Halfway down the street west of the park was a run-down tavern that sat beside an ugly abandoned gas station. The place didn’t have a name, not for lack of trying, but rather that many wouldn’t bother going through the trouble to do so. Drunken fairies and fay folk alike were notorious for stealing the name, and by extent, the vary existence of such a place for nothing more than a giggle. Kathlan had stopped keeping track of the various attempts to name the tavern by the previous owners, though the last attempt he could recall in 1935 was the eleventh reopening of the establishment. The decaying exterior gave the impression that it was a den for bikers, thieves, and other nefarious types for the mundane humans of the city, though not even the most hardened of such criminals would dare approach it.
He entered through a dilapidated door that hung by a single working hinge and gave an ear-piercing shriek as it swung open. Kathlan caught the feint whisp of magic at the center of the noise and recognized it as an amnestic spell, meant to infect normal citizens of the city with confusion and a general sense of fear. As he crossed the threshold a simple barrier that gave off a green color in the aura field appeared and passed quickly over him. A mechanical beep sounded across the room and a corresponding green light appeared inside a cabinet to the side of the entry way. The large metal door unlocked with a loud click as he pushed his way into the lavishly furnished reception area of the main bar. A lightly red hued hobgoblin wearing a pressed black leather jacket and dark colored denim jeans stood to the right of the doorway glaring at him with black pupilless eyes, while a beautiful fair skinned elven woman stood to the left in a black and white business suit, a silver tray pressed flat against her lap.
“Mr. Kathlan, A pleasure to see you are doing well after such an extended case abroad. Will you be joining a party tonight or are you desiring some quite reflection for yourself?” The polite eleven woman greeted him, her glowing platinum blonde hair bouncing in curls as she spoke.
“Hello, Miss Janice, I will be joining a party tonight, Garix Lonth has graciously sent me an invitation.” Kathlan replied, presenting the black letter he received the night before.
“I apologize for the inconvenience Mr. Kathlan, but it appears Mr. Lonth hasn’t arrived yet.” She reported with a smile, and notably without checking the list on the pedestal beside her. “Would you like to wait at the bar or perhaps,” she continued looking him directly in his eyes, “Could I interest you in a complementary waiting lounge, Courtesy of Master Zant of course.” She smiled widely. He recognized this as one of the tactics Zant liked to use when he was desiring a moment of one of his guests’ time, showing the new owners deep understanding of the finer business senses he possessed.
While most people considered business as the simple art of making money, Rydn Zant, saw it as the art of pleasing the customer. A distinction that gave him a respectable reputation among the dark and oftentimes dangerous competitors that he shared his field with. A truly devilish strategy and position suiting the reclusive pit fiend. This tavern, the unofficially named ‘Black Cathedral’, was his pride and personal heaven. A place where the customer was the king of his own castle and could fill any form of desire he wished to satiate for the night; for a fine and fair price.
“I will graciously accept Mr. Zant’s hospitality.” He bowed and thanked the elven attendant, “Would you send him a bottle of pradikatswien Riesling on my tab as a gift. He has always made me feel most welcome in his establishment, the least I can do is give him a well-deserved break from his troubles.”
The elf bowed her head while extending her right arm outwards, “He will be most thankful, if you would please come this way.” She quickly guided him across the foyer past the sneering Goblin at the door into a small corridor with several warded doors. She stopped at the last door in the hall and unlocked it with a controlled series of magical strokes before bowing and allowing him to enter.
The lounge was adorned in blue and grey velvet furniture, a knee-high black wood table centered in the room with several single-seat chairs and a more intimately sized couch arranged around it. The table had several of his favorite snacks already prepared for him and a bottle of 1842 Irish whiskey sitting next to a rocks glass. The assortment of dried meats, plums, and sweets sat in stained glass bowls on the table, each labeled in a fine cursive with the area they were precured from.
“If you require anything else, please do not hesitate to ask.” Janice said before bowing a final time and closing the door. A magic seal appeared on his side of the door, a blue tint to the scroll work that identified it as Zant’s personal design and a message appearing below it in a red calligraphy reading “Your privacy and satisfaction is guaranteed.”
Kathlan poured the ice-cold glass halfway with the lightly brown liquor and sat himself in the armed chair closest to the door. This wasn’t the first time he had been in Rydn Zant’s hospitality, but he was certainly appreciative of the length the king of the black cathedral went to ensure that he wasn’t wasting Kathlan’s time. Or perhaps, he had simply come to know what was required to ensure his cooperation.
After a few moments, a door hidden behind the velvet curtains along the wall was opened and familiar dark-skinned woman wearing a bright blue ball gown and glittering silver jewelry pushed her way elegantly into the room. Abigail Charlotte, a satyr woman, crossed the room and sat gently on his lap, placing her hand lightly against his chest.
“Kath,” her soft melodious voice graced his ears, “it’s been far too long since you’ve stopped by to see me. A girl gets lonely around here when there are no GENTLEMEN coming to see her.” She teased as she caressed his chest with two fingers. “Bragging about their wealth, telling obviously inflated stories to stroke their egos, and all the shallow flattery they dump on me. It’s all so boring, mundane, average, and trivial…” she paused, moving her fingers up his chest, and playing with the gold and amethyst pendant he wore around his neck mindlessly. “But you, Kath, stimulate the mind and address the hearts within people and treat them just as they are. No bias or judgements; no pre-truths or harsh ideologies; Just wisdom and compassion. A great and attractive feature for any good little housewife in waiting.” She continued, coyly moving her golden eyes from the pendant up to his face to make eye contact. “Are you finally going to make me into a woman my poor mother can finally be proud of?” she asked with a seductive purr, her hoof gently caressing the inner part of his thigh.
“Abby, I’m sorry to see that my absence has you this pent up with emotion. I’m certain that if I was ever able to leave this work behind me that sharing my life with you would seem like a never-ending dream. I could only imagine the bliss of those long days frolicking amongst the heathers with you.” He sweet talked her.
“You always come up with the most clever ways to avoid telling me no; you tease.” She said locking her leg in between his tightly. “You’re going to make a poor girl beg for you Kathlan? Because I will. I’ll pout my lip and everything; for all you know, these could be real tears I cry in secret longing for you.”
“I think we both know that if we ever did mean such things, the fun of these games would be lost, and I would be mourning at your grave.” he stated, gently calling her bluff. Abigail was a beautiful woman by fawn, or any other standards, a rare middle eastern birth of her species that made her not just uniquely stunning but highly in demand by clients. Her talents and aptitude for information gathering and negotiations led her to the happy life she led as Mr. Zant’s head customer satisfaction agent.
She grinned widely, but Kathlan could see a flash of hurt hidden behind her bright smile. “You’re right my love. I suppose you will want to get the matter at hand.” She gently stood up and walked to the chair opposite him, her delicate fingers sliding up his neck and chin as she did, leaving the scent of shea butter and sage lingering in the air. “Master Zant wants me to personally welcome you back into the city, even though he knows you have been back for a few weeks now.” She started, her tone stern but still soft. “He was surprised that you hadn’t visited sooner than this, as he was quite anxious to hear how his barghest problem was so efficiently handled. Though he understands that a rest is well deserved after sealing away a pissed off Hindu god of disease.”
Kathlan was caught off guard, as he had been pressured by the divine sanctum to take care of the extermination of those demonic wolves. Though as he thought about it, he considered that the sanctum didn’t gain anything from the subjugation efforts. At the time, he merely wrote it off as the sanctum’s desire to exterminate aberrations and creatures they deemed evil that were a threat to mundane population centers. He could recall now that Mr. Zant had a controlling interest in several of the dwarven mining operations in the area which now seemed a glaringly obvious oversight on his part.
“Were the barghest really causing that much of a disturbance in Mr. Zant’s mining facilities?” he asked pointedly.
“The delay was a significant factor in the decision, a loss of two million dollars in the span of three months certainly affected regional operations. However, Master Zant was far more concerned with the well organized and directed nature of the attacks. As you no doubt discovered, there were over twenty individuals who were slaughtered by the beasts. At first, the attacks seemed random, until we noticed that these people were all informants of the master. All the individuals were agents embedded into the local occult groups or political circles which were feeding valuable information to Master Zant to ensure the safety and prosperity of his ventures. Some of those agents were members of the sanctum under his payroll, so Master Zant expressed the dire nature of the problem to the sanctum and encouraged them to make the hunt a priority.” She replied, choosing a plum from the dish and taking a few delicate bites while studying Kathlan’s reaction.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
He found the whole conversation a bit odd. It was unlike Zant to go out of his way to just thank him for a job well done, especially since he had gone to remarkable lengths in hiding the request as his own. Kathlan sensed that he was about to be handed more work on his growing list of problematic requests this week.
“I suspect you aren’t just here to express Mr. Zant’s gratitude.” He stated bluntly.
The smile returned to Abigail’s as she gingerly dotted the juices from her lips with a silk cloth she pulled from the folds of her dress.
“As expected of the great Kathlan.” She said with a purr, placing the partially eaten fruit on a small dish in front of her. “Master Zant is politely requesting a meeting with you. If you had the time in the near future, he would like a moment of your time to express a few of his concerns with recent events.”
“Such as?”
“The master isn’t one to have others discuss his business on his behalf. Even as trusted I am, I am merely his messenger, a sweet and beautiful one at that.” She said coyly, slowly and deliberately crossing her legs from left over right to right over left, the high cut of her dress revealing her soft brown leg fur until it exposed the dark olive skin of her inner thigh.
“Historically, great rulers and kings would send opulent and pleasing gifts when delivering bad news or asking for favors. I take it Mr. Zant’s troubles are from just mere concern.” He replied, finding it difficult to ignore the charms of Mr. Zant’s indeed pleasing gift before him.
“You are indeed better read and studied then the master’s usually clientele.” She laughed lightly, seemingly satisfied with the delivery of her master’s invitation. “As much as I’ve enjoying getting to see you my love, it would be rude of me to delay Mr. Lonths arrival any further than we already have.” She stood and gave him an elegant curtesy before heading back toward the curtain she appeared from. She pulled back the purple velvet curtain and turned to look at him over her shoulder, “Next time, it would nice if you came here just to see me Kath.” Her eyes lit up with a bright smile and left him alone in the darkened room. He found that the snacks and alcohol had suddenly seemed less pleasing with her absence.
After another fifteen minutes of waiting, a knock came at the door. It opened as the elven servant Janice once again bowed to him and addressed the creature standing beside her.
“Mr. Kathlan, Mr. Lonth has arrived for your party.” She turned to the black scaly creature, “Mr. Lonth, please enjoy your stay, if there is anything I can do, please ask. Master Zant has taken up your tab this evening to make up for the confusion in scheduling.”
This didn’t seem to ease the towering form of Mr. Lonth as he entered the room and sat in the chair across from him with a heavy thud. He didn’t address the elven woman at all but gave a half-hearted wave of his hand to shoo her off.
“Thank you, Miss. Janice. I appreciate your services.” Kathlan told the waiting servant who was trying desperately to hide her growing frustration with his guest. She quietly closed the door as the sigil and privacy guarantee appeared once more on his side of the door. Kathlan felt the sharp pain at the front of his head as a wave of energy tried to force its way into his mind. Unlike Geneva’s well-trained fay magic, this was the feeling of a primitive mind trying to use its mental abilities to dominate any that it deemed inferior to itself.
Garix Lonth wore the full weight of his aggravation in the mandibles that protruded from his arachnid head, no doubt from the unexpected hassle of trying to arrive at this meeting. Kathlan felt a little guilty for unintentionally creating that frustration. That was until the creature finally began to speak.
“Old. One.” Mr. Lonth spoke in a clicking English that was barely decipherable.
“Mr. Lonth.” Kathlan greeted him curtly.
“What. Monster. Are. You.” The beast continued in the clicking accent.
Kathlan presumed that it had been meant as a question yet still felt a bit lost by the lack of context in Mr. Lonths comprehension of the language. He figured that if it was indeed a question, that it was referring to the creature’s growing frustration in the failure to force the psionic link against Kathlan’s inner will.
“The kind that likes to shake hands before allowing another into my mind.” He replied, admittedly far more directly than he had intended. He wondered if Geneva’s personality was starting to rub off on him or if he just suddenly started caring about it after the meeting with Hudsley in his office.
Kathlan observed the creature in front of him as it writhed in pain attempting to force its way into his mind, its mandibles flexing in spastic cycles as it did so. He saw Mr. Lonth, while arachnid headed, was noticeably more scorpion like than spider like. The difference he concluded was the shape of the top ridge of his scalp, which were a dark brown instead of the black the lighting originally made it seem, and the placement of the glossy eyes which were placed more staggered against either side of what he would presume to be a nasal cavity.
Mr. Lonth clenched the arm rests of the chair and leaned back, looking Kathlan in the eyes after another minute of effort.
“Proud. Race.” The demon exclaimed through gritted mandibles; a statement he knew was meant as a criticism.
“Perhaps, but I’d call this type of connection; intimate. Meant to be used between people with a certain level of mutual trust and capabilities. In truth, even I don’t dare to dwell too long in my own mind.” Kathlan retorted, taking a sip from the magically chilled glass.
Mr. Lonth slumped forward and placed his hand against his chest palm outward, the demonic gesture of surrender to a higher authority. “Could. Please. Make. Easy.”
“Gladly, thank you for asking.” Kathlan responded politely and promptly established the link as the “Guest” entity, a powerful position to be in depending on the “Host” strength of will.
Psyiontry wasn’t Kathlan’s specialty, it relied heavily on the users defined sense of self and the full understanding of the inner workings of their own minds, which Kathlan actively avoided. Not for fear of himself but due to the intense mental strain of having to sort and understand the vast number of thoughts, knowledge, emotions, and memories that many without his longevity simply didn’t have to contend with. Geneva had been a great mentor in his current use of this school of magic. The predominant idea being that one entity would bear the brunt of the effort in maintaining and controlling the link, being the “Host” of the conversation, and the one who can project themselves into the mind of that host, being the “Guest”. A trained psyionist could take hold of that host mind and either pry into unguarded areas or even project something akin to visual or auditory hallucinations into their host’s sense. A very powerful position given that the demon before him was relatively young by his and other noteworthy demon’s standards.
Kathlan could feel the dark and damp place that Mr. Lonth called his mind. It felt like a series of tunnels half submerged in a thick layer of coagulated blood. But he could hear the demon’s inner voice much clearer now.
“You are an arrogant and proud creature, Kathlan the devourer. And I mean that not in a way that would praise you.” The hissing and gurgled voice called out clearly in his mind. “But I shall place that aside for the moment as I mean to inquire about your dealings in the past few weeks.”
“Quite elegantly spoken for one such as yourself. Your master must have been a well-respected specimen of his race” he spoke in Mr. Lonth’s mind and eyebrow raised at the dignified speech he would normally associate with either a rank of Baron or Lord in the demonic caste system.
“Enough prattle and pompous words, old one. My patience is thin from your incessant taunts.” He growled in his mind, clearly forgetting the position he placed himself in with the link. “My men have gone missing, not a trace of them can be found in neither Hell nor Earth. Not even a whisper from the aether that can be smelt from your petty church’s insufferable crystal cages.”
“I would ask that you get to your point Mr. Lonth. The dispute between your lesser demons and the sanctum are of little interest or concern to me.”
“Yet you abide by the laws of the heretic church and do their bidding as guard dog. I want to know what my brothers have done to be hunted down and eaten by the likes of the Black Sun.” Mr. Lonth pressed the voice against him with the link, a tear forming at the edges of his arm rest.
“Again, I have done no such thing. I know of your organization by reputation alone and have heard that your dealings with human’s are trivially concerning at best for the Sanctum, if they even are aware of your existence at all.” Lonth was the new head of a lower ranked demon gang within Upper Manhattan, dealing in stolen religious artifacts of little use to the sanctum and demonic slaves of the other minor legions that fought amongst each other around the world. Kathlan indeed had little reason to investigate the group, let alone hunt down any of its members.
“Our workshops and forges grow cold; my legion is being pushed around by worms that once coward at the very mention of the Black Fangs. You have stolen from me, and I shall have my ounce of silver from you.” His claws ripped out the cloth of his arm rest and shattered the wood within as his rage intensified.
Kathlan finished the last of his drink and stood from his chair, the demon escorts that accompanied Mr. Lonth drew their weapons, one a longsword and the other a decorated Jambiya, both made from a black material he recognized as FellSteel.
“As I said, I have no idea what happened to your men, and I certainly am not interested in asking the Sanctum about their operations in this matter. You seem to already believe me responsible and there is little I could say to disprove your clearly well thought out reasonings. IF there is nothing else.” He turned to the door and placed his hand on the knob, the sign on the door sparking and shifting to produce the words ‘Thank you for your patronage, please indulge yourself again soon’.
“You will not escape these questions old one, I will find the truth and I will make you suffer for befouling the name of Garix Lonth.” The demon roared in his mind, quickly standing from his seat, and pointing a large cleaver made of Fellsteel at him.
Kathlan smiled and let the illusion he placed on his face drop, revealing his true form. The two guards instinctively stepped back and placed themselves behind Mr. Lonth.
“I await your attempt, Mr. Lonth.” He stated with enthusiasm before reapplying the illusion and breaking the link between them.