It was insufferable!
And the damage he had done! It was ridiculous! Hundreds of soldiers, guards, and servants killed! Huge craters in her city! And the Arena was destroyed! It was infuriating! It took her people thirty years to build that stadium, and he destroyed it in seconds! Thousands killed-not that it mattered much to her-and huge holes cut into her beautiful city!
And the Palace! That, that, that Were-cat! Whatever he had done to make magic not work on the Palace grounds was permanent! The Weave, the matrix of magical energy that existed on this world, had been pulled away from the Palace, and without that mystical link, no magic would work anywhere on the Palace grounds. The entire area was now magic-dead. This in itself wouldn't be much of a problem for most people, but Shiika hid her Demonic nature behind magical shapeshifting, and it would no longer function! She could no longer hide herself in her own home!
Insufferable!
She crossed her arms, her wings shivering as she looked down from a balcony, out onto the manicured lawns and beautiful gardens. It was ridiculous, how much damage he did in only a few short days! Even a Demon would be impressed at the havoc the Were-cat had wrought in her city in such a short time. She would have appreciated it, if it hadn't been her city.
Shiika wasn't the usual Demon. Unlike her ilk, she did not revel in chaos and destruction. She was certainly no sweet maiden, and her grasp on morality was not profound. Her only interest was her comfort. Not her power, not her influence, but her comfort. Taking the Empire had been nothing more than a means to secure her own luxury. After all, there were no beings on this world more pampered than the Emperor and Empress of Yar Arak.
That damned Were-cat. She should have killed him when she had the chance. He had screwed everything up. But no, she had to let him live, because she liked him. And after he destroyed the stadium, then it was too late to do anything more to him.
And that reason stood behind her.
The figure even gave her the creeps, and that was no minor complement. It was a single figure, tall and lithe, completely covered by a deep black cloak, a cloak that seemed to shift and move of its own volition, as if it were alive. A cloak that hid the figure's features in a dark shadow, making it seem that the wearer of the cloak was nothing but a shade of the cloak itself.
Shiika had been around a very long time. She had seen this figure before, and she was afraid. She knew just who and what it was. Who she was.
Her name was Spyder. At least that was what she called herself. She was a legendary figure, living for thousands of years, a nearly mythical being who had had a hand in the Blood War, who had had a hand in many historical events since then. She dwelled on the continent of Sharadar, in an inaccessible region between two towering mountain ranges, known only as Haven. She was reputed to be the most powerful being on the planet, a magician whose power was unrivalled.
After what Shiika had seen that day, she would like to bet on just who held that title now.
Some called her the Aleax, the Avenger, the mortal whose duty it was to do the dirty work of the gods on Sennadar. Others called her the Gatekeeper, the defender of the world's only active magical gateway that allowed a native being off the world and into the rest of the multiverse. To others, she was the Guardian, a solitary figure who had defended the unknown, legendary regions of Haven from all incursion by the outside. Shiika knew this woman. She knew that Spyder was all three of those things. And she was a being to fear.
She shivered her wings again, looking out towards the city. "You owe me for this, woman," she said hotly, crossing her arms beneath her breasts. "That Were-cat did serious damage."
"It is nothing you cannot overcome," came the reply. The words were sharp, succinct, each one pronounced with utter perfection before moving on to the next.
"He stripped magic from the Palace. He killed the Emperor! Do you have any idea how long it's going to take me to fix all this?"
"Then do not complain. After all, you can fix it, can you not?"
She snorted. "It's the principle of the matter. I really put my neck out for you, Spyder. If you hadn't have interfered, I could have gotten the book and hidden it again before he got to it. It's what you charged me to do in the first place. And then you come along and tell me not to interfere!"
"It was necessary."
"Damn your necessity!" she snapped, whirling on the cloaked figure, a hand balled into a fist before her. "Look at what he did to my city! I'm starting to get very tired of your flipflopping, Spyder! You bring me the book and tell me to hide it, to guard it, then you stop me from doing what you told me to do in the first place!"
"Your continued existence on this world is by my suffrance, Demon," she said in an icy voice. "I could have banished you a millenia ago. But I did not. Because it was necessary. You have your own part to play in this, just as I. Just as he. And you have fulfilled part of it."
" Part of it?"
"Part. Your hand has not been completely drawn yet, Shiikarathnezera," she said calmly, using the Demon's True Name, a name that could be used to control her, even destroy her. "You will be called upon again. Be ready."
"As soon as I fix this mess," she snorted, turning her back to the enigmatic figure again. "That damned kid. It's going to take me years to straighten things out."
"Perhaps. Perhaps not. Answer me honestly. Do you truly hate him for what he has done?"
Shiika was silent a moment, then she laughed ruefully. "Yes and no," she answered truthfully. "I'm certainly not happy about this," she grunted, motioning towards the city, "but I have to admit, I'm impressed. He took everything my minions could dish out. He even killed a Glabrezu! And he did it, he got the book. I have to admire his spunk, if anything else. That kid just doesn't know when to quit."
"Then you have learned a valuable lesson, Shiika. Not everyone is as they seem. Not even you."
Shiika was quiet a moment. "What do you get out of all this, Spyder? I'm sure you have something to do with it, and it's not like you to do something without some gain in it somewhere. It's not your style."
"What I get out of it?" she asked in reply. There was a long silence. "I do get something out of this, Shiika. Something you will never understand."
"What?"
"Peace."
Shiika turned around suddenly, ready to demand an explanation for that strange answer, but Spyder was gone.
"Hmph," she snorted, turning back around. There were some people around here that weren't want they seemed alright, and it wasn't her or the Were-cat.
What a mess.
Sighing, Shiika turned and started inside. She wasn't giving up her Palace this time. There was nothing that said an Empress couldn't take the throne. She'd been interested in taking a more active role in the ruling of what she considered to be her Empire anyway. Maybe Spyder was right. Maybe there was more to her, more to this, than there seemed to be. Maybe even some good could come of it.
Anything was possible. She was certainly proof of that.
Strange neighbors.
Garyth Longshank, cobbler of Aldreth and the village mayor, trudged carefully through the forests west of the village in the misty autumn morning, his destination not far ahead of him. He walked along an old cart trail, overgrown and ragged now that nobody really used it anymore, a trail that led out to the old Kael farm. A farm that had been abandoned for a while, when Tarrin left for the Tower, and his parents and sister packed up to go see him, and never returned. They'd sent back a letter to him, asking him to pack up all their things and store them in the village until they returned, that they were going to Ungardt for a while to see Elke's kin there. They were greatly missed in the village. Eron's arrows were used by nearly everyone, and the ale and brandy he brewed left just about everyone in the village with an aching hole in his belly. What was left was prized, treasured, kept in storage and only brought out for the most important occasions. Elke wasn't really missed, but the others didn't understand her. Well, they certainly didn't understand the ones that had taken over the overgrown Kael farm, cleaned it up and made it a livable place once again. Strange neighbors.