by Joe Jackson
The new recruits were under strict orders from Lord Allerius – the current head of the Order – to not bother Kari with personal questions or requests to hear about her past. While details of Kari’s career - particularly in her previous life - were still being taught to the new recruits, upon taking an administrative position she had made it quite clear to Allerius that she didn’t want to spend her days talking about herself. She worked with the headmasters to refine and correct details about her career and even add a little bit about her personal life, but given her private nature, Kari didn’t like to be interviewed or asked about her past life. She was, by all accounts, the only person to have been resurrected in the history of Citaria; fortunately, her coworkers and even the recruits respected her privacy.
However, that only went so far. Since word had spread of her resurrection and her work on Tsalbrin, the number of female applicants to the Academy had more than tripled. Many of them didn’t make it through boot camp: they were inspired by Kari’s story and wanted to follow in her footsteps, but they lacked the fortitude or the inner fire that made demonhunters special people. Still, while many failed to graduate from the boot camps, dozens not only graduated but did so with honors, and in many of them Kari could see shades of herself and her old friend Annabelle Sol’ridachi. Strong, determined female demonhunters were once again becoming common, and Kari took pride in knowing that she had set the example for many of them.
Kari rubbed her thumb across the leather surface of the journal she held, but she tossed it aside as unimportant. Based on its title and what little she had read of it, that particular journal seemed to be filled mostly with Bosimar’s personal life which, though she was curious about the man, wasn’t a high priority. She was more focused on finding the journals and records of what particular demons he was investigating or hunting during his tenure as Avatar, and what, if any, plans and schemes of an underworld nature he might have uncovered. So far, she hadn’t come across all that much: it seemed the world had been fairly quiet on the demon-hunting front in the years leading up to the Apocalypse. It left Kari to wonder if Bosimar ever had the sort of grand adventures Turik Jalar was renowned for: whether he’d been the kind of leader who walked right into the lair of the enemy and threw down the glove of challenge.
In the years since her return from Tsalbrin, Kari had studied Turik Jalar’s career in detail. He was her contemporary during her past life, and the two had brought an enormous amount of pride and prestige to the Order with their separate accomplishments. Jalar rose to the position of Avatar of Vengeance shortly before Kari’s untimely death, and it came as little surprise to the terra-dracon woman that his career only became more impressive once he laid claim to the title and the power that came with it. By all accounts, he had once even entered the underworld and laid a list of demands at the feet of the Overking. How he walked away from such an encounter was still more than anyone could fathom, but Kari understood well his passion and drive. When the headmasters of the Order compared her to him, she knew that it was no small thing.
Kari fished through one of the smaller boxes on her desk and her fingers traced across something metallic within. She pulled a set of manacles from the box, and her eyes widened in recognition as she held them up before her. She had seen a similar device during her mission on Tsalbrin: a young kirelas-rir war wizard named Triela was magically subdued by such a device, which kept both her psionic abilities and arcane power in check. Even as Kari’s mind flashed through the memories of that mission and its fateful outcome, she rose quickly to her feet and began to comb through the other items in the box. Along with several field manuals and instruction guides, she found a monetary ledger, a small pendant on a woven chain, and a journal that had the words ‘Year of the Snake’ etched prominently into its cover.
Kari sat back down in her chair and held the pendant up before her. She had never seen anything like it. It depicted some sort of mask that combined elements of a bird, a hyena, and a snake, all superimposed over what appeared to be a symbol unlike any Kari had encountered. It had elements of tribalism in it, not unlike the markings and glyphs of the lizardfolk and their language, but it was clearly not of czarikk origin. The pendant further lacked any latent auras such as the one that marked the authenticity of the dog tags Kari wore as a demonhunter, and it hung from a simple band made of tightly-twined plant fibers. Whether it was the holy symbol of a god or the crest of a demon king, Kari wasn’t sure; it didn’t match any that she was familiar with. She studied the pendant for several minutes, and then called for her assistant.
The Demonhunter Order had many employees who were not demonhunters, priests, or acolytes, but simply common folk who wished to assist the Order with its work. Kari’s assistant, Joaquim, was a young human who had aspired to become a demonhunter but simply didn’t have the proper physical gifts to complete their rigorous training. Even still, he had stayed on with the Order, helping it in various ways around the sprawling campus in DarkWind. With the amount of paperwork and research Kari had been doing in the past two months, she was glad for the young man’s help.
“Yes, ma’am?” Joaquim asked as he appeared in the doorway of Kari’s office. He was tall and lanky, with tan skin, dark eyes, and sandy blonde hair that he kept at shoulder-length to show that he was not a warrior.
Kari held the pendant out to him. “Take this over to the temple and see if they can make anything of it,” she said, and the young man took the necklace from her with a bow of his head.
Once he left, Kari regarded the two books before her on the desk. While she was tempted to start with the strangely-titled journal, Kari decided the monetary ledger might tell her more than the former Avatar’s notes. She took up the ledger and untied the string around it, and she began to flip casually through its pages. As expected, it was a record of mercenaries employed by the Order to either undertake scouting missions, or else to take care of problems the Order was concerned with but couldn’t spare the men to investigate. Curiously, the ledger also kept track of the races of the various mercenaries Bosimar had employed, and Kari could hardly suppress a chuckle when she saw there was a gnoll mentioned numerous times. Gnolls were a hyena-like humanoid people, but they were generally savage and uncivilized; for Bosimar to have employed one must’ve meant that the gnoll was unusual, to say the least. She wondered briefly if the gnoll might’ve had something to do with the hyena-like elements of the pendant, but she pushed the thoughts aside and continued with the ledger.
Kari’s eyes widened as she continued reading, and she flipped a few more pages to confirm that she was not imagining the name she was seeing: Jori-an Stormrider. She was shocked that the ledger also noted that Jori-an was a seterra-rir, and that shock grew even further when Kari saw the notations that Jori-an had worked with the gnoll, who was named Tormaar. The demonhunter considered the enigmatic first mate of Karmi’s Sword and wondered what would have drawn her into the service of the Avatar of Vengeance. Kari tapped her small black claws on the desk as her thoughts flashed briefly to her brother-in-law, Aeligos, and what he would do with such information if he were in the same situation. Aeligos was already helping Kari go through the many journals and logs when he had the time, but even he had yet to come up with any solid leads. With a crooked smile, Kari took note of all the names included with Jori-an: Tormaar the gnoll, Elias Sorivar the half-corlyps, Rhiannon al’Morihn the kwarrasti, and Danilynn Stahlorr the fures-rir – the last of which Kari found familiar, though she couldn’t quite place it.
With a narrower list of names to deal with, Kari concentrated on the other information the ledger gave: tasks and the associated payments. She found it interesting – in an annoying sense –that Bosimar had apparently kept track of his mercenaries’ tasks with simple one or two word phrases rather than cross-referencing the ledger to specific logs. Her first instinct was to think that Bosimar was hiding something, but at the same time, she could hardly believe that the Avatar of Vengeance would have anything to hide. The Avatar w
as supposed to be Zalkar’s right hand, so why would he hide the things he was doing? Her aggravation gave way to a wry smile when she noted that one of the first tasks assigned to Jori-an’s party was simply labeled with “Delivery – Beast.”
Kari laid the ledger in her lap, sat back in her chair, and gazed inattentively out the window once more. She wondered what connection Bosimar could have had with the Beast, the minotaur-like deity of shape-shifters and lycanthropes, who lived on Citaria rather than in the celestial realm. She wondered what would have prompted him to send a young adventuring group out to see the dour and grumpy deity. Based on the size of the monetary payment the group received, Kari guessed it wasn’t anything of tremendous importance, but when she turned to the next page, she saw that nearly all of the other missions Jori-an’s group undertook for the Avatar were simply labeled with the word “Snakes” – and much larger monetary rewards.
Kari looked up as a terra-rir appeared in the doorway of her office, and she smiled. Lord Allerius – or Albrecht, as he preferred she call him – was still head of the Order despite Kari’s own administrative position, but he considered her his partner in running the Order. Allerius was older than Kari, but still well-toned and battle-ready even in the middle of his fifth decade. He was a ruggedly handsome terra-rir with the white hair and green eyes most common to his kind. Like Kari, he had settled into an administrative position after marrying and having several children, but he was also a veteran of the Apocalypse and a respected hunter admired by all of those under his command. Still, rarely did he make an important decision without consulting Kari first, and he often sought her advice on which hunters to send out on specific missions. In the previous few years, Kari came to know her co-workers among the Order quite well, and she was adept at matching their strengths and weaknesses to specific tasks that would help keep them safe but also allow them to grow stronger. Though she wasn’t as well-educated as Albrecht, he still deferred to her instincts on many matters.
“What is it?” she asked him.
Albrecht beckoned for her to follow. “The Council wants you in on this,” he said. “A very important client just arrived on campus.”
Kari regarded him curiously; she had never been called before the Council to help with any of their decision making. The Council was comprised of priests, not demonhunters, so while Allerius was head of the Order, he still answered to Zalkar’s clerics. The head of the Order, usually an Avatar of Vengeance, was free to run the Order procedurally, but was still answerable to the Council on matters of policy and administration. As it was, Kari had only ever stood before the Council on one occasion: her promotion to the rank of Sword of the Heavens after her mission on Tsalbrin. Only the Council had authority to promote anyone above the twelfth order, and it had been one of the proudest moments of Kari’s life to stand before them and be judged worthy of the promotion by a unanimous decision.
Kari rose and followed Albrecht to the temple, which stood near the center of the sprawling demonhunter campus. It was clear from all the interested looks the cadets gave the pair that something unusual was up, and Kari wondered what all the secrecy was about. Though the interior of the temple was arranged like all of Zalkar’s other churches – with an altar fronted by benches set up in a horseshoe-shape and a speaking area at the center – the rear of the temple was a conference room. The large table at the far end was shaped like a boomerang, and seated behind it were nine human priests of Zalkar. Allerius led Kari through the empty gallery toward the table, and it was only then that Kari saw who was standing before the Council.
He was a giant, powerfully-built serilian-rir – or half-demon, as they were still commonly called – who must’ve stood over seven feet tall: about the same height as Kari’s massive brother-in-law, Serenjols. Kari drew closer and the man turned to regard her, and she marveled at how similar his coloration was to her own. While he was clearly serilian-rir, he had the same dark ebon eyes and long, silky black hair Kari did. He lacked any sort of horns that she could see, his hair was brushed back and tied neatly into a tail, and there was an undeniable handsomeness to him. He was dressed in black leather armor, but it was stylish and could have nearly passed for formal attire at first glance, and he had a heavy black cloak that was bunched up between his folded, massive, black leathery wings.
“Mr. Black,” she greeted him shortly before she and Albrecht came to attention before the Council. The massive male nodded curtly, and Kari saluted her superiors.
“Lady Vanador,” Master Bennet greeted Kari. The Council – and her coworkers – continued to refer to her as Lady Vanador despite the fact that she and Grakin were officially mated, since more people were familiar with her maiden name than her mate’s own proud surname of Tesconis. Kari never liked being referred to as a Lady, but her promotion to the rank of Sword of the Heavens had brought with it a title of minor nobility – one which the Order took a lot more seriously than she did. Master Bennet, an elder human, was the head of the Council and worked closely with Lord Allerius in running the Order and its academy. “Thank you for answering our summons so quickly. As you can see, the Order has a…delicate situation before it. However, I will let Earl Southwick explain it in his own terms.”
Kari turned to face the massive serilian-rir. She had heard many, many stories about Kaelin Black, the Earl of Southwick County, but better known as one of the most notorious crime lords in the world. What every story inevitably led to was an ending in which Black avoided all blame for the actions of his syndicate and somehow still managed to look like a legitimate businessman despite what seemed plain for all to see. Even still, he was the rightful lord of the city of Barcon and Southwick County, and until the Demonhunter Order found solid evidence of him committing crimes or terrorizing his people, they treated him with the respect due his position, if not him personally. Kari tried to keep her expression neutral as she held his stare, recognizing he had to be on campus to request help from the Order. Fortunately, it was chillier than she’d expected in the conference room, so no one really paid attention when she folded her arms across her chest.
“As I explained to your Council, I have a serial killer on the loose in my city,” Lord Black said. His voice was deep and somewhat threatening despite his posture and expression, and Kari wondered if it was something he’d practiced for years or if it was just a byproduct of being serilian-rir. “Normally my men are sufficient to take care of such things, but to date this assassin has proven too much for them to deal with. I have looked into the situation myself and even hired outside help, so far to no avail. As the body count is now in excess of two dozen with no end in the foreseeable future, I am requesting the Order’s assistance on this.”
“When did the killings start?” Kari asked.
Lord Black folded his arms across his chest and sighed. “Roughly two weeks ago,” he said, and when Kari’s brows rose, he shrugged. “I am able to teleport thanks to my heritage, to answer your question; that’s how I arrived here so quickly. I couldn’t afford to waste the time it would take to ride here and let this killer have his way with my citizens for a month and more. I need the Order’s help as soon as possible.”
“It will take our people weeks to get to Barcon, unless you can take them there yourself,” Kari reasoned.
The Earl shook his head. “I cannot, but that shouldn’t be an issue. For the time being, my city is under martial law: all citizens have been ordered to stay off the streets after nightfall and keep their doors and windows sealed until dawn. I can mitigate the killer’s actions until help arrives, I simply cannot catch them myself.”
“And you believe it is a demon, your lordship?” Allerius prompted.
“I do,” Lord Black said. “This killer leaves no tracks, no traces, and no scent. I’ve even had a brys try to track and find this killer, again to no avail. I can only reason that it’s some kind of demon of the underworld sort. I believe one of your Order might have better luck determining what it is I am dealing with, and know how best
to eliminate the threat.”
“Why not ask the Avenger order for their help? Gnarr is much closer to Barcon than we are,” Kari prodded.
The Earl shifted uncomfortably. “I should think it goes without saying that given my… relationship with the Duke of Sutherland, asking him or his order for their help would cost me much status as the Earl of Southwick. Your help would come at a much more reasonable price.”
“And why should we help you?” Kari asked, voicing everyone’s unspoken question.
“Lady Vanador,” Master Bennet said warningly, “Lord Black is to be treated with the respect due his position, regardless of which duchy he is currently standing in.”
The terra-dracon woman turned to face the Council and did not retract her question. “Masters, the last time I was in the city of Barcon, there was a church to Achirun the Deceiver right across the street from Lord Black’s tower,” she explained, pointing a clawed finger his way. “If his loyalties lie with an underworld demon lord, I’m not sure we belong trying to help him.”
Lord Black shrugged. “His priests are among the best lawyers in the world,” he said casually. “Far be it from me to tell my citizens who they can or cannot worship. After all, I even allow your own deity to maintain a church in my city despite the fact that your Order would like nothing more than to remove me from power.”
