You did not disappoint him, my child. He could not be prouder.
It was a woman’s voice, as soft and comforting as a velvet pillow, which seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. Ceredon’s eyes snapped open, darting this way and that, but he saw nothing but the desiccated corpses of a hundred Dezren. He winced in pain when he brought his hands up to his ears and shook his head. An odd sort of calm overcame him.
“Is this my punishment?” he asked. “For not acting in time? For allowing so many innocents to perish?”
You did what you could, my child, the voice said again. You have acted as a true hero should, with honor and dedication, with love for your goddess in your heart. No single elf can right all the wrongs in the world, but it takes a true hero to try.
“Celestia?” he whispered. This time the tears did flow.
I am here for you, my love, my greatest of creations, my righter of wrongs, but I do not wish for you to join my side just yet. You are my agent in the flesh, and you must go on.
His body grew numb as the fractured bones beneath his skin began to heal, the cuts and bruises disappearing from his body. He laughed then, the sound bouncing off the walls of the dungeon and coming back to him distorted, as if it had issued from the mouth of a demon from the abyss. It should have frightened him, but it did not.
You are loved, you are complete, the disembodied voice of the goddess said, answering his doubts.
Ceredon shook his head and wiped the tears from his cheeks.
“What would you have me do? Please, tell me.”
You must remain strong, my child. You must not give up hope, no matter how unbearable your existence might become. There is balance in all things, and the great pain you experience now will be rewarded tenfold in the many centuries to come.
“Will you not free me?” he asked. “Please, release me so I may confront those who have done evil in your name.”
That, I cannot do, she answered. You must find your own way, or your existence will mean nothing. But remember this-you are my children, never forgotten, never unloved. Trust me, Ceredon. Trust your goddess.
Ceredon stood and wrapped his hands around the bars to his cell, gazing into the flickering hall as if he might see Celestia in the lurking shadows.
“But what of the brother gods? Their war will consume and destroy us! If one of them finds victory over the other, what will become of us?”
There was a long pause in reply to his question, and for a moment he thought he had offended his goddess, that she had abandoned him. But soon the ethereal feeling of comfort washed over him again and she said three simple words: They are wrong.
Another sound reached his ears-a hard, clunking noise, like a sack of potatoes being dragged across uneven ground. The handle of the door leading into the dungeon began to jiggle.
You must remember, the goddess said, that no matter what you see, no matter what is taken from you, you still have your life. That is what matters. Do not bend, my child. Do not break. Become like the mountain I love so dearly. Unyielding. Unmoving. Forever.
With that, she was gone, her essence leaving the dungeon just as the door flew open and struck the wall with a thud. As pounding footsteps approached, Ceredon held onto the words of his goddess. He stood tall in his cell and walked toward the bars.
It was Clovis Crestwell who approached his cell, though to call him a human any longer would have been akin to sacrilege. He wore no clothes, and Ceredon could see, for the first time, that there was not a strand of hair on his body. His flesh was stretched taut over musculature that seemed to shift from one moment to the next-first bulging, then retracting, then broadening again. His face was rippling as well, the jaw elongating, the brow distending, until all would suddenly snap back into place. It was if the human’s flesh was a prison that his insides could not wait to escape.
Clovis dragged two sacks behind him, one large and one small. He stopped when he reached Ceredon’s cell, his meaty fingers releasing the scrunched end of the larger bag. The smaller one he placed almost gingerly on the ground, propping it against the wall. That was when Clovis finally glanced at him, his eyes glowing a red so intense that looking at them would be enough to sap most mortals’ inner strength.
Ceredon did not turn away from whatever this man had become. He remained standing, the words of his goddess infusing his heart with power.
With a chuckle, Clovis turned away and bent over the larger sack, removing four long iron stakes from within. One after another he drove the stakes with his bare hands into the solid bedrock that formed the dungeon floor. Ceredon watched his show of strength with awe. Then, once all four stakes had been set, the beast of a man reached into the bag once more, creating a wet sloshing sound.
Clovis worked with his back to Ceredon, a back that had grown so wide that the elf could not see what he pulled from his bag. He watched the rippling shoulders tense as the arms came down, heard the thwump of something soggy being wedged atop the stake. Three more times Clovis repeated the task, until finally he sighed, cracked his neck, and stepped aside.
It took every ounce of faith in Ceredon to keep from screaming.
A head was propped atop each stake, eyes bulging in horror, mouths hanging open, lifeless tongues lolling. Ceredon took them in one by one, refusing to look away, etching the memory of their last expressions in his mind’s eye. There was Orden Thyne and Lady Phyrra, their flesh battered and bruised; Tantric Thane, his nose cut from his face, a wicked gash running from the right side of his lip to his stunted right ear, exposing broken teeth and blackening gums; and finally, and most horrifically, was Ruven Sinistel. The most grave of insults had been reserved for the Neyvar of the Quellan. His eyes had been plucked from his skull and now rested on his tongue, a pair of dead orbs staring from the center of his gaping mouth.
Unyielding. Unmoving. Forever.
“I thought you might like some company,” the man said, only it was not Clovis Crestwell who spoke. The dual voices were now singular-throaty, like the grunt of a wild boar.
Ceredon stared back at him with a façade of indifference. Inside, he was reeling.
Clovis breathed in deep, his chest expanding all the more. He stepped up to Ceredon’s cell, wrapped his fingers around the bars. The atrocity was mere feet from him, and Ceredon could smell the rankness of its breath.
“What are you?” he asked. Amazingly, his voice did not crack.
“I am the teeth in the dark, the shadow that descends over all, the devourer of races, the fire that burns all. I am the one after which the abyss was named.”
It was a stanza from a popular children’s story, told with a personalized touch. The story had been taught to nearly every elf child in all of Dezrel. It cannot be. He narrowed his eyes and stepped closer to the bars, determined to show no fear. The reek of the thing’s breath assaulted him anew.
“You know what I am,” Darakken said. It almost sounded like it was laughing.
Ceredon nodded, and the demon smiled, revealing row upon row of sharp teeth within that human mouth. Ceredon took another step closer, now near enough to grab the bars, positioning his hands just below the beast’s. The sharp-toothed smile faltered ever so slightly.
“You do not fear me?” the beast asked. Strangely, even with its deep, inhuman baritone, it sounded almost childlike.
“I do not,” Ceredon lied. “What is there to fear? All I once had has been stripped from me.” Though it nearly brought him to tears again, he pointed through the bars to the Neyvar’s head. “I do not have a father any longer, or a kingdom, or my freedom. There is nothing else of value you could take from me.”