King Galukar’s apparent companion, the creature, was swift in reacting to the attack from below. Furling its wings and dropping like a stone. Collin saw the newcomer- the lich, he realised- suddenly veer off to one side as its enemy approached. Closer as they had become, he could gauge their relative sizes, and surprised himself by seeing that the surely human-sized lich was faced with a body nearly double its scale and surely many more times its mass.

Like watching an owl swoop down on a bat. He thought, just as great sword-long talons unsheathed themselves from the larger combatant and scythed for the smaller. It avoided them, barely, and replied with a flash of retina-searing light Collin knew all too well as a blast of lightning. He blinked the stars from his eyes just in time to see the larger figure take a single moment in reclaiming its equilibrium, thrown off-kilter by the strike as it had been. Then it twisted and flew after the smaller thing.

Flecks of black shot between them, each one missing the pursued monster, and the larger one changed tactics quickly. It dove, slipping beneath its enemy, then opening its wings once more. Collin realised what was happening a moment before it finished doing so.

Beneath them there blazed a fire larger and more sustained than the mostly-stone construct should have permitted, and it was doubtless casting all the hot air of a forest fire skyward. This same air caught the wings of the larger beast as it came lower and closer to the source, adding extra upwards thrust which let it surprise its prey.

Again the talons flashed, and this time Collin’s Ranger’s senses picked out a few flecks of blood as they grazed their target. The lich, though, was far more graceful and swift in the air, shortly coursing backwards and beyond reach. He saw the tell-tale static of building lightning, readied to see the King’s companion blasted.

Then the smaller figure was engulfed in a net.

Collin blinked, staring as the waited tangle of strange fabric and tethered ceramics wrapped over the lich and started dragging it downwards. The net was huge, huge to a man in the way a fishing net was to the clams and shoals it smothered. Such a thing could not have come from nowhere.

He took a second to work the events through.

By the time he figured it all out- realised that the larger figure had dropped the net as it set the fires, knowing gravity would take precious seconds to let it fall a significant distance over the area it covered- it was all over. A quick flight, a final unsheathing of deadly instruments, and the lich fell back down into the burning palace as a mass of butchered meat.

Collin had seen intestines mulched into sausage meat with less completion than the death inflicted upon this enemy. He wasn’t complaining.

In only moments the giant creature was closing on him once more, and Collin braced himself. He looked to the King, who still did not panic, and found that it didn’t rest his nerves at all. Galukar was known as a decent man, but he was a monarch all the same. A tyrant by nature, a threat by necessity. More to the point, he was a man, and the giant fucking thing coming at Collin was not. Better to remain a little on edge when you were dangling over one, his father had always said.

Fortunately, the abomination changed as it neared. Shrinking, compacting, transforming so completely that as it finally, slowly flapped down to land before Collin, it was a man once more.

Or something that looked like a man, he realised. There was no wisdom, and plenty of danger, in assuming a shapeshifter’s original form to be the one he found most palatable.

“It is done.” The man declared, as he finally reached the two of them. “Where are the others?”

“The others?” Collin frowned, fearing, for a second, that there would be yet more undead to throw themselves at him. Galukar didn’t seem worried, but then he never seemed worried about anything.

“Pooled out on the other side of the fortress, I was able to send them out to rally before we freed Baird, or before reinforcements arrived.”

“Who are you talking about?” Baird snapped, finding his temper mounting, no longer willing to merely be disregarded or ignored like some bundled objective of value. “I will have you know-”

“Silence.” The smaller man cut in, wearily, just as he started his march back around the castle. Galukar moved alongside him, and Collin, after a moment of frozen staring, found himself forced to do likewise. He cursed them with every step.

It soon became clear who and what the pair had been discussing, and Collin found his heart sawing as he beheld the sight of other prisoners lined up and waiting beyond the blazing fortress. They were more numerous than he might have thought, perhaps close to a hundred, and most looked relatively healthy all things considered.

Revoltingly, it occurred to him that their condition was likely intentional. And almost doubtlessly signified that the Dark Lord’s people had intended for each and every one of the fortress’ prisoners to be made undead. Healthy bodies made strong abominations, after all. Collin was glad to find the chill running his spine’s length diluted by the intoxicant of freedom.

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

The smaller of his rescuers interrupted the moment by speaking again.

“Let it be known,” The man called out, “That you are, all of you, bearing the privilege of having been rescued by Master Silenos, esteemed Fleshcrafter of House Shaiagrazni, keeper of the Auburn Flame, Conductor of Arts most Ancient and Lord of Hara’lguanta.”

It was not unknown, or, indeed, uncommon, for magi to insist on names of a ridiculous length. Collin had rarely heard of one to match this man’s pretension, however. And he just continued on, apparently far from done demonstrating it.

“Go on, now, and live out the remainder of your pathetic lives.” The caster called. “But do so knowing that they continue only because of me. That is all, you may leave.”

The man turned, stalking away quickly, and Collin saw the group begin to confusedly turn and leave. He almost joined them, before a hand closed about his arm.

“Not you.” King Galukar told him, bluntly. “You’re with us.”

It wasn’t an order, per say, but it wasn’t quite a request either. Things tended not to be, when made by a man capable of removing orc heads with one hand.

***

Silenos was back within the day, fortunately. Arion wasn’t entirely surprised. They’d looked around the city before finally finding its refuse pile, and, disgusting as it was, the matter there apparently served just as well in providing raw materials for his Master’s Fleshcrafting as any living tissue. It hadn’t even smelled after transforming, which was a pleasant surprise.

It had not been pleasant, staying alone with the bound Necromancer, but Arion had managed it. Keeping a careful eye on the woman and making sure she remained fed, even as she insisted on taunting him whenever her gag was loosed for eating. However much he’d handled the petty task, it was a relief to not have it be only his responsibility any longer.

Striding into the room, Silenos claimed the comfiest seat on the floor for himself without bothering to extend a word to anyone else, crossing his legs and peering at Arion questioningly. He’d known him long enough that the answer being asked of him was obvious, even without vocalisation.

“Nothing went wrong.” He explained. “And it wasn’t exactly difficult to ensure, you had me watching a bound woman to stop her from causing trouble. Not exactly hard.”

Silenos eyed him, then nodded fractionally. He didn’t speak, sending a globule of irritation to congeal at the base of Arion’s mind.

“How did things go with your mission, Master?” He asked, keeping his voice from a growl. Just barely.

“It was a success.” King Galukar grunted, from the doorway. His own exit was rather more difficult than Silenos’, the extra inches of height and hands of breadth making peasant doorways quite a challenge for the giant. He squeezed in after a moment anyway, and even avoided tearing any chunks out of the door frame. “Collin Baird is safely in the city and should be on his way to reunite with the Governor.”

Arion felt a tug of relief. So much had gone wrong lately, seemingly everything in fact, that he’d found himself hanging his hopes onto this latest endeavour with a single, fraying thread. Even hearing of its apparent success had him worrying over what they might have missed.

“Did he seem grateful?” He asked.

Silenos’ face drew as close to a scowl as he’d ever seen.

“He was not.” The caster replied, foul mood making itself known. Galukar cut in hastily.

“He was grateful enough.” The giant added. “It’s just that nobody can be grateful enough for this bastard, he expected to have the ground he walked on worshipped in thanks.”

Silenos did not confirm or deny the accusation, merely huffed irritably. Arion felt a curious weariness.

No sane person could question the power at his Master’s command, and Arion would be at the back of the line to do so. But there was an ice to him, too, that was more to credit than any other aspect for the inhuman, almost otherworldly presence he’d always had.

That ice was thawing, or at least wetting. He was beginning to let slip more and more emotion, sometimes guarded, and sometimes without even seemingly realising enough to try and keep from doing so. Arion would still have never even considered playing cards against the man, but he found himself growing ever more nervous.

Human volatility with Shaiagraznian power seemed a bad mix, to him.

“What happened exactly?” Arion asked, deciding he could use both the information and the distraction of receiving it. Silenos didn’t even glance at him, but King Galukar’s manners won out, as they tended to. Arion listened while the monarch explained everything, finding himself rather glad to have missed the fighting.

“You burned the fortress down.” He said, once the King had finished. “Isn’t that a bit…Conspicuous?”

His question was addressed to Galukar, but meant for Silenos, who seemed to realise the fact and answered it.

“It was the best way to ensure corroborating word of our claims reach as many people as possible.” He said, simply. “If the Dark Lord is busy in this region, he will not be seeking us in others. Once we leave that will make pursuit less likely.”

Arion reckoned that made sense. The Dark Lord had never been one to take an insult, and had historically found the destruction of his property and men to be just that. It was sound reasoning to bet on such a devastation as he’d heard described luring the conqueror’s focus away.

Assuming it was he who heard about it first, of course. If the more local leaders of his forces caught wind of their flight, there’d be a pursuit all the same.

Knocking. It was abrupt, more abrupt and more forceful than Arion had heard in a long while. He’d just realised why it struck him with such nostalgia, identified it as the very same tempo of a heralded magus, when King Galukar pulled the door open and stepped back expectantly.

It was a boy who revealed himself on the other side. Tall, broad in the shoulders and with the sort of jaw one might break their fist against. He had blue eyes bright enough to almost seem cyan, and brown hair that seemed to have been militarily cropped at some point, but since grown out. He wore green.

“Silenos Shaiagrazni?” The boy asked, looking to the caster without any of the surprise universal in those beholding him for the first time. A prior acquaintance then.

“I’ve come from seeing my father.” The boy continued, not waiting for an answer. Evidently he’d spoken to Silenos, too. “He sent me, knowing that I’d be recognised and hurry things along. He wishes to have an audience with you.”

Silenos smiled, and got to his feet. Arion realised rather quickly that the boy at the door was Collin Baird.

Which meant they’d be on their way to meet the Governor.