C10 Chapter X

One more step and Nill stood in the weak morning sunlight. He gulped down the fresh mountain air in deep breaths. Only now did he notice how stale the air in the caves had smelled.

“Stinks,” Pling said next to him.

I suppose fresh air is as weird to him as the cave air is to me, Nill thought. “I can’t smell anything,” he said to remain polite.

“Rotten air,” Pling explained. “Better in the rocks.”

“Alright, go back then,” Nill laughed. “I think I can find my way down the valley on my own. Downhill all the way.” Pling shook his head.

“Stinks, rotten air. Careful.” He gave Nill another clap on the shoulder, which caused Nill’s knees to buckle. “Good friend!” he added before retreating into the blackness of the caves. Nill felt Pling’s eyes on him for a while after he had vanished out of sight. Should he ever return to this place, he doubted he could find the entrance. And, he reflected, the Ossronkari meant to move to a different mountain altogether. All that would remain as a reminder of them would be the halidom.

Nill considered his options. He could follow the path back up the valley to find the nightcrawlers and seek knowledge about his amulet. On the other hand, if he went the opposite way, he could pass through the Waterways to reach the other end of Woodhold, where he hoped to learn more about Perdis. Despite the great distance, Woodhold was far more tempting. He imagined a pair of big gray eyes, stern at first, then crinkled in laughter.

“Forget it,” he muttered to himself as he cast aside the illusion. “I’ll go and find Brolok. Nothing should stop me from wanting to visit a friend.”

He found a gap between the densely-grown trees and began his descent. It had grown cold, and Nill was grateful for an excuse to move. His breath was visible about a hand’s length in front of his face before it dissipated, and the leaves beneath his feet crunched as he trod them into the ground. The weather had changed dramatically in the time he had spent in the caves of the Ossronkari.

Nill made steady progress, but he found himself less happy about that than he had expected. His sense of adventure had left him. He became twitchy and once caught himself staring so intently at a tree it was as if he meant to ask it something, as though he wanted to stop for a while and simply listen to the scratching of leather on the rough bark. And all the time an impalpable sense of dread grew in him. As the first beads of cold sweat ran down his brow, the old panic began to set in. Nill scolded himself silently and suppressed the shivering that had taken hold of his body. He knew the feeling. His reaction was always the same when the Other World approached: sudden rushes of fear. Ever since he had first encountered Bucyngaphos, it had never changed. Even the fact that he had visited the Other World on several occasions did nothing to diminish it. And here, in the middle of a dark, forested mountain, it made no sense at all, unless…

Nill took several slow steps back. As he walked, he sent his senses out behind him, along the vale and down the cliff, searching for a magical presence. Was this the foul stench Pling had noticed? He understood why his companion had decided to retreat.

Nill saw nothing. This was both a disadvantage and fortuitous; at least he now knew that whatever lay in wait had not discovered him yet.

Everything inside him burned to turn around and sprint back up the valley. He knew he had fast legs, but the valley’s incline was steep and his baggage heavy. The noise a hasty flight would make would certainly draw the mysterious follower’s attention – if it was indeed a follower. The smarter choice was to hide, to let the danger pass and then follow it out of the valley. Nill still hoped faintly that whatever it was was not here for him. His leap through the portals from the Fire Kingdom to Metal World had thrown off the trail; no mage could have followed him. Choosing a plan was difficult without the knowledge of which enemy he was dealing with. Perhaps it was not even an enemy; anything was possible.

No, anything is not possible, Nill chastised himself. He trusted in his instincts. The same smell, the creeping reddish-black aura had once before incited panic in him. An older student had summoned a minor demon on his shoulder. The thing that lurked out of his sight was not minor. It had to be a fully-fledged demon.

Nill kicked a small stone loose from its surroundings, and it gave a loud clatter as it tumbled. Demons can’t hear very well. They don’t see any better than humans or whatever creature whose body they take possession of, Nill told himself, but he knew what the demon was looking for. Demons had honed senses for magic and could detect an unknown aura over a hundred steps away. Auras could not be hidden; shrinking was the best way of hiding one, but nowhere close to infallible.

Nill slowly crawled up the slope. If I’m lucky I can hide up there and the demon will just pass by below, he hoped, and as he reached a small alcove in the slope he decided to lay in wait there. The valley’s sides were steep. In the lower reaches he could use the tree trunks to pull himself forward, but the further it went the more arduous the climb became. This spot was his best chance.

The demon was slow. Nill could still not see it, but he now felt the foul presence among the dark trees. All the animals in the forest had picked up on the new arrival and had fallen silent. Now and then a shrill shriek echoed through the silence and sent a chill down Nill’s spine. Tense trills betrayed the nervous birds hiding in their nests. The demon trekked along the valley until it reached a slope, then turned around and went back, each time gaining a little height.

Pling had been right. It would have been better to stay in the mountain and wait for the creature from the Other World to disappear.

And if it’s really after me? For the first time, Nill dared let the words form in his mind. Whoever sent Amargreisfing’s ghost after me would have no problem doing the same with a demon.

Once the thought had formed, it lifted the panic from Nill’s mind like the morning sun lifts the mist. All that remained was the anticipation, the anxiety of facing a more powerful enemy, as any warrior or mage felt before a duel.

Nill went over the possibilities. A direct confrontation with the demon was his last choice; he was only armed with the short dagger he had once forged and his staff. The staff was useless – demons felt no physical pain. To defeat one, he would have to utterly destroy its body. That was the only way to extinguish that terrible aura.

His dagger’s blade, despite all the magic it was imbued with, was only a weak weapon against a demon who was undoubtedly bigger, stronger, heavier and faster than himself, and he could probably rule out overpowering it with his own spells as well. Demons were masters of Fire and Metal energy and had the boundless strength of the Earth. Water was their weakness, and Wood was unknown to them. But Metal was more powerful than Wood, and Water could only extinguish Fire if it did not get absorbed by Earth.

The energy of light could possibly destroy the demon, but Nill had no idea how to call upon it. In the Borderlands of Fire he had simply transformed one energy into another. His only option, he concluded, was to break the summoning ritual that bound the demon to the person who had called upon it. But how was he to do it? He had only succeeded in his fight against Mah Bu because the Demon Lords had interfered. He had won against Amargreisfing because his opponent had given him a valuable hint. But here, he stood alone. A barely qualified sorcerer with the title of archmage against a demon. A demon was not simply a memory of the dead. A demon was a being of the Other World. The encounter’s outcome appeared obvious.

“Ramsker, where are you?” Nill cried out in the faintest hope that a higher force might yet save him. But the ram did not hear thoughtspeak and had disappeared somewhere high up between the rocks. I have to think of something, fast, Nill thought, but what?

He moved out from his hiding spot, for the demon was coming dangerously close. If the demon keeps the search as thorough as it has so far I should have enough time. Perhaps there’s a different exit to the valley. If all else fails… I’ll have to use one of the portals back to the Fire Kingdom.

The thought gave him courage. Nill began to climb and soon reached the spot where he had fought against the roc. It took half a day for him to scale the valley. The sun had climbed with him and now shone down on him from a deep blue sky.

The sun cooks me and the shadows freeze me, Nill complained silently, but in truth he enjoyed the warmth of the sun on his skin after days in the dark depths. Only the threat of the demon clouded his situation and forced him onwards, and his stomach began to growl. The hastily-gathered fruits along the way had given his teeth something to do, but were far from filling.

Nill looked around. To his right was the plateau where the roc had dragged the Ossronkar, to his left he knew the portal to the Fire Kingdom. Before him was a narrow ravine, probably gouged into the stone by a river that had long ceased to exist. It seemed the only path to the peaks if he did not want to climb the almost vertical walls. Ramsker might have been able to do so, but Nill was not a natural mountaineer. Where was that stubborn old ram?

It quickly became clear that the ravine was too tight for Nill to squeeze in with his luggage. He laid it on the ground and bound a cord to it. The first steps were the hardest. He clawed at the rock, pushed one leg into the gap and swinging himself forwards to bring his legs back together. He was now in a painful position; his torso was too wide to follow his legs and was stuck outside, threatening to drag him down. Nill had no experience in true rock-climbing. He was able to make his body lighter and the air around him heavier, but any magic would have been suicide with a watchful demon so close nearby. And so he hung on the rock, no more than a few feet from the ground. He dragged himself upwards and spread his knees apart, and now he finally managed with shaking arms to gain the height he needed for the ravine to accommodate his entire body.

It was easier now. He turned sideways and pushed himself upwards, a wall in his back and a wall against his knees and hands. A sudden tug at his belt reminded him of his baggage. Nill pulled at the cord, cursed a few times as it snagged on the uneven rock, but finally managed to retrieve his bundle. He tied it around his belly and continued his ascent, pushing further with his knees and his back. As he reached the top he flung his bundle over the edge onto the platform and heaved himself after it.

The Ossronkari would be in fits if they ever saw me climbing, Nill thought as he shook rubble and earth from his sleeves. The way ahead was steep, but at least it was more horizontal than vertical this time. He could finally walk again. It was unclear where this new path led; it was a mess of dark, weathered rocks, towering high above him, with barely enough earth between them for a lonesome flower to grow.

It’s actually quite beautiful up here, Nill mused. As he looked around, he saw that he was at the widest spot of a narrow high valley, surrounded by rock on three sides with a wonderful open view of the path he had taken up here and the land beyond. Nill thought he saw one or two small settlements far below, and the shadow of the demon, still moving back and forth. I have to find another place to leave. If I stay here for the night I’ll not see the morning. Even if the demon doesn’t get me, the cold and hunger will. Nill regretted not having taken the portal back. That way was no longer open to him; the demon was too close.

It would be a freezing cold night. There was not much wood for a fire, and adding to his shivers was his hunger. But a few hours of daylight yet remained.

Nill wandered over the green velvety moss, through the low-bushes and sporadic tufts of grass, with here and there small patches of earth. Everywhere there were hand-sized spider webs from which small insects were struggling to get free. It’s amazing how many animals live so high up in the mountains, Nill thought, but I doubt the kingspider or nightcrawler weave such small webs . Nill pulled out his amulet and inspected the band it hung from. Although the strands of spider silk were almost too fine to make out, he knew that a kingspider’s web would look different.

“Between the rocks,” Matria had said. “Not between the bushes.”

He would have to come back to the spiders another time. This was not the right moment. Nill felt a small sting of regret as he almost walked into a wide web. A dead bird hung motionless in mid-air; if it hadn’t, Nill would have stumbled right through it. The strands were as good as invisible, and even though Nill knew the web was there, every time he tried to focus on the delicate weave it fled his gaze.

It can’t be the nightcrawler’s, if the Ossronkari are right. So it has to be the kingspider.

The web was over six feet tall, connected to the rock in eight spots, and it hung directly above an animal crossing. Well, not a true one like the kind Nill had known in Earthland, but the earth was slightly denser here, and that took paws.

It appeared to be the only web around here, and the spider was nowhere in sight. Nill looked up at the sun’s position and decided to investigate the shadowy side of the rocks. The bright, translucent nets ought to be easier to spot there than in the glaring shine of the sun. Besides, he could hardly walk straight through here.

He was right – the pale yellow of the nets was far more distinguishable against the dark stone. Nill counted three: one in the rocks above his head, another in front of him, spread over the entrance to a small cave, and a third across the ground, as though the spider meant it as a trip-up trap.

The larger crevices were left free. Nill supposed this was because animals too big to be caught often passed through them, tearing down the delicate webs. If his assumption was correct, then they must lead somewhere. To his surprise, he was right for the second time that day: the mess of rocks was not nearly as impassable as it had looked from down by the ravine. Paths and natural corridors were everywhere. Even an inexperienced climber like Nill would have no trouble passing through here. He decided to inspect one of these crevices – he had not forgotten that escape was still his primary goal. He took a few hesitant steps into the shadows, pushed aside a playful tendril dancing in the wind, and as he did so he felt a soft resistance. Nill whipped his hand back, or at least, attempted to. The more he pulled, the tougher the stuff he had accidentally pushed his hand into became. He could still not see what it was, but it was certainly not the light yellow of the kingspider web.

Fantastic, Nill thought bitterly. I’m stuck in I-don’t-know-what in I-don’t-know-where and I can’t use magic to free myself because there’s a demon sniffing after me. Angrily he tugged at the soft substance that held his hand. He grasped a ledge with his left hand and put his entire weight into the pull. He felt something move. In the same moment something brushed across his left hand. Like falling leaves dancing across the ground it was, too little to tickle, too much to be wind. Nill looked around and froze. A black spider, the size of two man’s hand across, was hurrying across the rock. A second spider was climbing down a strand of silk from the stone above him, and a third lurked motionless at his feet.

Nill was usually not scared of animals, even wild ones. He felt a certain kinship with them and was often able to exchange thoughts and emotions with them. But spiders were different; they were ancient creatures, from a different time. Nill sent out a few thoughts, but the spiders ignored them. The simpler a creature was, the more difficult communication became.

Nill let go of the rock and flexed the muscles in his right arm. He was able to bend it to a certain degree; the web gave enough room for small movements. Now that he could not flee, he expected a fatal bite at any moment, and prepared to fight against the poison as soon as it entered his body.

“You’ll be surprised what happens if you try to make a mage your meal. The only thing keeping you alive right now is the demon out there,” Nill shouted into the darkness.

Three of the spiders were clambering up Nill’s left arm now. They were heavy. Their steps tickled and prickled. Nill clenched his fist angrily, but could do no more. Red eyes stared at him.

“Go away!” he commanded. “Webs, away!” But the spiders’ minds were so different to his own that he only received dead silence, in sharp contrast to the swarming around him. He must have stumbled straight into a colony of nightcrawlers whose express purpose seemed to be attacking his left hand, for the three jet-black spiders had received company. Nill heard a whisper, a hiss, but it was no more than the rustling of spider legs and exoskeletons. I should be able to feel their thoughts , Nill thought, but he could not rid himself of the feeling that these spiders were talking amongst themselves. The pull on his right hand grew stronger and his wrist began to hurt. Nill gave up his resistance and made a small movement towards the crag. He felt the relief in his protesting muscles and expected a counter-pull on his left hand, but apparently it was only held very lightly. He was in full control of his legs and torso. Whatever was going on, he was certainly not being wrapped up. Quite the opposite in fact, his left hand was now moving with ease. He pulled it closer, along with all the spiders climbing around it, and managed to resume a relatively normal pose. His body thanked him for it and sent fresh blood streaming into the frozen muscles. It tickled as the numbness wore away.

Before Nill could consider his next move, the pull on his right arm strengthened again and another wave of pain rolled up through his shoulder. Nill stumbled another step further into the crag and, slowly, understanding came to him. He took a braver step into the darkness and nothing held his left fist back. Only the right arm was still stuck.

“Yes, all right, I’m coming,” he grunted as he slowly felt his way through the dark crevice. He was still surrounded by the strands of nightcrawler web, but now it was less a trap than a signpost. The crag had widened. The nightcrawlers pulled him forwards and he managed three normal steps before something pulled his head down.

Nill fell to his knees, hunched over with the pain in his neck and spine. He crawled along the ground, slipped past a corner – and finally he saw light at the end of the crooked tunnel. At that same moment the shackles fell off him and Nill was able to leave the crag towards the light. He found himself in one of the many hollows he knew from the portals. But there was no sudden explosion of Metal energy. It would have been too easy to just find another portal he could escape through. Tough mountain grass grew wherever it found enough earth and sunlight, and on the other end of the hollow there lay several large white stone blocks in front of the black stone wall. Beside these blocks stood a ram, feasting happily on the grass.

“Ramsker!” Nill called in relief. The ram raised its head for a moment, then returned to its meal, as though nothing in the world was more important than hard grass.

Nill’s left shoulder still ached. Three of the spiders were still sitting on his arm.

“I think I’ve carried you enough,” Nill said as he kneeled down to return the spiders to the ground. The first leapt from his shoulder and scurried back into the protective darkness. The second followed noticeably slower, and the third crawled lazily onto the ground without fully leaving the hand.

“What is it about me that interests you so?” Nill asked without hoping for an answer. His eyes fell on his left hand, and what he saw worried him slightly. It was reddened and covered in slime. His ring was barely visible beneath the sticky layer.

Carefully, he wiped his hand in the grass, because the third nightcrawler had still not left. It had to be the ring. The spider was grasping it with two of its legs.

“Do you want it?” Nill asked, and attempted to slide the ring off his finger. The ring, however, was not easily removed; his entire hand was not only red, but slightly swollen.

“Looks like you’ll have to wait a bit,” Nill grumbled. Suddenly, with a stab of panic, he remembered the demon. He hastily looked back to the crevice and opened his third eye. Wherever the demon was right now, it was not in the immediate area. It was probably waiting for him to return.

Nill looked around and saw yet more spiders. But these were different. He supposed they must be kingspiders. He could make out four of them clearly. There were likely another dozen of them hiding out of sight; in the sunlight, Nill caught the glinting of several webs. The last nightcrawler retreated. The prey had been handed over.

Three of the spiders skittered behind him, as if to make clear that he could not escape that way. The fourth crawled towards the white stones. As Nill walked past Ramsker, he shouted to the spiders: “Why don’t you go for the ram instead? He’s got far more meat than me, and besides, he never does anything other than stand around stupidly.”

He had barely said the words when a mighty blow knocked him through the air and to the ground, where he landed on his belly. The kingspider hastily ran away. Nill looked over his shoulder and saw two yellow, slanted, very bad-tempered eyes.

“I knew it was a mistake to offer friendship to a ram! It makes them rebellious. You just wait until we’re done here, then we’ll have another duel and you’ll know once and for all who’s leading the herd.”

Ramsker lowered his head and displayed his horns as he scratched the ground with his front hoof.

“Wait until we’re done here, I said,” Nill growled threateningly, but at the same time he felt giddy inside. He was glad to have his companion back.

The white stones seemed to sparkle more and more the closer Nill got to them. The sunlight broke on their surfaces and shone straight into Nill’s eyes. These blocks were highly unusual. White, like those in Earthland, but far harder. Where the stone had cracked it shone like milky glass. Whatever this rock was, it certainly did not come from this mountain; it must have been brought from far away. And the blocks certainly would not have fit through the narrow crag he had just come through.

The blocks, Nill reasoned, were likely the remains of an old building, perhaps a temple or a place of prayer. There must have been four pillars in front of the entrance; one of them still stood high like a reproachful finger. The other three were broken in various heights. Nill saw a few discolored seed shells stuck in a crack in one of the stumps, their contents long since scavenged. Around another there was a pile of yellow leaves. The entrance had long collapsed, and with it the roof. Only the threshold still stood proud on the dark ground, as if to say, “Enter, wanderer, but temper your pace.”

Nill stepped through the broken entrance and felt the sacredness of the place wash over him. A last stone, more a board than a piece of wall, leaned against the dark rock behind it that surrounded the hollow. Nill gazed in amazement. This slab in particular was not broken, and thus unlikely to have been a structural element. It must have been the altar, or the praying-stone. While everything else had collapsed around it, this particular stone must have been lifted carefully out of harm’s way. Too heavy for a normal human. Magic, Nill thought.

The stone was decorated. Magical symbols danced across the gleaming surface at such speed that Nill was repeatedly forced to close his eyes to get rid of the dizzying sensation. The symbols were familiar, but he could not read them.

“Stand still!” he ordered, and the symbols gradually came to halt, forming vertical lines like troops of soldiers before a battle. Nill swallowed dryly. Six platoons had marched up before him. Their captain was on the left, a single symbol of unknown origin, made up of several symbol-like pictures. The soldiers were runes of Fire, old friends of Nill’s by now. To the captain’s right were the signs of Eos, next to those Arun, followed by Cheon, Mun and Kypt.

Above the captain there was a hole in the shining white stone, surrounded by tiny strokes in all directions. It looked like a sun. Nill found the same symbol atop Arun and Mun.

Beneath the lines of soldiers, at an angle and far enough away as if to disown any connection between the two groups, another row of symbols lived. After several attempts Nill made out the words:

“Sedramon-Per.”

Nill re-read it. There was no doubt; a name had been immortalized here. He knew that last group of symbols and could have spotted them amongst a thousand others. Per. Three runes, part of Perdis’ name. Here they were arranged after the name, indicating the tribe or family.

Nill could have sung with joy. This was the first real hint of Perdis he had found outside of Ringwall! While Nill still stared in astonishment at the altar stone, a chain of spiders had formed. They climbed up to the top edge of the block and dangled down to the symbol of Cheon, where they remained for a short moment. Before Nill’s disbelieving eyes, each spider secreted a tiny drop of liquid from a gland on its abdomen onto the stone. For a short while it then bubbled and formed foam until the liquid had run out of strength. The spider let itself down to the ground and the next spider repeated the whole thing. Nill lost himself in the strange game happening on the stone, and before he knew it, a perfectly round hole gaped above Cheon. The last two spiders busied themselves with scratching the rays around this new sun.

“Why, in the name of every element, are the spiders etching a hole above the rune of Cheon?” Nill wondered aloud. “Sun over Cheon. Cheon in the light, Cheon taken from the darkness,” he followed the thought. “Sure, I have found Cheon, but how would the spiders know that?”

The sudden insight made him gasp as colorful stones pieced themselves together to form a gigantic mosaic.

“The ring!” he breathed. “The spiders must have read my ring!”

Nill scratched the finger that held Matria’s ring. The redness and itch were long gone.

If the spiders recognized the ring or its magic, they must know the Ossronkari, or understand the four-element concept to a certain point. So they know that Cheon waits for its rediscovery in the caves… and that means that the spiders know a lot more than I guessed they would. Nill gaped at the stone, and saw that the sun stood not only above Cheon.

Nill stared at the hard white surface and apologized silently for his demeaning thoughts about primitive nature and the strangeness of simple-minded creatures.

He closed his eyes and opened his sleeping, magical third eye to touch the kingspiders that sat in front of him.

“Can you hear me? Not only Cheon, but Eos has also been found. I found Eos. Eos is in the Fire Kingdom, in the Borderlands, just behind a portal that can be entered from here, in Metal World.”

The spiders did not understand, but Nill redoubled his efforts. Before him there had been this Sedramon-Per, and Nill did not doubt for a heartbeat that this mysterious character had succeeded not only in finding Arun and Mun as well, but also in instructing the spiders to record his triumph for those who came after him. Had Sedramon-Per carved his own name into the slab, or had the spiders taken that duty too? Nill’s respect for the name grew, and at the same time his belief grew stronger that there must be a magical connection between Sedramon-Per and Perdis.

Tirelessly Nill sent his message to the spiders that sat around him, in every kind of sentence he could think of. Cheon, Eos, Fire Kingdom, Borderlands. He connected the words with images, then with emotions, with sounds and the magic of Fire and the searing heat he had felt. The spiders sat there as if they were children, listening to his story with bated breath. Even the spiders up on the altar stone had ceased in their work.

Nill gave all his attention to one single spider and listened. There was no reply. The spider he had assumed might be the one amongst many had perhaps noticed that Nill was trying to tell them something, but Nill was not even sure about that. How could it even understand his words?

Nill sighed deeply and decided to take the simplest, most direct course of communication. He pointed at himself, then stepped up to the altar and imitated a hammering motion with his finger directly above the rune of Eos. A shiver went through the collective spiders and then something happened that astonished Nill more than anything else. The first spider clambered hastily up the stone and stopped above the line of Kypt, lowered its abdomen over the spot where a sun was to be etched, and waited.

“No, no!” Nill groaned. “Not Kypt! Eos!” But the spiders did not listen, and had instead fallen into the deep silence of waiting and listening.

Nill took another step towards the slab, took what he assumed to be the queen from her spot and placed her firmly above Eos. As if she had been waiting for exactly this confirmation, she pressed out a tiny drop of crystal-clear liquid, and the white stone began to foam. The other spiders imitated her, and with the last rays of the setting sun they put the mark atop Eos.

“I really ought to sign it, like Sedramon-Per,” Nill quipped with a grin. He was exhausted. The possibility of signing his name in the stone was foolish; he did not know how to tell the spiders to write his name, and even though Nill was easier to write than Sedramon-Per, it might after all be for the best if he left his name out of it. He did not want to leave trails to himself.

The sun had fully set now, and Nill felt the cold setting in. The next few hours would be uncomfortable. He envied Ramsker; the old ram could find his meals anywhere. Yet it did not take long for him to fall asleep; the day’s efforts had claimed their toll.

When he awoke the next morning, the inevitability of the encounter with the demon stood like a wall in front of him. The temple hollow was a dead end. His only chance was to find another exit in the high valley he had come from, in the hope that the demon was still patrolling the valley below.

He had to return. The small vale lay before him in the blinding light of the early morning sun, the dew-covered webs glittering enticingly. It was beautiful up here, and Nill inhaled greedily. The air was crystal clear and its coldness was refreshing in his lungs. Nill stayed in the shadows of the crevice for a long time, enjoying his moment of peace, yet all the same alert to the vapors of the creature he had seen no more of than a fleeting silhouette and quick movements.

Yes, it was there. The demon’s smell hung light but unmistakable upon the air. It could not be too close; likely it was still below the ravine. Nill squeezed out of the crevice and began to inspect the walls around him. It did not look too bad. Ramsker would manage to climb up here easily.

More hard work for me, though, Nill thought, and the sudden clattering of falling stones made him whip around.

Without warning, with the advantage of height and the blinding sun, the demon leapt down. In its right hand it wielded a weapon unlike any Nill had seen. It was a wildly-jagged sword – no human warrior would ever think to swing such a thing in battle. The teeth along its edge made a clean cut impossible. It would claw into flesh or armor so fiercely that no normal warrior could release it for a second swing. That would take titanic strength. Successfully pulling this weapon from a body would tear out everything that still kept the body or armor intact.

“Break your legs,” Nill cursed under his breath as he cast his staff aside and pulled out his dagger. The blade instantly went black at the closeness of the demon. The demon leapt into action and stormed towards Nill at incredible speed. Nill slid forwards and slightly to the left to get away from the rocks and dodge the blow.

The attack came from the side and would have torn Nill in two if he had not managed to leap to safety. He was surprised. The swing had been fast, but still slower than he had expected. The second blow came from the twist of the massive body, but came nowhere close. The demon sliced through the air, and its motions were cumbersome. Nill squinted. From atop the rocks the huge spiders danced around, using their silk to descend and wrap the demon up. The cocoon around the servant of the Other World became so dense that even a twitch would have required great effort.

Nill swallowed the fear and panic that had risen in his chest. Every fiber in his body screamed at him to run. Before him stood the only thing he had ever truly feared, even though it was now incapacitated. A demon.

The demon’s aura was like the Thorwag’s that had once sat upon his shoulder. Wild, black, flickering and fleetingly dark red.

What’s stopping me from fleeing? By the time the Demon has freed itself from the webs, I can be long gone.

But Nill knew what truly held him back. It was a strange, bizarre mixture of guilt towards this living nightmare. He knew a blind, overwhelming fear for this creature of the Other World, but no hatred. The idea of leaving someone, something, wrapped up, unable to move for perhaps all time, was equally abhorrent to Nill.

And it would not solve his problems. This demon would only return to the Other World if it died here or if the enchantment binding it to its master was broken. The demon’s death would send the clear message to his enemy that no creature of the Other World was able to harm the Archmage of Nothing. Nill raised his knife and straightened his back. The knot in the pit of his stomach seemed to loosen.

“And now you earn your name, blade,” Nill muttered as he approached the stuck demon on shaky legs. He felt nauseous and his magic collapsed, together with his blood, into his legs. Every single step was an uphill battle against the fear that had held him in its grasp for so many winters. Nill’s clothing was drenched with sweat and stuck coldly to his goose-fleshed skin. There was a ringing in his ears and his eyes had lost focus. He was barely able to make out the shape of his foe; it flickered and wavered as though the entire world was dissolving around him.

It was only his will that kept him upright. Every time the world threatened to cave in around him, he stopped and rebuilt it with calm, deep breaths. When his body refused to move, caught in the spell of the untamed aura, Nill sent his breath from his lungs to every point of his skin. And when his heart stopped, skipped a beat, then hesitated on the next, questioning whether it could dare beat again, he countered it with the pulse of nature. The rhythm that filled life itself and spoke to all those who were prepared to listen. Nill thanked Tiriwi silently for the gift of the omnipresent drumbeat.

The demon was slightly smaller than Nill. Its head was bald, like the Thorwag’s, its skin gray. The huge eyes were closed; the demons saw best that way. The pointed ears twitched. They could not follow the sounds of nature due to the spider’s silk. The nose, no more than four horizontal slits in the grimace of terror, sniffed, taking every passing breath inside the bulky body.

Nill had expected to see the huge muscles fighting against their bonds, the mouth spitting slime and the eyes rolling madly. None of that happened. The demon stood still and calm, the only motion that of its flickering aura.

Nill took a hasty step backwards as he saw the strength of that aura, cutting through the webs. An aura could be a mighty weapon, and with a connection to the Other World it could sap his life force. But it could also be a gateway to the creature’s true being.

Nill decided that his fear of the demons and the Other World had lived for too long. He contracted his own aura until it assumed a dense, milky white, and entered the Other World through the enemy’s aura.

The familiar darkness enclosed him and slowly made way for a dull shade. Wherever he was, it appeared empty. There was none of the monotonous brown of the Plains of the Dead. There were no plains at all, no mountains to define them; not even space, as such. Neither was it the painful entombment of the mid-realm, the seam that separated and connected the Here from Beyond. Nothing here hinted where he was, what he was, how he was. The only thing he felt was magic. The magic of the Other World, and three of the five elements. The air was heavy with Metal, Fire and Earth, though he could not make an exact distinction between the three. Before him Nill saw the darkness of the ancient magic, without the germ of cold white light inside it. He felt wetness in the black that had nothing to do with the magic of Water; and over everything lay like a whisper the magic of Nothing. Released from everything that had shape and form.

He had arrived at the font of the Other World’s magic. It felt purer here than anywhere else he had ever been, as pure as the elements in Ringwall’s Sanctuary. And in that purity Nill recognized it with wonder.

The primal magic of the Other World was nothing other than the magic of darkness. It was the first power on earth, it was the darkness that enabled the light to shine. In that moment Nill learned to understand the magic of the Other World and that of the cosmos equally. All that due to a demon’s aura. Alone, he knew, he never would have found this place.

“The mages were wrong,” he whispered in amazement. The magic of the Other World was not an artful combination of Fire, Earth and Metal. Those three elements merely caused a call that the creatures of the Other World were ready to follow. The legendary power of the Other World lay in the magic of darkness, the same magic these creatures bore within themselves and carried, unbeknownst to the mages, with them. The mages were blind to their own doings. Nill had to laugh in spite of the situation.

If the demon’s strength lay in the darkness, he would be able to break it with the power of light. Nill returned to the world of spiders, the sun and the cold fresh air. Without hesitation, he reached into the web and pulled it apart, clawing at the demon’s skin. Tougher than a leather harness , he thought. To kill this demon he would have to ram his dagger into every spot that seemed soft enough to allow the blade to pass through. He would tear apart the body, slice through the sinews and crush the bones with magical hammer-blows. And the entire time, the demon would stand still and behold its own destruction with closed eyes.

Nill had few concerns about killing. But to destroy a creature that was bound and helpless, to crush a foe who did not offer even a token resistance – that required the unquenchable hatred Nill could not find in himself. He had no choice but to release the spell that bound the demon to its master.

He sat down before the demon and reached into the strange aura, which immediately began to sap his strength. He reinforced his own aura and dissolved the aura of the Other World from the inside out. He thrust his dagger into the reddish-black flickering. Had it not already been black, it would have turned blacker still. Until now, the folded metal in the blade had only reflected the old magic. Now Nill attempted to influence the Metal itself. He made it glow in the white light of the stars, but the blade remained black. Nill did not understand what was happening. He had felt the cold white light within the iron. It was there. But why had it not lightened?

Again Nill made the blade shine, and this time he followed the path of the light into the weapon. As a child, he had picked the plank for its special pattern; in the dusky light of the workshop it had made the surface look alive. The blank had not been a chunk of pure iron. It was made up of sheets, rings or strips, joined together under countless heavy blows from the hammer. Nill had seen that this piece was special immediately, even though he had not known what made it look the way it did, nor who had made it. A special metal for a special purpose, he had thought and dreamed of becoming a hero. Now the white light shone again in one of those thin layers. It was the innermost piece, a slice in the core of the blade with no connection to the surface. That was why the blade remained black. Nill chose a different layer, and suddenly the blade began to glow where it met the air. A thin, quivering strip in the black darkness of the metal.

The demon squirmed in its bonds. Nill did not know why, but the knife’s presence seemed to torture the demon. If the black light held the demon, then the White magic would release it, even if it meant the aura would die. “Demons don’t die so easily in this world. You will have to bear it,” Nill said loudly.

He pulled the dagger out of the aura and plunged again. Layer by layer was filled with white light. When the last layer gleamed, the demon crumpled.

Nill opened the web entirely, grabbed the demon – he noticed that it had become a lot lighter – and leapt with it into the Other World.

“I come to return your servant!” Nill shouted into the half-darkness. He was again somewhere on the Plains of the Dead. The shadows took no notice of him and floated onward.

“I’m right here!” he yelled and shot an arrow of water into the endless distance.

Anger and rage roared back at him.

“Have you finally noticed that I’m here?” Nill was almost insulted. He could not make out what was coming from what direction. He stepped aside, slowly and deliberately, pointed toward the figure on the ground and was about to return when he felt a cold chill that stopped him in his tracks.

“You brought him back,” a whisper said in his ear. “Now wake him. Apart from you, only one of our lords can do that, and they are far too preoccupied to take care of lesser demons.”

“You mean, if I don’t do something he’ll lie here for all eternity?” Nill asked incredulously.

“Yes, two or three eternities even; it might take some time before someone bothers to check on him.”

“And how do I wake him?” Nill asked cautiously.

“How should I know? You’re the one who separated him from his aura.”

Nill groaned. How was he to know how to revive a demon? This time, he left his dagger in its sheath. He gathered the black energy that was copious here on the plains, brought it together and made it flow into the demon’s lifeless body. He concentrated it, forced it through every orifice – the demon had many – and shot a spark of Fire after it.

“Black and red. That was your aura.”

Nothing happened. Nill could make out the restored aura, but it was not alive. It had no connection to the demon it surrounded. Nill was at his wit’s end and tried carefully to enter the creature’s body. There was a tiny gap between the aura and the skin. The aura was not truly one; it was merely concentrated energy, a case around a lifeless body. Just as a piece of leather that is wrapped around a ham can never again be skin or fur; just as a piece of meat might someday be a roast dinner, but never again the animal or human it once was.

How do I connect an aura to a body?

Nill laid a fingertip on the gap between the magical energy and the stiff skin, took a deep breath and prayed for the support of the Nothing and every magic he had ever heard of. He sent a tiny spark of his own life force into the gap.

The world around him exploded in bright colors. Nill’s body was shredded into countless fragments, his self burned out in a white cascade of light. The tremors in the Other World were so strong that it woke the shamans. The mages in Ringwall interrupted their studies; the timeriders lost all sense of direction; and the Onyx in the magon’s tower burst into countless shards as a wave of power broke through Ringwall’s walls. Even Gnarlhand, Archmage of Earth, would never be able to put the pieces back together again.

In the Other World, where time was worth little and space even less, the goat-legged stood beside the mighty Serp. The two demon lords looked upon one of their own, a lower demon who threatened to choke on its own aura. It required no grand words or gestures; a glance and the demon was revived.

Bucyngaphos approached in his throne, and the three Demon Lords formed a magical triangle that covered half of the Plains of the Dead. Slowly, the three greatest demons moved closer, bringing together what belonged together and removing what did not. A strange song rang out across the plain.

Nill’s skull was pounding, his body felt as though he had slept in a field of nettles, his arms and legs disobeyed him entirely. But he was alive. Above him he saw the mighty head of the battle-boar, the form Bucyngaphos always chose when face to face with him, and Nill became tiny and trembled. A Demon Lord is not a being most humans would like to meet. Legends are told of the great mages of the first time, when fate had been in the mood to make earthen magic and demon lords meet. Yet these were truths from half-forgotten days. Only Nill, of all the creatures in the world, now met Bucyngaphos for the third time, and he did not consider it preferential treatment.

“Greetings,” he said weakly, and the force of the answer made him cower.

“Were you never told that the magic of life can exist in the darkness, but must never be melded with it?” a voice rang out, filling the breadth of the plains, chaining the shadows in place.

Nill shook his head. He had just successfully moved his arms and legs and now attempted to get to his feet.

A snakelike hiss shot through the plain. Serp the Mighty seemed troubled this time, too. Nill could not understand this Demon Lord’s words, but he knew that his presence was unwelcome.

“Did I mess a lot up here? I apologize for my intrusion. But I could not simply leave your servant out there to die!”

The last words rose to a crescendo of outrage in spite of his calm intention; he did not notice the magic in his voice as it raced over the plain. An icy silence was his answer, and had Nill not felt the presence of the three Demon Lords he could have sworn he was the only being in the Other World.

Nill turned around and raised his eyes to the heavens. High above, in the distance, he saw two slanted, yellow eyes in the darkness.

“O Lord, with respect – I do not want to say it, but you have the eyes of Ramsker, my best friend.”

The eyes vanished, the hissing subsided, and Bucyngaphos’ voice echoed out once more. “I fear our next encounter, small human. Fate appears to have made you to disturb the order not only in your world. But know this: henceforth there is a demon who is connected to you by magic that cannot be broken by anyone, not even us Demon Lords. I know not what this means. Across all eternities there has been no such bond. You will have to learn to handle it, for not only does the master command his servant, but the servant shapes his master. In the end there may even be a demon who lives solely in the world of the living. Or you might become a creature of our world, forever in my service.”

“Is that what you fear, high Lord? That I am your servant? That I, as your servant, might shape you? If that is true, so help me please not to fall under your influence. I am a child of the living and would like to stay that way.”

As boldly as Nill had begun, so quietly and meekly did he end his speech.

“That is not in my hand, small human. Even we, powerful as we are in what you call the Other World, are merely pieces in fate’s delicate web.”

The voice was gone; it left behind only a dull reverberation. Nill stood, swaying slightly, his headache no better for the conversation, in front of the demon whose stance was unchanged, as though the spider webs still encased him. He still held that terrible weapon. Slowly, the demon gave a weak bow, his eyes not breaking contact with Nill’s. From the distance came a scream of anger and disappointment, a voice from the world of the living; it spread strangely and powerlessly across the Plains of the Dead and disappeared whence it had come. The demon opened his mouth. A few gargling noises came from it. That was likely his name. Nill did not understand the sound, but the message in his head was clear. It told him who the demon was and how to summon him. Nill nodded and returned to the crag.