossy, mahogany desk he reclined behind was flanked by bookshelves of the same deep, rich finish. Everything was tidy and perfectly in line. There were no ragged edges or oddities which seemed out of place. Everything was precise despite appearing like nineteen-thirty sat on its face and dribbled its goodness all over its chin. Orwell was like that though. He had particular eras he was fond of, and he lived like they never ended. Every meeting was like a scene from some black and white noir film, and he was the big boss behind whatever scheme was happening.

Bale unhappily played the muscle in Orwell’s fantasies. He carried Billy’s heavy ass over his shoulder all the way up to Orwell’s desk and dropped it in front of it in a fat, sweaty pile of unconsciousness.

“Sloppy as usual, Mr. Lance,” Orwell droned like an annoyed schoolteacher.

Bale always planned to be polite, to play the game, but he could never stick the landing. As soon as Orwell opened his mouth, Bale became a defiant child battling against the rules. “Sorry, Or,” he shrugged, “Fucker ran. Can’t figure why. Just look at him. This cat couldn’t outrun a stick of butter. He’d probably eat one though.”

Orwell’s jaw tightened as he replied, “Would you say I treat you with respect, Mr. Lance?”

“Respect?” Bale chuckled, “That might be a stretch. Polite, I’d say, annoyingly polite.”

The tension in Orwell’s jaw remained as he asked, “Then why do you refuse me the same?” He cleared his throat dramatically before continuing, “Mr. Durr, Orwell, either of those would be fine. When you call me Or, it sounds as if you’d like to reduce me to a common conjunction. Do I appear common to you, Mr. Lance?”

“Of course not, boss,” Bale grinned, “There is nothing common about you.” He nodded toward the pile lying on the floor next to him before asking, “This fat shit’s fifty, right?”

Orwell casually examined his fingernails as he replied, “Twenty-five.”

“It was fifty when I took the job,” Bale grunted in disgust.

“Clean marks are fifty. You always bring them to me stressed. How we do things is equally important as the things we choose to do,” Orwell’s tone dripped with boredom.

It was the same as always with this cocksucker. The price offered was never the price paid. As much as he liked to pimp the idea that everyone was dying to get into heaven, or at least their perception of it, nobody gave a shit about Orwell or the City of Gold anymore. If they did, that tightwad wouldn’t need to chase these losers down.

Bale sighed deep as he finally replied, “A soul’s a soul, and this one was a pain in the ass.”

Orwell shrugged and offered a smug smile as he replied, “Oh well, you did succeed where others failed, and he was a slippery one. Probably heavy too, by the looks of him. I’ll give you thirty-five.”

“Come on, Or,” Bale groaned, “You’ve given me thirty-five for coma patients.” He scratched his head, scowled at Billy still lying unconscious on the floor, and pointed several times at Orwell before adding, “Fine. I want to see her then.”

The dramatic and slow laugh Orwell offered before responding was as obnoxious as it was infuriating. He loved this shit. When he finally finished his patronizing chuckle, all he offered was more bullshit, “Do I look like a negotiator? Your next visit is in two weeks. You should be satisfied I allow you to see her at all.”

“Come on, five minutes. I’ve brought you eight solid marks since my last visit. Just let me pop in and let her know I’m still around.” Bale pled his case sweetening his voice up as much as he was able around the foul taste he always got in the back of his throat when he had to deal with this pretentious twat.

Orwell’s smile turned devious as he leaned forward into his desk, rubbed his hands together briskly, and said, “Fine, let’s negotiate then. You can have ten minutes, but then you only get ten for the mark.”

Bale clenched his fists like he might jump across Orwell’s desk and knock the condescending grin off his pompous face. Instead of making that grave mistake, he nearly shouted, “Ten years? That’s some bottom-feeder bullshit, and you know it!”

“Your mouth, Mr. Lance! Do not forget who owns whom here. If you want to see her, it is ten. If you would prefer thirty-five, you walk out of here,” the smile fled from Orwell’s face as his voice effortlessly rose to a volume almost loud enough to make ears bleed.

Bale cringed. Covering his ears failed to keep them from feeling like they might explode at any minute. He knew how to push Orwell across the line. Luckily, he had learned long ago when to stop pushing. The defiance dancing all about his expression fled as he sighed and said, “Please, Mr. Durr. Can we make it twenty-five and ten minutes?”

“That is better,” Orwell replied as the smug, satisfied smile slipped back onto face. Then he nonchalantly added, “Now, I have given you two clear options. All you need do is choose.”

Bale bit his tongue and choked down all the venom pounding on the back of his teeth that wanted desperately to spew out all over Orwell’s desk. None of the words he would assault the boss with would make a damn bit of difference, so he stuffed them deep into his gut to fester until the day he finally decided to take the old man on. He drew in a deep breath, let his body deflate with a big sigh, and said, “Negotiation, my ass. Fine. I’ll take ten and ten.”

Orwell signaled he was finished with the conversation by shifting his attention to something on his desk. The something didn’t matter. It was all an act, just another thing he did to make sure everyone knew how small and insignificant they were. He casually waved his hand and said, “Very good, Mr. Lance. Go ahead then. You know the way.”

It wasn’t easy to yank his stare away from that vile thing. There was so much more he wanted to say, so much more he wanted to do. But it was done. Nothing he could say or do would make a difference. It would feel good in the moment, but Orwell could erase him with a thought. That wouldn’t do. He had more work to get done.

He let the rage radiate off him as he walked toward a decoratively carved, wooden door, finished in the same rich mahogany as everything else in the perfect room. The handle was gold and resembled a solar cross with intricate patterns carved into it. The pattern was allegedly a phrase written in the language of angels. Michael had told him once that it said, “Eternity lies beyond this door.” Bale never believed it actually said anything. Michael was full of shit most of the time.

The door didn’t lead to any room. When he opened it, it looked like dark water with slight circular ripples slowly radiating out from its center until they terminated at the edges of the doorway. Bright, light-blue beams that were almost white shimmered from those ripples like static racing around those circles. He stepped through.

It felt just like departing. There was that brief moment of terror when his body felt like it was being ripped apart in a split second of excruciating pain followed by an instant of sheer bliss, like floating in a cloud, and then he was put back together in the most beautiful place in any reality he’d ever visited. It was paradise. Too bad it was just a beautiful prison for the only thing he cared about, the only reason he woke up every morning.

Everything around him was just a little bit more. The leaves on the trees were greener. The grass spreading out in every direction was greener and lusher than any lawn, no matter how well kept, in any of the billions of potentialities. Lilacs were the most vibrant purple, elegantly outlined in the purest white. It seemed a prettier flower could never exist until one beheld the irises almost glowing in their own purple hues. The dahlias almost outshined them both. Every flower of every type boasted the deepest yet somehow brightest colors that ever were. It was almost too much. The sky above was the same. The blue of that sky almost seemed fake in its perfection. The water of the small pond she sat next to on a large but perfectly smooth boulder pulling petals from a bright, white daisy and tossing them into the drink reflected the perfection of that pristine sky.

Bale just stood there watching for a moment. The time was short, but something about her innocence always left him yearning for simpler times. Angel Cakes is what he’d called her for the last who knows how many years. He had named her Eirini when she was born, but he hadn’t called her that in ages. It had been so long she probably wouldn’t even remember. Her perfect, dark-brown hair curled in ringlets that rested gently against her porcelain skin. She looked like a doll.

“He loves me,” she finally shouted as she yanked the last petal from her flower and tossed it triumphantly into the air.

The truest joy he’d ever felt was marred by sadness knowing he could never give her the life she deserved, but it still managed to bring a dopey smile to his hard face. It fled far too quickly as he glanced at the two stooges keeping watch. They looked like identical twins except for their long and flowing hair. Michael’s was blonde, and Gabriel’s was fire-red. They both wore impeccable white suits just like Orwell, and they both looked equally pretentious.

Bale offered the two angels a brief scowl before turning his attention back to his reason to exist and shouting, “Angel Cakes!”

He loved the way her eyes lit up when she saw him. The visits were too short and too infrequent, but she never let on how let down she must have been. She jumped down from the rock she’d been sitting on, dropped her petal-less flower, and ran to him with her arms wide and her perfect curls bouncing all about her head.

She jumped into his arms and stared up at him with wide eyes like two bright blue moons as she nearly shouted, “Daddy! The flower said you love me, and you came. You finally came!”

He planted a smooch on her cheek and said, “Of course, I did. Giant dragons couldn’t keep me away from the most beautiful, little angel in five galaxies.”

“Giant, fire-breathing dragons?” she asked with a skeptical squint.

“Oh yeah,” he nodded his head dramatically as he continued, “giant, fire-breathing dragons with three heads and a hundred arms!”

Bale spun her around until they were both dizzy. Then he tossed her high up into the air, hugged her tight, and spun her around again. They were both laughing like idiots when they fell to the soft grass.

Angel Cakes curled up against his chest and said, “I miss you, daddy. When can I come home with you.”

His eyes filled up as he laid there on the perfect, soft grass gazing up into a flawless blue sky. This was the worst part of every visit, the heartbreak. No tear would fall from his eye. She had to believe the lie he was about to tell her. He wasn’t sure who hated it worse as he replied, “Soon. Daddy’s trying, Angel. I’ve got a lot to do, lots of bad people to catch.”

“How many?” her tone gained an almost scolding quality as she asked the same question she asked him every time he came to visit.

“Too many to count on your fingers,” he replied quietly.

“And my toes?” she was such a trooper. This was the game. It was like she knew he would break her heart again, but she played along knowing how bad it hurt him too.

“And my fingers and toes,” his breathing grew steady as he lost ground against the tears desperately waiting to rain down his cheeks.

She cuddled in closer to his chest as he shot a deadly glare at those two bastard angels chuckling at their sorrow. “These bums playing nice?” he asked.

She sat up, gave him the most serious look he’d ever seen, and said, “No. They don’t play, or talk, or anything. They just stand there.”

He pulled his scowl away from the guards as a smile washed over his face. “Do they still scare you?” he asked while gently mussing her hair.

“No,” she scoffed as if it were the most ridiculous question she’d ever been asked, “They’re just dumb and don’t ever want to play anything.”

He laughed as he sat up and asked, “Did you tell them what I told you last time?”

“Yes,” she rolled her eyes and giggled. Her bright face could melt the hardest heart. Then she slapped her knee, laughed some more and added, “They didn’t think it was funny at all.”

He pulled her close again and kissed the top of her head before asking, “What did you tell them?”

A devious grin slipped between her slightly pudgy cheeks as she shrugged and said, “I told them they are big, dopey asshats.”

They both fell back to the ground as they laughed together. Someday, this would be every day. Sadly, it wasn’t this day. He let the idea slip away as he let the laughter take him away, chuckling like a fool in the grass with his favorite person in the world.

Once he gained enough control of himself to speak, he looked over at Michael and said, “Hear that, asshat? You bums are as big and dopey as she says.”

“Time’s up, Bale,” Michael scowled.

Bale continued chuckling as he replied, “Calm down, Mikey. I just got here, and Or gave me ten.”

Gabriel’s smile looked like cold death when he said, “Imagine how easy she’d break.”

Michael’s smile was equally cold and dead when he added, “Like a porcelain doll.”

Bale gave Angel Cakes a quick squeeze and a wide smile as he told her, “Give me a second, sweetie. I need to have a chat with the asshats.”

By the time Bale got to his feet, any remnants of joy had fled from his expression. His jaw grew tighter, and his scowl deepened as he stalked toward the two angels like death with a wicked hangover.

He put his face close to Gabriel’s ear as he quietly growled, “Once my debt is paid, I’m coming for you. One out of place hair on her head, and I’m going to make it hurt.”

Gabriel’s smile faltered the slightest bit as he replied, “All you are is words.”

Bale hadn’t noticed Angel Cakes follow him over until she peeked out from behind his legs and added, “Asshat.”

The kid was right. He never got a chance to tell her. A swirling circle of blue light spun up out of nothing right next to him. It was the same light blue, almost white light that pulsed in the doorway he used to get to the place. But this time it sucked him right in. He barely heard Angel call him. “Daddy!” she shouted, but he was already being torn apart.

Lots of folks who have suffered a near death experience—whether they end up crossing that line into clinical death or just come very close to it—talk about seeing a light. For some, this light fills them with joy and hope for what’s to come. It reaffirms their beliefs in a hereafter, whatever those beliefs might be. Others are filled with dread. Regardless of how they come away feeling about the situation, some of them aren’t ready to go. They are free to continue along on their mundane and useless journeys through this physical existence. Some are ready to go, and they know it. Those poor souls are tormented. Guilt weighs on them like a boulder crushing their spirit into the soft earth. Some think it’s demons or ghosts hunting them down to drag them off to hell or heaven or whatever thing they believe in. That part’s all in their heads. They are hunted, but it ain’t by any spiritual beings.

Bale Lance was a hunter. Millions of realities running alongside one another fell under his jurisdiction, and they all had an equal number of myths and beliefs, gods they worshipped or feared. None of those were real in the sense that the particular entity existed in the way they were described in those stories. All those various supreme beings were nothing more than failed attempts at describing Bale’s boss, Orwell Durr. Those souls belonged to him, and it was Bale’s job to collect them.

One of those wayward souls was the reason Bale found himself standing beneath the weight of an unseasonably warm, late April sky on a crumbling street in the bowels of Hell’s Kitchen. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky, but the air was so wet it seemed droplets of rain could form right out of the nothing. It covered his skin like a damp towel. The street surrounding him was littered with trash and empty except for the rodents scurrying about the refuse and searching for unfinished morsels to chow on. The entire place smelled like someone forgot to flush after unloading the chili from the night before that just hadn’t agreed with them.

Bale stood in the center of it all, soaking up the despair and letting it beat him down to a dark place inside himself, a hollow pit of desolation where he felt desperate enough to sentence some poor slob to oblivion. He hated his job, but Orwell didn’t give him a choice. As he gazed at his prey through a window cloudy with dust from years of neglect, he thought he should be getting hazard pay. For two weeks he’d been chasing this one through the sweaty streets, wet from the heat and humidity and saturated with the smell. He had finally caught up to his mark. It was time to tag his bounty and move on to the next thing.

Bale dragged his palm across his forehead attempting to clear away the sweat beading up above his brow. It didn’t help. The soaking air just left it glistening again. He kept his dark hair clipped short. That normally helped keep the sweat off his neck, but it was just as wet as the rest of him. On the plus side, Bale kept himself fit. Having his thick arms glistening when he walked up to his mark certainly wouldn’t hurt. Intimidating his prey into believing they couldn’t win if they tried had helped him avoid plenty of unnecessary scuffles in his long career. That was good. His favorite kind of fight was the one he could avoid. The folks he hunted typically weren’t horrible people. They didn’t deserve to be hurt. It was just their time.

Ceasar’s Ghost was a shithole of a bar that was probably something fifty years ago, the kind of place where uppity fellows with too much money and too much time could get together to sip bourbon and argue about things nobody else cared about. The name was apropos. The place was just like a ghost haunting a street so littered with trash and sleeping homeless it looked more like a war zone than the vital avenue in the heart of a thriving metropolis that it desperately wanted to be. The unlit neon sign bolted to the front of the building wasn’t how Bale knew the crumbling establishment had possibly the most perfectly descriptive name for a place that ever was. That thing was missing enough letters that the ones remaining didn’t spell any word in any language. Two weeks of hunting, chasing, and researching a poor slob who knew somebody was after him but couldn’t figure out who had led to the perfect spot to hide out for someone who doesn’t want to be found.

When Bale finally yanked the heavy wooden door of the joint open and strolled inside, it was like walking into a time warp. He could picture the place packed with a pretentious crowd pontificating over elegant snifters—each filled with two fingers of bourbon that cost more than some folks make in year—about why one philosopher’s ideas were preferable to another’s. There was no crowd haunting Caesar’s Ghost on this night. It was just before last call, and the dingy space was empty except for three other souls besides him. The one on the end of the bar looked like he’d been sleeping for hours under a pile of matted and dirty gray hair. He wouldn’t be a problem. The youngster behind the bar had the tools to be a scrapper, but his smooth cheeks and all the product in his hair suggested he’d rather chase tail than trouble. And then there was the fat, sweaty reason Bale had to subject himself to one of the most desperate-looking shit holes he’d seen in his life.

Billy Crass slouched over a big splash of cheap whiskey in a tumbler that looked like it was plucked right out of Aunt May’s kitchen. Everything about the guy was sloppy. His dark, sweat-streaked hair stuck to his forehead in spots and straight up in others. The button-down shirt he wore was probably perfect for an office when cleaned and pressed. Instead, the wrinkly, gray thing, that had most definitely been white at some point in its history, looked like armpit stink. The frumpy, brown trousers didn’t look any better.

Bale took one more glance around the room before taking a seat on the wobbly barstool next to Billy. Cracks in the plaster spider webbing all along the walls and ceiling looked like veins under thin skin. The back bar was probably glorious during the place’s heyday. Now it was cracked and discolored from too many years of neglect. The bar looked the same, a ghost of architectural perfection, faded mahogany scratched with graffiti.

“It’s last call. If you want a drink it’s got to be a quick one,” the pretty boy behind the bar quietly said without much conviction in his tone as he scrolled through his phone, probably deciding whether to swipe right or left.

Bale offered a menacing, back off smile with his response, “Don’t worry, kid. We’ll be leaving soon.” Then he turned toward Billy, grabbed the man’s glass of whiskey, slammed it down, and said, “Billy Crass, you died at 10:34 p.m. on Monday, April 1st, in the year of our Lord, 2024. You were supposed to go into the light, but you know that. Why didn’t you? Was that your idea of an April Fools' Day prank?”

“Hey, buddy, I don’t want any trouble here. Order a drink or step off,” the bartender’s smoky voice cracked a bit as he held up his phone and added, “I’ll call the cops.”

There was a reason Bale wore his t-shirts tight. His swollen shoulders looked like they might rip right out of them. He flexed those bulging shoulders slightly as he leaned onto the bar and brought his face closer to pretty boy’s. The smile he’d been wearing shifted to something closer to a sneer as he quietly said, “Look, I don’t want to hurt you. I have a job to do. Put your fucking phone away, or I’m going to shove it up your tight, little turd squirter.”

Billy split. He nearly tripped over the stool he’d been sitting on as it crashed to the floor, and he stumbled toward the exit. The door groaned loudly before slamming shut behind him.

Bale didn’t pay any attention to Billy as he fled. Instead, he stared at pretty boy’s eyes and let his face tighten into a hard scowl. He sat there in silence like that for an uncomfortable few moments breathing deeply like he was counting backwards from ten in his mind to keep from exploding. He wasn’t, but if he were, he’d have only made it to seven before the bartender slipped his phone back into his pocket.

Bale let the smile slip back onto his face as he said, “Thanks, jackass. Now I’ve got to chase him.”

Chase was probably a bit strong a word for all the pursuit would amount to. Bale knew exactly where Billy was heading. The destination was a dumb one. If Bale were trying to run from someone who found him hiding out in a random dive bar he’d never been to before, the last place he’d go would be home. That’s the first place most folks who want to find other folks would start, their homes. Luckily, Bale had no doubt that the chubby sonofabitch was on a dead sprint along the four-block route that would take him to his shitty apartment. Bale would be there long before he arrived.

He grabbed a thin, rectangular device out of his pocket. It was about the same dimensions as a smart phone, not the shitty, small ones but the big ultra kind. Bale didn’t have one of those. There wasn’t anybody he really wanted to talk to that badly, and he wasn’t a fan of any media, especially the social kind. He spun a couple dials on the thing and was just about to push the button that would transport him to his next destination without any running necessary when he felt the bartender staring at him.

Pretty boy’s quickly morphing expression gave away how hard he was thinking about the next words that would dribble out of his mouth. “Are you going to pay for that guy’s drinks since you chased him off?” he asked so quietly it was just a hair louder than a whisper.

“Why would I pay a dead man’s debt?” Bale chuckled and then hit the button on his device.

A moment later, he materialized on the top of a six story, red brick building across the alley from an identical red brick where Billy lived on the fifth floor in apartment 508. Both were equally dilapidated. Bricks were missing here and there. The windows that weren’t covered in rusty, metal cages were boarded up or missing altogether. Corroded fire escapes looked like the only thing they could help one escape from was life, and graffiti covered the buildings far higher than a human should want to scale a crumbling structure.

The sky was much better to look at than the sweaty hell languishing around the alley below. The moon was big and full that night, and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky to hinder its brilliant light in the least. Bale loved the moon, full or a sliver didn’t matter. It was one of the only things that brought him any joy anymore. The city lights hid the brilliance of all but the most ambitious stars and planets, but the ones he could see added just a little more magic to the quiet darkness. It looked so peaceful. He’d love to step right off the edge of the building and float off into the nothing, sail off into space and forget everything. He could never do that. There was someone depending on him.

“Where the fuck did you come from?” a voice asked from the shadows behind him, interrupting his little moment of Zen.

Bale spun quickly to get a bead on the owner of the raspy voice who had ruined his peaceful moment. It took a minute to place the fellow. He was buried in newspapers and other random trash. All the exposed parts of him were covered in so much soot, he blended perfectly into the darkness.

Once Bale had identified that the man wasn’t a threat, he smiled wide and answered, “Ceasar’s Ghost.”

“You ain’t no ghost,” the dirty fellow responded.

“No, I’m not a ghost. I was at the bar named Ceasar’s Ghost, and now I’m here,” he chuckled a bit as he replied.

“Yeah, but how did you get there?” the man grew a bit agitated as he spoke, “One second there was nothing there, and the next second, you’re standing there looking at the sky. How did you get there?”

Bale knew what the guy meant, but he had a few minutes to kill. He had no idea what it looked like to anyone who saw him arrive—or depart for that matter. That’s what he called it when he used his device, arriving and departing. He didn’t really understand how it worked, but it was a great tool for his line of work, which was basically hunting people. He plugged in the potentiality, longitude, and latitude coordinates, and hit the button. Then he vanished from where he was and showed up where he wanted to be. It was like a bionic GPS.

“That’s exactly how it happened,” he finally said. “First I was at the bar, and then, just like that, I was here.”

“Bullshit,” the guy groaned at him.

“May Athena strike me down if I’m lying,” he held his hand up as if it might add some validity to the statement in the skeptical man’s mind. Then he scratched his chin and asked, “What did it look like?”

“Static,” the man replied quickly, “The air got all shaky, and then it looked like tiny blocks were being put together so fast you could hardly see them. Then you were there, gazing at the moon like a jackass.”

Bale thought about the description. The fellow’s explanation of what he saw lined up with how it felt to travel. Departing did feel a bit like being torn apart, deconstructed into the most basic atoms to travel through space and time like waves of light or sound, and then put back together on arrival. The process hurt, but the pain was brief. He could never forget the first time he’d done it. It was an instant of terror the moment he hit the button. It felt like a thousand knives sliced into every part of his body all the way into the bone, but the pain ended before the mind-numbing fear could take hold. Then he was standing somewhere else no worse for the wear.

The man’s raspy voice dragged Bale away from the brief reflection as he asked, “Well, how did you do that, just show up like that out of nowhere? Is it some kind of trick? Are you one of them YouTube guys that goes around tricking people and fucking with them and making them look stupid. I ain’t got no place to go, but I ain’t stupid.”

It would be a solid minute and a half before Billy made the alley. Plenty of time to humor a guy who probably didn’t have much joy in his life. Bale finally smiled and said, “No, you obviously have your wits about you, and I am not some kind of Internet magician or anything like that. I hunt souls. I have a device that can transport me any place in any dimension at any point in their history.”

“Bullshit,” the man scoffed as he struggled to his feet, “Let me see it then.”

Bale tensed as the man approached. There was no reason to hurt the guy. Hopefully, the man wouldn’t give him one. “What are you doing?” Bale asked with a bit of authority stiffening his words.

“Relax,” the guy groaned as he shuffled closer, “What’s a scrawny fucker like me going to do to a tank like you? What are you, like six-two, six-three? You look like a pro wrestler. Steroids?”

“No steroids,” Bale chuckled, “I have a pretty strict training regimen. None of the marks carrying around the souls I need to collect want to give them up, and some of them are pretty tough customers. I need to keep myself fit.”

The man posed no threat. Even wrapped up in a dingy, old blanket, that much was obvious. There was something sad about the curiosity in the man’s bright eyes as they sparkled from the soot caked upon his sunken cheeks. He probably had a good life at some point. Bale thought of asking but didn’t. Billy’s big ass would be slowly running as fast as he could down the alley any minute, and it would be time to split.

Bale slid the device out of his pocket and waved the man closer, “Here, look at this.”

That was a mistake. The man was about a foot away from him when Bale caught a whiff. The guy looked like he spent his days swimming in sewage. He smelled even worse. Bale did his best not to grimace, but the odor was breathtaking.

Bale held the device out from his body to stop the man’s advance and struggled through his explanation, “Your reality is potentiality zero. There are millions, maybe billions, of potentialities very similar to this one but different enough that you wouldn’t recognize them all running in straight lines next to each other, each a mere vibration from the next. These are like different dimensions, slices of reality running from, based on the beliefs of this reality, we’ll say Heaven and Hell. This is the potentiality I come from. Anyone can travel from one to another, but it ain’t easy. It requires focus and manipulation of elements. This device does all that extra nonsense for me. I plug in the potentiality I’m traveling to along with coordinates, latitude, longitude, altitude, etcetera, and hit go.”

Bale clicked the button as soon as he finished his explanation. That instant of pain wasn’t the least bit frightening anymore. He knew it would be over quickly. His awareness spread apart, stretching, thinning, and expanding like a cloud. He could feel that he was moving, but it wasn’t like walking or driving, or anything of the sort. It was almost like floating. An instant later he was standing ten feet from the man, holding up his device and flashing a friendly smile.

“Holy shit,” the man gasped, dumbfounded.

“Holy shit, indeed,” Bale laughed. Then he shrugged, and said, “It’s been a slice, but I need to split.”

As if on cue, the sound of heavy footsteps and labored breaths echoing off the bricks of the buildings stretching up from the alley below filled the air. Billy had finally made the alley. Bale wondered if the poor soul had enough gas to make it the last half a block to the back entry of his building.

“Is that the guy you’re hunting?” the man standing on the roof with him asked, and then followed up with, “You’re some kind of alien or something, aren’t you? That technology, all that talk about dimensions. You’re from a different world.”

“I’m not,” Bale shook his head as he walked toward the edge of the roof, “I’m from a long time ago in this world.”

“Fuck that,” the man snapped. His voice gained volume as he grew more and more agitated, “You’re an alien. You’re trying to steal that guy, so you can experiment on him.”

“Dude, calm the fuck down,” Bale whispered, “I don’t want to hurt you, but I will.”

The man dropped his blanket and charged. Luckily, he kept his mouth shut. The last thing Bale needed was for Billy to get spooked and skip his apartment for parts unknown. The scrubby guy just grunted with his first step, lowering his head like he was going to attempt a takedown. It was a short elbow Bale threw at the guy, fast and stiff. It connected right at the back of his jawbone. He dropped like a rock, out cold.

“Dumb ass,” Bale sighed as he turned his attention to the alley six stories below. He felt bad about hitting the guy. He’d be alright. He’d be out for a few minutes, and his jaw would be sore for a couple days. Beyond that, all he’d take away from the altercation was a great story about how he fought with an alien to share with anyone who’d listen. It wasn’t personal. If the guy hadn’t caught him in the middle of a case, he would have enjoyed chatting with him for a while. As it was, Bale had work to do. His target was huffing and puffing six stories below him.

The alley was dark, a wasteland of trash and unfortunate souls hiding among it. There was only one light along the entire block. Halfway from one end to the other. It hummed loudly as it cast a dim glow on a steel security door with more dents on it than a newborn’s cranium. Billy was about ten feet from that circle of dim, yellow light struggling to finish the last leg of his journey. His feet hammered heavily into the pavement with each labored step he took, splashing water up from random puddles, potholes filled up from recent rains.

Billy was a mess. His shirt had come untucked, unleashing his sloppy belly to flop in all its hairy glory from his knees to nearly his chin with every slow stride. He fell just before the stoop in front of the door bathed in the glow from that one working streetlight in the entire alley. He crawled up the three steps and pulled himself to his feet on a rusty, old railing that barely held his weight.

“Don’t have a fucking heart attack,” Bale whispered. It would wipe out his payday if the jerk died before he could deliver him to Orwell.

Billy fumbled with the lock for nearly a minute before finally getting the thing unlocked and flopping onto the stairway on the other side of it. Hopefully, the poor slob would survive the five flights of steps he’d need to climb to make it to his floor. The door swung shut, and Bale turned a couple dials on his device to set the proper coordinates that would land him in Billy’s living room. Then he clicked the big button in the middle.

The rooftop around him melted away. After a whisper of darkness, four dingy beige walls materialized around him. He was in Billy’s living room with his ass planted in an easy chair which accounted for a full quarter of the furniture in the room. Nothing matched anything else in the room aside from it all being at equal levels of disrepair. The chair he sat in was leather and was probably gorgeous thirty years ago. Now, the material was worn, and both heavily cushioned arms were shredded and losing stuffing. The end table next to him had at one time been stained a light oak. At this point in its life, it was full of scratches and the finish was mostly bare wood. It housed a small lamp that belonged on a child’s desk rather than in a living room. The sofa next to that looked even older than the easy chair Bale sat on. It was an awful brown and tan pattern that was difficult to make out amid all the stains and tears in the fabric. Against the wall across from it all was a giant, flat screen TV. At least Billy had his priorities straight.

A solid five minutes passed before Bale heard keys jingling in the hallway. There were no less than four deadbolts keeping the door secure. It took another two minutes for Billy to unlock them all and bust into the kitchen. He didn’t even glance in Bale’s direction. Instead, he headed straight for the kitchen. The smell of spoiled eggs wafted all the way to the living room when he opened the fridge. Billy’s back was to Bale when he cracked a beer and downed it, twist, fizz, chug. Then he tossed the bottle into the sink and grabbed another.

Bale let Billy get about halfway through his second beer before he said, “You know, if you ran everywhere that fast, you might not be carrying around the ninety extra pounds that gave you that heart attack in the first place.”

Crash! The bottle slipped from Billy’s trembling hands and smashed to bits against the floor.

“Who the fuck are you?” Billy stammered without turning around.

“I’m a collector,” Bale replied quietly, “You died, but you didn’t stay dead. Some folks who almost die, aren’t ready yet. You’re not one of those. It was your time. You were due in the City of Gold two weeks ago. I need to take you there.”

Billy didn’t respond. He just stood there, tense and looking like he might try bolting again at any moment.

“Look, I’m sorry, but I have a job to do,” Bale’s tone was matter of fact as he continued, “You’ve got no place to go, and you can’t have any gas left in your tank. It’s over. Don’t try to run…”

Billy bolted toward the door.

“Damn it. Now I’ve got to chase…” Bale said as he thumbed his device and vanished, reappearing in the hallway right outside Billy’s door. The stickers on the flimsy thing read 50, but that was only because the 8 had fallen off.

When Billy busted through the door into the hallway, Bale finished his statement, “…you,” as he threw a right hook and dropped him where he stood. Then he looked down at Billy’s unconscious body and asked, “Why the fuck do they always run?”

The circular room at the top of the tower was the same as it ever was. The cyclopean stones piled on one another too perfectly to be as random and chaotic as they seemed were bathed in total darkness and then total light in such rapid succession, they seemed completely dark and completely light at the same time. It was almost as if the two conditions existed in one moment rather than a rapidly changing procession. The oddness of that condition of light giving way to dark which in turn gave way to the former so quickly no discernable difference could be perceived by any eyes save those of a god wasn’t what had Ijilv’s brows dipping toward his nose. It was the young man suspended between the obelisks emitting all the light and dark in such perfect and fast intervals. It seemed he was wearing a smirk. Ijilv had never noticed any sort of expression on the young man’s perfect face at any of the many times he stood in the very spot he occupied and beheld the magnificent creature. Any expression would have been a bit disconcerting, but the smirk seemed especially troubling.

“You stink of fear, you pathetic thing,” Kallum’s voice groaned in his head.

“I love you, brother,” Ijilv replied with as fake a chuckle as had ever been, “but you are nothing. What does the opinion of nothing mean to anyone?”

“False bravado is beneath you,” Kaldumahn chimed in almost giggling. “I can smell it too. You are terrified of visiting him in that false paradise you’ve created for him within his own mind.”

“I am troubled,” Ijilv granted the cackling fools, “That is not the same as fear.”

“So, you say,” Kallum laughed.

He protected the thought from his brothers, but they were correct. Fear coursed through him in that moment. Of course, there was no fathomable way they could smell it as Kallum had suggested, but they were certainly accurate in their assessment. It was that damned smirk. What could the boy be up to locked inside the fantasy he had concocted to trap the boy in his subconscious mind? As concerning as the idea was, he’d have to peek in eventually.

Geillan, the obelisks, the massive black stones, and both the light and dark melted away in favor of something far different than Ijilv expected. There were no fluffy clouds lazing about an impossibly blue sky filled with sunshine. Instead, the sky was pink. No, it was purple. Wait a minute. That sky was definitely orange. It suddenly occurred to Ijilv there wasn’t anything wrong with his vision, nor had he forgotten how to properly identify colors. The sky was shifting. Not quite the chaos outside the tower where Geillan lay sleeping between those four obelisks, but not the orderly perfection he had left for the boy’s mind to play in.

He was so intrigued by the sky that he failed to notice the absence of the lake. The last time he’d visited the boy there had been a lake there. It was gone, replaced by a wide field of unkempt purple weeds interrupted by the occasional bush. Those were hideous. Wild and rough with pointy, red needles nearly as long as a tree branch.

Geillan had obviously been busy manipulating Ijilv’s creation, but how? Where did he get these horrid visions to speckle about the once beautiful landscape? The boy had never been anywhere but this place. He must have gleaned these haunting ideas from his mother before destroying her. What else had he learned while scanning her mind and soul? More troubling than anything about the new and odd landscape was the thought of where the young man might be hiding in the awful place.

Kallum strolled from a dark hole within a bright orange mound surrounded by grotesque blue trees. They weren’t quite that, but it seemed they strived to be, twisted, leafless trees all gnarled up and sad. The trees weren’t near so disturbing as his brother though. Him he had left in that mock prison, gray and defeated. The being walking toward him was nothing of the sort. He glowed with all the glorious light befitting a god.

“You look as if you have seen a ghost,” Kallum boomed through a wide smile.

Ijilv felt as if he might vomit right there on the… It suddenly occurred to him that he was ankle deep in bright, yellow muck that only just failed at mocking the consistency of sloppy mud. Of course, there was nothing in him to vomit, but he remembered enough about the time before time to recall what it felt like. The perfect and horrible sound of Kallum’s voice brought him right back to that place. How? The small and gravelly thing he had left him with was gone. Could Geillan have done that? He must have. Worse still, the boy must have reasoned a method to borrow Kallum’s essence and his power.

He did his best to hide the shock and terror stomping about his mind when he finally replied, “You misread me, brother. Nothing happens in this place unless I will it.”

“Is that so?” Moshat’s voice boomed just as gloriously rich as Kallum’s had been, “Is that to say you sent Geillan to free us from our cell?”

“Of course, he must have,” Brerto laughed as he seemingly emerged from the scenery directly before Ijilv’s face.

“I did not direct him to release you,” Ijilv nearly stammered, “Nor did I command him to return you to your former countenance and glory. However, I did not prevent him from doing so.”

Kaldumahn suddenly appeared beside Ijilv with his arm draped across his shoulders, “You did not prevent him from doing so, because you had no idea what he was going to do. You must do as you see fit, of course. If it were me, I would worry greatly over how he managed to accomplish the task.”

“You have said yourself that he was under your complete control,” Moshat agreed, “Could it be you are losing power over your plaything?”

“You convinced him to kill his mother,” Brerto shook his head. “Tsk, tsk, what terror do you suppose he will unleash on you?”

Kallum approached quickly as if he planned to attack but stopped directly in front of Ijilv. “Kneel,” he commanded as he raised his hand high above his head.

Ijilv chuckled at the gesture, “Do not fool yourself into believing this new freedom my son has granted you gives you any power in this place. You are still completely under my control.”

Kallum’s cheeks trembled slightly with effort. “Damn,” he finally said before casually strolling off to stand near Moshat.

“I told you that would not work,” Brerto laughed at Kallum before turning his attention back to Ijilv, “The boy told us as much. He freed us from your prison because he was bored, if I recall correctly.”

“Yes,” Kaldumahn smiled, “That is precisely the word he used. He was bored and wanted some company.”

Brerto’s smile fled as his voice lowered and deepened, “Brother, you might as well give up the charade. We can all see the truth weighing down your troubled brow as uncertainty bends your back. It is time. Whatever you have planned for that boy needs to happen now. It is only a matter of time before he solves your puzzle and frees himself. Perhaps he will look more fondly upon you if you release him before that happens.”

“Fine,” Ijilv finally sighed, “You are correct. There is no sense hiding it from you any longer. You are still helplessly under my control, but the boy seems to be wriggling out from under my grasp. Take me to him.”

“I think we all might appreciate it if you would ask us nicely to assist you,” Moshat teased.

“Please,” Ijilv’s voice remained flat as he acquiesced.

Moshat beamed as he replied, “Thank you for that. It felt good. Sadly, we are not completely sure where he is right now.”

“This place is constantly changing,” Kaldumahn complained, “I would imagine this is a result of your pet’s boredom.”

“Though we cannot take you to him as you so rudely commanded, we can help you find him,” Brerto smiled, “Despite all you have done to us, I still feel an odd kinship with you. Furthermore, I think you truly believe whatever outcome you are reaching toward is the right thing for this world.”

“As diluted as you are, I believe you believe it too,” Kallum dryly offered.

It was an odd sensation warming Ijilv’s chest. Emotions are so petty. Of course, he always told his brothers he loved them, but those were just words. They were useful tools he had always been able to exploit. They served their purpose well. Yet, it was something akin to love that he felt in that moment. As simple and dry as his brothers’ proclamations were, they meant more to him than just words. Was it loneliness? Standing there exposed as near a fraud in front of his pious and pompous brothers, and they refrained from mocking him. He hoped the odd ideas tossing about in his mind failed to show on his face.

“What about that cave you emerged from?” he nodded his head toward the place where it had been.

Kallum turned toward the same spot and shrugged, “It is gone. Nothing remains constant in this queer place. It is like the lands surrounding your tower, chaotic and wild.”

The sky flashed a translucent green off in the distance. A wild shriek rumbled over the land mere moments after.

“Is that a storm?” Ijilv asked.

“Near enough,” Moshat answered.

“I think it would be wise to head in that direction,” Brerto suggested, “The boy was toying with the weather while he played with us.”

“What did he do to you?” Ijilv asked.

“Many things,” Kaldumahn offered, “He brought the storms while he had us fighting one another in our animal forms.”

“I finally got to battle the great eagle one on one,” Moshat smiled.

“You cheated,” Kallum complained.

“I did no such thing,” Moshat shook his head, “It is not my fault you were cursed with a beak instead of blessed with glorious fangs.”

“How did he know of your animal forms?” Ijilv asked.

“Probably from the brief moment he spent with his mother,” Brerto shrugged, “Dragon’s fire is more than just a mere element. Having access to it opens a man’s mind to things other creatures simply cannot access. Who knows how much time he spent strolling through her thoughts and memories in that moment, as brief as it seemed.”

Standing around and speculating about all these troubling thoughts brought him no closer to his goal. The sky flashed again in the distance. Ijilv nodded toward the spot where the bright green flash had occurred and led his brothers in that direction. The screech that followed came a bit quicker. Perhaps the storm was approaching. He wondered what rain concocted out of Geillan’s mind might feel like. Would it be slimy, hard, or maybe just wet like any other rain?

The five brothers strolled through a forest of those blue things that seemed so intent on being trees along a trail that twisted, turned, and doubled back so often it was impossible to discern in what direction they headed. Despite that lack of direction, the storm remained in the sky. Though it was not a straight path, they appeared to be getting closer to it.

Then the trees disappeared, and it seemed they were in a cave. The walls radiated with a sparkly pink, iridescent glow. Mushrooms of all sizes and colors grew randomly on the walls and floor of the place as a stream of shimmering, green liquid oozed its curvy way through it all. It looked too thick to be water, and the odd creatures that occasionally broke the surface were able to walk upon it.

Those creatures were at least as strange as the water. They resembled frogs with legs a hair too long, but they had shells on their heads and two rows of blood red spikes lining their slightly yellow tinged skin.

“What are those things?” Ijilv gasped.

“Nothing I have seen in any reality,” Kallum replied offhandedly.

“Nothing here occurs in nature,” Moshat agreed.

“At least, not on our side of the Lake,” Kaldumahn added.

“Where are all these ideas coming from?” Ijilv troubled.

“Perhaps they are not ideas, but malformed thoughts yet to be born,” Brerto offered.

“You speak of the subconscious,” Ijilv’s eyebrows raised as he pondered the thought. It would make sense, of course. He dared not share the rest of the thought. He didn’t want those ideas echoing in their minds. If Geillan had enough access to his own subconscious mind to bring his prisoners from one part of it to another, there is no telling what else he might be able to find.

“You have more to say…” Brerto began when the world around them began to swirl.

The colors went first, bleeding together on wind that seemed to originate from nowhere. Then the odd mushroom things were swept up, followed by the water, and finally the strange frog creatures with their formidable spikes. All of it whisked around the five of them until they were finally swept up in it.

Ijilv’s eyes went wide with fear as he failed to control the things happening around him. A quick glance at his four brothers assured him all but Kallum were equally concerned about the chaos warping around them. Three sets of wide eyes drenched in terror stared back at him along with Kallum’s dopey grin. The latter seemed to be enjoying the lack of control Ijilv had over a world he had created.

“You have crafted a nightmare for Ouloos over which you have absolutely no control,” Kallum scoffed.

A tear perched on one of Kaldumahn’s eyelids as he stared at Ijilv and asked, “Is this what you planned all along, to bring us all together so your monster could terrorize us before finally destroying us completely?”

The world just spun faster around them, colors and shapes bleeding together until it was all nothing more than a murky blur. Ijilv had to control it. He drew a slow, deep breath in through his nose. The air around them smelled like the instant immediately before a lightning strike. His face tightened around a scowl as he decided there would be no lightning. There would be no storm at all. He was done playing this silly game.

By the time his perfect mouth opened to respond, Ijilv had gained back enough control of his emotions to appear calm, even aloof, as he said, “Stop sniveling. The great silver lion who stalks the sky cannot be brought to tears by an illusion. Impossible. My son is having a tantrum. He finally had cause to use his great power to complete a horribly challenging task, and he is coming to terms with it. The boy killed his mother, burned her to ash with Dragon’s fire. I expected it would take him time to process the act.”

“This is a tantrum?” Kaldumahn lost the tear he’d been holding back as he spread his arms wide and glanced around dramatically at the swirling madness surrounding them.

“You failed to answer our dear brother’s question, Ijilv,” Kallum’s smile slithered off as he continued, “Was it your plan to have the boy torture us before finally destroying us in this horrid place?”

Ijilv’s smile feigned authenticity as he replied, “I have only had one singular goal since emerging from the Lake with all of you, watching the birth of this world. The mayhem surrounding us is merely a side-effect of my plan to achieve that goal. The birth of a world is no trivial thing. Billions of worlds fade from existence before ever achieving true consciousness. We must expect challenge and hardship if we hope to see this one to a different fate.”

The impossible colors and gut-wrenching shapes swirling at unimaginable speeds suddenly ceased. Complete darkness replaced them followed immediately by complete light absent any hint of shadow. The darkness had been so pitch, and the light so bright, Ijilv could no longer see his brothers. He couldn’t even see his own hands before him. Everything had been washed away. And then it was gone.

The world suddenly appeared less strange. Ijilv still stood with his brothers, but the sights around them appeared closer to the paradise he had created for Geillan. It wasn’t quite that place, but similar enough that he could at least recognize a hint of his will remaining in it.

Geillan was there lounging on a flat, smooth boulder casually skipping stones across the frothy purple waves of a vast lake. The mountains surrounding the oddly colored drink were a burnt orange. The sky above was bright pink interrupted by smoky blotches of forest green that must have been clouds despite the way they darted rather than lazed about.

The forest was cooler than usual. A dampness hung in the air and clung to Hagen’s cheeks as he carefully made his way across a trail grown over with vines and interrupted by twisting and gnarled roots jutting from the soft earth. The trees, ancient and mighty sentinels standing tall against time, stretched into a cloudless sky and reached for one another with their girthy and bent branches to block out any sunlight which might prove bold enough to reach down toward the moss and vines on the forest floor. Hagen loved all forests, but this one held a special place in his heart. The trees of this wood were cunning and wise. They had neither the time nor the patience to suffer fools or mischief-makers. He could tell they recognized him after a few steps in. The change in their demeanor was nearly imperceptible, but he noticed. The path grew wider. Vines slipped away from it, slithering back into the darkness while thick roots sunk into the soft earth. They found his company as pleasing as he found theirs.

It seemed odd at first, the scrutiny. The trees of the Sobbing Forest had always been very particular about which guests they would allow to visit, but he knew they enjoyed his company and their chats. Of course, the trees didn’t speak. Instead, they hummed out melodies. Some folks only heard sobbing as ominous as it was troubling, but folks with a mind for knowing could pull meaning from those melodies. Hagen had a mind for knowing, and he could tell right away they hadn’t recognized him when he stepped into the darkness of their keep. He couldn’t blame them. The last time he’d strolled among the timeless creatures he had appeared a bent old man. The vibrant youth he’d become since Antopy reminded him who he was, was anything but that. At least seventy summers must have passed since the last time they would have seen him looking so young.

“I’ve missed you, old friends,” he smiled up at the canopy with the truest joy he’d felt in far too long.

They hummed a happy response back. They had missed him too.

He’d been born there among them. Of course, he couldn’t remember being born, but his mother told him the stories of how the trees helped her cope with the pain. Father wouldn’t help. He was a good man, wise, but he believed in allowing things to happen as they will and refused to intervene. The trees helped in his stead. They hummed her soft melodies and lowered balmy branches thick with soft leaves for her to rest upon between contractions. They even bubbled fresh water out of the soft ground for her to drink and cool her forehead. She loved the trees and told him that story over and over again.

They hadn’t stayed long after he’d been born and, though he had returned frequently over the many summers which had passed since then, the visits were always too brief. Breathing the fresh forest air, he felt he could stay among them for the rest of his days. The trees vibrated happily at the thought, but it could never be. He had too much to do. A new king perched on the throne of the greatest city of men, and that man needed his help. On top of that, Mother and Father had instilled a restlessness in him. He hated it. Most times he could ignore the call, but something always got him. It wouldn’t be long before he’d have to hit the trail again. A great power lay dormant, sleeping in a tower at the edge of time and understanding. At some point, it would wake. Once Ymarhon had wrangled enough control over his subjects in Havenstahl, Hagen would need to investigate that great power.

Hagen’s smile faltered as he got back to the business at hand, “I wish the goal of my visit was to share stories and reminisce. Alas, I am on a mission to find wickedness hiding amongst your glorious shadows.”

Confusion swept through the trees as the canopy rustled with discontent. The trees liked to believe they knew vastly more than the dense and stiff things occupying other forests. They were correct. As far as Hagen knew, the mighty trees of the Sobbing Forest were the only trees in any forest who knew anything about anything. He also knew they could only know what they could know, and that was only what the birds flittering about their branches or the furry critters scurrying about their trunks would tell them. News traveling in that fashion was rarely news any longer by the time it reached their leaves.

“Forgive me,” Hagen proceeded cautiously, careful not to bruise the collective ego of his old friends, “but beasts have sailed across the Great Sea to lay waste to these lands.”

Of course, the trees knew all about the giants from across the Great Sea and the other monsters they brought with them. That wasn’t news at all. Havenstahl had stood tall against that invading force.

Hagen’s smile widened, “You are quite wise and quite right, as always. Most of those monsters have been destroyed or turned away, but not all of them. I have been hunting one of them who has been causing much trouble for men who fall under the protection of Havenstahl. Laenkishot Kil hides among your shadows, and he is the vilest of creatures.”

The trees knew he was there. He hadn’t caused them any trouble. They were skeptical of him at first, but he looked at them with awe and reverence. How could any creature that saw them as the glorious things they were be anything but pure?

“I mean no disrespect,” Hagen pressed on as delicately as he could, “but the lands from which he hails are cracked and barren. Not to mention, the trees from Biggon’s Bay to Mount Elzkahon aren’t near so magnificent as the glorious host surrounding me here. Nor do they sing such mesmerizing songs. Of course, he admires you for the exquisite works of nature’s art you are, but he is wicked. The five vicious trogmortem who follow him are the same, vile monsters with no love for anything.”

The trees weren’t convinced. They were probably no more dubious than any other moment, but they were dubious, nonetheless. They challenged his accusations. What had these peaceful creatures done to earn his ire?

“They have been raiding villages all around these lands,” he frowned. “They hide among you, because the men of Havenstahl—even the fiercest among their ranks—are terrified of your wisdom and strength. They hear all these horrifying stories of the trees ripping men to shreds or suffocating them until their hearts cease to beat. They would never venture into the darkness of this place.”

Their moaning increased in volume until it was almost a wail, the kind of shrill sound a starving baby might make.

“I know,” Hagen huffed in mock shock. “How could anyone think such things? But you know men are strange. They fear things they do not understand. Sometimes, they fail to see beauty where it clearly exists, and thus, they fear you.”

The blaring cry dulled again to a low moaning. It was almost a murmur, really. Hagen hated pointing out that they’d been duped by such dull creatures. The trees of the Sobbing Forest saw most other sentient life as beneath them, at least in intellect. The idea they could fall victim to something as base as flattery was difficult to admit.

Hagen allowed a mellow smile to rest between his cheeks as he held out his hands, “You cannot blame yourselves. I haven’t met this giant, Laenkishot Kil, but I have searched his thoughts. He thinks very highly of himself, and he has an odd charisma about him. It is very disarming. Had I not the benefit of creeping around his mind and analyzing his intent, I would find him as pleasant and endearing as you. We can’t worry about that. I bid you please take me to him, and I will rid of you of his vile presence in your sacred lands.”

The trees parted toward the east bringing a wide smile to Hagen’s face. The smile dimmed quickly. They weren’t quite threats dancing among the rhythms of the humming vibrating off the trees but close kin. The wise and ancient creatures had sensed the change in him. Bolts of lightning blasting about the woods could cause quite a bit of hurt for a forest regardless of how wise its trees might happen to be.

“I would never think to unleash something so reckless while in your midst,” Hagen smiled up at the canopy. “No harm will come to this glorious place.”

The trees remained skeptical but made no move to hinder his progress. Despite the wide path they made for him, it was clear they refused to entertain any destructive forces unleashed beneath their leaves.

The path Hagen followed shifted slightly south. He could tell he was getting close. The trees’ humming steadily grew as if a warning to alert him of his proximity to his adversaries. By the time he could see the faintest outline of shapes through the thick trees off to his right, the humming could have been the chime of a loud bell but sustained at the same volume and pitch as the moment it had been struck.

He sidled up to a massive oak and listened. The trees recognized his need for stealth and reduced the volume of their song.

It was difficult to see much through the thick trunks and brush growing around them, but Laenkishot Kil appeared to pace back and forth before five shapes that were seated in a semi-circle around a small but crackling fire.

“You threaten me against using lightning, but these invaders can enjoy a blaze?” he shook his head slightly as he glanced up toward the canopy and smirked.

The trees hummed out their answer. Laenkishot Kil and his group only burned what the trees allowed. Creatures like giants and trogmortem need the heat of fire to stay warm, and the trees had nothing to fear from them.

“So, you say,” Hagen smiled wide. “Now, please let me listen to what they are saying. I need to know if they intend to depart for their homes or continue terrorizing the lands around this place.”

“The army at Havenstahl has seen its ranks replenished,” Kil complained to his companions as he paced about.

A trogmortem Hagen couldn’t see clearly replied, “All the great cities of men answered the call from what I hear.”

“There are no great cities of men,” one of the others quipped.

“On that you are correct,” Kil agreed. “However, those armies together represent a force far too great for us to battle against.”

“Why battle at all?” one of the other trogmortem asked. “I am comfortable in this forest, and the men of Havenstahl seem to fear this place. We get all we need from the surrounding villages. We can remain safe here as long as we like.”

Hagen had slowly been working his way closer to the clearing as he listened. By the time the last words left Gorban Khan’s lips, Hagen had slipped around the tree he’d been hiding behind and into the flickering firelight. He recognized all the trogmortem in the clearing but one. Groban Khan was probably the most gruesome of the bunch. Not because he was more vile or vicious than his kin. He had survived a battalion of dwarves during the battle of Fort Maomnosett. They had left him for dead with his nose split down the middle and deep gashes crisscrossing his massive face. Hanol Jo, Bancle Hig, and Lonac Yan were the other three he recognized. There was nothing particularly striking or unique about them, aside from Bancle Hig’s size. At seventeen feet tall, he counted himself among the tallest of trogmortem. The last one was a mystery to Hagen.

After gauging the level of shock on the six faces looking back at him, the wizard looked toward the one unfamiliar face and said, “I know all the souls occupying this clearing with me except for you. How is it I do not know your face?”

“He claimed he was guarding the ships during every battle, but I think he was afraid,” Hanol Jo chuckled. “Only came to shore when the bay got all angry and frothy. He jumped right into the drink and swam for shore when the first wave splashed against his ship.”

“Shut up, fool,” Laenkishot Kil growled at Hanol Jo before crouching closer to Hagen and sneering, “You are a bit far from home and obviously a fool to stand so close. I will grant you leave to depart this place if you do it quickly and never return.”

The giant’s breath was foul like rotten meat. He had been eating men. There were probably bits of villagers’ flesh stuck between his teeth. Hagen winced slightly before replying, “I will grant you the same, Laenkishot Kil, mightiest of giants. Leave this place, and no harm will come to you. Stay, and there will be no place in these lands where you will be safe.”

Lonac Yan lost himself in a fit of laughter that lasted long enough for Kil to snatch him up by the throat and pin him against a tree. Kil looked back at Hagen as Lonac’s eyes bulged from their sockets. After a few moments of listening to the trogmortem struggle for air, he said, “Today is the day you die. I would like to know your name before I end your time in this world.”

“Of course,” Hagen smiled at the threat while removing his hood, “I am Hagen of Havenstahl, and I will be the one who sends the lot of you to the Lake if you fail to heed my warning.”

The giant’s eyebrows dipped toward his nose as he released his grip on Lonac’s throat, cocked his head to the side, and said, “I have heard of a healer who goes by that name, but he was a very old man. That is not the creature standing before me.”

“One and the same,” Hagen’s smile widened as he spread his arms out to his sides.

“Hmmm…I won’t pretend to know if you’re up to some trick or if you truly believe yourself to be that famous old healer, but I’ll eat you just the same,” Kil shrugged, “And, since I’m feeling generous of late after enjoying the bounty of your lands, I will grant you some knowledge before I swallow you down. We could not leave if we wanted to. Our ships were destroyed by a violent storm. Three escaped the bay. Ours was one of them, but she was in no condition to make the long journey across the Great Sea. We beached her farther down the coast and found our way here. This is our home now.”

“Wait,” Hagen raised an index finger as Kil took a step toward him, “What if I told you I could give you a ship stocked with all the supplies you would need to make that journey if you agreed to leave in peace?”

Laenkishot Kil laughed. It was a horrible sound, something like metal grinding against stone. After a few moments, the rest of the group joined in. They all laughed at Hagen as his smile faded in favor of a shallow frown.

“I would prefer not to hurt you,” the wizard finally sighed, “but I fear your laughter is the only answer you will grant me on this day.”

Kil’s laughter ceased as quickly as it had begun. He leapt over the fire toward Hagen with his mouth wide and menace in his eyes.

The slightest hint of fear coiled around Hagen’s spine as the monster’s massive face lunged toward him howling a breeze of that rotten breath in his face. He had promised not to attack. Perhaps the trees felt more affection for this pack of beasts than they’d let on. There could be no clean way out of the situation. He hadn’t the might to battle the monsters with his fists, and any spell he might conjure would enrage the trees. A battle with those old sentinels was one he wasn’t sure he could win even with magic.

The giant’s fingers were inches from his face when Hagen decided to try his luck with the trees. He couldn’t just let the monster eat him after all. Perhaps the forest would understand.

The words Hagen would use to focus his intention on the spell that would cause the ground to erupt in a massive mound and launch the giant high into the canopy died at the back of his throat before they could be born into the world. He couldn’t tell if it was a vine or a branch. It happened too quickly to identify the weapon, but it fired out from deep in the trees. Then it wound itself around Kil’s neck and squeezed while yanking him back into the fire.

The giant screamed as the fire caught hold of his boots and flames licked up at his trousers. A vine whipped out and wrapped itself around his neck from the other direction. More vines came. They snapped out from the darkness faster than an eye could track them, each latching onto one of the giant’s limbs.

Hagen almost felt pity for the giant as the vile thing struggled to get air while the fire finally caught a firm hold of his trousers and flames began licking up toward his shirt. The poor creature’s face was red with effort as a soundless scream poured forth from his wide-open mouth.

The sound the trees made when they yanked the monster apart wasn’t any kind of humming. It was a guttural howl dripping with malice and revenge.

Hagen covered his face as Laenkishot’s insides spattered the entire clearing. He and the five trogmortem were covered in meat and guts and blood as the vines raced back into the darkness carrying the giant’s limbs with them.

“I am sorry,” one trogmortem cried out as more vines came. He had barely gotten the words out before a vine was wrapped so tightly around his neck no more sound could leave him. It was only a few moments more before he and his kin were splattered all over the clearing just as their leader had been.

There was no joy hiding in the shock twisting up Hagen’s expression. Of course, the vile creatures deserved their fate. He would have given them a similar end. The blood didn’t bother him. It was more the violence unleashed by the trees. He had always seen them as somewhat peaceful. The mess soaking the clearing up to his ankles was anything but that. The smallest hint of fear returned. It whispered a warning from the back of Hagen’s mind.

The trees were sorry to have scared him. There was a stark almost childish honesty to the feelings oozing about their gentle humming. It was reassuring, but Hagen still failed to completely forget that tiny breath of fear. Even still, that fear seemed small next to the aching in his heart. A single tear perched on his eyelid.

“I am sorry for what you had to do,” he smiled despite the tear, “I wished not for that end.”

The sky was clear that day, not a cloud to mar the blue perfection as far into the horizon as one could see. The town beneath that magnificent sky was far less majestic. Once a bustling town of well-kept huts, sturdy piers, and beautiful boats that were as pleasing to look at as they were sea-worthy, the place had become a ghost haunting the shore. The few huts which had survived the fires were nothing more than gutted, crumbling shells. Most of the one-hundred or so surviving townsfolk who weren’t dragged away by the monsters from across the Great Sea for nefarious purposes were grimy with soot and chained together, tasked with cleaning the remaining fish they had left to feed the invaders.

Only five trogmortem remained with the captives in the city. All of them were beastly, nasty, and cruel. Their green eyes glowed when the light hit them just right, not like creamy jade or a sparkling emerald, but something ominous, the kind of eyes that startle you out of slumber while trapped within a night terror. They had rough, reddish skin that almost looked like hardened scales. Their builds were thin with wiry muscles, but they were still as wide across as two stout men, and more than twice as tall. Their bent postures kept their stony fists just off the dirt as they lumbered around threatening any of their prisoners who slowed even the slightest in their work with long, blackened claws and sharp fangs wet with saliva.

The biggest of them, Nalzin-Lo carried a massive whip with small metal shards fastened about its end. They jingled as he shook the thing and whistled loud when he cracked it. He was the first to notice the deep gray clouds forming atop the hill above the small fishing village. It was like a ball with rough edges swirling and expanding. Blue lightning arced within and around it occasionally striking out in zig zag patterns ten to twenty feet long.

“What do you make of that?” he yelled back to his kin.

“Strange looking storm right there on the ground,” one answered back.

“Maybe the gods,” another added. “Should we kneel.”

“You saw the great tiger when he came to call on Ott in the great waste,” Nalzin-Lo grunted back. “He didn’t arrive riding lightning or floating in clouds. He was just there. No. Form up on me. If anything steps out of that mess, we’ll rip it to shreds.”

The swirling mass of clouds grew larger until it was a full fifty feet in diameter. Flashes of lightning came faster as the bolts traveled further and further out from the thing. Finally, a bolt arced out and blasted the trogmortem standing next to Nalzin-Lo. It blew a hole right through the nasty beast’s chest and tossed him twenty feet through the air. The crack of thunder that accompanied the strike shook the ground and toppled the other four beasts right to the ashy sand.

“Stay down,” Nalzin-Lo,” shouted at his group.

Fear danced about the prostrate group as they watched the growing mass in horror. The lightning subsided slightly as the swirling clouds gained depth. Before long, it looked like a corridor expanding before them at the top of the hill, rather than a cloud growing just above the ground. When Hagen stepped out of the swirling tunnel, removed his hood, and shook out his healthy mane of light brown hair, those luxurious waves fell around a fresh face that could not have seen more than twenty-five summers.

Nalzin-Lo jumped to his feet, looked around at his brethren, and laughed, “He is a child.” Then he looked back up at Hagen and commanded, “Best go back where you belong. There is nothing for you here.”

“On the contrary,” Hagen smiled flashing teeth as white as fresh snow, “I have come for those people you’ve been terrorizing, and I aim to see them free from beneath your heel. Leave now, and our quarrel can wait. Remain, and I crack the ground beneath your feet, burn you with lightning, and bury you beneath the waves where the fishes can pick your bones clean of your rotten flesh.”

The threat only made the mighty trogmortem laugh harder. He nudged the warrior next to him and said, “We haven’t the time for this. Kill the fool.”

The grim trogmortem soldier heeded the command. He charged up the hill toward Hagen with murder in his eyes and a menacing war cry pouring forth from his lips.

Hagen didn’t budge. His smile just widened as he raised his arms out to his sides and shouted in a voice as beautiful and terrible as a god’s, “BARAQU!”

As soon as the command left Hagen’s lips, three bolts of lightning from three different flashes in the sky all converged on the charging trogmortem. Thunder shook the ground as the massive beast exploded in a sloppy cloud of blood, meat, bone, and entrails.

He smiled at the remaining trogmortem and bellowed, “I warned you. I gave you ample time to free yourself from my vengeful gaze, and you have spat upon that gift. RIMANIS IM!”

Wind suddenly swirled around the three remaining trogmortem. Nalzin-Lo’s eyes were wide with terror when his head slammed into one of his soldier’s knees. Then something smashed into his elbow. He couldn’t tell if it was a head, a foot, an elbow, or something else. The vicious wind spun so strong it dragged dirt up from the ground to color itself dingy brown as it stretched up into the sky, a hundred-foot whirlwind spinning faster and faster. Nalzin-Lo was nearly unconscious when the sensation of falling upward finally ceased. He just spun there, bouncing off his brothers, helpless and out of control.

“NAHU!” Hagen commanded.

The swirling wind immediately ceased, and the three trogmortem fell one-hundred feet to crash upon the merciless ground, smashing into bruised puddles of blood and vomit. Once the sound of rushing wind, bodies thudding dully against grassy sand, beasts crying and groaning, and bones cracking from the force of falling from great heights had ceased, Hagen turned his attention to the terrified townsfolk.

The grim menace that had twisted up Hagen’s recently young face as he battered monsters with the elements smoothed into a friendly smile as he spread his arms wide and approached the chained and huddled mob. The sounds of dull sobs and heavy, chain links clinking and squeaking against one another as the frightened group hugged each other huddling as closely together as possible in fear of the next attack made it difficult for him to maintain the calm demeanor. If it were in his power, he would kill those monsters again and again. Thoughts like that were dangerous, but their crimes against his people had been great.

Thoughts of punishment suddenly swirled about in his mind. They were foreign. Much had changed in the past few hours—forgotten ideas and power well beyond any elixir he could concoct—but the idea of punishment wasn’t one of them. It was new, fresh. He’d always been a man with a mind for learning and nurturing. Even the idea of using his remembered power to free his people wasn’t born from a longing for revenge. After witnessing how cruel the beasts from across the Great Sea had been, and how callously they had treated his people, it was difficult not to embrace ideas like punishment and revenge.

The welcoming smile he had forced onto his face remained as he spoke soothingly, “Good people of Castrine, you have survived terrors no man should ever have to endure. You have lost many you love, your homes, your glorious ships, and even your way of life. You have spent your lives loving the Great Sea, showered in its glorious bounty, and now fear what comes out of it. There is much of that I cannot change. There is no power great enough to pull someone back from the Lake once that journey has been made, and the only thing that can heal this new fear is time. Havenstahl has failed you. I have failed you.”

“Ye ain’t failed nothing,” a grimy, old woman popped her head up from the huddled mass. Her voice was rough with age, but strong. Her eyes, though gray from cataracts and partially obscured by messy, gray hair, sparkled with hope as she continued, “Them monsters did what they did. Ain’t nothing can be done for what’s been done. But what of us who remain. What do we do now?”

“SIKKURU PETU,” Hagen boomed in response. Instantly, each cuff fastened to each wrist in the huddled mass popped open, and the chains binding the group clanged to the ground. Then he turned toward the hill behind him and shouted, “NGIR DU!”

The group of newly homeless refugees had just begun rising to their feet when bright flashes of blue lightning arced across the sky atop the hill. The crack of thunder that immediately followed drove them all back to the ground, prostrate and covering their heads.

“Please, good people of Castrine, you have nothing else to fear. I am here to help not harm you. In fact, I will see to it that no monsters from across the Great Sea will ever harm you again,” his voice had gained an imploring note as he approached the brave woman who had spoken and touched her gently on the shoulder.

“Look there,” he said, as he pointed toward the swirling mass of blue light that had formed atop the hill stretching into the horizon like a corridor. “You have nothing to fear. Despite the lights and clouds and sparks, that is nothing more than a doorway. You will walk through and find yourselves in the courtyard at Havenstahl. Walk up to the first person you see and tell them you need help. They will know what to do.”

“How will they know?” the old woman asked. “We’ve got the look of grimy trail thieves.”

“My voice will leave your lips when you speak, and they will understand,” Hagen smiled down at her. “Now go. I promise you, once we’ve sent the monsters from across the Great Sea back to their homes, we will rebuild your village to its former glory. Your lives will return to normal.”

The group obliged Hagen’s command and trudged slowly up the hill. He watched as the able helped the injured until all had made it through. He waved his hand once the last had crossed the threshold, and the swirling mass shrunk out of existence. Then he turned his gaze south down the coast allowing the grim menace of his expression to chase his smile away.

The fresh, mountain air was cool on Elbahor that night. It smelled like rain, but Glaadrian new the shower was far enough off to not be a hindrance. The old dwarf’s knees weren’t acting up at all. They would be giving him fits if a storm were imminent. Despite the overcast sky above blocking all the light of a full moon no one on the mountain could see that night, the grizzled dwarf soldier was confident he and his group would remain dry during their mission.

That overcast sky was a blessing. The mountaintop was nearly pitch outside of a small dome of flickering, orange torchlight occupied by two battle-hardened trogmortem and the object of Glaadrian’s mission, a waif of a dwarf named Alenaat. Though his position offered no view of the tortured dwarf, he knew the latter was chained to the Sacred Pine, a custom that had ended when Maelich chopped the head off a giant and freed a city of dwarves from that monster’s rule. Maomnosett Ahm had been a hard ruler, not a creature Glaadrian looked on with anything close to fondness. However, by all accounts he’d heard sneaking through the caves beneath Alhouim—he refused to call the city he loved Maomnosett regardless whose rump warmed the throne—Ott was a million times worse. At least Ahm had been relatively fair when not pushed to his limits. Ott was just a cruel, malicious tyrant. In his first act as king of his stolen city he reinstituted that horrid punishment for the crime of a loud mouth and a loose tongue.

Had adrenaline not been coursing wildly through Glaadrian’s veins he may have taken a moment to reflect on how odd it was for him to be sitting in the dark and waiting to challenge a couple trogmortem for the life of a waste like Alenaat. It would be quite a trick to find any dwarf in the city with the slightest shred of love for the scruffy slacker. That was before the poor soul was chained to the most sacred spot on Mount Elbahor, the most sacred spot in all of Ouloos as far as the dwarves of Alhouim were concerned. Alenaat could have killed Glaadrian’s own mother, and he would still save the oaf. He might kill him afterward, but he’d pull the young dwarf off that tree first. The thought sent Glaadrian’s mind tumbling down another path he should have avoided while waiting in the dark in ambush, Bindaar.

Bindaar had been another waste. Most would suggest a more worthless dwarf had never existed. He was even worse than Alenaat. That was, until Ahm had strung him up to that tree. It changed him. They strung him up a useless waste of air, and he came down a dutiful dwarf ready to serve his city and friends. One tear managed to spill over Glaadrian’s squinting eyelids. It was all he’d allow himself. He silently hoped Alenaat’s time on the Sacred Pine would have a similar effect.

A chill breeze sent a shiver through Glaadrian as he sat there in darkness delving more deeply into bleak memories than he should have. He pulled his cloak tighter around his shoulders. The thing smelled like stale blood and rot. It was a blessing he couldn’t see it in the darkness. Weeks of battle and days sneaking through the caverns beneath the city had it looking as bad as it smelled.

An out of place whistle that failed miserably at sounding like any sort of bird mercifully brought his mind back into the moment. Lentaak was in place. That whistle—which hadn’t earned the slightest attention from either of the guards watching over Alenaat—meant the quietest dwarf in Alhouim was hiding right behind the Sacred Pine waiting to strike. Everyone was in place. Though he couldn’t see any of them in the darkness, he knew Chialdaan the fair-haired monster who had earned the nickname grong’s bane for his efforts at the battle at Fort Maomnosett crouched in the fairy weed across the trail from him, and Muljaak, a dark-haired brute of a dwarf who stood nearly as tall as a man, hid in the shrubs further up the trail. It was time.

Glaadrian gripped his axe tight, stood up, and casually strolled toward the dim glow of torchlight with a whistle in his cheek. It was a happy tune his father had taught him when he was much younger and far friendlier. The song got the attention of one of the trogmortem standing guard in the warm glow at the base of the Sacred Pine. The head that popped out from behind the tree to examine the sound looked like any of the vile beasts from across the Great Sea he’d ever seen—pointy ears, a big, swollen nose, a humongous mouth filled with more jagged fangs than could comfortably fit, and green eyes which seemed to glow from within—but Glaadrian recognized this one from descriptions he’d heard whispered while scouting for the mission. The scar beneath the beast’s right eye gave him away. If the stories he’d heard were to be believed, the monster’s size was only matched by his merciless cruelty in battle. That beast would wrestle anyone at any time to prove his might.

“Pray the gods you have business in this place, or I will decorate this mountaintop with your scattered limbs,” Haram-Vi shouted while squinting and stretching his neck toward the darkness.

“Except your right leg,” the other guard added as he stepped out into the light. “I’ll be gnawing on that. I’ve got a thing for legs.”

Glaadrian recognized this one too. He was Malek-Ta, smaller than Haram-Vi but equally brutal and cruel. The dwarf stopped whistling and chuckled through his response, “Ain’t but two of you? Best be heading back to the city to get some friends. The bloody waste be littered with the battered bodies of your kin who fell to this axe in me hand.”

“Is that so?” Malek-Ta growled.

“Aye it is,” Glaadrian growled right back. “Come on out and test if me words ain’t the truest you ever heard. I’ll be painting this trail with your vile blood.”

“Step into the light then. Prove your boasts,” Haram-Vi challenged.

“Afraid of the dark are ye?” Glaadrian shouted up the trail. As much as he liked to think of trogmortem as mindless beasts, he knew it wasn’t true. They were wily, cunning, and smart, but they were also prideful and saw the likes of dwarves and men as being beneath them.

Haram-Vi took the bait first, jogging from the safety of the torchlight into the darkness. Malek-Ta followed closely behind, grunting, “Those are the last words that will ever leave your filthy, dwarf mouth.”

Glaadrian had slowly been backing away as soon as he’d grabbed the attention of the two guards. Once they entered the blackness of the trail, he quickened his pace. He could faintly see the glow of their eyes in the darkness, that dim and eerie green, but he knew they couldn’t see him at all. Their eyes were accustomed to the bright desert sun, useless on the dark trail.

“Coward,” Haram-Vi called out as his pace quickened.

Glaadrian ceased his retreat, gripped his axe tighter, and replied, “Come on and test that claim then.”

“It’s a trap,” Malek-Ta hollered a moment before Glaadrian heard the rock bounce off the trogmortem’s head. Muljaak had delivered the first blow.

Dim silhouettes were all that Glaadrian could make out in the darkness, but the glorious sounds he heard assured him the massive dwarf was cutting the giant trogmortem down. A dwarf axe makes very distinct sounds whether it be slicing through still air, chopping meat, or severing bone. He heard all three of those as the larger of the two shapes fell toward the trail. Muljaak must have cut the beast down like a tree. It would take a thick bone to make a sound like that. Glaadrian grinned in the darkness as he heard Muljaak’s axe connect over and over again. The dwarf must have moved on to the softer parts of the monster. The sounds of meat and guts slopping about and spilling onto the trail mingled with the trogmortem’s cries sounding a symphony to Glaadrian’s ears. If only he could see the macabre art his chum made on the trail that night. In the darkness, the sweet music of the dying trogmortem’s cries and pleas for mercy would have to suffice as they remained unanswered. There would be no mercy and no forgiveness for the monsters who had stolen his city and killed so many of his kin.

“Thank the gods I blessed ye with a quick death, vermin,” he heard Muljaak quietly sigh at the pile of slop he had made on the trail. “If I could, I’d be following your sorry soul to the Lake to be torturing ye until the end of time.”

He had but a moment to chuckle at his good friend’s proclamation before realizing he had allowed the excitement of battle and the adrenaline coursing through his veins to distract him from the plan. Muljaak had only felled one of the beasts on the trail with them, and Glaadrian had lost sight of the other. He saw the faint flicker of Haram-Vi’s eyes a moment before the monster plowed into him.

Glaadrian’s equilibrium fled the trail as he rolled end over end with the massive beast. By the time they settled, he was on top of the monster but had lost hold of his axe. Too much thought can be an enemy when locked in battle, so he gave the missing axe very little. He couldn’t see his target in the darkness, but the first thing his right fist connected with was soft. It seemed too large to be a nose being bigger than his fist, but the splatter of blood the blow earned suggested it was the giant, bulbous thing that took up a good chunk of Haram-Vi’s face. The sound the creature made in that instant gave Glaadrian the faintest glimmer of hope he might best the beast with fists alone. The first blow he delivered with his left hand chased that hope away.

He couldn’t know where on the big monster’s head he had connected, but it was like punching rock. He swung two more times earning a giggle from his opponent. The growl that followed invited fear in to mingle with the rage boiling in Glaadrian’s belly. He reached for his dagger, but it was too late. His head bounced hard off the trail as the big trogmortem got hold of his ankle and dragged them both out of the dirt.

Then the fire came. At least, that’s what it felt like when Haram-Vi’s claws slashed through the meat of his right thigh. The sound might have been worse than the cut itself. He heard bone crack. A racing mind chased along by fear can sometimes conjure images much faster than logic can run, but the idea his leg was off flittered away quickly once it occurred to him that he hadn’t dropped back to the trail. His leg couldn’t be off. Before he could even taste one morsel of relief, the big bastard tasted his flesh. It might have been his imagination, but he was certain he felt each individual fang as it punctured his skin. The burning agony continued as the jaws clamped down and began grinding back and forth on the bone beneath.

“Help,” he cried out in the darkness, “the big bastard’s gotten a hold of me leg.”

It seemed an eternity passed as he hung there screaming and flopping like a big, beached chooker while a smelly monster of a beast gnawed at his leg. All his limbs flailed helplessly until his left foot finally connected with something. It must have been Haram-Vi’s thick skull. It felt like kicking a mountain.

“Whose blood paints this trail, you little worm?” Haram-Vi growled before biting into Glaadrian’s other leg and grinding at the bone.

The world grew suddenly quiet for Glaadrian in that moment. He could tell he still screamed by the burning in his throat. He could still feel Haram-Vi’s horrible fangs grinding mercilessly at his leg. But all the sound was somehow gone. He wondered if this might be the end. It seemed a safe bet. Even safer when he felt his shoulder pop out of joint.

The sound returned. Ripping flesh hits a horrible note. It’s worse when you know it’s your own skin stretched beyond its limits. Though he felt the arm rip from his body, it still felt like it was attached to his shoulder, even after that bastard trogmortem clubbed him in the head with it.

“Help,” he cried out again.

“Be holding him steady,” Chialdaan finally answered, “and I’ll be chopping that beast down.

Glaadrian had no more words to share. His entire body burned like fire licked him from all directions. He hadn’t seen his good friend assault the monster who’d been chewing on him, but he heard the axe connect. The sound Haram-Vi made when that glorious dwarf axe connected with his thigh would have brought him the greatest joy if his mind weren’t absorbed by pain and the stark realization that his soul had precious few moments to remain in the broken sack he’d become. He barely even noticed how far the trogmortem had tossed him into the fairy weeds. He’d probably die there among the enchanted plants.

It was a sad thing when he realized the last bit of joy he would have in the waking world was listening to the glorious sounds of his chums cutting his killer down. He wished he could see the results of their vengeance, but Haram-Vi’s agonizing cries did a fine job of telling the story. The beast growled like a wild mountain scarra threatening an amatilazo off her pups. Both Chialdaan and Muljaak sounded just as monstrous growling, howling, and threatening right back at that monster. Oozing over the top of the grotesque symphony were other more horrible notes. The whistling of sharpened dwarf axes slicing through the mountain air before chopping through meat and cracking bone sounded a fine rhythm worthy of a foot-stomping dance. The drip and slop of blood and fluids and organs and entrails made a melody soaring over the top of it. If he’d had the voice left to spare, he may have sung out some words to finish the beautiful ballad. Ode to a Pile of Slop Who Used to be the Vilest of Vermin had quite the ring to it. If only that vermin hadn’t destroyed most of his limbs, it might be a song he’d get to sing someday.

Glaadrian’s mind drifted as the song played on. The fire raging in his body still burned, but it slowly lost its grip on his awareness. He felt weak. It was an odd thought, a thankful distraction. His heart was pumping as strong as ever and pulsing the blood right out of his mangled limbs. He’d be dead soon. As he lay there barely clinging to consciousness, dying wasn’t the thing filling him with sadness. He couldn’t stand up, grab his axe, and help his friends. What if they failed? What if that beast was chomping at their limbs like he’d done to Glaadrian? That was the saddest thought in his mind in that moment. He was a goner anyway. He didn’t want his friends to die too.

“Let’s go,” Chialdaan’s voice in his ear was an even sweeter song.

“Did ye vicious dwarves chop that monster into stew?” there wasn’t much force behind his words, but he managed to muster the slightest chuckle.

“Aye, we did,” Muljaak whispered in his other ear. “We chopped him up good. Ye’d be proud.”

“Good go ye then, lads,” a smile danced about his whispered reply.

By the time Tiegran made it up near the main gate, hundreds of men had already formed into tight columns in front of it. Daritus ranged up and down the ranks shouting out the glory of Druindahl and Havenstahl. Even limping the man appeared invincible.

Tarturan grabbed a hold of Tiegran’s arm and tugged him into the formation shouting, “You are with me. We fight until we have no fight left.”

The columns grew as men poured in from every direction. By the time the steady current of bodies rushing up the hill or from the castle or the trees surrounding the road up to the main gate slowed, more than three thousand men stood ready to fight with at least one hundred more on horseback. Some were grizzled men with years of battle reflecting in their hardened stares. Others were green, new recruits with fear in their eyes and innocence in their hearts. Tiegran thought back to his first battle. It had not been that long ago, and he remembered the feeling all too well, the fear in the eyes of those green recruits. It was nothing like what he felt standing in front of the gate at Havenstahl next to Tarturan. A chill of excitement shot up his spine. I have goosebumps. He nearly laughed out loud.

He looked over at Tarturan whose smile was just as big and shouted, “For Havenstahl!”

It nearly brought tears to his eyes when the group of soldiers formed up with him replied, “For Havenstahl!”

“For Druindahl,” he shouted back at them.

“For Druindahl,” they answered.

Tarturan let out a war cry as his heavy hand gave Tiegran’s shoulders a stiff pat. The crowd responded in kind. Tiegran hoped the giants could hear them. He hoped they knew Havenstahl would never surrender. As long as one man drew breath, they would fight until the Lake called them home.

Tiegran finally caught Daritus’ eye through the crowed. The general, the legend, gave him a wide smile and nodded. Tiegran shouted with all his might, “For Ouloos!”

The crowd answered, “For Ouloos!”

Then Daritus called the command, “Charge!”

Uneasiness swept over him as he neared the main gate of the small village. It was too quiet. There should have been something, a child playing or a man coming home late for the feast. Something. Anything. There was nothing. The entire town appeared asleep. Warily, he continued.

As he approached the first hut within the main gate, he noticed the door had been smashed in. He slowly strode inside. The stench of rotting flesh hung in the air. It seized him immediately when he entered and tugged at his attention while he quickly surveyed the room. One body, the body of a man of relatively large stature, lay sprawled out across a table occupying the center of the room. A large chunk was missing out of the poor bloke’s neck. The wound was rather dry and the corpse’s skin quite pale as if the body had been drained of all its blood. ‘Amatilazo’, he thought. A woman’s body lay curled around that of a small child in the corner. Her head lay a few feet from the rest of her. Her face grabbed his attention. It was frozen in a look of terror like none he’d ever seen in his short life. He looked back to her body still clinging to her baby’s lifeless carcass. He considered their embrace for a moment, frozen in death. She died trying to protect her own. Perhaps she could have escaped as her husband was being drained of his life’s blood, but she didn’t. Instead, she gave of herself in a desperate attempt to save her child. It was a completely selfless action. How strong must be the love of a mother.

His thoughts drifted to his conversation with Ymitoth about his own mother. He learned early on she died shortly after he was born. He didn’t have any details about her demise, but he knew he spent no time with her. He wondered if she had ever held him the way the courageous woman lying in front of him clung to her child. Did she ever cradle him in her arms, brush his hair back and sing to him? Ymitoth said she had a song sweeter than a chorus of songbirds. Had he ever heard that song? If he had he would never be able to recollect, as he would have been but a babe. A strange emptiness began in his belly as if there were a hole right through his mid-section. His head swam as dizziness swept through it and he thought he might lose his feet. He stumbled out of the hut and fell to the ground in a heap. If only there were someone to embrace him, someone to tell him everything was all right. His eyes burned as they filled up, but he fought back the tears. He struggled back to his feet. ‘Feeling sorry for yourself won’t do any good,’ he thought. He pushed back against the hopeless, empty feeling threatening to consume him and forced himself to move on.

Maelich leaned against the mighty oak crowning Keller’s Hill. The spot was a favorite of his, a place to ponder both days gone by and days yet to come. This particular occasion was similar to most. After a full day of rigorous training his mind often had a tendency to chase concepts rather than relive memories or form new ideas. Of all the concepts he mulled over while leaning against the rough bark of the great oak, mother earned the lion’s share of his attention. Of course, he knew what the concept meant. He simply had no experience with one. His died shortly after he was born. All he had were stories, and they were vague at best. There was something about a young woman and a great power. None of it was anything tangible. Nothing more than loose concepts and generic ideals.

“Hey there, lad,” Ymitoth’s voice shattered the quiet. “It be time for your feeding.”

Maelich waved his response, collected himself, and tromped on down the hill. Pink clouds caught his attention, painted by the sun setting behind him. He must have lost track of the hour. His stomach grumbled loudly as if to confirm the idea. He quickened his pace down the hill.

Admiration swept through Maelich as Ymitoth glanced back at him. His stern mentor looked like he had jumped right off a painting Maelich had seen once. It was an image of valiant men standing tall against a horrible dragon. Ymitoth could easily stand among heroic men like that. He was massive, a half-head taller than most and broad about the shoulders. The wind caught hold of his hair. It danced about the breeze glinting like rusty gold in the failing light of the setting sun. He was every bit the hero in Maelich’s eyes. There wasn’t a man who stood mightier.

Then something about Ymitoth’s expression changed. It was odd and unfamiliar. It resembled a smile the way it parted his beard from his mustache and plumped his cheeks out, but it didn’t quite fit, like a dwarf seated on a giant’s throne. Normally the sharp lines of his face looked like something that could cut stone. Accompanying the strange smile-like thing twisting up his beard was an uncustomary wave. The warrior almost looked…happy.

Maelich grinned and quickened his pace all the more. He puzzled only briefly over Ymitoth’s odd behavior as he worked to catch up to the man he had grown to know as father. There was a concept far more readily available to him. Ymitoth had always been very clear about the fact he and Maelich shared no blood. However, as far as Maelich could tell, his teacher, mentor, and trainer accepted him as a son. And, of course, Maelich loved and admired Ymitoth as he imagined any lad would love and admire the one teaching him to be a man. Ymitoth wasn’t one to fall victim to bouts of affection and show anything which might be construed as weakness. There were times, though, times when the rough and tough would crack just enough for Maelich to catch a hint that Ymitoth cared for him. The odd smile combined with the awkward wave equaled one of those times. Those brief moments were enough for Maelich. They had to be.

Every day was the same for him. Rise with the sun, take in the morning feeding, run the pastures with Ymitoth—who seemed to get slower as Maelich grew—and then bathe in Yester’s Pond. All those things were considered by Ymitoth to be, “the warm-up.” After the warm-up came sword training. Sword training always seemed to last forever. By the time it was finished he could barely lift his sword. He didn’t mind too much as he was but a lad of twelve summers and already close to being Ymitoth’s equal. The fact made him feel powerful. Stories of his master’s conquests spread as far as Maelich had ever been.

After sword training was complete it would be time for the midday feast, the nucleus of the day. Every other activity was planned around it, even the short nap that followed. Maelich’s workday ended with his book lessons, when he learned about how the world came to be and how to make your way through, “The great journey of life,” as Ymitoth called it. Once all his daily tasks were complete, Maelich was allowed a bit of time to himself before the evening feeding, which brings us back to where we began.