Not long thereafter, Callista decided that her purpose consisted mostly of being prodded before Nerothos through a series of increasingly suspicious-looking portals.

Nerothos had opened yet another with his stolen trinket, and now she stared at the circle of rippling stone with a look of annoyed resignation. There were none of those convenient little portholes in this part of the corridor, and she had no idea what was on the other side. She wanted dearly to argue, but somehow she doubted very much she would win a game of 'let's you go first' with the dreadlord.

Scowling blackly, she stepped through the portal –

– and into the chest of a rather surprised and fearsomely-armed doomguard.

Callista and the doomguard gawked at each other, before recovering their wits almost simultaneously.

The doomguard bellowed in rage, hefting his huge double-headed battleaxe.

Callista yelled in panic, trying to scramble away and summon a gout of felfire in the same motion. Her efforts were impeded, however, by a clawed hand seizing her wrist, preventing both flight and her attempted incineration of the doomguard.

She struggled wildly for a moment, before realizing that she hadn't been disemboweled, and the doomguard had, in fact, lowered his battleaxe. Twisting her head around, she discovered that the claw belonged to Nerothos. He had her arm in one hand and a token, a coin-shaped piece of silver marked with a glowing seal, in the other.

She yanked her wrist free with a scowl.

The doomguard waved them through, looking bored and just a little disappointed as he stepped back to his post. He was standing guard beside a magnificent set of double gates, large enough that a fel reaver could have comfortably marched through, and as thick as Callista was tall. They were heavily enchanted, brilliant with runes. Power boiled off of them in waves, causing the fine hairs on her neck to stand up and the air to taste like static.

"You knew that was there," Callista hissed at Nerothos, as they passed through the gates into the cavernous room beyond.

"Of course," he said, totally unrepentant. His eyes scanned the area methodically, searching. "The guards have been overzealous of late."

Callista muttered something highly uncomplimentary, which Nerothos ignored.

The room they had entered was enormous, hewn directly from the red bedrock of Xoroth, and teeming with demons. The air smelled of smoke and acrid chemicals, and the din was terrible. Looking around, Callista found the source of most of the smoke to be a row of heavy industrial machinery against the wall to her right, stamping glowing rivers of molten metal into black steel components unidentifiable to her.

A cage containing another of those half-mutated dwarves stood to her left, swarmed around by gan'arg and a single harried-looking mo'arg engineer. He had, she was mildly interested to note, only one arm. The other was missing above the elbow, capped off with a tangled mess of metal and wires. He was waving a spanner around in the mechanical claw that served as his single remaining hand as he harangued his underlings.

"Wait here," Nerothos commanded as he strode off towards the cage.

Callista narrowed her eyes but did as she was bid, watching as Nerothos addressed the one-armed mo'arg. The mo'arg looked rather alarmed to see him, cowering subserviently.

She wrinkled her nose in scorn, and leaned against a low stone table to wait. It was piled high with wires, cogs, enchanted crystals, bits of metal, and various mystifying tools. She picked idly through the junk, keeping half an eye on Nerothos.

The mo'arg was nodding vigorously now and gesturing towards the far wall. Nerothos was, as usual, inscrutable. At least he appeared to be making someone else miserable, for once.

Something glittered among the mound of bits and pieces on the table, catching her eye. She casually pushed aside a nest of burnt-out wire to reveal a multifaceted prism identical to the one Nerothos had used to enter the wall spaces. A quick glance assured her that no demons were watching, and she pocketed it. She had no idea what mischief the dreadlord was involved in here, but she didn't like it. At least now she could escape on her own, should the situation sour.

Nerothos returned to collect her, addressing her carelessly. "Come, warlock."

His tone was galling, but she had to admit she didn't find his presence quite as distasteful as she had earlier. Mostly because she was beginning to attract unpleasant stares from the other denizens of Xoroth, who were unused to mortals outside of warded cages. Mo'arg and gan'arg alone and in small groups held no terror for her (they were inventors, not warriors), but being outnumbered several hundred to one by the creatures was a bit disheartening.

She pushed herself away from the table less ill-temperedly than she might otherwise have done, following Nerothos' leathery-winged back as he stalked toward a runed archway set in the far wall.

"I don't suppose you'd like to tell me why I'm here," Callista said, minutes later, as they passed through the arch into a large antechamber. It contrasted sharply with the roughly-hewn, utilitarian room they had just left, tiled in gleaming black stone accented with precious and semi-precious gems and lit with green flames burning in finely-worked silver braziers.

Nerothos halted and turned to face her. His expression, for once, lacked any of the contemptuous amusement she'd come to associate with the dreadlord, and she looked up at him warily.

"Your task is to remain here and watch for gan'arg."

Callista stared blankly. This was so unexpectedly stupid it took a moment to sink in. "What?" she said finally. She could see two gan'arg without even turning her head, busy polishing one of the braziers. She resisted a sarcastic impulse to point out that she'd found some.

She found herself talking to Nerothos' back. The dreadlord had turned and was striding toward an ornate double gate at the back of the chamber.

Callista's eyes narrowed. Oh, she didn't think so. She was thoroughly sick of being hauled off to strange places by a creature she hated and lying about things she didn't understand. If no more answers were forthcoming from Nerothos, she would get them her own way.

She cupped her hands together and murmured an incantation. When her hands parted, a small sphere of pale greenish light was floating between them. An Eye of Kilrogg. The Eye lifted from her palms and darted towards Nerothos, hovering above and just behind him.

The double gates swung open noiselessly to admit the dreadlord, and the little sphere of light flitted in just before they slammed silently shut.

Callista closed her eyes, and instead of darkness she saw the adjoining room. She immediately breathed a sigh of relief. She had been worried it would be bare, no place to conceal her spy, but that fear had been unfounded. The room was crowded with artifacts of every kind. All of them looked as though they were worth a fortune, and most of them radiated power. Statues of gold and precious metals, runeblades, carved gems, even something that looked suspiciously like a shard of ata'mal crystal. Whatever demon inhabited this place had expensive tastes, and impressive means to indulge them.

Callista instructed her Eye to wedge itself between a gold-covered book of spells and a sword about which fel-colored lightning crackled. It was hidden there, and had a good view of Nerothos, who was standing at one side of a massive jet-black table inlaid with opalescent runes.

She opened her eyes, and her view switched back to the antechamber. Rows of black marble columns ran along either side of the room, and she chose one with a good view of both entrances to lean against. She didn't trust this place.

When she shut her eyes again, three other demons had joined Nerothos around the table. A six-armed shivarra, eyes glowing with fanatical light; a mo'arg, half of whose face had been replaced by a steel prosthetic; and a demon Callista had never seen before. He looked a little like a dreadlord, but larger and far more hideous. Even hunched over as he was, he stood half a head taller than Nerothos. He had too many arms, an extra pair emerging from his bulging shoulders beneath the first, and his bat-like wings were marked with decorative patterns of scars, likely self-inflicted.

He had been speaking, but his voice was so thick with a strange accent it took Callista a moment to realize he was speaking Eredun and not some other accursed tongue of the Nether. "- will learn the consequences of reneging on his contracts with the Tothrezim!" the demon snarled. His sunken eyes burned with furious hatred, and the claws of his bottom two hands gouged into the tabletop.

The shivarra stood at his side, two of her slender arms looped through one of his. "Soon now, my lord," she said, stroking his arm soothingly. Her voice would have been pleasant, if it hadn't been laced with such malice. "High Mekgineer Charin assures me your forces are prepared."

"Aye, lord," the mo'arg said, artificial eye glowing a deep red. "We await only your word. Assuming, of course, that Nerothos has kept his."

"But of course," Nerothos said, resonant voice courteous. "If your forces can win their way to the Draenor-gate, I can usher them through. Lord Banehollow will be most pleased by your defection."

Mekgineer Charin grunted noncommittally at that.

Nerothos' back was to Callista's Eye, so she couldn't read his expression. A pity, since this was proving to be a very interesting discussion. So. It seemed that Nerothos was an agent of the Shadow Council. She supposed that explained why his Common was so good.

She opened her eyes, intending only to take a quick look around the antechamber, and froze. The one-armed mo'arg she had seen Nerothos speak to earlier was marching purposefully towards her, flanked by two gan'arg assistants. He was looking at her in a clinical, curious way, as if she were a specimen he would like to dissect, and she stared back at him as contemptuously as she could manage.

The mo'arg and his entourage paused a few feet in front of her. He looked her up and down through green-tinted goggles, muttering to himself. "Yes, yes, healthy specimen, very good, should do excellently."

Callista glowered. This had to be Nerothos' doing. She would kill him. "I am not one of your specimens!" she snapped in Eredun. Every time she blinked, her vision flicked between rooms, and she was beginning to find it disorienting. She regretfully dismissed her Eye of Kilrogg.

The mo'arg looked at her with something like incredulity. "It speaks! How curious. Ah, well, no matter. Best hope your performance is less disappointing than that of those dwarf-creatures, human. Otherwise we'll just have to purge the lot of you, such a waste." He tsked disapprovingly.

"Oh, I'm not worried about it," Callista said, tilting her head appraisingly. If he thought he was getting her in one of those cages, he was insane. Nerothos and his ilk were a bit more demon than she was really equipped to handle, but this little footpad she could deal with. He only had one arm, for one thing, and the furtive way his gaze darted around gave him a distinct whiff of minion. Callista had a great deal of practice in handling minions. Her hand crept towards the hilt of her dagger.

"Good, good," the mo'arg said, edging closer. "Now, if you'll just – "

He lunged, mechanical claw grasping. He threw his entire weight forward, expecting Callista to try to push him away, but instead she grabbed his forearm and yanked hard. Off-balance, he fell into the marble column Callista had been leaning against, and, as he tried to use his one good arm to lever himself back up, she drove her knife through his forearm and into the column, trapping him there.

He howled in pain and outrage. "Release me at once, mortal!"

"No," Callista said, leaning on the hilt of her dagger. Then, looking at his gan'arg attendants, "Shoo." She conjured a handful of felfire and stared at them meaningfully.

The two gan'arg exchanged glances, then backed up two large steps.

"Traitorous cowards!" the mo'arg wailed. "The Lady will flay your miserable reeking hides! And you! She will make you beg for the peace of death, human!"

Callista regarded him critically, unmoved by his threats. She couldn't let him go, but she didn't really want to kill him, either. He looked rather pathetic with his stump of an arm flailing about that way, and she wondered if this sort of thing happened to him often. Oh well. As long as she had him stuck here, she might as well see if he knew anything useful. He had, after all, had a rather lengthy conversation with Nerothos. She pulled a soul shard out of her pocket.

"A warlock? Nothing was said – What are you doing with that?! Release me, you wretched creature!" the mo'arg demanded, eyeing her skittishly.

"Answer my questions, and I'll let you go." The problem with asking questions of demons, of course, was that they lied. Callista could force the mo'arg to be truthful, but if she bound him with an enslavement spell the ties that held Jhormug to this plane would dissolve, and Tun and the others would be left defenseless until her return. After a moment's deliberation she decided it was worth the risk. They must surely have been discovered by the gan'arg days ago, and if nothing had happened to them yet it wasn't likely to happen now.

She closed her hand around the soul shard, and murmured the words that would initiate the spell.

Several minutes later, she had learned that the mo'arg's name was Fiendsmith Tazlik, he served, among other duties, as a personal aide to Lady Sarlah (the shivarra she had seen in the adjoining room), and he was involved in her mutinous conspiracy up to his bulging, bloodshot eyeballs. Also, he hated Callista.

"Why chance it?" she asked, once he had satisfied her curiosity on more concrete matters. He hadn't, so far, told her anything she couldn't have deduced herself from the conversation she'd overheard through her scrying spell. It seemed that Lord Vathregyr (the Tothrezim) controlled a substantial portion of the Xorothian war machine, and, with the help of his lieutenants, was preparing to assault one of Xoroth's waygates using Hel'nurath's own forces.

"Not that it's any business of a sniveling mortal dog, but Lord Vathregyr is furious because he believes Hel'nurath cheated him on his last commission." Tazlik was bound by Callista's spell to lie neither directly nor by omission, but he was still free to couch the truth in whatever terms he wished. His abuse was becoming quite colorful. "The High Mekgineer possesses a great deal of technical information desired by the Shadow Council, whose leader would also like to see Hel'nurath discredited (you filthy meat parasite), and they have offered the Mekgineer a substantial incentive to join them (I hope the Lady tears out your entrails through your eyes)."

"And what of your Lady? What does she want?" Callista asked, still leaning on her dagger hilt. She wasn't sure how much longer she'd be able to hold this spell. He was fighting her terribly.

"I can't tell you that," Tazlik said, twisting his lumpy head around to stare at her haughtily.

Callista frowned. That was unusual. She checked her magical bindings, and found they still held him. "Why not?"

"I can't say," he said again. He was breathing heavily now, as though in pain. Odd, since Callista hadn't actually harmed him. A knife through the arm was a trivial wound, for a demon. She regarded him contemplatively. If Tazlik said he couldn't tell her, he must be telling the truth. Which meant he either didn't know, or was in the grip of some magic stronger than hers.

"Do you know the answer?" she asked, watching him carefully.

"Yes," he spat grudgingly. He looked to be under significant duress now, pale chest heaving.

She thought that over for a moment, chewing her bottom lip. "If you were allowed to lie, what answer would you give?"

"I would say, you misbegotten cretin, that Lady Sarlah acts out of loyalty to her lord. Now cease this outrage immediately!"

Before Callista could follow up on that, her thoughts were interrupted by a searing pain behind her eyes as her enslavement spell failed. Ugh, she hated this part. The mental strain it took to subvert another creature's will, no longer mitigated by magic, was rapidly becoming a splitting headache.

"Unhand me, you imbecilic collection of spare parts!" Tazlik shrieked.

She pinched the bridge of her nose with one hand as his flailing became even more violent. "Look, if you'll just – "

"My word, what's happened here?" A cultured, feminine voice, cold as glacier ice, cut into Callista's speech.

Tazlik immediately ceased his struggling and began to grovel. Or rather, he tried to. He looked to be having difficulty abasing himself properly with his single arm pinned to the column, so Callista helpfully yanked her dagger free.

Then she turned, and had to resist the urge to do a little cowering of her own.

Nerothos' meeting had adjourned. Now he, Lady Sarlah, Lord Vathregyr, and High Mekgineer Charin were gathered in the antechamber, staring at her and Tazlik. They did not look amused.

Callista winced, and tried belatedly to wipe Tazlik's blood off her hand.

Lord Vathregyr grinned unpleasantly, showing an impressive collection of fangs. "Oh, dear, Lady. It appears as though one of your pet's little experiments has gone awry."

"So it seems," Lady Sarlah said coolly. Her face was classically beautiful, but such malice shone from it Callista couldn't find her anything but terrifying. "Explain this disruption, Tazlik."

Tazlik looked up from where he was kneeling to reply. "My-my lady! This creature – "

"That creature is mine," Nerothos interrupted smoothly.

Callista, who had been petrified with fear until now, was reminded by Nerothos' voice that she was also furious. And her head was killing her. She regained enough of her nerve to scowl contemptuously at his comment.

Her expression did not go unnoticed by Lady Sarlah. "Yours, Nerothos? My, my, she isn't very fond of you, is she? I didn't know you kept pets."

Callista looked even more disgusted at that, but held her tongue. High Mekgineer Charin, who had not said anything yet, gazed from her to Nerothos to Tazlik with a piercing, calculating stare that made her uncomfortable. Her scowl darkened.

"She is a most unwilling servant, I'm afraid," Nerothos said, stepping forward to seize Callista about the arm and looking down at her in amusement. "She would destroy me if she possessed the means, but since she does not, she serves. It is a useful quality of mortals."

"Indeed," Lady Sarlah said, laying two of her hands on one of Lord Vathregyr's arms. Callista tried unsuccessfully to wrench herself away from Nerothos' grip, and the Lady looked amused at the attempt.

Nerothos took his leave of his co-conspirators, and Callista found herself propelled back through the archway, the dreadlord gouging her arm with his claws whenever she opened her mouth to speak. He didn't release her until they were inside the walls again, and well away from the last of the scurrying gan'arg.

"You set me up!" Callista snarled, as soon as he let her go. Her headache had abated, but she was still furious and now her arm was sore from Nerothos digging his talons into it.

"In a manner of speaking," Nerothos said, smiling wickedly. "Though I fail to see the source of your ire. I daresay you found it informative."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Callista said, giving him her best look of disdain. She didn't really expect to deceive Nerothos, whose race's talent it was to lay bare all mortal deception, but she lied anyway out of sheer perversity.

"You're a poor liar, warlock, though I suspect you are aware of it," Nerothos said, twitching his wings with an unimpressed air. "You enslaved his will, I would assume."

"No," Callista said coolly. She was beginning to suspect she was not the one who had been set up here, after all.

Nerothos ignored the transparent lie. "Did he speak at all of the lady Sarlah?"

Callista cocked her head at that, running her fingers thoughtfully along the coarse stone of the wall as she walked. "You think she's betrayed you."

It would explain that nonsense about watching for gan'arg. Nerothos questioning one of Sarlah's minions meant, without doubt, that he was suspicious. But Nerothos' servant, who was not in his confidence and clearly hated him, doing the same might only signify the servant's disloyalty.

"I think you should answer my question, warlock, and truthfully, or you will find you are not the only one with an interesting interrogation technique."

She raised a brow at the threat. So, she was right, then. She supposed it made sense. The shivarra were, as a rule, fanatically loyal to the Legion. And what Nerothos was mixed up in was most certainly treason.

"He couldn't tell me," Callista said, looking up at him with some interest now, anger mostly forgotten. "Another spell was more binding."

Nerothos growled softly, looking most displeased.

Na'rii woke groggily. She didn't remember going to sleep, and she stared through half-shut eyes at the shadowy ceiling, disoriented. The last thing she recalled was listening to the dreadlord and that warlock conversing in the demon-tongue. Her eyes narrowed to suspicious slits at the memory. She hadn't understood what they'd said, but the fact they had said it in a language no one else spoke was damning enough.

She moved cautiously into a crouch, gaze darting around the corridor. Tun was leaning against the wall, yawning drowsily. Callista was speaking to him with her back to Na'rii, and her felhunter was pacing restlessly just beyond them. Kar'thol sat in the middle of the floor, looking from side to side with a puzzled expression. He caught her eye and bared his blunt teeth in a meaningful snarl. The dreadlord had vanished.

How convenient. It was high time she received a few explanations, and she didn't expect any from him. She eyed Callista's unwatched back and grinned.

Callista rubbed at her arm where Nerothos' claws had gouged her, and watched enviously as Tun yawned. All Nerothos' running about was cutting into her rest. And now the dreadlord had disappeared, leaving her once again in the awkward position of explaining his whereabouts to an already suspicious group. They were all too groggy yet from the aftereffects of his spell to have noticed his absence, but it was only a matter of –

Her thoughts were interrupted by a cold prick of steel against her neck.

She yelped and tried to leap away, but suddenly found a wiry blue arm about her neck and the sword point pressed between her ribs. "What in hells?!"she swore, trying to twist to look at Na'rii.

Na'rii simply tightened her grip and dug her sword harder into Callista's chest. The warlock stopped squirming abruptly. "Let me go, you Horde savage!" she demanded, beginning to become alarmed.

"Na'rii, what in the Light are you doing?!" Tun asked, mouth agape in astonishment. "Let her go!"

"Sorry, mon, not 'til she be tellin' the truth," Na'rii said, tightening her lock on Callista's neck. "Now, what ya be up to wit' that demon when ya should be guardin', hmmm?"

"You plaguing idiot! I haven't been doing – "

Callista's last words were drowned out by Kar'thol's roar of agony. Her felhunter had slunk around the distracted group and lunged at him. Kar'thol had shattered the felhunter's shoulder with his chunk of door, but now Jhormug had the ogre's tattooed forearm between his jaws and was slowly crushing it in his teeth. There was a sharp crack as the bone splintered, and another agonized howl from Kar'thol.

"Kar'thol smash demon!" he bellowed, slamming a fist into the felhunter's wounded shoulder.

Jhormug growled around his mouthful of arm, the long spines on his back bristling in fury. Felhunters could feel pain, but fear had been bred from them eons ago. Injuring one would never deter it, only fuel its bloodlust.

"Call off the dog!" Na'rii snarled, jabbing Callista with her sword. Her practiced gaze swept over Kar'thol's arm. It was a nasty fracture, and the felhunter's teeth had torn up his flesh badly, but she thought she could mend it. Provided, of course, the foul creature didn't bite down and take his arm off entirely.

"Let me go," Callista countered, scowling. The troll woman's sword pointed at her heart was disturbing, but it was far from the worst thing she'd encountered in the last few days. "Oh, and I wouldn't touch that blood. It's poisoned." She tacked on the last statement with relish.

"Callista! Call that thing off before she runs you through! What is wrong with you two?!" Tun demanded, tossing his short arms up in frustration. He marched over to where Kar'thol and Jhormug stood deadlocked, berating them all as he walked. "Isn't there enough trouble in this thrice-cursed pit without you inventing more?!"

He eyed Jhormug with utter loathing before digging his fingers into the felhunter's gums and attempting to pry his jaws apart. "Get…off, you disgusting fiend! I know you can understand me."

Jhormug growled a little louder, but refused to relinquish his hold.

Under other circumstances, Callista would probably have found the spectacle of Tun trying to bully her felhunter amusing, but she hadn't been bluffing about his blood being tainted. She sighed in defeat. "Enough, Jhormug."

Jhormug dropped Kar'thol's arm and backed away awkwardly, favoring his injured leg and snarling viciously. Kar'thol bared his teeth at the retreating demon and brandished his meaty fist.

"Now," Tun said, crossing his arms and turning his exasperated stare on Na'rii and Callista. "What is going on?"

"There appears to have been a…misunderstanding."

Tun spun around at the sound of Nerothos' voice. The dreadlord had reappeared in the center of the corridor, looking highly entertained.

Na'rii hissed and jerked Callista around by the neck so she was between her and Nerothos. Even half-strangled, Callista bit back an inappropriate desire to laugh at the naiveté of the action. If the troll thought Nerothos would hesitate to destroy them both if he wanted her dead, she knew nothing of demons.

"Has there?" Tun asked, regarding the dreadlord with suspicion.

"Oh, yes," Nerothos said, eyes alight with malicious amusement.

He was unsettling Na'rii; Callista could tell by the tremor in the sword pressed against her chest. She shifted uncomfortably and watched Nerothos with a resigned kind of misgiving. Nothing the demon said while looking so pleased could possibly be helpful.

"The troll," Nerothos continued, cocking his horned head to study Na'rii with a vicious smile, "is under the touchingly naïve impression that you govern your own actions on this world. Allow me to disabuse you of it: you don't."

Callista noted, amid the uneasy silence that followed this pronouncement, that she'd been absolutely right.

A/N: And so we come to the end of the largest block of text I have ever posted on this site. Haha. Hope you enjoyed!