It was clear that to remove the staff, the seal had to be broken.
The figure inside the glass prison shifted its position and flexed its wings. It seemed as though it was listening to the conversation. It seemed that it was preparing to escape its imprisonment.
"Without it, your parents will die," Vheod told her. "You may die."
"That doesn't matter now," she told him. "I can't believe that." He shook his head slowly, his gaze never dropping from hers.
"You have to believe it, Vheod. I'm not worth it. No one person is."
"That's not the way I see it," he told her firmly "If I thought that I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't have survived in the Abyss."
"That's not what I mean."
"I can't let you die, Melann. I can't let the misery and pain of your family's curse continue."
Melann looked away from him. As she was drawn to look even closer at the massive figure within the translucent prison, she saw that its face was shaped like the stone pattern the gnolls had made with their green rocks. It looked just like the Taint on the back of Vheod's hand.
Melann then knew the truth. Orrag was not the voice of temptation, he was yet another pawn in the whole vast plan. Apparently, only Vheod could remove the staff and free Chare'en, but Orrag could never have convinced him to do it-the balor in the prison knew that.
No, Orrag did not provide the temptation here. She did. Every portion of the Taint's-of Chare'en's-plan had come together.
"Vheod, you can't let them win!" It's not your fault, she thought. It was the Taint-it was Chare'en all along. Even the curse on her family was but a stepping stone to this moment when Vheod's human side would act out of what Chare'en certainly saw as the human weaknesses of love and loyalty.
"No," Vheod said, "I love you too much to let you fail." He reached toward the silvery staff.
Melann ran to him, hands outstretched, attempting to cross the distance that remained, all the while dodging the veritable maelstrom of metal parts to the grand device surrounding the prison. Her mouth formed a silent scream of protest, and her eyes were wide with fear and despair. She was too late.
Chapter Twenty-one
FREEDOM. "No, Vheod, No!" FREEDOM.
"Vheod, don't you see? They've won! By the Mother, it's free!”
"They've not won," Vheod proclaimed. "I have." FREEDOM.
With the staff removed, the silver seal burst asunder.
With no more seal holding the seam shut, the egg-like prison split apart.
"No!" Melann fell to her knees before she ever reached Vheod.
Humid air belched forth from the opened capsule. The figure that emerged dripped with foul fluids. Burnt red skin pulled taut over sinewy muscles and sharp, wicked bones as it moved, stretching wide, bat-like-dragonlike-wings with a wet, fleshy crunch. Clawed hands clutched a long, black, many-tailed whip covered in spikes and a jagged sword of black iron, both dragging along the ground behind it, creating sparks of protest. The prisoner's wide head sported a flat face framed by broad, slightly curled horns.
A mouth of jagged teeth like rusty nails curled in what might have passed for a smile in some unthinkable nether plane. Powerful lungs inhaled deeply, expanding its chest to a surprising degree, and it exhaled a single word that echoed throughout the room.
"FREEDOM"
“I’ve won," Vheod said, holding the silver-runed staff above his head, "because I can give you what you need and still stand against the evil of Chare'en!"
Vheod tossed the staff to Melann and spun on the creature emerging from eons of imprisonment, drawing forth the blade with which he'd defeated Orrag. A wild look filled his dark eyes as he stared at his ancestor. He tossed the small sword back and forth from hand to hand as he poised tensely for battle.
Chare'en looked down and studied the cambion who stood before him. Black eyes like lances bore holes into Vheod, but he stood his ground. The balor threw his head back in a barking, echoing laugh.
"You are mine to control little man," the demon said. "You dance like a puppet on my strings, and you always have. You stand against what I tell you to stand against."
Vheod's long red hair had been smeared with dirt, sweat, and blood, a little of each marring his dusky face as well. Mouth grim, he worked his jaw but stared up at the balor in front of him with only victory blazing in his eyes. A smile creeped across his lips, and he finally spoke. "I reject you, great-grandfather. You don't control me."
Chare'en's laughter exploded forth like a burst bubble. "If I did not control you, I would not be free." The words slid from his mouth like snakes.
"Vheod," Melann said, raising her head. Through the fear and despair, she choked out, "The Taint-it's the Taint. It's not you, you're not evil. It's not your fault."
She was wrong, of course. Vheod knew that he was indeed evil. He was half tanar’ri, and tanar'ri were inherently malicious, cruel, and all that was wrong. That is what they were on some important, fundamental level. He couldn't blame the Taint, or Orrag, or even Chare'en for his own nature, not any more than a child can blame his parents for his eye or hair color.
At the same time, however, he was half human. Rather than worry about his nature, he could overcome it. Facing it head on, he could challenge evil and defeat it. Right now, that meant facing and defeating Chare'en once and for all. He would show himself and all the world that he was master of his own life, and his own destiny, by taking the offensive.
Nevertheless, Vheod had to admit to himself that it had seemed a better plan before actually seeing the towering figure of the balor standing before him, quite literally dripping with power, rage, and evil. Even if he died Vheod would still have won. He still would have fought against evil rather than having been mastered by it.
"Your freedom means nothing," Vheod said through teeth gritted with determination. "I will destroy you." Again Chare'en threw back his head in a spasm of laughter. This time Vheod used the opportunity to his advantage. Summoning his strength, he grasped the hilt of the short sword in both hands and launched himself into the air. He came down with a stabbing strike over his head, plunging the sword into the huge tanar'ri's belly.
In the walled city of Tilverton, a less than reputable weaponsmith named Hirtho makes his living by selling low-cost, simple weapons to criminals and thugs. Hirtho once worked for a group in the city called the Fire Knives, an evil, roguish group that plagued the city. Eventually, the Fire Knives were completely driven out of the city, and Hirtho looked into a new line of work. His father had been a blacksmith, and Hirtho had learned a little of the trade when he was young. Possessed of none of his father's skill or artistry, he nevertheless discovered that the right clientele would be willing to buy his crude weapons for low prices. Because of his connections, he knew where to get cheap steel "liberated" from merchant caravans.
Hirtho thus led a simple but comfortable life off his ill-gotten gains. One of his many sales went to a young man named Wenmer who was hired as an enforcer for a local criminal and-according to some-priest of some mysterious evil god. Little did Hirtho know, the young enforcer would be killed before he ever drew the blade-by his own criminal boss as a blood sacrifice no less. Hirtho would never have believed that a cambion from the Abyss would then take the sword and use it against that same criminal. The idea that one of Hirtho's crude creations would have been used in an attack against a balor-perhaps the most powerful of fiends in all the Lower Planes-would have been inconceivable to the shady smith.