Jackal Among Snakes

Argrave walked out of the makeshift interrogation room a great deal later, his gray eyes looking somewhat darker after what he’d learned. Others, who’d not participated in the interrogation so as not to make it overbearing and overcrowded, walked up to him.

“Have we learned any useful information?” Bhaltair questioned.

Argrave stood, searching in his own head for how he might answer that question. After a long while of many waiting expectantly, he finally said, “I think we may have a new ally.”

“What?” People looked between each other. “You got that one to turn against his kind?”

“No,” Argrave shook his head. “But they’re fighting against someone they call the Manumitter at the same time as us. This person is apparently capable of liberating Shadowlanders from their hierarchy. Anneliese and I… after reviewing all the information, and making some admittedly big leaps in logic…”

She nodded to back up his point. “We think that it’s Traugott they’re fighting against.”

Argrave looked between everyone. “Guessing that, I proposed a collaboration. This Manumitter has amassed a sizable force of Shadowlanders, freed of the hierarchy. He’s apparently attempting to break the chains that bind them once and for all, bringing free will to everyone in the Shadowlands.” Argrave rubbed his chin.

“And?” Ghislain pressed.

“Our little dark knight friend with a flesh wound wanted me to meet his boss.” Argrave crossed his arms. “The big boss. The Hopeful, he called it. He’s physically incapable of breaking protocol and working with me independently. Only the big boss has free will. And the way he told it, it sounds like the Hopeful’s responsible for holding this whole realm together. If the Manumitter takes him down—and that’s not out of the realm of possibility—we might have bigger problems than a few stragglers coming to our world. The whole damned Shadowlands could leak out to our world.”

“If he can’t break protocol, why’s he talking to you?” Aurore asked prudently.

“I’m not sure. Maybe it’s because the big boss never accounted for his little peons actually being able to speak. It seems like only the higher-ranking ones are, and only within the domain Anneliese establishes after I burn away the shadow.” Argrave shook his head. “But I’d only be guessing. Question is, I suppose… do we meet with big boss?” He raised a finger. “Speak now, or forever hold your peace.”

“That depends largely on what such a thing would entail,” they sought information.

Argraev nodded. “It would entail me letting the man go so he could deliver word, and then waiting for him to make good on his promise.”

Felipe looked at Anneliese. “Do you have any insight on his truthfulness?”

“None whatsoever,” she answered. “His eyes seemed truthful of his intent, but eyes can only say so much, and this realm is nothing like anything I’ve ever experienced before. Besides, if he is slave to a larger system, then it doesn’t particularly matter what he feels, no?”

“I say we don’t trust it. You all heard that cryptic talk he gave when first encountering us, about fate and death and all of that. He’s not someone that we can rely upon. He wants us dead, pure and simple.” The Archchief shook his head. “Only a fool lets an enemy go when they have them at their mercy. We should use him to send a message.”

“Hell, it doesn’t matter.” Balzat crossed his arms as he looked between everyone. “He’s only a small part of a larger picture; one part of a grand hierarchy. We’ve shown that we’re capable of subduing him. If he cooperates, we gain an in with their leader. If he doesn’t, then all we’ve done is let loose an enemy that may have a bit of knowledge about our forces. In reality, Argrave hasn’t shown all his cards at all.”

Argrave said nothing, grateful that Balzat had such a high opinion of him. In reality, he’d been on the backfoot the entire time that black knight had been fighting him in the sky. But others seemed to appreciate Balzat’s words much more than Argrave himself—they were persuasive. At the end of the day, it was only one enemy of many. Roland still had this horseman tracked.

“I’m going to see what more I can get out of the man. But once he’s all talked out, I’m going to let him go. You might think it’s foolish, all of you, but I’m the one that bled to get him in that dank little cave. I think I have the most authority when it comes to deciding when he goes.”

No protest was brooked, even from the Archchief who’d been most adamant. Argrave didn’t know much about this black knight. But from all he’d heard, the Shadowlanders never came to their realm out of malice. Rather, it was similar to a concept that Argrave had read about in the past: Hungry Ghosts.

There was a reason that, in their realm, the Shadowlanders had such a profound impact in their surroundings. They seemed to eat light, color, sensation, sounds, and smells. Why? It was because their very presence was a craving for existence that could never be fulfilled. Their entire life was that of hunger, of consumption, and of desire. They possessed an insatiable desire to exist, but were denied that sensation. Their body constantly imposed itself on the world around it, eating away at sensations of existence to fill a void that was not meant to be filled.

Argrave didn’t know if it was a tale woven by a captive, but apparently, the one called the Hopeful kept all of the Shadowlanders shrouded in the abyss. He deliberately cultivated an atmosphere where no sensations could be felt, and where all was different from the mortal world, to keep them from their suffering. He did all of this under the hope that one day, a cure for these sensations might one day present itself, allowing them to exist as they so desperately craved. It was only when Gerechtigkeit descended that this eternal peace was disturbed, and some were drawn from the shadows to bask in the light.

As for how such a painful existence could come to be… their captive knew as little as the average human knew about how the world was created. If the Hopeful was capable of sustaining such a realm, perhaps he could give the answers that Argrave wanted so dearly.

But there was something Argrave knew in his heart of hearts. Whatever cooperation arose, the Shadowlanders would never resolve things peaceably. Argrave and Anneliese had disturbed their territory, and now that they knew the possibility existed for it to be overwritten, the Hopeful would never allow that to lie for after the Manumitter was slain. They could collaborate with them to deal with the larger problem that was Traugott, but at the end of the road, there was a reckoning in store. Of what scale… well, perhaps he’d have to ask the Hopeful.

#####

Argrave felt rather like a child releasing a wounded animal he’d found back into the wild after its injuries were tended to. Like a child, he secretly hoped the pet would come wandering back. Ultimately, it was a calculated risk. If nothing came of it, so be it. If something did, they’d gain. Either way, torture wasn’t truly on the table.

For the first few hours, Argrave’s company thought that nothing had come of it. Roland noted that the horseman was staying on the edge of the realm they’d carved out of the Shadowlands, doing nothing. Argrave coped by suggesting that he was having someone else send the message, but he secretly thought that he might’ve been played by the black knight after all.

That is, until Argragve realized just how wrong he was about how gloomy this place could become.

It all started off rather casually, as one might slowly turn up the heat on a frog in the water. The land all around seemed to become darker, as though the sun was setting in the Shadowlands. Soon enough, it became clear this was not a transitory thing. The white grass grew grayer and grayer, until eventually it turned black. The dirt darkened until it seemed like nothing remained of it. The mesas of varying shades started to shift to a solitary black.

Then, gaping holes opened miles above, and gigantic spouts of black shadows started to flood the world in a horrifying scene. Argrave thought this might be another attack on its way, and so sent out blood magic to chip away at what came. But soon enough, someone pointed out something.

“Something huge is coming this way,” said Bhaltair. “I… I can’t quite make out what it is.”

Not long after Bhaltair noticed its presence with his undead scouts, everyone started to feel it, too. It was an overwhelming presence that tugged at their very souls, threatening to spirit it away if they lost concentration for a moment. It was a constant thief, a constant desire, a constant hunger, that was so intense in its existence that it could swallow them if they didn’t resist.

Resist they did—Argrave spent copious amounts of his own blood fighting back against this changing world, and Anneliese struggled desperately to keep it maintained by rewriting it near as fast as it was destroyed. Eventually, this consumption of shadow became so utterly overwhelming that Argrave resorted to a spell he’d deemed a last resort—[Apollyon]. Bursting free of his skin, he had no lack of energy to replenish himself as the locusts raged against the collapse of this world brought about by the coming giant.

In this suffocating darkness, the gigantic form that intruded upon this world they’d carved loom large over them. It made the giant gods in the Bloodwoods seem miniscule by comparison. The heroes of the ages past crowded around Anneliese and Argrave for reprieve against this nightmarish creature. It was only darkness, but in that wreath of shadow, Argrave could barely make out a pair of brown eyes.

“It’s him,” Anneliese confirmed to Argrave, her breath heavy from the sheer pressure and fear of this scenario. “There’s no one higher in the hierarchy. He holds the reins.”

Argrave gazed into those oddly human brown eyes, gritting his teeth as locusts erupted from both of his hands in defiance of the coming of the abyss. This was, ostensibly, what they had decided to seek out. Now… how the hell was he supposed to have a civil conversation during all of this?

“If you’re here to talk… can you dial back the darkness?!” Argrave shouted up. “And if you’re not here to talk, well… talk to me anyway!”