James Davis - Circle of Skulls

Back in the hallway, before he could consider rushing downstairs, he found the ghostly glow of emerald flames flickering from within a shroud of shadow at the top of the steps. An unholy growl escaped the tortured throat of the skulls' stolen body as it disappeared down the stairs. Jinn gave chase, leaping over the banister and taking the stairs several at a time, though the skulls had already crossed the ballroom in a dark blur, wisps of shadow dissipating in their wake.

Cursing, he held back, crossing the ballroom slowly, feeling less on the heels of a mystical killer and more a rogue's mark being led into a trap. Silhouettes passed the windows outside, lit by streetlamps and wandering in the garden, surrounding the house with their dead eyes and curved knives.

Too late, he thought.

Peering around the corner, he found the green gaze of the skulls, waiting for him within a doorway. A deep, droning chant echoed from the dark as the skulls crept backward, descending into a hidden stairwell as if beckoning the deva to follow. Jinn hesitated, weighing his options as the chant grew louder, punctuated by throaty gasps and moans. The voices slid on the air as if wet and clinging, like the silvered trail of a slug given sound. Despite all, he could not resist his nature, pulled forward by the chant as easily as if they were trumpets calling him to war.

Stone faces, filled with the glowing light of guttering candles, were set in the stairway's single column as Jinn cautiously took the steps. He followed the edge of his blade inexorably down, imagining that the Abyss itself awaited him below. The night's chill was replaced by the cloying, damp heat of bodies pressed to exertion. Scents of blood and sweat grew stronger, more sour, as they mingled with the none-too-subtle smells of sex and death. It called to mind many such gatherings he had witnessed in recent years, the same stench embedded in the threads of the bloody cloth map he'd found a few days before.

He did not flinch or recoil from the scene that awaited him below, having grown sickeningly accustomed to the extremes that foolish people embraced to alleviate the daily routine of their lives. For the poor it was the hope of a richer life, for the empty a plea for a life worth more than the nothing they felt. For the wealthy, more often than not, simple boredom ensnared them in pits of perversion.

A wide, shallow basin of marble dominated the room, sloshing with oils and blood. Bodies slid and grasped at one another in the basin with toothy smiles and wild eyes, their limbs tangled and stained so much that the meeting of one body and the next was lost in the press. Each already bore a series of symbols, neatly carved down the center of the chest, though they remained alive and seemingly oblivious to the pain of their wounds. The chant came from those surrounding the basin, in dark blue, stained robes. The blue-robed people exulted in a chaotic song of magic, voices upraised, almost pious, as though in prayer.

Blood dripped over the bodies from a curved blade held in the skulls' possessed hand at the far end of the basin. Ephemeral tendrils of energy flowed from the cavorting congregation and into the flickering shadows of the skulls' body, their darkness rising and licking the air like black flame. They regarded Jinn casually, beckoning him with the stained blade.

"Come, deva," they said, their voices booming in the small room, sending ripples through the bare flesh before them. "We would have words with you."

Jinn heard them speak but did not register what they'd said for several breaths, blinking and seeing the chamber as if for the first time, a sudden silence falling over the repulsive spectacle. A stinking miasma of evil overcame him, assaulting his senses and summoning a righteous rage that burned in his gut. Several half-lidded gazes fell on him at once as his golden eyes flashed in anger, looking down on the victims for whose lives Quessahn had argued, defending their right to live, to be represented rather than ignored.

"Innocents," he spat. He raised his stolen blade and charged.

Quessahn leaned to her left with a held breath, placing weight on the leg and half expecting it to collapse beneath her. It didn't, though she winced at the dull pain that throbbed through the limb. As the last streaks of stars left her vision, she stood straight, determined to at least appear strong. Mara sat, her legs crossed, as she pored over the contents of the archmage's notes. The hag's glowing gaze illuminated each page in a dark shade of red that sent chills down Quessahn's spine.

The sight of the night hag, so engrossed in powerful, arcane secrets-old magic rewritten for a spellplagued world-alarmed her more than if Tallus himself had appeared to reclaim them. Keeping an eye on Mara, Quessahn located her ritual dagger and retrieved it, stifling a gasp of pain as she knelt. Slipping the blade beneath her cloak, she approached the night hag warily.

"We should go," she said but received no response. Mara continued turning pages, one clawed finger tracing line after line of handwritten text. "Mara?"

"Are you certain?" the hag asked, not looking up. "Or should I betray you and Jinn now and save myself the trouble of worrying over how to stab you in the back later?"

She closed the book loudly before Quessahn could respond and stood like an apparition in her dark, tattered robes, the archmage's book disappearing in their many folds. She fixed her pinpoint red eyes on the eladrin.

"Save us both the trouble," Quessahn replied. "I'm tired of keeping one eye over my shoulder, wondering when you'll turn on Jinn."

"But you should, my dear," Mara said, twisting a sparkling jade ring. Her form melted and shifted, returning to the guise of a human woman, the unassuming proprietor of an unassuming bookshop. "Just as I keep an eye on him, wondering when he'll be morally struck by the dark bargains he has made over the last few years and decide to start making amends for his misdeeds… on the point of a blade."

"Fair enough, then," Quessahn said. She limped toward the doors. "He'll need our help now."

"Yes, I'm sure he will," Mara said, but she did not follow, instead drawing several items from within her cloak. "So I think we shouldn't bother with limping through the streets. If I read correctly, he'll need our assistance directly."

"What does the book say?" Quessahn asked as she scanned through Mara's spell components.

"You're not being fair to him," Mara replied, ignoring the question as she drew a circle on the floor in blue chalk.

"W-what-?"

"You have something that he has never known: direct knowledge of one of his past incarnations," Mara said. "You look at his face and see another. You say his name, but it sounds unnatural and forced. And you seem to expect him to be the better man you once knew him to be, despite the fact that he, I believe you called him Kehran, is long dead."

"Do you read minds now as well?" Quessahn asked coldly.

"I didn't have to," Mara answered, completing the chalk circle and holding out her hand for the eladrin. "You wear your every emotion plainly. Jinn may not see it-or may not want to-but I do. Putting the pieces together was not too difficult."

"Why do you care?" she asked, hesitating before taking the hag's hand and entering the circle. "If your alliance with him is just a convenience, what do you care if I hide things from him?"

"I do not," Mara replied casually. "I merely point out that betrayals take many forms. While mine, if and when it comes, will be direct and likely bloody, it will be just another in a long line of righteous battles for the deva, but you… you have a grip on his heart, something intangible and lasting that could follow him through every life he lives until the end of creation itself."

"I–I didn't mean…," Quessahn stammered, taken off guard and stunned by the statement.