Now, onwards to power.
The first to fall to Milo's influence were the goblin gangs and kobold clans infesting Athkatla's sewers. Swathing himself in illusions, he appeared before them wearing the guise of avatars of their respective deities, Milo's magic quickly convincing them of the truth of his divinity. Gone were their previous scavenging existences, replaced by the purpose and order of Milo's rule. In gratitude, they delivered the sewers to his dominion. A good first step.
Then followed the thugs at the docks, who had thought the sewers convenient cover for their smuggling. Their obedience Milo secured not through superstition, but more directly with enchantments worked on their minds. Brutish of brow as well as of manner, none would notice the hidden influence behind their actions. They would serve well as Milo's muscle and enforcers of his decrees.
Now Milo could begin in earnest to manipulate commerce in the city, by which means he ensnared the slavers in his web. In their desperation to re-establish business after recent setbacks, they happily acquiesced to conditions that at first glance seemed beneficial, but in the end made them dependent on Milo's goodwill. Fetters forged from coin may gleam with a golden sheen, but they are heavier than iron and no less restrictive.
With the flesh trade Milo gained soldiers perfectly placed to wage a war of information against the true rulers of Athkatla's underworld: the Shadow Thieves of Amn. It wasn't a fair fight, really; the Shadow Thieves never knew they were in a war in the first place. Their schemes and plots mysteriously began to fail, betrayed by boastful tongues in every brothel and bathhouse, loosened by liquor, free to wag indiscretions at every sympathetic whore and harlot willing to listen. And listen they did, and then report to Milo.
It took surprisingly little effort to manoeuvre the paladins of the Most Holy Order of the Radiant Heart into open opposition with the Shadow Thieves. Milo shared an enthusiasm with the Order for lawful government, and they eagerly acted on the information Milo supplied them. A few well-choreographed provocations was all it took to escalate; soon, the streets ran red with paladin and shadow thief blood.
By this time, Milo's blackmail of the nobility was bearing fruit, and the strength of the army and city guard was joined to the Order. Within half a year, the Shadow Thieves were eradicated, and Milo's puppets on Amn's ruling council ascendant.
With the resources of one of the most prosperous cities in the world at his disposal, Milo soon grew engorged with power: economic power, from the merchant guilds plying Milo greed with gold; political power, from his mouthpieces on the council propped up by the support of the people who prospered under the agreeable yoke of Milo's rule; and finally magical power, gained from raiding the libraries of spells of Milo's rivals among the Cowled Wizards. It was time to dispense with pretence.
The ceremony was one for the ages. It was held in the old hall of the Radiant Heart, the Order having effectively died out from casualties suffered during their heroic crusade against the Shadow Thieves, with all the land's nobility in attendance. Milo himself was resplendent in imperial purple, crowned with mithral, and when the evening was done, declared god-king of Amn, ruler in perpetuity of its lands, colonies and provinces.
Milo's first decree was to make Amn whole again. Crush the ogres of the Sythillisian Empire, who had presumed to gnaw off the southernmost areas of Amn for their own petty ambitions. Reclaim the traitorous cities who had defected to Tethyr, and demand from that sanctimonious 'ally' recompense for the insult of accepting them.
Milo's second decree was for his people to pay him tribute by conquest. The people answered with gratifying assent, and soon Milo's armies were marching across Faerûn, bringing the disorderly realms to heel.
That's how it should have gone, damn it.
To the grave he went,
Falling to temptation,
By confusing whim,
With reconciliation.
Perhaps a little less linear, a little more swashbuckling…
Emboldened by undeath to explore new ways of living, Milo tried his hand at cat-burgling, which he found incredibly exciting, but, alas, proved none too adept at. After a bungled raid on a mage's library, he fled the wrath of the Cowled Wizards all the way to Waterdeep.
A brief stint as a black market scroll merchant later, he ventured to Silverymoon. Using forged credentials from the Lady's College, Milo posed as a magical instructor, wormed his way into the confidence of gullible wizards, gaining him access to their spellbooks. Escaping his marks, Milo joined the army marching towards Luskan, gathered to meet their most recent aggression.
Once setting foot in the City of Sails, Milo promptly betrayed his comrades and defected to the other side, joining the Arcane Brotherhood. He spent an entire month unearthing the secrets of the Host Tower before raising the ire of the Archmage Arcane, and in a dash he was off on a ship bound for Neverwinter.
The Bitch-Queen had other ideas, however, and the ship was blown off course, and somehow ended up in Calimshan. All for the best, as it gave Milo an opportunity to play a different game: the infiltration of a Pasha's palace. Chased out of Calimport by an angry fire-sorcerer, Milo crossed the Shining Sea, arriving at Lapaliiya, where he gave the natives even more reason to fear arcane spellcasters.
Next, it was Halruaa that beckoned, where a different tack was tried. He cultivated his scholarly reputation—became of a man of letters, wrote essays on magical theory—by which means he gained admission into more rarefied courts, eventually swindling his way into the towers of several Halruaan archmages.
Having whet his arcane appetite on such wonders, Milo hungered for even more delectable fare.
He dreamt of stealing into the academies of Thayan red wizards, to learn their infernal binding techniques and methods of elemental manipulation
He fantasized of participating in the great circles of the witches of Rashemen, to understand their style of spirit summoning
He envisioned raiding the oldest tombs and most ancient mausoleums, to master the mysteries of the old empires: Imaskar and Illefarn, Narfell and Raumathar, Cormanthor and Myth Drannor, and grandest of them all Netheril.
Milo had all of eternity to learn all magic the world had to offer; he could barely wait to go out and get it.
That would have been acceptable.
Instead he got this.
In memoriam Milo,
Plaything of fate;
In articulo mortis,
A rotting state.
Or more traditional. Milo was a sucker for tradition.
He cloistered himself in his home in the sewers, devoting his undead energies to study and research. Now he had plenty of time to follow up on promising projects, and to focus completely on mastering the Art.
Naturally, the order of things demanded that others would seek to take what was his, so Milo planned accordingly.
His first line of defence were the illusions draped over his lair, subtle enough to prevent witless wanderers from stumbling into his domain, but not to turn away tomb-raiders lured there by the promise of easy treasure, rumours planted by Milo's own hand.
The second layer of security were the monsters whose service he compelled, and whose duty was dictated to be the defence—to their death—of Milo's stronghold.
Third were the ingenious and ostentatiously lethal traps he installed on every door, bookcase or chest (in other words, wherever adventurers might lay their grubby hands).
Fourth were the riddles and puzzles that were essential features of any self-respecting master wizard's dungeon.
Fifth and final was Milo himself, in all his reality-shattering power. He would feast on the intruders' wealth and knowledge, before finally devouring their souls.
Ah, such would have been a good unlife…
Since Milo the thirty-third,
Died without writing a word,
These lines so hastily done,
Count for two rather than one.
Milo's daydreaming was interrupted by the sound of Verona's voice.
"Good morning to you, Mister Tosscobble!" said the master of the sphere as she descended the stairs to Milo's cell, accompanied, as always, by Morul.
Milo put down his quill and regarded his captors for a moment. Though Morul had schooled his face into calmness, his left hand worried at the hem of his robe and his eyes were darting to and fro. He kept taking short, agitated breaths, and he was swallowing more than usual. The boy was uneasy, plain as day.
Since embracing undeath, Milo had begun to notice these things, things which had previously been invisible to him. He had learned that living beings were predictable beasts. In thrall to base urges they couldn't control, their thoughts betrayed by every word and gesture, the truth of their intentions written as clearly in their faces as in their minds, mortals were more akin to automata than free-willed beings, though constituted by blood and bones instead of the gears of clockwork.
The master of the sphere was more difficult to read, however.
At times, what Verona thought was unambiguously apparent, and her emotions radiated from her in crashing waves. There was no confusing her anger, amusement or annoyance, and when you were its target, you felt it palpably. At other times, Verona's behaviour was that of a bad actor's approximation of a regular person: all superficiality and empty emoting, the cadence of her voice an affectation, the twitch of her facial muscles a performance, and the details of her body language an afterthought.
Now Verona seemed to be in good cheer, which seldom boded well for Milo.
"And a good morning to you as well," said Milo. "Though I will have to take your word for it."
"Not for much longer," said Verona. "You are to be released from your confinement."
No matter Milo's surprise at hearing those words, no matter his uncertainty as to what they meant, he knew from painful experience that Verona did not like having to repeat herself, so he decided to play along.
"Well, it's about time," said Milo.
"Indeed!" said Verona and gestured for Morul, who took a step forward, retrieved a rod from within the folds of his robe, and tapped it against the barrier that kept Milo locked in his cell.
"You may step out now, Mister Tosscobble," said Morul.
In a moment of rank madness, Milo entertained thoughts of defiance. It was a momentary lapse, however, and he settled for a smaller act of rebellion by taking the time to roll up the parchment he'd been writing on and put in a drawer—the need to keep a tidy desk outweighing the risk of pain—before complying with Morul's implied imperative and walked out of his cell.
As he did so, leaving the noxious anti-magic zone behind him, he felt a thrill in the very core of his being as his connection to the Weave re-established itself. Mistress Magic was his command once again. He didn't have his spellbook, so he was still cut off from his main source of power, but it was a start. A marvellous, marvellous start.
"Welcome back," said Verona. "Of course, we can't have you going around looking like you do… or at least Morul convinced me of as much."
Milo glanced down at his bare-boned self. Verona had flayed off his festering flesh during a previous experiment.
"And what do you suggest…" said Milo, trailing off when he saw the lumpy beige ball hovering beside Verona.
"I'm glad you asked," said Verona. "Be still; this takes some finesse."
The ball folded itself open in such a way as to call to mind the bloom of a rotten flower. The interior of the ball was a visceral, glistening redness, raw and moist with all manner of unsavoury fluid, convulsing as peristaltic waves rippled across its surface. For a moment it just hanged there, squirming in Verona's invisible grip, and then it enveloped Milo within itself.
At first, the sensation was not unlike getting into a wet pyjamas. But that comparison quickly lost its force when the wet fabric that clung everywhere began to feel less like cloth and more like Milo's own flesh, muscle and skin. Milo then experienced a shift in his perceptions, as if he had begun to sense the world at a remove; he saw with eyes, felt with fingers, tasted with a tongue. It was almost like…
"…walking in your own skin again?"
Milo looked up at Verona. "What did you say?"
Verona looked at him with a tolerant smile. "I asked how it feels to walk in your own skin again."
Suddenly Milo was startled at his own nakedness. His nakedness. This arm, he thought, this skin, these fingers… they are mine. Panic overcame him for a second, as he thought perhaps Verona had made him mortal again. But no. The skin he wore had once been his, he saw that now, but even though it seemed to have been grafted onto his skeletal frame, and even though it relayed sensations to his mind and obeyed his commands, it was not properly part of him any longer. And there was something perverse in the way the tissue seemed to slither around his bones, something debased about the skin's insinuating snugness.
"It feels great," said Milo.
"A curious bit of magic, that," said Verona as she looked over Milo's new body. "Closely related to shapeshifting. Powerful, I suppose, but I personally see little appeal in changing my appearance. I prefer that the world bend to my will, rather than the other way around." She drew back a little, wiped at her sleeve, as if the mere mention of such sorceries had dirtied her.
"And now," she continued, "my will is that you, Mister Tosscobble, lend your assistance to Morul, for whatever tasks he sets before you. You bragged earlier of your proficiency at binding and summoning; perhaps we'll find some small use for that talent."
Verona gave a nod to her apprentice, a last look at Milo, and then she disappeared in a puff of smoke.
With his captor gone, Milo felt free to seethe. He hated the way Verona's look lingered in his memory, how it made him shiver all over; hated that he didn't know if it was an engineered weakness of this new prison of skin that enclosed him, or if Verona could somehow strike terror into creatures who by all rights should be exempt from such mortal failings. And he hated that Verona hadn't even made any threats; hated that his obedience was simply assumed, that she didn't think there was any danger to letting him out of his cell. And most of all, he hated she was right in all her assumptions. Milo would go along with it all, because Verona had his phylactery, and she could crush him like a bug if she so desired.
Milo fixed Morul with his most imperious glare. "Boy, should I brazen this sphere in the flesh, or will you bring me some clothes?"
After he'd been appropriately attired—white-woollen breeches and shirt, a dapper vest in corduroy brown, a pair of fine leather boots—Milo was given a more in-depth tour of the planar sphere.
He was introduced to Nara, another apprentice of Verona's, a young human girl, earnest and eager to please. She administered the sphere's nested hierarchy of libraries. The collected lore was both wide-ranging in its subject matter and deep in its detail. There were not only separate libraries for natural philosophy, history, languages, cartography, theology, planar lore and magic theory, but sections and sub-sections for ever-narrowing specialities: one room dedicated to figment illusions, another to the flora and fauna of the Chultan peninsula; one room for the necrology of Old Illusk, another for dialects of elven; and so on. Each division came with its own set of tenders and sages, there to assist, collect, catalogue and research.
He was shown the workshops—alchemy, spellcraft, golem construction, item creation, and more—and the great furnace that powered them.
Then the lecture hall and communal eating area.
The scrying pool, a great circle at least ten feet across, upon the unnaturally still surface of which was currently displayed a bird's eye view of Athkatla.
The summoning chambers, of varying sizes to accommodate whatever creatures one cared to call there.
The size of it all was bewildering, but one thing caught Milo's attention.
"You have not showed me anything of the sphere's internal machinery," said Milo.
Morul was hesitant with his reply, but apparently his master had given him no orders to withhold this piece of information that he so very obviously wanted to share, so he proceeded to divulge what he knew and suspected.
"There is another layer to the sphere," said Morul. "However, Master Verona says that it's… dangerous to go there until we can repair it."
"The sphere's broken?"
"In a sense. I don't understand all the details, but from what I gather, the last jump fried the, ah, core of the sphere."
"If your master built the thing, shouldn't she be able to fix it?"
"Oh, Master Verona didn't build the sphere."
"She didn't? Who did?"
"A necromancer named Lavok, I believe."
"And where's he?"
"Well, uh, Master Verona killed him…"
"…and took the sphere. Of course she did."
Milo soon learned why Verona bothered to keep Morul around. The boy was a dab hand at the creation of magical items, and his 'primary purpose' [Verona's words] was to furnish her with such things as she required them. Apparently, enchantment of magical items was not part of the skillset of the master of the sphere. A useful thing to know.
"Where did she get all of this?"
"From the drow."
"Your master peddles metal with the dark elves?"
"Well, not exactly…"
"Say no more, I understand."
While Milo had resigned himself to servility (at least for the time being), it still unnerved him when he found a scroll of the phantasmagoria spell serving as a bookmark in a sourcebook on the astral plane.
The phantasmagoria spell ensnared its victim in a self-reinforcing illusionary world. In other words, the victim's sensory experiences would be under the complete control of the caster, and they might never know that their entire world was a lie.
Milo quickly realized that Verona could have cast this spell on him. Everything he saw, felt, smelt, heard, tasted—all of it—could be part of an elaborate illusion. And there could be traps within the illusion, tempting Milo to commit actions that would be construed as defiance. For instance, suppose Milo found a way to escape Verona's clutches—or worse, kill her—and he seized the opportunity…
It was within the realm of possibility that Milo's experiences were real and not illusory, but Verona had placed the scroll there deliberately for him to find (and she knew what books he was likely to read), in order to discourage rebellion, or just to mess with his head.
He could well imagine her doing either.
Or both; his experiences could be fake and Verona could've placed the scroll there to taunt him.
Or neither, and it was just coincidence that he found the scroll. He couldn't be certain.
And it didn't even matter that as a lich, he should be immune to such illusions, because logical restrictions didn't seem to apply to Verona.
During his years among the cowls, Milo had cultivated a healthy paranoia. But now it was driving him to hysterics.
He settled the matter by kicking a rock, and then got back to his research.
"I have to know, why put up with her? What do you gain?"
"She's an incredibly powerful wizard. There's a lot I can learn from her."
"Really? And how much time does she spend teaching you, as opposed to berating you? Or ordering you about?"
"Eh, you see, well…"
"I thought as much."
"Now, wait a minute. I'm well-beyond mastering my cantrips—it's not like Master Verona has to drill me on the basics of magery. And I'm offered opportunities to learn things I couldn't elsewhere. My master can be generous; I have free perusal of her scroll collection, I get to experiment with top-notch equipment, and…"
"All right, good points, but that's not all there is to it—please, I'm no fool. You're a Cowled Wizard, like I am. What do they think of your association with Verona? I know her reputation."
"As I said, the benefits outweigh the—"
"Don't bother saying it. Yes, I might expect such a calculated move from certain kinds of individuals; not from someone like you. You're not bold enough—don't make that face at me, it's not an insult—so let's stop this game and just tell me the truth. Or not, and we get back to work, but spare me your rationalizations. Yes? I can see you want to tell me. Speak up."
"Do you know my master's history with the Cowled Wizards?"
"She apparently killed a lot of us."
"More than that. When she got here—uh, to Athkatla, I mean—she was given warning that only licenced mages were allowed to use magic. She defied that warning. Wizards were sent to apprehend her. She killed them. She continued flaunting the law against magic, and she kept killing those sent after her. Eventually, the Cowled Wizards sent their strongest numbers against her. To no avail; they died like all the others. At that point, there was no one who dared go up against her, so she was essentially free to do as she wished. That was when she chose to purchase the licence to use magic."
"Why am I not surprised…"
"And that was before I was assigned to Master Verona, as part of the reconciliation."
"They certainly didn't do you any favours."
"Yes, I learned all of this after I graduated. Apparently, my mother, Lady Zhamn Ophal, had made an enemy of a high-ranking Cowled Wizard. Her idea of revenge was to have me assigned to Master Verona, so that I would be tainted by association. No-one within the organization would work with me."
"So you went back to Verona."
"Yes."
"Let me guess: it was Khollynnus Paac."
"How did you know?"
"I recognize her work; it reeks of her characteristic spite."
"What does this tell you?"
"Let me see. Well, ah, it's an anchor for the Weave, that binds magic to the item."
"Really? Cast the identification spell again. Look closely at the illusion effect."
"Very well. But I don't see wh—huh, now that's… odd."
"My thoughts exactly."
"It looks like an anchor for the Weave, it's just that something's…"
"…off about it?"
"Precisely. Where does it say this amulet was found?"
"Anauroch desert, I think."
"Strange indeed."
Every night, Milo was returned to his cell. He spent those lonesome hours deep in thought.
His restrictions had been eased—he had free range of the sphere, and had not been experimented upon since (maybe because Verona didn't want to damage Milo's new hide)—but that was not enough. It was contrary to his very nature to be caged; therefore, he had to attempt escape.
Perchance he might regain his spellbook. But even if he did, would it allow him to breach the defences around the sphere? Defences that had stymied even his superiors among the Cowled Wizards?
Maybe he could contrive to be re-united with Synigoros, and thereby benefit from his imp familiar's wise advice? But how much would that weigh in the balance, in the end?
Possibly he could learn the spell written on the scroll on his desk in front of him, the spell of the ninth circle that supposedly allowed spellcasting within an anti-magic zone. Never mind that the spell was magnitudes above him, what good would it do?
All lines of reasoning snarled around the same thorn: Verona.
Was it possible for Milo to kill her?
How, given that he didn't even know how strong she was, only that she was undoubtedly an archmage? To defeat such a foe, by whose own admission death was little more than an irritant…
There existed means of binding souls, of preventing resurrection. Or diverse methods of magical imprisonment, which locked a victim away—still alive, for a certain value of 'alive', but in no shape to retaliate.
But even Milo knew of countermeasures to all those things, and someone like Verona surely knew of more.
He could try to placate Verona. This would be the safest route, in as much as the word 'safe' meant anything around Verona.
And yet… Morul didn't seem to live in fear for his life. He was proof of the proposition that accommodations could be made with Verona.
"So, snivelling submissiveness it is?" said Milo.
He despised himself for not coming up with a better alternative.
It was at the stroke of midnight, on the day when Summertide gave way for Highsun.
Milo and Morul were labouring in a summoning chamber in the planar sphere. They were drawing an intricate circular shape, measuring approximately ten yards along its circumference, painted with the most extravagantly expensive dyes and oils.
The sound of footsteps, of a person entering the chamber.
"A minute, master," said Morul, for it could only have been Verona, and they were attending to a delicate task.
Morul prepared the argentite emulsion, and then, with a concluding curlicue from Milo, the figure was complete: a summoning diagram impressed on the floor of the chamber.
"And we're done," said Milo.
They carefully put away their brushes and jars of pigments, eased away from the wet paint to survey their efforts. "Yes, we're done," said Morul, visibly satisfied. They turned towards Verona.
And there she stood, uniformed in the gear of a battlemage: black robes over mithril and dragonscale. For all that she was ready and prepared for bloodshed, she wore a jovial smile on her face.
Milo and Morul shared an uneasy glance—both knowing that Verona's appearance, demeanour, indeed her very presence, portended something significant—and at once turned back to the summoning diagram they'd just finished drawing. Partly because both knew what was expected of them, and partly because Morul didn't want his master to see his shaking hands. The truth was that they weren't entirely done with their work.
Morul first spoke a quick spell to clear away every speck of dirt, particle of dust, smudge of paint, blot of ink and spot of moisture from the diagram. Then he assayed a more powerful transmutation, whereby the pattern of the paint was indelibly infused into the marble of the floor. At this juncture, he had to choose which magical trap to tie to the summoning diagram, a decision which hinged upon the type of creature to be bound. Looking at him, Milo could practically see the logic working its way through Morul's brain.
As per Verona's instructions, they had bordered the diagram with symbols derived from a combination of the Celestial and Infernal scripts. (The perversity of the pairing made the calligraphy an almost physically painful effort.) Taken together, this would represent a supreme symbol of antipathy for one manner of being: demonic.
Having arrived at his conclusion, Morul cast the magic circle, setting the trap.
Finally, he made it so that once the trap was sprung, whatever caught inside was prevented from escaping through magical means.
"Are you finished?" said Verona.
"Yes," replied Morul. There was nothing more to be done; only the summoning itself remained. "With your leave, master," he said and made for the door, but she stopped him with a gesture.
"Stay. Both of you. This should prove instructional."
Morul and Milo fell in by Verona's side. She in turn took a single stride forward, traced a circle in the air with her hand, and began speaking words of power—words Milo couldn't even begin describing, never mind transcribing—forming phrases that tore at the very space around them.
(She hadn't so much as glanced at their work—as far as Milo had seen—giving him the uneasy feeling that the protections and safeguards they had put into place were more for their benefit than hers.)
What followed were successive assaults on Milo's senses, each one more tremendous than the other. First, like some inverted lightning strike, there was a terrible clash succeeded by a bright blinding light; then, an overwhelming smell of rotten eggs followed by the great outrushing of wind that carried it; the taste of ashes and the pain of his tongue on fire; and then, a strike of the lash across his mind, words etched into his soul by acid, understanding burned in his awareness.
WHO DARES THIS SUMMONING? WHOSE SKIN SHOULD I FLAY FOR THE PRESUMPTION? WHOSE BONES SHOULD I BREAK FOR THE INSULT? WHOSE SOUL SHOULD I DEVOUR FOR THE DISRESPECT?
Standing before them was something that could have been borne from a child's fearful fancies. Cloven feet and massive bowed legs supported a hulking body seemingly made of fire and muscle, surmounted by a great horned head, the mouth a grin of daggers, the eyes black pits that drew in the light around them. A pair of wings, bat-like and bountifully spiked, sprouted from its back; in its one hand, a sword easily as long as Morul was tall, its edge gleaming with keen malevolence, in the other, a whip made of flames. And Milo felt the weight of all the beast's attention, focused upon him. At that moment, the wards—Milo's wards—that supposedly kept that thing at bay seemed a flimsy veneer indeed.
WHAT AMUSING HUBRIS LED YOU TO THIS MADNESS, LITTLE LICHLING? NO MATTER. YOUR SOUL IS UNWORTHY OF ME, BUT I SHALL TAKE YOUR PITIFUL BODY AND THROW IT TO THE DRETCHES FOR THEM TO FEAST UPON YOUR FLESH—
"Demon, I am your summoner," said Verona, interrupting the excruciating deluge of words that was flowing into Milo's mind.
The demon moved as if struck. It had apparently not seen her, even though she was standing before it confident and killing-clad.
I… I SEE. WHY HAVE YOU BROUGHT ME HERE, YOU WHO MIGHT HAVE BEEN LADY OF MURDER?
"I require something from you."
YOU DESIRE A BARGAIN? VERY WELL, MY LADY. WHAT IS THY OFFERING? WHAT MANNER OF TITHE WARRANTS MY AID?
In response to that, Verona offered the abomination an indulgent smile, much similar to the smiles she gave her apprentices, when they had said something endearingly naïve.
"Oh, you misunderstand me. You're not here to make a deal; it's your presence I need, not your cooperation or consent."
There was a loud rattle and clanging as massive chains whipped out from holes in the summoning chamber's walls, wrapping themselves around the demon's limbs. These were chains of true-forged adamantine, and upon the manacles holding the demon fast were inscribed runes of magic negation. (Milo knew this because he participated in their construction and enchantment—an obscene expense.)
The fires that played across the demon's body died in an instant, not unlike a candle flame snuffed out by the wind. Its sword and whip clattered to the ground, the latter's fire extinguished as well, and the demon gave a guttural cry as it strained against its bindings, but to no effect. Instead, the chains tightened, splaying out the great and terrible creature as if an insect prepared for a microscopist's scrutiny.
"THIS WILL NOT STAND!" the creature roared, its words no longer appearing in Milo's mind but shouted, at ear-splitting loudness, in the common tongue. "I WILL DRINK YOUR BLOOD! I WILL GNAW ON YOUR BONES FOR AN ETERNITY! I WILL—"
"You will be quiet."
All sounds from the demon were unnaturally silenced, even as it gave every appearance of trying to bellow its displeasure for all to hear.
Verona turned to Milo and Morul, and said, "If you'd mind moving a bit to the side?"
At this point, Milo had become so numbed that the following events washed over him in a blur. Above it all, he remembered a great stretch consisting only of Verona's voice.
"Thank you, Morul, Mister Tosscobble. Golem! Enter. Step forward two yards; yes, stop there. With your left articulated appendage, take a firm hold of the hide beneath the arm there—a little higher, yes there—and hold it still, so as to minimize the torso's movement relative to your frame. Now, with your right articulated appendage—currently with the blade attached, yes that one—and place it point first just below the chin, holding it—the blade!—perpendicular to the torso. Upon my mark, increase the pressure against the hide gradually until you achieve a penetration of one feet; and, mark! Now move the blade downwards, maintaining a depth of penetration of one feet—and… stop. Detach the blade. Release your hold, yes. Place both your articulated appendages on the torso, and guide your digital extremities to the furrow you've made, approaching from opposing vectors along the curve of the torso, perpendicular to the furrow. Now, probe with your digits inside the furrow and take a strong hold. Now, tear it open; I mean, with your hold firm, exert gradually increasing force along opposing vectors perpendicular to the furrow, along the horizontal curve of the torso. Stop. Within the cavity, there is a mass about two feet in cross section, rhythmically contracting and expanding. Sever the connections to the mass from the surrounding tissue; with the blade, do it with the blade. There. Take the mass carefully—carefully!—and remove it from the cavity. Good. Place the mass inside the container. Good. Good! Golem, deposit the container in my private laboratory, then resume regular duties. Morul, nice work with the golem, but I think we can make its language comprehension a bit more sophisticated; it's such a bother to have to make instructions so literal. Anyway, clean up this place, won't you? I'll be in my lab; see you tomorrow. Good night."
Some indeterminate time later, another voice broke through the fog of his daze.
"Mister Tosscobble!"
Of course it was Morul. They were still standing in the chamber, amidst the aftermath of Verona's summoning.
Milo didn't want to think about what had happened—he wanted to flee to his cell, where he was safe from such anathema that had invaded his mind, and could unsee the unspeakably vile thing Verona had done to it—but something the beast had said had become lodged in Milo's unfailing memory, and he simply had to explore it.
"What did it mean," said Milo slowly, "when that thing said that Verona 'might have been Lady of Murder'?"
Morul looked at him with astonishment.
"You don't know?" said Morul. He straightened himself and addressed the air, "Servitor! Fetch the biography!" A moment passed, and a book materialized in Morul's hand. He gave it to Milo. "A little bedtime reading for you."
The book was bound in soft leather—'twas a decent-sized tome, two-hands' width, or thereabout—upon the title page of which it read 'The Life and Adventures of Verona, Greatest of the Children of Bhaal, by Volothamp Geddarm, Esq.' Accompanying the title was a very good likeness of the master of the sphere, captured in lines of black ink.
AN: Another chapter for my loyal audience of two (three?) readers. If you feel like it, I very much appreciate reviews. If you don't, that's all right as well.
