by Jesse Teller
It was blocky in form but its limbs were long and muscled. Its body was gray and seemed porous like volcanic stone. It possessed bat wings, a set of tiny horns perfect and black, and had a hound-like face. Its claws were long but its entire body was no bigger than a small monkey. Roth stared at it for a while, wondering how he was going to save his brother from it, before Tate reached up and stroked its head with his finger.
Tate smiled. “I call him Bertaal,” he said.
“Is that thing yours?” Roth asked.
“And I am his, yes.”
“What in the name of the gods is it?”
“Not the name of the gods, Roth, you’re shooting too high. Aim a little lower,” Tate said. He turned around and walked down the stairs to the rest of the tower.
“Hell?”
“I picked him up in the bazaar in Hell, yes. Took him was more like it. The demon that was selling him tried to stop me, but that didn’t end well for him.”
“You stole him?”
“Bertaal is a living creature, Roth. Slavery is wrong. Our Collective has said so many times. It is in our charter that we abhor all forms of slavery and will fight it when possible.” Tate smiled and it made Roth uncomfortable. “Let’s say I rescued him. I like that better than stole.”
“Do the others know?” Roth said.
“No, not yet, but I am calling a meeting soon and I will tell everyone everything. What do you need?”
“What?”
“Why are we here, Roth, instead of me in my lab and you doing whatever you are doing wherever you should be doing it?”
“I came to collect you,” Roth said.
“Did you now?”
“I am ready to free the brothers. I have a set of instructions for you I have written up in my—”
“I’m not going.”
Roth felt as if he had been kicked in the gut. He turned to Tate with confusion and pain, and shook his head. “You have to be there. You are– I need– You just have to help. Why would you not be there?”
“You don’t need my help.”
“I need one person for each sword, and I thought you would want to be there.”
“Did I not help you enough in Hell?” Tate said. He tossed a bloody piece of meat to Bertaal and the creature snapped it up.
“Yes, but we have always helped each other in our tasks. You—”
“You have not been helping me on my newest endeavor.”
Roth stepped back and pointed at the door. “I would if you told me what you were working on. Every time I need you, I find you here locked in this room. What is it you are working on that is so secret?”
“It is freeing to work alone and without interruption.” Tate smiled but it looked like a sneer. “Try it. You will love it.”
“Tate? What are you doing?”
“I’m asking you to leave.”
“You’re what?”
“I have important work to do. I have things I need to get to. If you are done judging me and begging for help you don’t really need, then I will get back to it.”
Roth ripped a portal open and went back to Ironfall. He entered his warehouse, and the door shut and sealed behind him.
“Where is he?” Quill asked.
Roth fought to keep the emotion out of his voice. “He is not coming. I can’t stay with him, and no one is at his tower. One of you needs to go find him and back him up.”
Ithyryyn nodded. A portal opened, and the mage was gone. Roth turned to the rest of the people present and fought to get Tate’s smile out of his head.
Roth grabbed the floating handle of Betamus and took Burke Dreadnaught’s other hand in his. Together they appeared on a darkened battlefield. The bodies that lay the ground were white as chalk and dusty. They seemed almost to be made of salt, and each face was contorted in horror and pain. Roth let Burke speak. Betamus knew him already.
“Betamus!” Burke yelled. “We are here. I am going to take you back home. I will take you to your family.”
From the cracking, crumbling corpse of a screaming man rose a massive brute of a body. The face was lined with thorns. Each barbed thorn curved slightly to frame the face in a terrifying, mystifying way. The man’s hands were riddled with thorns, his knuckles pointed with them. The face was pale, the hair black.
“Home is here. Home is this,” Betamus said.
“Fannalis Deame craves the twin he has so long been separated from,” Roth said. Betamus turned to glare at Roth.
“That name is forbidden. I will rip your heart out of your chest with these thorned fists.”
“My name is Roth Callden. I can reunite you with all of your family,” he said. “Or I can leave you here if you cannot face home. But know this, Betamus, this was never your home. This has always been your prison. I have the keys and I want to unlock your cell door. Will you leave it when the door is opened to you?”
Betamus said nothing. Roth couldn’t wait for an answer. “Think on it. I will leave you with your friend Burke. When the portal opens, both of you will need to exit as quickly as possible.” Roth turned to Burke, “Betamus will be weak when he enters our world again, and you will need to carry him the last few feet. Drag him in and be fast about it. This place will crumble on you after it is opened.”
Roth left. He needed to move other pieces into place.
To Harloc, the man who had for so long been trapped in Hell, Roth took Arcturus. Roth did not know for sure he was right about that choice until he saw the two together. Harloc was largely broken, and Arcturus seemed to bring strength out in people. When he saw the two of them standing side-by-side, Roth knew he had chosen right, and he left them.
Ran-toc was introduced to Quill and Roth knew the pairing had been perfectly planned. Ran-toc had been a romantic of his time. When he saw a beautiful woman before him, all his weakness boiled away. Suddenly Ran-toc had someone to be strong for. He longed to make a good impression. Roth left them as Ran-toc was asking Quill if she danced.
Leteral was introduced to Gale. Gale being elondri resonated with the woodsman in Leteral. Gale was obviously from the people of the First Tree, and Leteral was drawn to him like air to a flame.
Geterel was hard as a barnacle and just as sharp. When Roth entered his cutlass, Geterel was furious. He charged and Thrak appeared. They broke out into battle instantly. Roth knew better than to try to talk the two of them down. Thrak could pull Geterel through when he needed him to. That would be good enough.
When Roth stood before Rayph and Fannalis, he bowed.
“Today is your day,” Roth said.
“Today you set us both free,” Rayph said. “Fannalis has been the only constant in my life for ten thousand years. He is closer to me than a brother. Uniting him with his family is a deed I will be grateful for the rest of my life. You are giving us both back our lives with this act, Roth.”
Fannalis nodded but kept his eyes down.
“How do we know it will work?” Fannalis said. “What if he has made promises he can’t keep? What happens when he lets us down?” the wizard hissed.
Rayph took Fannalis by the sides of the face and the two men locked eyes. “Then we have united the six brothers and we have the father. If this does not work, we keep trying. We are closer now than we have ever been. If for only that reason, Roth has been a boon to us. But I have faith in him,” Rayph said. “I know better than to bet against him.”
Fannalis remained petulant, but Rayph waved Roth on. Roth left to return to the warehouse again.
He had to wait for the correct hour. This many portals being opened at one time was tricky business. He needed to get the father in the right spot in the summoning circle. Needed to have the crafter of all six weapons, and the father to all six men, as a focal point in the circle. Roth needed the air temperature to be just right or the shock of the different climate might be too harsh on their minds. He was pulling a child out of a bladed womb. Six children out of six bladed wombs. The conditions had to be just right.
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sp; And that was the hell of it. The waiting was going to be the death of him. Hours ticked by with no friends or allies at his side. He hated Tate for not being here. Hated his twin for letting him down. The anticipation left nothing but time for Roth to second-guess himself and allow seeds of doubt to take root.
When he could wait no more, Roth held his hand out over the circle. He betrayed the names of the souls he was summoning.
“Fannalis and Betamus,” he said quietly. “Geterel and Leteral,” he sighed. “Harloc and Ran-toc,” he whispered. If he were to call their names out too loudly, they would be deafened. He thought he had spoken too loudly, but knew he had no recourse but to move on.
Roth opened a portal over the father’s prone form and stepped back. He looked through to see a shifting image of twelve figures. They held each other, they danced, they stood watching a crumbling battlefield, and they talked. Two figures battled each other incessantly and Roth held the flickering portal wide. He had written a splinter spell, a spell that would break the next spell he cast into six perfect pieces and cast them all at the same time. He cast his splinter, then with the wave of his hand, Roth cast the deconstruction spell.
The swords began to fall apart.
Metal bubbling and dropping to hunks of steel. Wood handles falling off and growing twigs. Leather unwrapping and fading from the black dye to a chestnut brown. As the weapons fell apart, the figures within rushed for the open portal, and as one, all twelve figures burst from the doorway out into the warehouse.
Confusion and loud crying, shouting and whimpering, it was pandemonium. Within a breath, six souls that had been trapped and caged for more than sixty thousand years were set free. Roth waited to see if they would hold, uncertain if their bodies would crumble from age or simply crack and break, but when the six brothers held, he turned and walked out of the warehouse.
He felt empty. His moment had come, the moment he had planned for so long, and Tate had not been there. Had not wanted to be there to see it. Roth fought off tears as he walked the deserted streets of Ironfall.
All the Manhunters were gone. There was nothing for him here anymore. Roth opened a portal and disappeared into it. He did not feel like celebrating. Did not want anyone to thank him. All Roth wanted at that moment was to be alone.
The Sixth Master
Roth and Tate stood in the park in the city of Pollax looking at the tree with Byron’s and his lover’s name carved there. A deep well of sadness grew within Roth. They had done their research on the man who guided them through the horrors of Hell and had been horrified to realize he was their uncle, Meredith’s brother. Roth looked at the tree, once tall and proud, now twisted and dry, ravished by some disease Roth had no name for.
He pulled the sword of his father, and with one swift chop, the tree was cut loose. It fell to the ground with a dry wheeze.
Tate brought his hands together, and with a word and a look of concentration, he summoned up a globe of light. It was red swirled through with yellows and browns. It bled orange smoke and he left it hovering over the stump to seethe and bubble.
“Thrak, when did you know you wanted to be a duelist?” Tate asked as they all walked the halls of the Castle of Chains. He had summoned them all to him, and at once, every member of the Collective had come. Tate’s black robes whispered across the floor with every step he took, Roth’s fear creeping up on him like a hunter stalking him as its prey. This was not going to go well. Tate had a dark purpose at heart when he brought them all together. As they walked the darkened halls, Roth fought back the bile rising up in the back of his throat.
“When I was small, an army came to my town to try to wipe us out,” Thrak said. “A great man came to our aid, and with one display of power, he killed thousands of the enemy. He did most of the damage without pulling his blade. I knew then that I wanted to wield that kind of power and do that sort of thing for a good cause. I must have been five or six.”
“Ithyryyn, when did you get Baby?” Tate asked.
Roth remembered the enchanted horse Ithyryyn had cared for and imbued with power all their lives.
Ithyryyn laughed. “Found her when she was just a colt. She was weak and I made her a bit stronger just to get her through the night. Things just kinda got going from there. That must have been twenty years ago now. She would be getting old by now if I was going to let her do that.”
“Twenty years,” Tate said. “I see. Gale, when did you start writing spells?”
“Tate, you obviously have something to say,” Gale said. “You have us all here talking about our disciplines and the things we have become masters of. I am guessing you are ready to declare your mastery. We have all been waiting for years for you to make your desire known, and we would like very much to hear your decision.”
“No matter what it is, we will stand beside you and aid you in becoming the best the world knows of the subject,” Quill said. “We are with you no matter what it is.”
They entered a room filled with hovering glowing orbs. Each was no bigger than a man’s fist, and each was of a different kind of light, a different color. Many bled, steamed, or smoked.
“Your constructs,” Gale said. “You have been building these since the Madness Wars. I had no idea you kept at it like this. I never saw this collection before.”
Roth knew Tate had a preoccupation with constructs, but he never knew his brother had such a vast collection. In this room now hovered over two hundred constructs, each unique. Each deeply disturbing except one. Roth seemed to be pulled in by it, seemed to be summoned by it.
It was beautiful beyond anything Roth had ever seen. He stepped closer to it and beheld a small sphere of crystal that gave off a very slight glow. It appeared strong and fragile. It seemed a steady thing and a thing flickering.
“These are my way of expressing emotions,” Tate said. “Most times I am empty inside. I feel a great hollow place within me I can’t fill with anything. Love, work, play, battle, nothing I embark on can make me feel whole. I am not like you, Roth,” Tate said, turning to face him. Suddenly Tate was at the point of tears. “I am not happy.” Tate was crying then. He curled his fist into a tight ball and tears coursed down his face to gather at his chin.
Thrak held Quill back from comforting Tate, and Roth had to fight his own urge to do the same.
“But then I created this,” Tate said. He walked to the construct strobing light from a crystalline globe. “Thrak, what was I feeling when I made this?”
Thrak did not hesitate in his answer. “Hope.”
Tate turned to him, nodding emphatically. “Yes, hope, that is exactly what I was feeling. Do you see anything like it anywhere else?”
Roth looked carefully. Though he saw glowing yellow and other friendly looking expressions, he did not see anything that resembled hope.
“This is when I knew,” Tate said. “This moment when I made this construct is when I knew what I was.”
“When did you make it brother?” Roth asked.
“When we got back,” Tate hissed.
Roth drew back in horror and Tate stepped away. He walked to a curtain that covered a balcony door.
“When we got back from Hell, that construct was the first thing I made. I stared at it and I knew. I knew exactly what I was.” Tate turned back to look at them. He was so shrouded in darkness. He was a bare shape of black in a field of shadow. “I knew then that I was a demonologist.” Tate swept the curtain aside. “That I would have to keep a castle like this, in this land.”
The windows beyond the balcony were black and tense, as if something was pressing in on them. Tate stepped to the doors and swept them open. Instantly the black on the window flapped away as thousands of tiny demonic beasts no bigger than birds exploded in every direction. They screamed out into the world beyond. They cawed and screeched as they fretted through the room, and they flopped around the ceiling, scratching and fighting for purchase.
Tate stepped out into a maelstrom of heat and yellowing light. The
vista behind him was one of torment and loss.
“I am the demonologist of the Callden Collective, and its Lord of Hell. See me before you, weigh me, and accept me or cast me out. But this is my path. Take me as one of yours if you will. If not, take your ring and leave me to my land.”
Roth sobbed and the Collective could only stare.
The End
“The new king is generous,” Rayph said. “I asked him if I could walk you out, and he said yes. I love that man. He will bring light to this nation. Too long this nation has been led by darkness. I tried to curb it as much as I could, but I just didn’t speak the language of those men.”
Rayph passed the darkest part of the dungeons and stepped out into the light.
“They will run now. The last of them will flee for their lives. They may cause their brand of horror upon the world, but they will not be focused by a singular vision. They have no leaders. They have no one to fear who will command them in any enterprise. The Stain dies with you.”
Black Cowl kept his head down. He was beaten. Months in the Crown being worked on by Brody’s people had broken him.
“Will you give me one thing before I die?” Black Cowl said. “Just one final gift before I go?”
“What might you want from me?”
“What did you do with them? You couldn’t have killed them, you are not that dumb. You captured them and caged them. You can’t think a prison can hold them. Sooner or later they will get out. Sooner or later he will call the Stain back to his side.”
“Wizard room,” Rayph said.
“A training room?” Black Cowl asked.
“It is our place where we sink in to read and practice and learn. It is perfect for Brody. It can only be opened by the wizard who creates it. It has no doors. It has no locks. The wizard that lies within does not get thirsty and does not get hungry. He survives. And a wizard can leave it, close it up behind him, and never go back. No god can see in it. No one can find it. Brody and his band of terrors are trapped there now. No one but I can let them free. That day will never come.”
