A flash of lightning illuminated the figure for a fraction of a second as she stepped forward. She stood seven feet tall, with dark gray skin, and long horns that sprouted from her forehead and curled around short, black hair before ending at an upward point. A tail that ended in a spade whipped back and forth behind her, and her wings shook off a light coat of rain. He was dressed in dark leather armor and had no visible weapons. “Stay your hands, mortals. Unless you wish them severed. The damnation that I seek to bring about is not thine.”

The language she spoke, Tahir didn’t understand. He wasn’t sure how he comprehended it before he realized that she spoke Infernal. A language of fire, which his spirit translated. Metilia looked like she understood, but he wagered Theo only heard harsh, guttural words with ow meaning to her. “Erinyes.” Tahir spoke, and the fiendish woman turned her gaze on him, hopefully confirming his guess on what she was. “I -we heard you, but speak common, please, or we all won’t be able to understand.”

“I refuse to speak a mortal tongue.” She switched languages. This one flowed better to Tahir, but he also couldn’t understand it himself, relying on the fire spirit to translate. He took a guess that this one was primordial. The language of the elements. Theo also looked like she could understand this one, and Metilia nodded in response.

“Fair enough. As long as we can communicate properly. If you are not after us, can we assume it is someone in this ruin?” Metilia questioned. Tahir remembered Erinyes as the fiendish servants of the God of Death, Odium; who is the world’s namesake and the ruler of the underworld. Though fiends, they followed a strict set of laws, and operated in the underworld’s interests. They were known to be ruthless and cunning, but if she wasn’t there for any of them, then perhaps they had an opportunity.

“You assume correctly.” The erinyes answered. It might have been Tahir’s imagination, but he thought she sounded less harsh when she responded to Metilia. “A mortal that has broken a contract brokered long ago hides here. I suspect he has been dormant within this tomb, but now that he has been detected, my sisters and I will take his soul to be judged, when they arrive.”

“Need any help?” Tahir offered. Metilia and Theo looked at him incredulously. “I mean, before your sisters arrive. You’d get all the glory for taking the soul of course, we don’t want anything to do with something like that.” He knew Erinyes were ruthless and cunning, to mortals sure, but especially to each other. They always wanted to one-up each other in any way possible that didn’t involve actively sabotaging each other’s duties.

The fiendish woman looked at him with barely contained contempt. “I’d get the soul, yes, while you lot help yourself to whatever loose coins you can find.” She stated. Tahir swallowed hard but held her gaze. He supposed he expected her to see through him, but he did genuinely offer their aid. She looked between them as if appraising, and her tail whipped back and forth behind her. “I suppose I can allow you to indulge in your mortal vices. There will be no ill-gotten gains within this place.” Seems like her desire to win over her sisters won. “But shall you three be capable of providing ‘help’ to me in this place? My mark was a formidable mage of fire in life, and this likely has not changed in his seclusion.”

“Well, we just got rid of a ton of void-corruption about 30 feet away.” Tahir gestured behind her. Knowing full well that the oil did most of that work. They were the ones who facilitated it, at least?

“Truly?” The erinyes closed her eyes, seemingly sensing something. While she did, Metilia moved to open her pack and pull something out. A heavy bundle of cloth that she began to unwind. “I sense the residual, fading traces of the void, indeed.” The fiend’s gaze shifted to Metilia as she uncovered the bundle, revealing several large shards of some kind of crystal that looked black as night.

“These were recovered from a being brought to life by the corruption that we dispatched.” Metilia covered them quickly and stuffed them back in her pack. “I plan to use them as catalysts later.”

“I suppose you will do, then.” The erinyes gave the trio a haunting smile. “And if not, I will be there to shepherd your souls so that our offender cannot get a hold of them.”

“Great. Awesome, fantastic. Can you give us a bit of time to rest. It really hasn’t been that long since our last fight. And can we get a name or something to call you-?” Theo said, but seized up at the erinyes’s annoyed look.

“Very well. I will return in an hour’s time.” She turned to leave, glancing back at them briefly. “And for the time being, you may refer to me as Neveroth.”

After she took off, Tahir felt one of Metilia’s muscular arms drape along his shoulders, and then jerk him down and close to her in what felt suspiciously like a headlock. “Tahir. What have you gotten us into?”

“Yeah, Meti’s right! We were just going to look inside the ruins, weren’t we?” Theo looked like she wanted to either run, or douse him with punice oil and set his hair on fire, but couldn’t decide which one.

“I’m sorry. I had to think quick and I didn’t quite consider all the ramifications.” Tahir apologized. “I felt like a bunch of erinyes were going to kick us out, and even the one showing up confirmed that ruin itself was beyond what we could deal with, but with her help?” Stories of heroes working alongside powerful, otherworldly beings swam through his head, as well. Even if an erinyes wasn’t one of his first choices by a long shot.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

After a while, Metilia sighed and let Tahir go. “I suppose you’re right. We could have tried to wait until a host of erinyes came to clear the ruin out by brute force, but I imagine we’d find it quite empty of valuables in the aftermath. We are most likely out of our depth here, but we have a powerful ally.” She looked between Theo and Tahir before moving to sit back against the wall. “An ancient one at that, and one who could probably tell about how strong we are with just a glance. If she’s agreed to go through with this, she’s probably confident that she could clear this place and whatever it contains on her own.” She beckoned the other two toward her with a come hither gesture. “Whatever the case, we have limited time to recover before we enter. So come here, you two. I’m still damp.”

###

Neveroth returned an hour later, as promised, and she looked pleased to see the trio ready and waiting for her. “If you are ready to proceed, let us not delay.” She spoke, in primordial again. She seemed to settle with that language, and Tahir confirmed while they rested that both Metilia and Theo understood it. When the trio nodded to her in response, she strode past them and toward the raised platform at the end of the room. After standing on it, she turned to them and stared expectantly.

Following close, the stood on the platform with her. Before Tahir could figure out what to do next, a rune at the center of the platform pulsed with a red glow, and they all found themselves somewhere else.

“A teleportation circle?” Tahir asked, and looked toward Metilia.

“Likely not very far. I believe we’re simply on the floor below, and they didn’t create any other way to travel between.” She replied while looking around, her staff at the ready.

The thought of having no other method out of there outside of teleportation unnerved him, but with the Traveler, they might be able to go back to the teleportation circle, and he doubted Neveroth would have led them through without a way out. At least he hoped so.

The erinyes herself took a single step off the platform, and torches on the walls revealed the group in the center of a much larger room than the first. Situated on the corners of the walls were four cages, which all opened simultaneously. After that, a creature sped out of each cage, and raced toward the group. They looked like dogs, but Tahir could see what looked like burning embers for eyes, and cracks of molten yellow and orange underneath coal black skin. “Hellhounds!”

Fast as he could, he summoned his water spirit, and elected to keep fire alongside it for the heat resistance. Rushing forward, he drew the attention of two of them immediately. They turned to chase him, losing the momentum of the run.

Neveroth flew directly upward, and a black bow appeared in her hands. As she pulled back the string, a black arrow flared to life in the bow, and she took aim, but didn’t fire immediately. Metilia shot off a couple bolts of pure magic, which stopped one of them in their tracks as it dodged out of the way, and Theo rummaged for something in her bag as the final one approached. Once close enough, it lunged, and Theo pulled something out in both her hands and slammed them together.

The hellhound then collided with a burst of frost that erupted in front of Theo. Not a spell, but a rapid alchemical reaction from materials she brought with her. It stumbled back with frost all over it, a solid block freezing its muzzle shut. That gave time for Theo and Metilia to scramble away as a burst of burning breath from the hellhound melted the ice.

Tahir darted and dodged between two of the hellhounds, alternating between his normal speed and aura enhanced leaps and lunges to keep them from getting used to his speed. He swiped with his sword whenever they got too close, and prepared a spell, but held off on firing it until he could get a clear shot. One of them rushed around to his blind spot, and the two of them lunged in unison. Tahir dodged right and cleared one of them, but misjudged his speed and hissed in pain as he felt a pair of claws rip through a portion of his aura shield. He nearly lost the magic he prepared, but managed to hang onto it. As the offending hellhound landed, it yelped in pain as an arrow caught it in the rear, and Tahir used the opportunity to fire off his spell.

A thick shard of ice with a sharp point raced toward the hellhound, piercing in the side before it could react. It struggled on the ground, but another arrow in the head put it out of its misery. After a quick glance back to his companions, Tahir fixed his gaze back to the other, snarling adversary.

Metilia continuously fired bolt after magic bolt toward her hellhound. She grazed it on more than one occasion, but it sped toward her, flames in its maw and a predatory glint in its eyes. It lunged, and Metila swung with her staff. Mid-swing, a spectral blade formed from the tip of the staff, and the resulting cut bisected the hellhound while it was still in the air.

Theo danced around the hellhound that went after her, striking it with the same alchemical reaction of frost and stopping it in its tracks two more times. After the second time, it rushed forward before she could gather the chemicals, and she dug in her heels and caught the hellhound instead of letting it slam into her. “Ow! Hot hot hot!” With aura flaring to life in her arms, she heaved and threw the hellhound into the air. A second later, it hit the ground with its back littered with arrows, and didn’t get back up.

After that, cleaning up the last one that Tahir still battled with proved simple for the three of them. Tahir panted as she sheathed his blade, looking around at the carnage around him. He would need a moment to recover his aura shield, and Theo had slight burns on her hands that she could heal in about the same amount of time, but they were otherwise unscathed.

“Some help!” Theo called up to Neveroth, fuming. “All you did was shoot arrows from up there!”

“You are unscathed, are you not?” She floated down to the floor while looking at Theo. “I have done plenty. I would concern yourself with making sure that you continue to do the same.”

“Leave it, Theo.” Tahir called to her, when it looked like she would say something else. “It was tough, but we could have done it without her. She’s probably saving all her energy for her actual target.”

“And all things considered, I wouldn’t want her fighting what she came here for with anything less than full strength.” Metilia said, while walking over and putting a hand on Theo’s shoulder. Theo still scowled at the erinyes, but decided to drop the topic for now.

“Smart girl.” Neveroth said, though Tahir couldn’t tell if she referred to Metilia or Theo. “Take more time to rest, and we shall move to the next chamber.”