Malzuth stood before the trio, holding his staff firmly. His expression was that of contempt, but there was a hint of a sneer upon his malformed, orc face; to call him ugly would have been doing ugly a disservice. There was a deep evil within his eyes and Friedrich knew that no matter what he said, he was not to be shown an ounce of mercy.
“Servants of the wooden elf,” he said in his gravelly voice. “Do you know of what which you meddle in?”
“Don’t know, don’t care,” said Friedrich. “I want to take my payment and get out of here.”
“Ah, you are simple mercenaries. Is that right? Whatever you’re being paid, I will double it if you turn around and leave.”
“No can do. We’ve already agreed to our deal with Faeryn to get rid of you, so I’m afraid that’s what it’ll have to be.”
“Very well,” said Malzuth, twirling his staff around. “Just be aware that I tried to warn you.”
With that, he disappeared through a door.
“Get him!” called Friedrich, sprinting up the stairs. Marina and Blackjack followed, trampling over the ashen remains of the vine beast they had just slain.
The group charged through the door, but found themselves alone inside a small circular chamber with empty portraits surrounding them on the walls. Friedrich looked behind him, only to find that the door had disappeared.
“He tricked us,” said Friedrich, hitting on the solid stone with his fist. “How do we get out of here?”
“No…it cannot be you,” muttered Blackjack, walking up to one of the portraits. “Teldur?”
The portrait was no longer blank, it was painted to show a handsome young high elf. He looked similar to Blackjack and was smiling at her. She reached a trembling hand out to feel the portrait, only to recoil before her finger touched the canvas.
“Mother?” whimpered Marina, falling to her knees and weeping.
Another portrait had suddenly been filled, this one depicting a beautiful woman who looked almost identical to Marina, save for being twenty years older and having deep brown eyes rather than Marina’s sparkling blue.
Friedrich felt the urge to gaze into one of the blank portraits, but something held his gaze back. He felt his hand being drawn to the minotaur mask that hung around his neck. Trying to fight both impulses, he could feel that he must give in to one or the other. He knew the face he would see if he looked into the portrait and could not bear it. Trusting the mask, he placed it upon his face and felt himself transform.
As he experienced the familiar agony, he felt the impulse to look towards the blank portraits vanish instantly. Upon standing tall as the minotaur, he looked to them and they remained blank, almost as though they dared not trifle with the soul within the mask.
Blackjack stood stunned before the portrait of her fellow high elf with a glistening substance upon her cheeks. Tears? Surely not. Blackjack was strong and not one to give into emotion, but here she was, crying over an image.
“Teldur,” she whispered, her eyes fixed forward. “Teldur, I am sorry. I will do whatever it takes to avenge you. Whatever it takes…”
She was too lost in the portrait, perhaps even unable to pull herself away, so Friedrich knew he had to do it for her. He walked past Blackjack, tore the portrait from the wall and threw it to the ground. Haphazardly grabbing an arrow from her quiver with his clumsy hands, he pierced the canvas and watched it burn as the magic took hold.
“Friedrich?” asked Blackjack, coming to her senses. He pointed towards Marina who was touching the cheek of the woman in her own portrait.
Blackjack nocked another of her fiery arrows and aimed at the portrait. She released it and wedged itself firmly in the temple of the woman in Marina’s portrait, setting her ablaze.
“No!” screamed Marina. “Not again! Not the flames! Not the flames!”
Friedrich rushed over to Marina who was paralyzed in fear as she watched the woman burn. He lifted her away as she kicked and screamed, desperate to return to the woman and help her. Friedrich glanced at the portrait and could see the woman’s visage contorted into a helpless scream.
“A shame,” boomed Malzuth’s voice from somewhere within the circular room, “but I am not through with you yet. Your torment shall feed this temple and I will only grow stronger.”
Friedrich snorted and scoffed at the orcish mage, then looked over at Blackjack and pointed to the blank portraits. She unleashed a series of arrows, burning each blank portrait before either she or Marina could be drawn in by them again.
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With a yell, Malzuth fell from within the final portrait as it burned, and suddenly the door to the room reappeared along with another door within the opposite wall.
As the orc stood up with his staff in hand, ready to address the trio, Friedrich leapt to action. He would not allow the sorcerer’s foul words to poison them. He lunged at Malzuth, ripped the wizard’s staff from his hand and hurled it across the room. Malzuth looked at him, not fearing the large beast before him, but Friedrich would make him afraid.
Friedrich grabbed the orc by the throat and threw him against the wall. Malzuth grunted in pain as he hit the stone, then again as he landed awkwardly on the floor.
“You foul…you rotten…” he began, but Friedrich was upon him once more.
The young man felt an immense bloodlust, stronger than the compulsion he had felt to look at the blank portraits. He grabbed Malzuth, lifted him up and sank his teeth into the orc’s neck. As the wizard screamed, Friedrich bit hard and tore a chunk of flesh from him before throwing the wizard to the floor. He lifted one of his mighty hooves and slammed it into the wizard’s skull, crushing it beneath him with a gruesome squelch.
Friedrich roared in fury before looking to Marina and Blackjack, wanting nothing more than to do the same to them, but something was holding him back. He panted with his chest heaving, desperate to fight his instincts. Blackjack raised her bow, fearful of what he might do, but Marina approached him slowly and carefully.
“Friedrich?” she asked quietly. “Are you there, Friedrich? It’s me, Marina.”
Her voice was soothing and Friedrich felt his bloodlust start to fade. As Marina reached up and laid a hand upon his face, he closed his eyes and breathed deeply. The intense anger he had melted away and he no longer felt the terrible urge to harm his friends.
“It’s alright,” said Marina sweetly. “Look at me.”
Friedrich opened his eyes and his heart softened, the soul of the minotaur losing its dominance over his body. He nodded slowly and snorted, making Marina giggle a little.
“You’re alright now. Everything’s alright. We won and we can leave.”
Blackjack lowered her bow. “I am glad that I do not have to shoot you,” she said. “I would have found that most unpleasant.”
Friedrich snorted again.
“Let us be gone from this place,” said the high elf, turning towards the door the trio had entered from. “I would prefer that we no longer stick around to loot.”
Friedrich walked to the new door that they had not seen before and kicked it open, revealing that the central chamber where the chest lay was at the bottom of a set of stairs.
“That makes things easier,” said Marina, looking relieved. “I don’t want to see another ghost in the twisty corridor.”
The trio made their way down the staircase and towards the chest, which was no longer protected by the magical forcefield. Marina tried to open it, but found it locked. His patience with this place growing thin, Friedrich picked it up and smashed the chest on the ground where the gemstones within scattered across the floor. Without paying much attention, Friedrich grabbed an emerald and walked towards the exit, not wanting to spend another minute in this wretched place.
As the party ascended the staircase, Friedrich reverted to his human form. He took the minotaur mask in his hands and stared at its soul stone. What nature of beast was trapped within? While Kitt seemed docile, the minotaur’s spirit was anything but.
“Friedrich…Blackjack…” piped up Marina as they walked through the stone archway and back outside.
“Yes?” asked Friedrich, hiding the minotaur mask underneath his tunic.
“I know that neither of you have mentioned it yet, but I would like to pre-emptively request that we do not talk about the woman in the painting. Is that alright?”
“In turn, I would ask you to not mention the young man in the painting I was enthralled by,” said Blackjack.
“Fine by me,” said Friedrich, presently more worried that he would accidentally murder his companions if he put on the mask again.
“Then we are all in agreement,” said Blackjack.
“Yes,” said Marina, smiling brightly once again, but Friedrich knew that her smile was fake.
*
“You have returned,” said Faeryn, now corporeal as she stood before her pool. “When I regained my form, I knew that you had been successful.”
She was quite beautiful now that she was no longer made of a ghostly wood. She had long brown hair that puffed up, unlike the straight-haired Blackjack. Her pale skin had a tint of green to it, so faint that Friedrich wondered if he was imagining.
“We did as you asked,” he replied to her. “Malzuth is dead and he will never trouble you again.”
“Did you burn his body?” asked the wood elf.
“No.”
Faeryn sighed. “The shrine is a place of magic, or did you not realise that from the many spectres down there.”
“We only saw one spectre,” shrugged Friedrich. “I didn’t really think beyond that.”
“No matter,” sighed Faeryn, shaking her head in exasperation. “I will send my lurkers within to retrieve his body. I would prefer that he not haunt the shrine or be raised back to life. There are plenty of walking corpses down there, as you well know.”
The trio exchanged confused glanced. It seemed as though they had accidentally taken the correct route on their first guess, but did not want to reveal their perceived skill as a simple coincidence. That would be too embarrassing.
“Indeed,” said Friedrich, reaching into his bag and pulling out the emerald. “I took this, by the way.”
“With the many magical implements within, you opted only for a basic gemstone?” asked Faeryn.
“Yes,” said Friedrich through gritted teeth. He was now starting to regret not checking the other corridors upon Malzuth’s death.
“I thank you for not robbing the house of my ancestors and taking only a small trinket. It is much appreciated, human. Many Mercians like yourselves would not have been so kind.”
“Don’t mention it,” said Friedrich, wanting to drown himself in the pool for his foolishness. “Now, it’s probably be best that we head back to the road before it gets too dark.”
“Perhaps we will meet again,” said Faeryn, holding her arms out to the trio. “You are always welcome to return here and visit. I deem you all friends of the forest.”
“That is reward enough,” said Marina with a smile, making Friedrich die inside just a little more. She had to hold back her laughter upon seeing his face.