“Alright, baldies, we have less than a month before fuckin’ Armageddon. You will either learn how to defend yourselves, or you will die. But if you live, you will live the rest of your lives as the baddest motherfuckers around. Navy SEALs will shit their pants at the sight of you. The Pope will be afraid to be on the same continent as you. Let’s keep that tall-hatted motherfucker in Europe and let’s kick some ass, alright?!”

The baldies — who were no longer actually bald — chanted and pounded the concrete floor in approval.

“Guys, I told you to stop that shit. It’s fuckin weird.”

“Actually, this is good,” Mother Dora said, standing in front of the crowd of baldies. “This chant helps them focus their energy. Puts them in a trance, sort of.”

“Alright, whatever,” I said. “How’s the training coming along?”

“Very well, actually. Better than I could’ve ever dreamed. For me at least. Most of the students are… lacking.”

“Can they do anything?”

“Most of them have a grasp on basic blood manipulation, but only a few have gone beyond that. So far, I’d say there are only two or three students who might be competent dark mages by the end of the month, and even that is a stretch.”

I groaned, and the chanting stopped.

“Which three aren’t completely useless?”

Mother Dora pointed at three baldies in the crowd and gestured for them to step forward. The first was a young olive-skinned man who looked like he was six-foot-four and about ninety pounds — the definition of a “beanpole”. His spine bowed like an old tree branch, and he closed his eyes and kneeled in front of me. The second was a stocky redheaded woman — a proper Irish lass. I couldn’t believe I used to think all of these people looked the same. She kneeled too. The last was an older guy with pale skin and a ring of brown hair around his head that stuck out in several directions. He kneeled next to the lass.

“What can you do?” I looked at the long man. He looked at me and stood up, back still hunched over. He took out a knife and sliced the top of his arm open without flinching. Blood floated out of the wound and towards one of the baldies behind him. It formed a mask around the unsuspecting baldy’s face, completely depriving him of oxygen. He quickly fell to his knees and clawed at the blood, but his hands went straight through it. A mouth shaped depression formed and flattened out over and over as the man attempted some desperate, futile inhalations.

“Alright, I get it, I get it! You can stop,” I said, and the blood retracted back into the beanpole’s arm. The wound did not close, but it didn’t keep bleeding either.

“What about you?” I said to the redheaded woman. The crowd behind her stirred nervously. She took one of her fingernails between her teeth and tore it off in one swift motion. I flinched seeing that maneuver, but she was cool as ice. She threw the bloody nail on the ground and crouched over it, covering it with her hand and murmuring something in a hypnotic monotone. When she moved her hand, a jet black scorpion scurried towards me. It was at least twice the size of a normal scorpion, and fast as hell. It almost clinched one of my ankles before I jumped out of the way and welded it to the ground with sludge. The redheaded woman looked horrified.

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“I’m so sorry my lord!” she said. Holy shit, she actually had an Irish accent. “I didn’t mean to send it after you! I didn’t think it would just go after the first person it—”

“Good shit,” I said, and I crushed the scorpion with my heel. “Last guy, what do you got?”

The old man stood and looked the beanpole deep in his eyes.

“Brandon, smack our Lord in his face. Hard.”

The beanpole walked up to me and slapped me like he was my pimp and I hadn’t paid up. Then he turned around and tackled the old man, bringing him to the ground and punching him repeatedly in the nose.

“Stop! Stop! It’s fine. I see what he was doing, Brandon,” I said. The two men went back to their kneeling positions next to the Irish lass.

“Congrats to all three of you,” I said. “You’ve just been promoted to teacher’s assistants. You’ll need to help Mother Dora get the rest of these pieces of garbage up to snuff, and soon. Meeting adjourned. Get to fuckin’ work.”

The three of them nodded and thanked me profusely. Mother Dora waved her scarred hand and led the baldies down the corridor towards the library.

“Wait!” I said, before they got too far. “Mother Dora, how many new recruits have we gotten so far?”

“None that I see,” she said.

“That won’t do. What’s your name?” I turned to the Irish lass.

“Clodagh, my Lord,” she said.

“Seriously? Alright,” I said. “Anyone who doesn’t bring in a new recruit, voluntarily or involuntarily, within the next week is gonna have to deal with one of Clodagh’s scorpions. Got that?”

Clodagh grinned wickedly, and the rest of the baldies nodded vigorously before turning to follow Mother Dora down the corridor for their next lesson. I sat alone in the main chamber, on a nice leather recliner I had the baldies bring in for me. It was sort of like my throne, facing where they all gathered, but I didn’t like to sit when they were around — I couldn’t relax in a room full of dewey-eyed minions, begging me to tell them what to do. With them gone though, I sank into my chair and allowed the muscles in my neck and back to unclench.

“My Lord?”

For fuck’s sake. Of course Gerald had to come in at that exact moment. Had he been waiting for everyone to leave so that he could come pester me one-on-one?

“What?” I said.

“I was wondering…” he said meekly, “if I could also start attending the lessons with Mother Dora? It has been my lifelong dream to study the dark arts.”

I didn’t get up from my chair, barely bothered to look in his direction.

“You’re lucky I haven’t killed you yet. You know that, right?” I said. “I’m sure you want me dead at this point. Why the fuck would I hand you the gun?”

Gerald went ever paler than usual. Blue veins were clearly visible under his translucent skin. He didn’t say anything in response.

“Ya know, I do feel bad for coming in and taking over like this, though,” I said. “I don’t want this any more than you do, but I have a war to fight. You know how it goes. Can’t fight a war without soldiers. Tell you what: I’ll let you study with Mother Dora, but only from a single catalog. You will be our Mender. When someone gets an arm torn off or some shit, I want you to be able to give them a new one, or whatever the fuck — Mother Dora hasn’t explained it very well to me. She isn’t too advanced on it herself, but she can help you with the Latin at least. That will be your catalog, and if I hear about you reading a single word about any other subject, I will stick you to the wall and let you starve to death. Sound good?”

That last part seemed to bounce right off of him. Some of the opacity returned to his skin, and he looked pleased.

“Thank you, my Lord,” he said. “I will begin my studies as soon as possible.”

I grunted and shooed him away. He damn near pranced down the hall.

My guys were all preparing as much as they could in the short time we had. Now, it was time for me to begin some preparations of my own.