The army of the dead under Victorian’s command marched on the city of Hadel at a brisk pace. With the bell tower of the temple already visible on the horizon, he reasoned that they were now no more than a few hours away.

He had no plan; no idea of what was going to happen once they did arrive. His mind was clouded by the recent chain of events and tragedies, leading Victorian to withdrawn from all social interaction. He kept well ahead of the others and away from their prying gazes.

Diana and her servants rode a short distance behind Victorian. They were closely followed by their death knight escorts with the infantry closing their formation. Their rusted spears and halberds pierced the skies, swinging back and forth in perfect unison to the sound of their creaking bones. The ground beneath them shook to the one-two march of the dead men as they went to war.

It was a veritable parade of death.

The terrain in this part of the county was an overgrown plain, partially submerged beneath the bog and morass. Tall grasses stretched across open fields on both sides of the road with only sparse clusters of trees dotting the horizon. There were ruins of old manors and large country houses visible in the distance, yet none appeared inhabited. Picked apart by scavenging farmers and marauders, the destitute buildings stood as a testament to a once greater prosperity, which the rising groundwater had all but drowned over the centuries.

The young paladin’s somber contemplations were interrupted as he was approached by Lady Albrech, riding on her dark horse.

“The time for your final test has come, Victorian,” she announced.

Victorian looked to the Devil on his right and found her peering expectantly at the red sun setting over the city in the distance. Their arrival looked as though it would take place just as the she had planned.

Dressed in her magnificent red robes, she was seated with both legs over one side of her horse as not to ruffle them. The Devil radiated an aura of beauty that was only further enhanced by her humble surroundings and the repugnant company of the dead that followed them.

“Are you still of a mind to kill him?” Diana asked, “Or have you reconsidered?”

Victorian shook his head in denial.

“I will have my retribution,” he proclaimed and placed his hand over the pummel of his sword.

Victorian himself was dressed for battle, though the quality of his gear was questionable. Most of it he had scrounged together from the undead infantry under his command. The individual pieces were mismatched, but he had somehow managed to find enough of them to put together a full set of armor, albeit a shoddy one.

“How are you feeling today?” Diana asked.

“I am well, My Lady,” Victorian answered. “Thank you for asking. It would seem that my thoughts are a little more collected today.

I feel like I should apologize for what happened earlier. When we set out from the graveyard… I should not have shouted at you. I don’t know what I came over me. It all feels a bit hazy now that I think back on the past day’s events.”

“You should never apologize for speaking your mind,” Diana said. “I expect to hear nothing but truth from you, if our agreement is to stand the test of time.

Besides, I don’t blame you for losing your temper. I’m sure there was a good reason why you couldn’t think straight.”

The Devil looked back at the servants following them. Her inquisitive gaze fell upon Leonora and the handmaiden lowered her head in shame.

“Youth is wonderful,” Diana said, “But the young often make rash decisions.

Incidentally, are you two getting along well?” Diana inquired. “I trust that Leonora hasn’t been causing you any trouble?”

Victorian appeared confounded by her question. “Lady Leonora?” he asked. “No… Why do you ask, My Lady?”

Diana shrugged. “Oh, it’s just that my handmaidens can be a bit quick tempered. Excuse them, if you can. The girls are still young and can sometimes act without thinking it through first. It is in their blood, I fear.”

“If you say so,” Victorian said and shook his head, “But I still don’t think it is right to use them to such ends.”

“What do you mean by that?” Diana asked.

Victorian took a deep breath. “Pardon me for prying, but Lady Silphi told me about their purpose; what they have been trained for.”

“I don’t think she told you everything, Victorian,” Diana grinned. “They have their secrets, you know. You could say that there is a quirk to each and every one of them that escapes the naked eye.”

“The girls are trained killers,” Victorian said. “It doesn’t sit right with me. That is, I don’t think that I can condone resigning someone to such a harsh fate – to be an assassin.

You allowed me to decide whether or not to join you, so I can’t help but ask if they were offered that same choice… or if it was made for them.”

“I appreciate your concern for the wellbeing of my servants, Victorian, but I think that you have gotten the wrong idea about them. I understand you disapproval of my methods, but they are by far the lesser evil here.

Yes, I train my agents from a very young age, and yes, I expect them to be able to kill without hesitation. But can you really blame the girls for taking me up on my offer? They were bred for war, Victorian.

The handmaidens…” she glanced back at the twelve women following them, “Their choices in life were already limited from the moment they were born. I think the phrase ‘sins of our fathers’ would apply here, as it is in their blood to be more than just wives and mothers.”

“And what were their choices exactly?” Victorian asked.

“What choice did you have?” Diana asked. “When the Temple came for you – what did your father do to shield you from becoming a Templar? Could he have prevented them from taking you and your arcane gifts?”

“I went willingly,” Victorian pointed out. “Magic is too dangerous. I had to be trained in its proper use, for the safety of others as well as my own.”

“Well, then you didn’t really have a choice, did you?” Diana asked. “From the moment you were born, you were destined to either join the ranks of the Templars or be forever persecuted by them.

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Much like you, my servants are far too dangerous to be left alone. There has to be some grater power to watch over them, to guide them. Otherwise the world will fall to chaos. And then the Oblivion is sure to follow.”

“And who do you answer to?” Victorian asked.

“Mostly to my God,” Diana answered. “That is, I think that he cares for what I do. I’m not quite sure, to be honest. For a cosmic deity that is all encompassing, Caldun can sure be quiet some times. I wish that I could question him, to ask for guidance, but that is not how it works.

You see, in the beginning there was nothing; nothing at all.” Diana snapped her fingers. “But then the universe was born and time became a thing. It now had a beginning and there also had to be an end – Caldun, the Titans named it. And it was magnificent.

They studied matters of science and magic long before we ever could even conceive of such pursuits. The wisdom that they had gathered was so vast that they could traverse the stars in more ways than one. They could bring life to dead worlds. They were the ones that brought your ancestors here.

That was back before the apocalypse, of course; before the universe split into the three planes of existence that we know of today.

You see, Victorian, beneath the surface of our daily concerns lays a vast wealth of knowledge and history that is as of yet undiscovered. So much has been lost to time and ruin that we, the lesser races could hardly ever guess at the splendor of the once mighty Titans.

I wish to embrace that pursuit,” Diana explained. “I believe that we are just as capable of uncovering the mysteries of the universe as they were. But first, we must survive the coming night. And we cannot do so as a divided people.”

“How do you know all this?” Victorian asked. “What proof do you have of such things?”

“I was born on this world, Victorian, but I have visited many others. Some were deserts, some were seas – some had both. But everywhere I went, I did so through the gateways that the Titans had constructed. Everywhere I arrived I discovered more evidence of their greatness and… more of their slaves, patiently awaiting the return of their masters.

But they are not coming back Victorian, so we must take up their mantle and re-discover their lost knowledge. We can wait no longer. We can ill afford any more hesitation, because the time of peril draws closer. Doom awaits us all behind that ever shirking wall of darkness in the sky.

Caldun, in his wisdom and compassion, has given us an opportunity to survive it and we mustn’t waste the chance.”

The Devil halted her horse and the entire army stopped behind her.

Victorian observed Diana as she dismounted and made her way into the meadow lying adjacent to the road.

“Walk with me, Victorian,” she said and waved for him to follow.

“As for the rest of you, set up the camp. We will remain here for the night.”

Victorian compiled and dismounted. “Are we not to advance on Hadel then, My Lady?” he asked.

“We will, Victorian,” the Devil replied, “But first I wanted to show you something.”

As Diana slowly walked through the knee high grass, she emanated a dark aura. It withered the plants in a wide area around her. They turned brown and then black before finally crumbling away into dust, leaving behind only a layer of barren soil where the lush grasses had been growing just a moment prior.

“I have a gift, Victorian,” Diana said as she crossed the plain, leaving a long trail of death in her wake. The withering aura reached out across the field, consuming all the vegetation as it expanded. “It is the kind of gift that keeps on taking…

I can take from people; take from nature…” she waved her hands at the surrounding landscape. “I can take life away.”

Diana stopped and kneeled. She held up the edge of her robe with one hand so that it wouldn’t touch the black soil beneath her.

“I can take away the power and abilities of others, but I can also hand it back out. Pass it on, if you will.

You see, I can’t create something out of nothing, but…” She reached out with her hand. At the touch of her fingers a frail sapling sprung up from the ground.

“I can create almost anything given enough material to work with.

Life and death are two sides of the same coin, and not opposite ends of a straight line, as the mortals see it. They are a part of the same circle; the one never ending cycle of existence and ruin. Nothing ever truly dies,” she explained, “It only changes shape.”

Victorian stood silent as the tree sapling grew larger and larger until it all but towered over the barren plain surrounding it.  Then something even more incredible happened. The tree began to take on the vague shape of a humanoid: it grew a face; a pair of arms and legs pealed away from the main body. The living wood titan – and ent – opened its eyes and tore away its feet from the ground to the sound of snapping roots and splintering bark. The leaves in its braches shook as it fell down on one knee before Diana, sending a heavy tremor through the field around them.

“Everything living will die in due time,” Diana said. “Nothing lasts forever, not even the gods.”

The living tree lowered its massive arm for the Devil to seat herself in. It even shifted its wooden fingers around to provide his master with armrests.

“So, tell me Victorian – after all that I have shown you, all the power I have displayed, do you still think that I cannot offer you redemption?” Diana asked as she leaned back into the arm of her creation, “That I cannot possibly provide a brighter future for you and your people than the Temple ever could?

I sense your uncertainty, your doubts and your fears. I know that the things you once did in the name of the Temple still linger heavily on your conscience. But they should not define your future. There are still other roads to walk, you know.”

Victorian placed his right hand across his chest and bowed his head. “Then I must confess the true reason for my doubts, My Lady,” he said. “I fear that you are offering me something that is not yours to give in the first place.”

“Is that so…” Diana crossed her legs and leaned on her hand in contemplation.

“But I am willing to serve you regardless of it,” Victorian reassured her. “I am convinced that whatever your intentions for this world might be, they cannot possibly make it any worse than it already is. And if I can accomplish even a little in my life, then I would gladly spend it in service to you and your cause.”

Diana smiled. “If you can’t think of a way to make life even worse for the mortals on this world, then you are lacking in imagination, Victorian. It can always get worse.

I have grand designs, you know,” the Devil said as the giant tree moved its branches to shelter her from a sudden sharp breeze. Its lush green leaves folded into a protective canopy that closely resembled the scales of a dragon.

“I will be honest with you, Victorian; I have unleashed an army of the dead upon your city.”

Victorian’s eyes widened in horror. “What? Why?”

“Because I believe that you care for those people,” Diana said.

“Of course I do!” Victorian yelled at her. “Why would you do this?”

“I need to test you,” Diana explained. “I need to see who you really are.”

Victorian meandered in place for a moment as he feverishly considered this new revelation. He was clearly overcome with rage.

He the spun around and ran towards his horse.

“Stop!” Diana commanded.

Against his better judgment, Victorian complied with her order.

“What do you think you are doing?” Diana asked.

“I will ride for the city!” Victorian furiously replied. “I must help them!”

“Are you going to fight them alone?” Diana asked. “You are just going to throw your life away.”

“I don’t care,” he replied.

“Fair enough,” Diana said, “But are you going to help the Duke then?”

Victorian struggled with the idea for a moment.

“If I must,” he replied. “I don’t care if he wants me dead.”

Victorian shook his head and clenched his fists as he fought the urge to leave for the city. “You are insane,” he said.

“No,” Diana said, “Just pragmatic to the extreme. I don’t care for how many must die for me to get my way. Take note of that.”

The Devil waved her hand signaling for Victorian to leave. “Fine, you can go now. And take the death knights with you – they will be needed.”

“Then you are going to help me defend the city now?” Victorian asked to make sure. At this point he had no idea of what the Devil’s intentions were.

Diana nodded. “Yes,” she said and waved for Victorian to scurry along, “Now go, you have people to save. I will be with you shortly.”

Victorian did not hesitate. As soon as he was back upon his horse, the young paladin charged off towards the city. The death knights were quick to follow as they drove their horses after him at a breakneck pace. Soon the thunderous beating of their hooves began to fade in the distance.

The Devil’s handmaiden’s now all gathered around their master.

“Julia,” the Devil beckoned for the golden haired maiden to approach.

The girl stepped forward and bowed before her master.

“I will need you to deliver a message to Duke Ferdinand of Steinfeld,” Diana said. “Tell him that I want to arrange a meeting to… celebrate the victory over the undead horde. Let him know that Victorian will be attending.”

The girl bowed. “As you wish, master.”