My town was full of humans.

Admittedly, there is nothing inherently sinister about human beings in a peaceful settlement at any given location, but it was a final nail in the coffin of the little world I had thought I was building. Free of the valley, with my memory of the intervening time mostly blank, a childish corner of my mind had kept thinking that coming home would be coming home. But five months had passed, and Godwod had taken up with the enemy. My home was gone.

The village sprawl had been curtailed out of apparent necessity. Riding in, most of the nascent fields the lillits had been working on looked abandoned, and the more far-flung structures reduced to burnt out frames. They had constructed a wooden palisade around the town center and the longhouse, so the mine and those that lived there were screened behind tall wooden stakes.

Above the stakes, a flag hung limply, folding around the eagle sign of Henterfell. Beside it was a black pennant embroidered with the red sigil of Dargoth, a mark almost identical to my elder sign.

Those who were working outside of the wall dropped to their knees at the sight of my demonic companion. Bojack walked beside me as I rode, leading the horse burdened with the obsidian Anchor. The gatehouse was just large enough to admit a wagon, a short wooden hall built into the palisade with a heavy door reinforced by iron bands.

A Dargothian man, marked by his standard issue armor, stood beside the gatehouse. His face was pasty pale except where it was pink with sunburn, and long strands of oily hair slipped out from under his metal cap. He'd caught sight of Bojack from a mile away, and opened the door for us.

I dismounted. The gatehouse was a little short for someone on horseback. Someone was galloping down the only street to meet us. A familiar, pockmarked face. As he pulled his mount to a halt, the man nearly broke his neck coming down as fast as he could to avoid sitting with his head higher than Bojack's. He stumbled the landing, then turned it into a bow.

Gent looked about the same as the last time I'd seen him. His pants were dusty and serviceable, but he had thrown on a blue doublet stitched with his house sign in gold thread over his linen tunic. A leaping rabbit. He barely spared a glance for me. In my zombie mask, there was no way he would recognize me unless we spoke, instead focusing on the demon.

"Your eminence," he said, nervously. "To what do I owe the honor of your company?"

"We are here to inspect the mine," Bojack said, continuing forward. I followed him. "Your presence is not required."

Godwod had reinstated Gent as the Baron. It shouldn't have come as a surprise. Looking around, I kept hoping to spy lillit faces, but there were none to be found. The little folk were all either in hiding or in Dargoth. The people who lived here had either come from Gent's hamlet or immigrated from across the Wastes. I saw more soldiers than laborers. Lots of new buildings had been constructed, though their purpose wasn't immediately obvious.

Williamsburg was now less a bustling town and more a military outpost.

"Whatever you wish," Gent said, keeping up. "There's work going on in the shaft. Would you like me to clear them out?"

"You may."

"I don't know what there could interest you down there. The yield has been disappointing. Lord Godwod didn't mention that you would be coming."

Bojack paused long enough to glare at the Baron. "Your place is to obey, not to question."

Gent withered under his gaze. It was satisfying to see, but it didn't make the situation any more palatable. Everything the lillits had worked for, the community we had strived to create, was gone. I wasn't angry at Gent. The man was just a pawn being maneuvered by Godwod. Instead of a tight ball of fury in my chest, all I felt was emptiness.

The mine looked much as I had left it, though the entrance was supported by new beams. Gent gave orders to the laborers, who quickly spread the word that a demon was on the premises and came filing out of the tunnel over the course of the next few minutes.

"Is there any other way I can be of service?" Gent asked.

"Yes," Bojack said, not deigning to look at the baron, "do not speak of this visit to anyone. Not even your Lord."

"Your eminence," Gent stammered, "that is very unu—"

Bojack dropped his hand on the baron's shoulder, nearly causing his knees to buckle. "Not to anyone. Do you understand?"

"Of course," Gent's mouth hung open, "as you say." His gaze drifted to the Anchor strapped to the back of a tired horse, its edges shining with ruddy runes. He excused himself and bowed away.

I tied off the horses at the post beside the mine, and we entered the tunnel together. The workers had taken their lanterns with them, but even as the light fell behind us, the interior was clearly visible to me in shades of gray. Bojack had to lower his head, hunching over to accommodate the low ceiling. At eight feet tall, he made me feel like a lillit. Beleth had been within normal human proportions. Were more powerful demons bigger?

"Bojack," I asked we he headed deeper into the mine, "where do you fit into the demon power scheme? Are you above or below average?"

"I am the fifty-fifth harbinger," Bojack said. "The last to arrive so far."

"Okay, but what level does that make you?"

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"In terms of raw essence, I am among the least of my kin. But many of those who occupy higher seats have grown complacent. There are only a few that I fear."

"Could you have beaten Beleth?"

His expression was placid, but there was a hint of annoyance in his tone as he answered. "I could tear him apart if we came close, but his affinity would allow him to keep me at a distance. For most opponents, demon and human alike, circumstance dictates the outcome more than simple strength."

I could relate to that. If you stabbed someone in the back, it didn't really matter how tough they were. Godwod had cut off my fingers because I'd held them out for him. The siege on the way-station had gone as well as it had because the road and the tower had allowed me to split up the enemy into more manageable chunks. Bojack seemed unkillable when all I had to work with was stone, whereas Excalibur could have chopped him to pieces.

If Gent had kept digging down, he would have eventually found the underground base. Instead, he'd focused all of his efforts on the side tunnel I'd dug halfway down, assuming I'd come across a vein of gold there. That section of the mine had expanded significantly, but the lower tunnels were essentially as I had left them.

I mined out the blocks that hid the entrance to the base by hand and found my supply depot untouched. The lillits had been preparing to use the mine as a holdout when the town came under attack. Obviously, they hadn't been able to last forever, and their equipment and food stores had all been cleared out in the months since. But my area, the domed chamber above the base, was lined with chests.

All the extra material from the farm was here, including my workroom set-up, and most importantly, Kevin's tools. I'd lost Excalibur when I was captured, but I'd left the orichalcum pick, shovel, and ax behind on the way to war. Death had always been a possibility, it was the imprisonment that had come as a surprise.

I gave Bojack a quick tour of the base. He had no interest in the library, but he spent a long moment of contemplation over the diamond encased armor. It was in stasis. Five months was nothing compared to however long ago its original crafter had left it down here.

"Can you do anything about the case?" I asked.

His hands moved in a series of precise gestures, and he muttered an incantation in the demonic tongue. My breath caught as the crystalline surface rippled like the surface of a pool. Then the runes flared, and the diamond cubes reasserted their solidity.

"It is beyond me," he said. "You will need the atreanum."

"And we're sure that's where the Stargate opens to?"

"The inscriptions make it clear. More, there are no other realms near enough to this one for so simple a portal to be effective."

"Can you explain the realms thing to me? Are we in a different universe, or on different planets, or what? Where is Earth?"

"Far away." Bojack turned from the treasure room and strode back into the central chamber, his long legs forcing me to hustle to keep up.

"Far away in distance? Like, if wyverns could fly in space, could one of them eventually get there?"

The dark hoop of the Stargate gleamed in the pale aquamarine light of the glowstones on each corner of its dais. Bojack had no trouble stretching his back in this chamber. The ceiling was twenty feet above us, crafted of the same bluish stone as the rest of the base.

"Plana is small," Bojack said, "and fragile. If you could fly above the world, beyond the moon, you would eventually reach a boundary."

"What's on the other side of the boundary?"

"Nothing. The realm curves, and to approach its end would return you to the beginning."

So the universe was an old-school side-scrolling video game. Good to know.

"Then where is Bedlam? Where is Earth?"

"The realms are layered. In a sense, we are standing in Bedlam now." Bojack made a sharp motion with one hand, and a chunk of stone broke off of the edge of the dais and rose to hover over his palm. He muttered under his breath, and the chunk broke into fragments arranged in a vertical tower, each rotating at a different speed. The bottom fragment was the thickest, and didn't move at all.

"At the bottom of everything is Harmony," Bojack said, "unable to change, frozen, and dead. At the very top, and surrounding everything, is Discord. The Realm of Eternal evolution." He touched the second lowest stone, which completed its first rotation in about ten seconds. "Your homeworld is like this, close enough to Harmony to be the keystone of this dimension, but touched with enough Discord to be a living realm."

His finger moved to the top of the tower, a pebble without a regular rhythm. It spun, jerked, or held still, seemingly at random." This is Bedlam, at the very cusp of true Discord, with Plana below."

"Earth is a keystone? So if your god eats its way through all the realms and gets to earth, the whole universe breaks apart?"

Bojack's hand dropped, and the assorted stones clattered to the floor. "The One Who Knocks does not seek dissolution. Nor do we. Discord itself wants for nothing. It simply exists. The same can be said of Harmony. When you activate this portal, the veil will draw aside, allowing you to walk from this realm to the next. That is all."

"So, is it possible to make a portal that would take me home?"

"Not directly." Bojack shrugged. "But you could create a ladder of sorts. Crafting a portal that would bring you closer to Harmony instead of farther away is more difficult than anything a hero of this realm could achieve. The Survivor who built this place could not have done it." His gaze locked onto mine. "But the One Who Knocks has that power, and the knowledge you would need to craft such a portal."

Of course he did, at the cost of tearing Plana apart, and every other world on the way down. The idea of returning to my true home, seeing my family again, was enticing, but I couldn't forget who I was talking to.

"Let's start with getting me that armor."

Bojack nodded. “Opening the portal is not so demanding. It requires a small sacrifice, and it becomes keyed to the individual who pays the price. It is what you will find on the other side that will be more likely to trouble you.”

“Monsters, right? Can’t you just keep them off of me?”

“I could. But the environment itself is treacherous, and though I will advise you, I cannot accompany you.”

“Why not?”

"Were I to travel through Bedlam in your company, it would not go unnoticed. Other demons, or even the One Who Knocks, would question why I had left my post. We are bound to him, and he sees us wherever we go when we occupy the same realm. Here, he has only the dimmest sense of me, but were I to return before my time, he would sense it immediately. Your Presence is still ephemeral enough to be overlooked or mistaken for a lesser entity."

Monsters had a spiritual sense, and I was pretty sure I was developing something like that myself. In zombies, it was weak enough that my bloody costume had fooled them, but Bojack had had no trouble seeing through it.

"How could they think I was a mob? You can sense me, can't you, even if you don't see me?"

"I can. But at a distance, you are still indistinct. As long as you approach nothing more powerful than a taiva or a koloss, the background of chaos that fills Bedlam will disguise your presence."

"Isn't Bedlam swarming with demons, though?"

"The realm is broad, and we are not so numerous. It is home to many formidable entities, most of whom serve only themselves. I do not know what lies on the other side of this portal, but the Survivor who built it will have crafted themselves a holdfast. I can instruct you in how to find atreanum, but the realm is too unstable for anything as convenient as a map."

“So you’re saying I’m going to be going alone into dangerous, unknown and possibly unknowable territory, under-equipped and under-informed, searching for something I’ve never seen, assailed by forces I cannot fathom?”

"Yes."