Underkeeper

Bernt charged into the gap he had made with a roar, followed closely by those nearest to him. He needed to get closer, to get to Jori. He felt her leg snap through their bond and shivered in sympathetic pain. As more Underkeepers rushed after him, he pushed the white flames out ahead of him, clearing the way. If he could keep control of them, he might be able to finish this on his own.

Just as he had that thought, light flared in his peripheral vision as the fire ignited some kind of heavily enchanted armor on a Duergar corpse. Fire shot in all directions, including toward the oncoming Underkeepers. Bernt tried to seize control of it and push it out toward the enemy, but it was too much.

A goblin screamed as a spray of fire struck her, splattering onto one of the warlocks and then more people behind them. Heart leaping into his throat, Bernt extinguished those flames with an effort of will that cost him his control over the remaining wall of flames. The fire that was burning his allies was snuffed out almost immediately, but the affected defenders were still badly burned. At least they were still moving.

Pushing the shock and suffocating sense of horror to the back of his mind as best he could, Bernt turned back the other way and recast his control flame cantrip. He quickly shrank down the remaining blaze, drawing mana out of it and dispersing it into the ground. If he couldn’t control it properly, a giant wall of fire was as much a liability as a useful weapon. Just as he did, he saw a burst of reddish-orange hellfire ahead of him and to his right. The cart was on fire, and Jori was in the middle of it. It hurt, but he could feel her triumph radiating through the bond. She was laughing.

Through her eyes, he saw as fire consumed the duergar leader from within, completely destroying the body in seconds. Then his armor melted, collapsing to mold itself to the shrunken and twisted remains.

The odd, misty haze vanished first. Then, all around, purple flames flared in rapid succession. Bernt whirled to search for the threat, only to realize that the demons were disappearing, one after another. He had no idea what kind of pacts duergar warlocks used, but he guessed that their permission to remain on this plane was tied to the survival of either their demon overlord or his host.

“Sit your asses down on the ground and surrender!” Dayle shouted, his voice amplified by magic. “You’re trapped down here now, sure as shit in a dwarf’s beard.”

The duergar soldiers didn’t immediately comply, but they kept backing away, looking over their shoulders toward where their leader had been. The bulk of the duergar forces disengaged from the advancing Beseri soldiers and adventureres, who were still streaming from the cavern entrance. For a moment, everyone held their breath, uncertain.

Jori was nowhere to be seen, but Bernt knew that she was currently clinging to the underside of the still-burning wagon. Nuros’ specially armored guards were looking around in confusion, as if they weren’t sure what was happening. If anything, they seemed even less certain than the regular soldiers. What was wrong with them? One of them sat down on the ground, followed by another. There was some shouting as another protested, but then the soldiers began to drop their weapons and surrender.

It was over in minutes.

A few of the Underkeepers sat down right where they’d been standing when the fighting stopped, but Dayle quickly took charge and got everyone back on their feet. Those who hadn’t fought directly checked the injured and administered healing potions, while anyone who was still in fighting shape began the work of disarming the enemy.

They’d barely started when Beseri soldiers arrived to take over. They piled the weapons off to the side and marched the duergar out of the cavern in manageable groups, often much more roughly than was strictly necessary. Bernt had no idea where they were going to take them, and he didn’t care. He had people he needed to check on. As soon as he could get away with it, he borrowed a healing potion from one of the goblins treating the wounded and hurried toward the burnt cart where Jori was still hiding.

He could guess why she hadn’t come out. If the Beseri soldiers saw her, they might attack. The Underkeepers would recognize her, and maybe the adventurers would as well, but there were far more soldiers here now than anyone else.

Signaling her through the bond, he approached to find her crawling out from under the cart. Sure enough, a nearby soldier shouted and raised a sword as soon as he saw her, but Bernt waved him down.

“Relax! She’s with me.”

The soldier frowned at him suspiciously, but lowered his weapon. Ignoring him, Bernt turned back to grin at Jori. She was quite a bit larger now, standing nearly up to his waist. Her wings and horns had grown longer. Despite that, she actually looked more humanoid than before. Her arms and legs seemed more in proportion to her body and she stood straighter.

“I did it!” Jori said proudly. “I stole the demon’s souls and I set his blood on fire! Wait till I tell Elyn about this – she’s going to write a song about me! I’m going to be so famous!”

Bernt smiled at her and nodded. Maybe she would. “Come on. We need to see if Torvald is alright.”

Carefully picking their way past the enemy soldiers, they made their way to the back of the Undercity Market, where a single human still lay sprawled face-down on the ground. Torvald’s leg was bent at a horrific, unnatural angle underneath him and Bernt shuddered to think what that felt like.

“He’s alive!” Jori said, skipping forward and turning him over onto his back with a heave. She was bigger now, but shifting that much weight was still a major effort.

He didn’t look alive. Torvald’s skin was so pale that it nearly looked gray and his eyes were open, staring at nothing. One pupil was a pinprick, while the other looked normal – an obvious concussion. Quickly, Bernt reached down and straightened the paladin’s leg with a horrible crackling noise, then he pulled the minor healing potion from his pocket and uncorked it.

Someone grabbed his shoulder.

“Ugh, back off with that thing. He can’t swallow while he’s unconscious anyway. You’ll just choke him. I’ll do it,” Josie said and knelt down next to him. She looked like something the hells themselves had spat up, her hair and face covered with blood and worse. Her heavily enchanted robes, by contrast, were not only undamaged but also spotless. Still, she hadn’t come away unscathed. Two fingernails on her right hand had been torn off and blood still dripped from them onto his shoulder, soaking into his robes. Her expression, though, was as determined as ever.

Bernt backed up a step to let her work. The Solicitor pulled a small, rolled leather case from her pouch and opened it, pulling out a glass syringe with what seemed like an unnecessarily long needle. After filling it with some of her potion, she carefully inserted it into the shattered leg and injected it directly into his bloodstream.

Color washed back into Torvald’s face and he blinked, though he still didn’t look like he was all there. His leg spasmed and he made a strangled sound.

“Hold him down!” Josie ordered as she moved up and held his head still. “There you are. Alright, drink it down, small sips.”

Before long, Josie had their young colleague sitting up, looking around in confusion. A patch of hair on the back of his skull was missing, and Bernt wondered just how bad that concussion had been.

“What were you thinking?!” Josie berated him. “You literally ran into an enemy army. That was the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen in my life!”

Torvald shook his head, though even that small motion still pained him. “She told me to do it. Ruzinia did. I had to.”

Josie scowled. “Do you commit suicide every time someone tells you to?!”

The paladin grinned at her.

“It almost sounds like you were worried about me,” he teased, but then adopted a more sober expression. “You don’t say no to a god. It was… intense. Besides, I wanted a calling – it’s why I joined the Underkeepers in the first place.”

“I told you!” Josie growled. “You can’t sign yourself over to a being who operates at that kind of scale. You’re less than an ant to a god, and it shows. Just look at you!”

As the two of them fell into a familiar argument, Bernt let out a small sigh of relief. Torvald, at least, was going to be okay. They helped him up and slowly made their way back to the Underkeepers’ headquarters. Only then did Torvald finally notice Jori walking alongside Bernt.

“Uh. Jori? What happened to you?” he looked from her to Bernt a little warily. Josie very carefully didn’t look at them, but he could still see the worried frown on her face. She knew exactly what had happened, and what it meant.

“I stole some of the power that Nuros was absorbing and I destroyed his host with it.” Jori explained helpfully, grinning brightly. “I won the battle!”

“I… see? What does that mean? Is he dead?” Torvald asked, looking from Jori to Josie. The warlock shrugged.

“Not dead, no. Just gone. The duergar warlocks will summon him back, most likely. But I doubt they’re going to do it here. There isn’t much left of his army, and it looks like he mostly got what he came for, anyway.”

“Souls, you mean,” Bernt said, swallowing thickly. How many people had just died? “How much more powerful is he going to be next time?”

Josie sighed. “That depends. If he had enough for his metamorphosis, he would have done it. But… he might be close after that. Still, there’s no guarantee he’ll come back here at all. I’m sure there are softer targets out there.”

Bernt looked around at the destruction that filled the cavern. Hundreds of people had died here, and practically everyone he could see was injured in some way or another. Burn wounds were especially common among the duergar, and many of the corpses clustered around his earlier position were charred black – his work. The stench of burnt meat and hair hung in the air.

They made their way into the Underkeepers’ headquarters, where they deposited Torvald in one of the back rooms with the other convalescing guards. He’d be back to normal soon thanks to Josie’s expensive healing potion – well before many of the others who had taken much lighter wounds. They were on their way back to the courtyard when a skinny-looking dwarf woman with a nasty bruise on her face stepped out of the break room and held up a hand to stop them.

“Dzhorianath, you have broken the bounds of your agreement with the Solicitors, Archmage Thurdred, and Archmage Iriala to remain on the mortal plane. Please step inside.”

Beside him, Bernt could see Josie tense up, but Jori looked completely relaxed. The imp casually walked forward and past the warlock, disappearing into the room. Bernt made to follow, but the Solicitor took a half step forward to block his way.

“You are not required to be in attendance for this meeting. You’re not party to the contract.”

“I’m going to help.” Bernt said, shoving past her none too gently. Josie followed quietly behind him, and he noticed crossly that nobody tried to keep her out. The room was filled with the surviving solicitors – eight of them, including the young apprentice, who sat near the back of the room by the kitchen, watching Gnugg and Trip as they made random concoctions out of the tea ingredients on the counter. Bernt guessed they’d spent the entire battle here.

Radast stood up and nodded formally to Jori. There was a ritual circle on the ground next to him with much the same configuration as the one the Solicitors had made outside earlier, though this one was just drawn in salt.

“I appreciate your timely intervention. Without your support, it’s unlikely that we would have been able to stop Nuros.”

Jori grinned at him. “You’re welcome, but I didn’t do it for you.”

“I am aware,” Radast said with a severe frown. “You have advanced in power and exceeded the limits of our agreement. I’m afraid this means that you will be forced to leave this plane immediately.”

“No, it doesn’t!” Bernt interrupted.

Radast held a hand up to silence Bernt and kept his gaze on Jori. “I fear that you may not appreciate just how far I was already bending Beseri law to allow you to remain here as you have.”

Jori’s grin turned a little sharper. “Maybe. But you weren’t doing it for me.”

“Be that as it may,” Radast said seriously. “There are no further accommodations I can legally make, and no amount of heroism will convince me to defy the king. Adherence to the law is the bedrock that the Solicitors are built upon. It’s not the outcome I was hoping for, but it’s the one we have. If you would step over here, I can make your transition painless. You may, of course, return provided you do so under an approved pact.”

That was his cue.

Bernt cleared his throat and took a step forward.

“Fine, then let’s do it! Weren’t you even going to ask me first?”

Radast stared at Bernt with cutting skepticism written all over his features. Josie nodded at him encouragingly, though. She’d been trying to get him to do this from the first day they met. Jori, on the other hand, felt surprised and then alarmed.

“Underkeeper Bernard, as I’ve previously mentioned to you, you lack the proper temperament for a warlock,” Radast said condescendingly. “Managing an intelligent demon in the long term, even within a pact, requires force of will, cunning, and an iron dedication to the letter of the law. You have repeatedly demonstrated a lack of caution and an unacceptable flexibility in regard to both the spirit and the letter of the law.”

Bernt scowled at the man. “You didn’t say she needed one of your warlocks, you just said she needs a pact that meets your standards. I’ve seen the standards and there’s no reason I couldn’t make a pact like that.”

Radast shook his head. “I will not accept it, regardless. You’d be a rogue warlock within a decade – or, more likely, a week. She may make a pact with a more suitable candidate if she wishes, but in the meantime she will need to return to her home plane regardless.”

“She just saved practically the entire city!” Bernt shouted. “She saved everyone!”

The chief solicitor sighed, tiredly. ”There is no need for you to be so defensive. She will be fine.”

Jori spread her wings and beat them down once, drawing everyone’s attention. She wasn’t grinning anymore and Bernt could feel her frustration. “I’ve seen the approved version of the pact too, and I’m not going to be bound by the Solicitors. Or anyone! Not now, and not in the future.”

Moving quickly, she stepped inside the salt circle and then lifted her gaze to look Bernt in the eye. She flashed him a quick, bright grin accompanied by a complicated mixture of determination, grief and wry amusement. “Besides. I haven’t saved everyone. Not yet.”

She leaned down and dug the razor-sharp claws of one hand into her palm, spraying drops of burning blood down onto the salt. The circle ignited in purple flame and she disappeared in a burst of fire that seemed to collapse in on itself even as it formed.

Over by the kitchen, Gnugg wailed in horror.

Bernt stared uncomprehendingly at the spot where she’d been.