“So, what’s supposed to happen now?” Dalthan lifted his emerald eyes from the earthenware bowl to glance across the rough-hewn oak table to where the [Witch-Queen] sat across from him.
“Patience,” the hag said without lifting her golden eyes from the ashes scattered across the dark liquid held in the bowl.
“Do you need to feel my hand?” The [Rogue] asked, his eyes darting toward Belial in search of guidance. “The last time an old woman tried to read my fortune she played with my hand.” Dalthan’s brows furrowed as the memory replayed itself in his mind. “It was creepy. On second thought, can we skip that part?”
Belial glanced away from the bowl momentarily to soothe the noisy thief. “I don’t think Aunt Aga needs to do that. Sometimes these things just take time.”
“What about the funny looking cards?” Dalthan asked as he leaned forward to peer into the depths of the bowl, much to Belial’s distress. “I tried that a couple of days ago. The old woman conned me out of two silver and didn’t tell me anything. Something about a fool being hung from the tower or some sort of nonsense.” The thief waved a hand dismissively, his flippant gesture came alarmingly close to tipping the bowl.
“I think you need more blood, Human Dalthan.” Vex said, carefully enunciating his words as he rose silently from Dal’s shadow. If the two women were surprised by the sudden appearance of the blue-skinned abomination, they didn’t show it. “This blue slaad has seen my gray brothers perform divination magic before. It required more blood than you have shed. Copious amounts.”
The [Rogue] looked over his shoulder, more startled by the giant frog’s appearance than anyone else. It would take time for him to grow accustomed to carrying a horrifying battle toad around with him wherever he went.
“I don’t think I want to shed any more blood for this. I wouldn’t have shed this much if the old crone hadn’t tried to melt my brain.” Dal leaned back into his chair, arms crossing in an open display of irritation. “Why don’t we talk a bit about that? Because I don’t think we need any magic to see the future where I kick your ass over trying to mind fuck me. Twice.”
Belial’s ruby-red eyes flickered toward the silent hag. The drow’s white eyebrows narrowed, her plush lips pursing into a thin line before she spoke. “He does have a point, Aunt Aga. I brought him here as a guest and you attacked him.”
Dalthan nodded. “Exactly. I think I need to be compensated for my pain and suffering. Since I have a short list of people that need a good hexing, I’ll accept services rendered. We can start with this prick named Zaplixel.”
For the first time since she’d tossed the bloody cloth into the bowl, the [Witch-Queen] looked up from the vessel. “Quiet. Both of you. I can feel the spell being diverted. Something is trying to obfuscate your future from my sight.” Dalthan didn’t care for the glimmer of keen interest he saw shining in the depths of her golden eyes. “Who are you, boy?”
Before Dalthan could answer, a pillar of black smoke erupted from the bowl. Plumes of darkness shot through with flickering silver light billowed toward the ceiling high above. Like lightning flashing in a thunderhead, the silver light seemed to leap from one section of the smoky cloud to the next. Wherever the light touched, the black seemed to fade, replaced by a lighter gray and, eventually, by a pristine white.
Once the entire pillar had been bleached the flawless white color of polished pearls, two dainty female hands poked through the dense smoke. As if they were parting a heavy curtain, the two hands brushed aside the smoke to reveal the face and upper body of a woman with blonde hair, blue eyes, and alabaster skin. Though she appeared to be human, there were some traits that clearly separated her from Dalthan and the rest of his mortal kin.
For starters, the woman looking down from the white, pillowy clouds had an ethereal beauty that no amount of good breeding or alchemical treatments could ever match.
She also had an enormous set of feathered wings on her back and a golden circlet that hovered over her head.
“Oh, it’s just you, Agadeem.” The interloper sighed tiredly as she looked down at the table below. “I thought someone talented was trying to pierce the veil.”
“What the hell are you doing in my house, you haughty tramp?” The [Witch-Queen] lifted the gnarled stick at her side to point its tapered tip at the angelic visitor. “You can’t be here. There are rules, Sera.”
“It’s so sad to see how senile you’ve grown in your old age.” The woman rustled her wings in a strangely avian gesture of irritation. “You connected our realms with your little inquiry and I was sent to shut it down. Of course, I didn’t know it was you. If I had, I’d have brought a few pamphlets with me. It’s never too late to join the winning side.”
There was a savage light gleaming in the woman’s brilliant blue eyes made Dalthan question the sincerity of her words.
“And what have we here?” The woman, Sera, asked as her attention turned toward the others that were gathered around the table. “I see some fresh slaadi horror that you’ve dug up from Limbo. I thought better of you than that Aga. Then there’s…hmm…who might you be, girl?”
“I’m Archpriestess Belial Lucentia,” the dark elf said with the edge of open hostility cutting through her usually smooth tone. “You are trespassing in my Lord Balerik’s sovereign kingdom.” A smile curved one corner of the priestess’ lips in a self-satisfied smile. “Prepare to be banished, you flying sow.”
Dalthan reeled back from the vehemence in Belial’s voice. Her anger was so acute that he could feel the rage radiating from her like heat from a roaring bonfire. For a split second, a trick of the light made it appear as if Belial had a set of wings of her own, though hers were black and leathery, like the wings of the dragon he’d seen earlier. The vision immediately vanished, likely the result of Agadeem scorching his brain.
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Dal was snapped from his thoughts by the sound of tittering laughter. The noise drew his gaze back toward the window in the cloud where the angel was clapping her hands in amusement. “Oh, Aga,” Sera said, “You never fail to entertain. Such interesting guests! Yes, I’ve heard of you, Belial.” A stern note entered the woman’s voice as she glared down at the priestess. “I think the witch needs to give you a lesson on planar contact. You see, if we were in the City of Lies, your authority would shunt me away back to the higher realms. But we’re not in the Last Prince’s realm, are we?”
“My cottage exists on its own demi-plane,” Agadeem said, though her eyes never strayed from the angelic figure peering down at them from above. “It should have been impossible for Sera to enter uninvited.”
The angel rolled her beautiful blue eyes. “I already said that you initiated the connection, Aga. I just followed it because that’s what the guys upstairs told me to do. I had no idea that you were on the other end.” With the weight of a mountain, the woman turned her attention to Dalthan. “Process of elimination means that whatever Aga was up to had something to do with you, young man. Allow me to introduce myself. I am an Astral Deva named Sera.” The woman pointedly ruffled her wings again and reached up to tap the golden circlet that hovered above her head. Her voice was soft and welcoming, easing the day’s tension from his body like the touch of a skilled masseuse. “Who might you be and why are you mixed up with these two very dangerous women?”
There was something about Sera that put his mind at ease. He never questioned the sudden urge he had to answer her, an urge remarkably similar to the one he’d felt from Agadeem.
“My name is Da-” Dalthan’s words were abruptly cut off by a muffled grunt as Belial backhanded him in the chest hard enough to send him spilling out of his chair. He lay on the ground, wheezing for breath, while Sera tutted and wagged a finger at Belial.
“That was totally uncalled for,” the angel sniffed. “We’re trying to have a polite conversation.” Sera directed her attention to the man haltingly climbing back into his chair. “I’d burn that shirt if I were you. I’m not going to tell you where her hands have been, but I can promise you that it’s not sanitary.”
“You fucking hit me,” Dalthan grumbled, staring daggers at a completely unrepentant Belial. “Why the fuck did you do that?”
“You were about to give her your name,” Belial pulled her ruby gaze away from Sera long enough to give the thief a withering look. “I know you’re kind of an idiot, but you should know better than to give your name out to anyone that asks for it. They can use it to track you down. Or worse.”
“You introduced yourself!” Dalthan hissed, having grown very tired of this city’s penchant for random acts of unexpected violence. This made two or was it three? times in the past day he’d been assaulted with no provocation. “If she’s so dangerous then why did you give out your name without a second thought?”
The dark elf blinked and shook her head, sending long white locks sliding against the shoulders left bare by her low-cut dress. “Belial isn’t my true name. Besides, I have my ways of preventing outsiders from finding me. Do you?”
“She’s just using you as a stepping stone,” the angel stage-whispered loudly enough that everyone in the room clearly heard her. “You deserve better.”
“You don’t even know him,” Agadeem’s voice crackled like snapping bones. “You’re so eager to judge people and what they deserve, aren’t you?”
Nonplussed, the angel lifted one slender shoulder in a casual shrug. “It’s part of the job.”
The witch’s lips opened wide, exposing pink gums and two crooked, yellow teeth. “Today, answering my question is part of the job. Who sent you to divert my spell?”
Sera’s eyes narrowed. “Why would I ever tell you that? You have gotten on in the years, Aga. I have one word for you. Hospice.”
“But you will tell me. One question. I’ll have the answer to my one question since that was the nature of the augury that I cast using the boy’s blood.” The witch’s smile remained cast across her wrinkled face. If anything, it seemed to grow as dark lines began to snake through the white cloud Sera was perched upon.
“The realms are still connected,” Belial said, her eyes widening with understanding as they darted from the witch to the angel. “She could enter your home, but that means you can also enter hers.”
The [Archpriestess] wasn’t the only one who noticed the way Agadeem had begun manipulating the gate between planes. Sera had reached out and taken hold of the cloud stuff and was trying to slide it shut the same way she’d opened it earlier.
To no avail.
“Horse fudge!” Sera growled. “I don’t know the kid, Aga. How do you expect me to answer anything about him?” The angel was tugging desperately as the slithering black lines slid through the white cloud and began to reach the window. Dark appendages that looked grotesquely like tongues began to undulate toward the angel who yelped and flinched away from their touch.
“I’m owed one question.” Agadeem’s golden eyes watched impassively as more dark tendrils began to close in on the angel. “You don’t know the boy? Fine. But you do know who ordered you to interfere. Tell me.”
Dalthan watch the shadows swirl around the [Witch-Queen] like ink caught in the grip of a tornado. She seemed completely at home with the darkness caressing her like the touch of a fond lover.
The angel, on the other hand, seemed far less receptive. “Fine! Make it stop, Aga!”
Despite Sera’s pleas, the dark, slithering tentacles continued to close around the woman like a noose tightening around the neck of a condemned criminal. The angel’s voice grew shrill as she made herself as small as she could manage. “All I know is that it was one of the big wigs! I’m talking about one of the top choirs!”
Even at this distance, Dalthan could see the fear swimming in her brilliant blue eyes as the tips of the writhing tendrils began to brush against her pristine wings and the shining halo above her head. “His name is Brenton!”
With a crack like ice shattering, the window between the planes suddenly snapped shut. The cloud of smoke immediately dissipated, drifting away to diffuse through the air of the large hovel.
The change was so sudden that all four of the room’s occupants continued to stare up at the vacant space that’d been occupied by an angel only moments ago.
After several long heartbeats of anxious silence, Dalthan broke the spell with a soft chuckle.
“That’s so weird,” the thief began. “What are the odds that some angel would have the same name as my pa?”