I. Ill Met By Lightning

There was something wicked in the air.

Orobas could sense it crackle across his unfeeling hide as surely as he felt the charge of the lightning strikes that neared him. The rain did not trouble him as it poured from tempestuous skies, dripping down the featureless face that was half hidden by rotting rags and hanging moss. He looked like some ancient forest god as he moved through the woods on his stag-like legs, ducking his antlered head to avoid branches. The Argent Forest was not the innocent place it had once been. It was not that the corruption that lurked in the growing shadows had touched it...not yet, at least. Such a thing would come in time, if his creation failed in her endeavor, but not yet.

No, this was mortal-made. It lingered as a sickly sweet aroma, the smell of rot. The copper tang of blood was barely detectable even to his superior senses. It had been some days since this path was last used. He brushed aside the undergrowth with one clawed hand, moving carefully to avoid detection. For such a hulking figure, he could pass with surprising stealth. After all, he did not tremble or pant as a nervous human might.

His obsidian eyes gleamed in the flash of the lightning. In the west, he was caeles, an aspect of divine perfection. But the east had another, perhaps more fitting name for his kind.

Demon.

The taste in the air was growing stronger. It overpowered even his own smell, the earthy aroma of decaying plant matter and moist soil. It was so powerful that it was entirely possible he would be walking onto the scene of multiple deaths. That was...concerning. Perhaps it was an animal—this was certainly far enough from the city for that to be the case, almost a day's ride—but the bare footprints in the earth suggested otherwise. Someone had gone running this way, tripping and falling as they scrambled to flee. The rain had washed away the echoes of their fear, but the scraps of fabric caught on some of the brambles spoke of a panicked haste. Claws gingerly tugged one piece free of the thorns. A few droplets of the color of rust marred it. He examined it more closely. Rough enough of a weave to mark it as a peasant's clothing, but not so rough that it was from the lowest of the low. By his calculations, it was likely a servant. The tracks looked more like a woman's than a man's, judging by size.

Orobas's steps were certain, his hooves biting into the mud. He felt no fear, not because he considered himself equal to the danger of whatever was in these woods now, but because he lacked the capacity. His heart was void.

He broke out into a clearing. There was a still form in the center, fabric stained deeply with that same rust color. Orobas swiveled his head, taking in the entirety of the clearing. There was not a trace of large life to be seen. Dark birds cawed at him and launched themselves into the air at his approach in a flurry of black wings.

She was lying on her back, face turned towards the weeping heavens. The eyes were gone, a favorite treat of scavengers. They were deep enough into the forest for wolves, but he saw no sign of them. That was unusual, so he made note of it before returning to his investigation. The cause of death was obvious: a single blow from a sharp instrument that had sliced down through her collarbone and through the top half of her ribcage. A powerful blow. He crouched down beside the body and examined the cut. It had sheared through bone with a single strike. A sword, if he had to guess, wielded by a very strong man or woman. The boot prints in the area looked of a size to be a human man, but such things could be deceptive. There were no scraps of torn fabric from the pursuer, which suggested to Orobas they were wearing armor without a surcoat.

Someone did not want colors seen.

The demon lowered his head towards the body of the woman, obsidian eyes unblinking. Her expression was serene as only the look of the dead could be, despite the damage to her face from scavengers. She was not recognizable, not that he had ever been within Tamaris's walls to take note of a servant. He saw suggestions that she had once been symmetrical and aesthetically pleasing. Beautiful, in a word. Seventeen or eighteen, perhaps. He checked her wrist and her left hand. No sign of marriage. She wore a necklace, a simple tarnished silver locket. Her killer had not removed it. This was not about money, nor had they even attempted to disguise it as such.

Murder. Simple, calculated, cold-blooded murder. This was not an act of passion. He saw where her body had been searched, thoroughly and calmly. The killer was not worried about someone coming upon them. Why would they be, so deep into the woods? They were far from a road. She could have screamed all she wanted and summoned no help, though Orobas guessed that she had been so out of breath by the end that she wouldn't have had it in her to scream. Nor would she probably have tried, if she aimed to evade being caught.

Her brown hair was plastered to her face by rain. Delicately, Orobas brushed it back with his clawed fingers. He did not feel sorrow any more than he felt fear, but he did note that it was a waste. A life cut short.

But purposefully so.

"WHAT DID YOU KNOW?" he rasped in his perpetually calm, thoughtful voice. Every pensive syllable resonated slightly in his chest, a hum clinging to the words. He would never sound human. But then again, he had never pretended to be anything but what he was.

The sound of hooves striking the ground pulled him up from his study of her face. A rider in the woods in the midst of the storm was unusual. The flash of lightning split the sky, followed in fractions of a second by the boom of thunder. He felt the buzz of power in his body. That one had been close. Orobas did not have to listen closely to differentiate the sound of multiple horses. His senses were calculated, honed. Perception was as natural to him as breathing was to mortal creatures. He was a creature attuned to detail.

Orobas rose to his full height as the riders broke into the clearing. He did not know if these were those who had killed the girl. He doubted it. He had seen no sign of a horse on the trail, and the killer was a wiser breed than those who felt compelled to revisit the scene of their crimes. A search party seemed unlikely. Too few. Most men did not come so deep into the forest, even one as seemingly benign as the Argent Forest, in weather like this. Wicked things moved in the woods when the sky went dark, even if the sun was only veiled. Wicked things were done.

The riders certainly wore colors, as was fitting for knights. He did not recognize the house symbols for the most part, not that he particularly cared. One, however, he recognized. A dragon on emerald and silver. Fine boots, a beautiful horse. His lance was wickedly sharp. That narrowed the field of possibilities to one answer. "GREETINGS, FIONN MÓR, KING OF YSSA," Orobas said calmly.

"Demon," Fionn hissed, his face pale in the rain. He was not wearing his plate, not for hunting. "What have you done?"

"I HAVE FOLLOWED THE VENOM IN YOUR LANDS," Orobas said. He gestured down at the body. "ITS MOST RECENT VICTIM. NOT ITS FIRST, NOT ITS LAST."

"Caution, Your Majesty. They speak in lies," the older knight with him said.

Orobas knew that they were attempting to determine whether or not they could best him without their armor and reinforcements. It was unlikely at best and the oldest seemed to recognize that. "I SPEAK IN FACTS," the demon said. "WHAT YOUR MINDS TWIST THEM INTO IS A PRODUCT OF YOUR MALFUNCTION, NOT MINE."

"Silence, beast!" the younger knight at Fionn's side snapped. He had drawn his sword. Not old enough to be wise, more impetuous even than Fionn.

Fionn held up his hand. "I would hear of this supposed venom," he said, eyes fixed intently on the mossy, cloth-shrouded creature in front of him. "Is this some prophecy of yours, demon?"

"I ATTEND TO THE FINITE. PROPHECY IS INFINITE, A WEB OF POSSIBILITIES," Orobas said. He tilted his head to one side. "BUT I CAN SPEAK TO WHAT IS PROBABLE."

"Very well," Fionn said. He had the face of a man looking into creeping dread given shape. "What is probable?"

Orobas paused thoughtfully, considering this. His mind was a thousand calculations at once, each one of them leading off into the endlessness of time in a different direction. "IT IS VERY PROBABLE THAT YOUR KINGDOM IS NO MORE PERMANENT THAN A CASTLE OF SAND UPON A BEACH. IT IS VERY PROBABLE THAT THE VIPER THAT HAS BITTEN HER WILL SINK ITS FANGS INTO YOUR HEART—IT IS VERY PROBABLE THAT IT ALREADY HAS AND YOU DO NOT YET FEEL DEATH APPROACHING. IT IS VERY PROBABLE THAT THE WORLD WILL BURN AND THE VOID WILL CONSUME THE ASHES."

Fionn went white as a sheet and so did the men with him. "A curse," the young knight said, his sword starting to tremble in his hands. It was a small miracle that he didn't drop it.

"AN OBSERVATION," Orobas said. He did not sound particularly ominous to his own mind, but the lightning played across the sky and thunder rolled again almost immediately. They were directly beneath the worst of the storm. Perhaps the tempest was unsettling the humans. Then again, these men seemed to have little stomach for honesty as well. Denial was a very human reaction. He could read fear in the wideness of their eyes and their smell. "YOUR KIND HAVE WHILED AWAY A MILLENNIUM IN IGNORANT PURSUIT OF EPHEMERAL PLEASURES. BUT NOT ALL WERE SO FOOLISH. WHILE YOU DIVERTED YOURSELF, THEY PREPARED. NOW IT HAS COME TIME TO SETTLE ACCOUNTS."

"What is this venom? This adder?" Fionn said.

Orobas looked down at the girl for a moment, then back up at the king. "IT IS A PROMISE MADE A THOUSAND YEARS AGO FULFILLED. YOUR TIME IS ENDING, FIONN MÓR, KING OF YSSA. IT SLIPS THROUGH YOUR GRASP LIKE SAND THROUGH AN HOURGLASS. I CANNOT SAY WHAT WILL BECOME OF YOU WHEN THE LAST GRAIN PLUMMETS FREE. THE CHOICE IS NOT MINE TO MAKE."

"Whose choice is it?" the King demanded. His nerve was failing fast, but there was a strange fascination that compelled him to ask.

The demon paused for a long moment, reflecting on the question. "THAT IS UNKNOWN."

"Kill it!" the younger knight blurted out.

"THAT WOULD BE AN UNWISE DECISION," Orobas said thoughtfully, flexing his clawed fingers as he watched them. It wasn't exactly a threat—it was more a preparation—but he could see that it unsettled them. "I DID NOT COME TO THIS PLACE TO DO WOUND. TO BE REDUCED TO VIOLENCE IN THE SERVICE OF DEFENDING MYSELF FROM BASE AGGRESSION WOULD NOT BE DESIRABLE."

"Why are you here, then, spewing falsehoods?" Fionn's older companion barked.

Orobas's obsidian eyes caught the next flash of lightning, burning white for a moment among the rags. "BECAUSE I MUST SEE THIS THROUGH TO THE END. WHERE THE DAUGHTER OF THE VOID GOES, I AM BOUND TO FOLLOW. THAT IS THE NATURE OF WHAT YOU REFER TO AS FATE."

"Who is the daughter of the void?" the King asked through lips stiff from fear.

"SUCH THINGS ARE NOT FOR YOU TO KNOW," Orobas said simply. "GO FORTH FROM HERE, FIONN MÓR, KING OF YSSA. LET THAT WHICH DOES NOT LIVE TEND TO THAT WHICH LIVES NO MORE." When they remained frozen in place, Orobas extended a clawed finger. The lightning that struck the tree beside them did not come from the sky. That was all it took to drive their frightened horses to bolt. The smell of ozone and sorcery lingered in the air, a taste of what was to come.

Orobas began to dig, his powerful claws biting into the earth. It took him only a few minutes to dig a shallow grave for the body. He laid her to rest in it and carefully scooped wet earth in to cover her still form. He had to rise and make several trips to build a cairn of large stones over her body. It would keep the animals from digging her up. Humans cared about such things, a concern fueled by the fear of mortality that hounded so many of them. When he was finished building, he studied his handiwork.

Again, he asked the air ponderously, "WHAT DID YOU KNOW?"

It was a pity that the dead could not speak.

The rain continued to pour, the lightning flashed, and the thunder cracked the sky. Orobas could still feel it humming through his body.

There was something wicked in the air.