A Skull Full of Souls

You’re in it now, mate. Way too invested. How do you expect these kids to grow up if you keep coddling ‘em? You know the path we’re on now. You’ve been here before. Rick inhales a silent breath and releases it. Yes, he has been here before. The others never really could understand why he hesitates to help. Why he’d often let them face true danger without lifting a finger. They thought he was lazy and selfish. That it had to do with his Fey nature. And they weren’t wrong. Being a pixie did come with some funny habits. But being immortal came with many more. His thoughts are heavy with remembered tragedy as he scouts the underground catacombs under the chapel of Salvatore’s Service. Rick is ancient. He speaks languages that no longer exist. He’s survived eras that had been erased from history books. He tries to count the number of times, he’d awakened only to find the bodies of those children he’d attempted to raise into peers. He stops counting after the 50th attempt. Mostly because he knows he’s forgotten more attempts than he remembers. And yet, sneaking through these tunnels and drawing a map for the raid. He knows, once again, that he can’t step back. Julius is different. Or at least, has a chance to be different. He isn’t mortal, not like the others. Yeah right, mate. You know this pattern. Get your hopes up. Get invested. Start helping too much. Stunt their growth and then watch them fail. Watch everything you’ve ever gotten attached to turn to corpses and ash again.

His brooding thoughts are interrupted as he slips into an area that’s unlike the rest of the crypt. He can tell from several small clues. The walls show signs of being freshly dug. There’s no dust or cobwebs. And the guards are inconveniently stationed there to prevent unauthorized entry. Rick’s first thought is to just murder them and keep scouting. It usually is. But even before his oath tugs at him, he discards the thought. Force always seems efficient to the powerful. But sowing violence mostly just yields opposition and resentment. He’s here to find the kid. Once he’s located, well then…then he’ll stick to that oath. Blasted wizard, ruining a good old vindictive murder spree.

***

Carrie-Ann finds being a moth very uncomfortable. She’s a vulture. Her wings feel cramped and weak. The strange information her antenna keeps giving her is distracting and difficult to understand. She also begins to panic after shifting. The moment she starts, the gem cracks, and she vanishes. It feels like she’s left all reality behind. Then, in one momentous eternity, she is back, but in the wrong shape. Her brain and instincts still feel like she should be a vulture, but her body and senses now talk in moth. The most upsetting part is when she focuses on her bond with Julius. It feels weakened. But not just that. It seems diluted. As if strands of her connection are fraying away and tethering her somewhere else. At first, she’d panicked. Fluttering and trying to squawk, fearing the link would wink out entirely. But it stayed stable. Now, she rides Rick. She stands on his head with her too many legs. They have arrived at a closed door and Rick has stopped. He can’t get past them! She realizes. She flares her bond with Julius. Straining to hear him. To tell him she’s here. But there’s a thick muffling barrier, like trying to shout though a concrete wall. Then suddenly, the tiniest wisps of sensations come across. Pain, outrage, and terror. Her chest burns as if half of her sternum is being sawn away. Which causes more than a little confusion as she has an exoskeleton on her thorax and no bones. Julius is hurt! She knows, she’s feeling his pain. She tries to call out. But all that’s released is a high-pitched whistle that Rick doesn’t even seem to notice. Her thoughts flee as she flings herself to the door. Her flight method is so alien that she accidentally crashes headfirst into it with the tiniest of thocking noises.

The impact stuns her, and she falls to the floor. The towering guard looks down at her. The eye slits in his hiding all of his features except for the glittering reflection of the lights. “Stupid bug damn near killed itself hitting the door. Did’ya see that, Morris?”

“Hmm,” Morris grunts disinterestedly.

The first guard snorts. “I should stomp that stupid pest. Remove a little dumb from the world.”

“Mmh.”

Guard one glares again. “Come on Morris, you know how it is with bugs.”

“Mmhmm,” Morris says. Eyes never looking at his fellow guard.

“You know, one minute they’re flapping against some door then you forget about them, and then BAM, they fly right up your nose or in your eye, and then you’ve got some nasty, dusty, little blighter stuck in your helmet. Or worse, it falls down your neck and tickles your torso with its nasty little flutters. And then what happens? You squeal in a most unmanly way and dance around pulling off your chest plate right as your commanding officer walks up, and you’re stuck explaining why you’re distracted and out of uniform.”

“Point.” Morris agrees. Then he tilts his head. “I hate the flying ants more though. They look like they bite.”

“Damn straight. Now let’s not let that happen.” He turns toward Carrie’s stunned form. He raises his foot, just as an invisible Rick brushes past his face, striking the guard’s nose with a wing. “GAAAAH! Blighted nights! Another one just got me!” He’s snorting and twitching, trying to push his fingers inside and brush away the dust.

Carrie stirs and rights herself. She scrambles under the door as the guard quietly swears and rips his helmet off.

Morris grunts, this time with amusement. “Serves you right, Dennis.”

“What for? I didn’t deserve that.” Dennis growls, his body performing the full-body yuck shudder that always accompanies a bad touch from an insect.

“Caiel’s law. You decided to attack the bug due to a fear of the innocent being a nuisance, and thus balance decrees that a just reaction is to suffer the fate you wished to avoid.”

Dennis glares. “That's dragonshite that is. You always claim balance as an excuse not to act! I say it was just the God’s way of proving my reasoning in the first place!”

“Dragonshite? So still pretty good then. If you really wanted to call my words stupid, you’d have called it Koboldshite or Gnollshite.” Morris responds with a smirk.

“Them too,” Dennis responds. There’s a long pause before Dennis grunts.

“What?” Asks Morris.

“Probably make a good fertilizer.”

“What?”

“You know. A mix of Dragon, Kobold, and Gnollshite would make a great fertilizer.”

“Your lowly upbringing is showing, Dennis.”

“Come on, think about it. A vineyard and hops farm specialized in drink crops. You could call the farm ‘The Good Shite Farm,’” He sighs wistfully. “People would go into bars and yell, ‘Bartender! Gimme some Good Shite!’ and the bartender would say, ‘What flavor? Dragon Wine, Gnoll stout, Or Kobold Mead.’ an’ then they'll be like ‘What?’ cause see, they’re not from round here. And then on a whim, they’d go for a sip, an they’d be like ‘That is good shite’ see? ‘Cause the fertilizer is posh poo. It’s a brand that sells itself.”

Morris blinks at his fellow guard. “Alright, I’ll give you the name is good, but how would you get regular shipments of shite like that? And also, all those creatures eat people. Doesn’t that seem a little unappealing?”

“Ah right. Well, it was just an idle thought.”

Rick resisted the urge to snicker. The distraction had been perfect and entertaining. Also, he is totally going to steal that name if he ever gets into any food or drink business in the future. Now, to pass this door myself. He flew to the same crack Carrie crawled through. He could just barely see the hallway on the other side. That is enough as a puff of mist emerges from where his invisible form lay, and he suddenly appears right where he’d been staring in a second puff of mist. A moment later, his form fades back into invisibility. He spots Carrie’s moth form as it flutters down the corridors. The walls show that they aren’t the same weathered stone as the cathedral’s catacombs. Instead, bricks line these walls. The mortar is fresh. They must have expanded their underground in secret.

***

Julius did not look well. In fact, as Alain's animated armor finishes excavating a gem from the skeleton’s rib cage, his spine falls apart. What’s left of his legs clatter bonily to the floor. Just before the gem’s removal, his eyes had been their usual red left and blue right rings with glowing purple irises. As the gem is removed, the eye lights stutter, as if an enchantment is losing power. His screams cut off. His flailing halts, and all that is left of his eyes is one lightly flickering blue ring. His body is limp and nothing but the eye moves. It quivers with desperate longing as it stares at the glowing gem in the gauntlet’s palm. The gem itself is purple, but it’s a little difficult to identify the gem type. Perhaps tourmaline or amethyst. It glows from within, is covered in small arcane engravings, and is inlaid with the same strange silvery-black metal flecked with red that is inlaid into arcane script on every bone on the skeleton. The gem pulses, and whispering growls and words seem to enter Alain’s mind. “Return us, Food. We’ll kill you for this. Give us friends back! PAIIINNN!” Alain shudders with revulsion, even as his eyes eagerly study the intricate sigildry covering every facet of the beautiful gem. Dimly, he realizes that he’s dropped his mug and taken a step towards the gem. He musters his mental defenses and looks away. Sending his will towards his construct, he instructs it to place the gem inside the small quarantine circle on his desk.

As the armor leaves the dissection cage and steps beyond the wards, the gem’s bright glow incandesces into an amethyst sun. Alain watches with interest but hears nothing. He snorts in amusement as he remembers he’s still in the circle himself, and he steps out. Immediately, his head fills with a cacophonous mental screeching. The entity in the gem has gone into a full panic. Convulsing and grunting, Alain leaps back into the containment circle. He feels something warm and wet dripping from his nose. His hand rises up and comes away bloody. “Such a powerful psionic entity.” He quickly casts a cantrip, cleaning his face and watching as the gem is placed onto the next containment circle. He pokes his head out of the wards and hears no screech. He sighs with relief and recovers his coffee. He steps over to the desk and sits. The gem is once again only glowing and no longer blindingly bright. Someone knocks on the door to his office. “Yes? Come in.” The door opens and reveals Saindrel. The man’s helmet has been removed, and Alain sees that blood has also freshly stained his muzzle and his ears.

Saindrel salutes, his green eyes quickly surveying the room checking for any sign of danger. “Sir, all the guards in the hall were suddenly struck by some kind of attack. Every one of them identified this room as the source. Are you alright?”

Alain sighs. “I am. I’m sorry, my son. I was transferring a piece of my project from one area to another and didn’t realize that it housed such a potent psionic. It is contained now and likely won’t survive the next set of tests. I shall be more cautious with the remaining pieces of my subject.”

Saindrel nods. “Very good sir. Do you require healing or any other assistance?”

Alain blinks. “No, I was protected by the wards for most of it. But what of the other guards? Some of them might not have protections against such an attack.”

“Indeed, several were rendered unconscious by the attack and are being seen to.”

Alain gasps. “Oh! I’m so sorry to have brought you boys harm. There’s a first aid cabinet behind the door on your right. Please administer potions to all injured and convey my apologies.”

“Of course, sir. We are relieved that you are well—” An enraged shriek of a bird erupts from the open door behind Saindrel. “—What was that?” Alain stands and takes a step toward the door as Saindrel draws his sword and turns around.

***

Rick follows Carrie's moth form, she’s steadily becoming more frantic, flying in a big left and right zigzagging path. She must be able to feel him. She’s trying to figure out direction, but the hallway is too tight. He memorizes each turn and notes every guard, door, and patrol they pass. Suddenly, Rick flinches as a psychic scream floods the hall. It hurts, but his mind is far stronger than the source. More interestingly, Carrie has landed and stares in the direction of the noise. At first, he’s worried that the mental assault might kill her, but she seems unhurt. Then she takes off. Fluttering straight for the source of the attack. Rick mouths a curse and follows after her. She shimmers, returning to her preferred vulture form. She flies past several guarded doors. The guards blink after her and squint, but most seem disoriented from the psionic pulse. She flashes by, paying little heed to them. As he follows in her wake, he hears various muttering voices.

“Ow, my head. I think I just saw a bird.”

“Great, not just a headache, a hallucination too.”

“Was that a vulture?”

Crikey kiddo. I’m coming. Just hold on. I don’t think retreat is an option with Carrie already blowing our cover. Sorry Moranth, looks like this is going down exactly as you wanted to avoid. Ah, well. More fun for me! Rick puts on a burst of speed and gets above his vulture companion. He wills the dust to fall from his wings, and she vanishes. She isn’t trying to sneak so they can hear her coming. But humans have trouble hitting what they can’t see. Moments later, they approach the end of the hall. There’s an open door and a guard looks like he’s about to close it. Carrie shrieks in rage, and he can just barely sense her invisible form swoop through the door.

“Auugh!” Alain screams as talons flicker into visibility just in time to scratch across his face and displace his glasses. He convulses and tries to back away from the attack. He trips over his chair and falls back onto his desk. There’s a muted crack as the base of his head strikes the gem that he’d pulled from Julius. Pain lances into his skull.

“FOOOOOD!” The word screams across Alain’s mind as mental tendrils burrow into his consciousness. His defenses are overwhelmed in seconds as Alain’s consciousness begins being forcefully dragged into the incandescent gem.

“Primus Alain!” Saindrel rushes to aid his charge as he convulses on the desk. Blood instantly begins flowing from Alain’s eyes, nose mouth, and ears as the gnome thrashes and gurgles. Saindrel’s free hand grabs at the gem, and he screams as blades of psychic energy erupt from the gem and sever his fingers. He gapes at his destroyed hand for one second before he’s pulled back as the Primus gurgles and thrashes. I have to save him, but how?. He glances at Alain. The blood is flowing even faster now. Saindrel’s eyes flicker around and lock onto the still skeleton in the cage, and he raises his sword in his one good hand. Maybe if I kill the skeleton, the gem will die too. He rushes over, fumbles the lock open, and dashes inside to finish the monster. His vision tunnels upon the glowing eyes as he steps forward and raises his sword. A quiet schwing and small stinging pain on his neck intrude on his thoughts. But he ignores the distraction. He must save the Primus, nothing else matters. He takes one last step and his sword descends, but not onto the skull of the monster. It falls from his now limp fingers as his arms drop. His world spins as darkness creeps inward from the edges of his vision. Exhaustion and numbness take him into nothingness as he sees his own torso fall beside him. Someone…killed…me.

***

Rick sighs as Carrie attacks the gnome in the lab and follows behind her. He draws the hilt on his back and flicks the rune on its cross guard. In an instant, the weight of the weapon quintuples as five feet of solid metal appears where the blade should be. Through long practice, his diminutive stature compensates for the new center of balance, and he spins in a circle, cutting through the torso of the guard still standing outside. The soldier manages to cry out, alerting others of an attack before the sword strikes him. Rick’s sword is largely unimpeded by the heavily armored torso, and two pieces of a once whole guard slump to the floor, gurgling quietly. He flies in, the kill taking all of two seconds. His eyes sweep the room. The gnome is clearly incapacitated, gurgling and twitching. Carrie has fallen inside what looks like a containment circle. She frantically flaps and scrabbles, but can’t get out. But the feline guardsman is trying to get inside Julius’ cell. He’s the next threat. With calm deliberation, he flies after the man. He arrives just as the door opens and with one smooth motion his blade cuts the man’s neck with a schwing. His strike is so sharp and swift that the head stays in place and the guard takes a step forward as his arms come down. The sword falls from his slackened fingers and clatters against the skull of Julius. Julius’ flickering blue eye-ring quivers and focuses on Rick before returning to staring at the gurgling gnome.

Rick smiles and waves.“Gday, Jules. The cavalry has arrive–Oh gods, what have they done to you?” It’s obvious that Julius can’t move. As nothing but the eyes have so much as twitched. What’s more, he has no legs. All that remains is one femur. He’s also missing one arm and part of his sternum. But the most alarming part is that he hasn’t blathered a single word. “C’mon bloke, stay with me.” Rick frantically flies towards his friend. Unsure of how to help, but desperate to do so anyway. But as he crosses the threshold of the cage, five inhuman constructs stir. Three suits of armor turn towards Rick as their eye slits burn with flickering red lights. One stands next to the thrashing gnome, the other two are inside the cell he stepped in. Next to them are two mechanical golems, both also turn to him and raise their shields and maces. The armors, he now recognizes as a construct called a Nightmare Helm, all begin to make noise as they advance toward him.