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His New Hoard

Chapter 3: Protecting What's His

Sponsored by Fox_Sinz

By Draconicon

"Actually..."

Draconicon grunted, straining to keep the spear from darting any closer to the mole. The angel was deceptively strong. Even using all the strength of one arm was barely enough to keep the point of the spear from darting towards Jaceb's heart.

"Actually...he's my necromancer. If you have a problem with that...you have a problem...with me."

With a grunt, he shoved the spear sideways, stepping between the mole and his attacker. He'd barely moved before the spear had spun around, now pointed just under his chin.

"I thought you might be a good person in the wrong place, dragon. Was I mistaken?"

"I don't know. Was I mistaken in bringing you back?"

"I have a duty to ensure souls damned here remain here...Necromancers violate that rule."

"Just a moment ago, you were grateful to be saved from dying. Did that gratitude go out the window just because of the company I keep?"

"He is a necromancer."

"And one that certainly doesn't belong here. Jaceb?"

He looked over his shoulder, half-expecting to see the mole on his knees, cringing in pain from the loss of his hand.

Instead, he saw the necromancer clenching his free hand around the stump at the end of his arm, squeezing tightly as his shadow picked the severed hand from the ground. Jaceb was paler than usual, but the chubby mole wasn't exactly screaming in agony the way that a normal being might have done.

"Jaceb? Are you okay?"

"W-will b-be. J-just...mmmph. J-just...hurts."

"You lost a hand. It's supposed to hurt."

"He should have lost much more," the angel growled. "That skull -"

"Do not!" The mole raised his voice surprisingly loud, making even the dragon lean back. "Do...not...T-they don't deserve...t-this p-place."

"..."

The angel shook his head, slowly lowering his spear until the butt of it was resting on the red earth. He sighed.

"You...saved my life, dragon. I owe you a favor. Do you claim this as that?"

He glanced back at the angel as he fought the urge to just say yes. Just going with one's instincts worked for a while, but he'd had enough failures lately to force him to consider all his options.

The angel was obviously strong. After seeing their fight against the various defenders that Hell had spawned against them, Draconicon would have put the angels up against most monsters that he had seen in his lifetime, though he didn't know if that was down to their weaponry or their skills. Either way, having the angel as an ally and someone that owed him a favor could be enormously helpful down the line.

However, that meant dealing with a constant assault on Jaceb, someone he'd already promised to free from Hell. They'd not been together long, but he felt that the mole deserved a second chance in life. A chance to do more than this.

And I can't be sure that I can keep this guy from succeeding in his goals, Draconicon thought. He's stronger than he looks, and he's probably still healing. If he keeps pushing this...

He needed as much magic as he could get in order to get out of Hell. If he wasted it defending someone else, all he'd manage to do was alert everyone that he was trying to break free. If he didn't smash through the space between universes, his enemies would just bind him here all the tighter.

With all that in mind, there was really only one choice.

"I do. I formally demand as my favor that you do not attack or seek to harm, kill, or have harm done to the necromancer known as Jaceb."

"..."

The angel hesitated for a moment, his teeth clenching before he thumped the butt of the spear against the ground.

"Then our debt is discharged. The necromancer will come to no harm from me."

"Good."

"Where are you going, dragon?"

"..."

Draconicon pointed to the ring of ice some way off. The angel turned, then glanced back at him.

"Are you seeking to leave Hell?"

"I'm pretty sure anyone that can think clearly wants to get out of here."

"...Our paths are parallel, then. I will travel with you."

"I'll take that."

As the angel turned away, already walking off, the dragon finally turned back to the mole. Jaceb was no longer so pale, but his hand was still hanging off the end of his arm, attached by little more than a bit of thread. Draconicon shook his head, reaching down to support it while the shadow continued its sewing efforts.

"Are you okay?"

"W-will b-be. J-just...p-putting myself b-back together."

"Sorry this happened. I didn't think he would do that...or be so fast."

The mole nodded.

"Does it hurt?" he asked.

"A lot."

"Can I -"

"Mmm-mmm."

"...You're not bleeding anymore."

"No."

"Why?"

"Made my arm...dead...K-killed it...can resurrect...b-bring it b-back...after sewing's done..."

A clever way to get around the limitations of necromancy, he had to admit. Draining the life from a limb, essentially 'killing' it, would make it so that it was completely dead and no longer hurt him, or at least, not much. Probably would hurt at the point where it connected to the shoulder, but that was nothing compared to having the entire thing in agony from a lost appendage. And with the hand and arm both 'dead', Jaceb could cheat and bring the whole thing back to 'life' after the hand was sewn back on.

Avoids the complications of dead flesh by keeping the time short, too...this mole really is a brilliant one.

It made him wonder what had happened to send him down here...

Before long, Jaceb was back to normal, his hand moving fine as the dragon made him prove it was okay. Once he was satisfied, Draconicon turned his attention back to the world around them, and the icy ring that lay before them.

"We're not going to like this, are we?"

"No...no you...you w-won't..."

"...Might as well get it over with."

The pair of them set out, following in the path of the angel's footprints. Draconicon tried to ignore the way that the blood-dirt tried to stick to them as they walked, and pushed the feeling of it turning from dirt to...liquid...down as hard as he could.

#

They were unmolested during the half-hour walk to the ice, though the sound of conflict and chaos followed them wherever they went. The dragon could hear it in the distance and imagined that there were many souls of Hell that were fighting for the chance to survive, to not need to go underground and regenerate before continuing with their day.

He glanced at Jaceb, half-tempted to ask him what some of the sounds were, but he resisted. Something told him that the answer wouldn't help.

Eventually, they reached the border between the blood-dirt of the ring of fire and the chilled ground of the ice ring. White wisps of cold rose from the freezing surface, looking like flames in their own right as they licked the air.

"So...what happens when you step over the line?" Draconicon asked.

"Try it and find out," the angel muttered.

"...Fine. Jaceb, pull me back if I -"

"You w-won't fall..."

Somehow, he didn't like the sound of that. Jaceb had intentionally chosen to leave the ring of ice to come to the ring of fire. The necromancer had gone through with the idea that this place, where emotion completely consumed you, was better than what the ice did.

He hesitated, then took that first step.

As soon as he put both feet on the ice, he felt...nothing.

Absolutely nothing. Not even a draining feeling as his emotions disappeared. One moment, he had been frustrated, even angry. Maybe a little sad, maybe a bit curious and a bit driven to keep moving.

Now...

Nothing.

He stared into the distance, the cold winds of the ice ring blowing around him. He took a deep breath in, then a deep breath out.

There was a reason to keep moving. He could remember that reason. They were trying to get out. Trying to get free. Trying to get revenge.

They were facts.

They were facts, but there...

There was nothing behind them. Nothing to prop them up. Nothing to make the facts matter. Emotion...emotion was gone. Completely gone. Not suppressed, not chilled, not held down. It was just...gone.

And it didn't even scare him. He felt no urge to turn around and get it back. Oh, he acknowledged that this wasn't healthy, that this wasn't right, but he felt no urge to get it back. Even as he logically went through every reason why emotion would be helpful, the complete detachment from any desire, any emotion, just...kept him where he stood.

"Jaceb...was this how it felt when you crossed it? This...nothingness?"

"..."

"Angel?"

"This is the ring of ice," the angel said, his voice as flat as the dragon felt. "Within the cold, nothing can burn, but more importantly, nothing can live. It is nothing more than existence. An existence full of thoughts that never have the fire to drive them forward. An existence where nothing matters, no matter how much it should."

He was starting to see why the ring of fire was preferable to this.

"Jaceb...Jaceb, pull me back."

Soft hands gripped his tail, his feet sliding along the ice until they touched the blood-dirt again. As soon as the fire reached him, he felt the emotions come back. Not a surge, not a flood, but more like a simple flicker back into existence.

Draconicon gasped for breath, his scales popping with sweat as he went from cold to hot again. Suddenly, he was aware of the ice that had started forming on his shoulders, the little icicles that had draped down from the sides of his snout. He had...

Nothing mattered, he thought, staring at the ice ring. Nothing matters in there. Not dreams, not hate, not love...not even your own life.

"How did you cross that, Jaceb?"

"W-with..."

The mole paused, looking at the angel for a moment before lowering his head.

"W-with...help."

"What kind of help?"

"..."

"Jaceb, if we're going to get out, I need to know."

"Hmmph." The angel shook his head. "If he had help, it was doubtlessly from one of my order. There's no way -"

"No...not one of y-yours..."

The dragon arched an eyebrow as the mole looked down at the skull tucked under his arm. Fingers traced runes and names that the dragon couldn't understand, the mole taking a deep breath.

"P-please...Don't j-judge me...help me...again..."

Knowing that the mole wasn't talking to him, the dragon stepped out of the way as the necromancer moved to the border. The mole knelt down, placing the skull precisely where the ice and the blood-dirt met, and began to whisper.

The earth shook all around them. The angel leaped into the air while the dragon forced himself to stay where he stood, not daring to move in case it broke the necromancer's concentration.

So much power...

The air around Jaceb was swirling with a blue energy, the scrawlings on the skull lighting up with the same color. The mole's mouth continued to move, whispering words that were no longer audible as the ground shook and rolled, lifting and lowering as little dots and bumps began to rise beneath the dirt and the ice.

"He's calling the dead!" the angel shouted.

"Obviously!"

"No, you don't understand! He shouldn't -"

Ice and blood-dirt were rent apart as dozens, hundreds, thousands of bodies were suddenly ripped from their resting place. The blue lights - numbering as many as the bodies - leaped from the skull and into the corpses and skeletons and everything else that the mole had ripped from the ground. Their eyes glowed with the light of the long-dead, and the bodies began to move.

They wove themselves together in the way that only the unfeeling departed could, bones cracking and flesh ripping as they wove themselves into a tunnel of the dead. The gaps closed one by one as they folded themselves together, the light of their possessing spirits staring blankly into the ice as the tunnel extended further and further.

Draconicon stared in awe at the display of power, kneeling down by the mole as he kept whispering. Finally, he could hear what Jaceb was saying.

"I'm s-sorry...s-so s-s-sorry...one time...one last time...p-please...don't hate me...don't hate me...I'm s-sorry..."

He wanted to ask. He wanted to know what the mole had done, why he was still tormenting himself, but he knew better than to push. With so many different souls and bodies to juggle, the dragon wasn't going to risk dispelling this work just so he could satisfy his curiosity. Instead, he looked down the tunnel, watching as the last of the bodies folded themselves into place far off in the distance.

As impressive as the structure was, he didn't know what it was for. How was that...

A thought occurred. Help. Jaceb had help before, but he hadn't said for what. Were the dead...

He stepped forward again, this time into the tunnel. A bone cracked beneath his foot, the shards stabbing into the arch, and he winced.

"Sorry," he muttered.

"T-they...can't feel it..."

"Still, sorry."

He took another step...and another...

And could still keep walking.

"How..."

"The dead..." Jaceb whispered, taking a deep rasping breath. "The dead..."

"Abominable magic," the angel grunted, spitting. "You're tormenting them so you can get through? Using them as a shield against your just punishment?"

The mole didn't answer. He just lowered his head to the skull, forehead to forehead with it, still whispering.

Draconicon finally understood. As the ring of rib-bone had been a guard against the heart, the various bodies formed a tunnel of their own dreams and feelings, their own reasons for doing things. They worked...

They worked in service. A command did not need an emotion to be followed. You could not command yourself...but you could hear and follow the command of another. Standing among the dead, he could still feel the cold, but he could hear their whispers at his sides.

"Keep walking...keep walking...keep walking..."

It was a constant shifting whisper, the words almost blending into one another, but at the same time, completely understandable. Their command reached through the cold that pushed through the bodies - though even that was lessened to an extent by the insulating corpses - and felt his body continue following what they asked of him.

"Keep walking, keep walking..."

"Come on...while we can..." Draconicon groaned, thinking he should wrap his arms around him for warmth, but unable to quite manage it. "Jaceb...How far does this go?"

"Halfway...halfway to t-the next b-border."

"Which one is that?"

"The border between ice and darkness. Between emptiness and blindness." The angel joined him in the tunnel, showing no effects from the cold. "If you think this is bad...brace yourself for what comes next."

The dragon wondered if he should have felt fear from hearing that. He wondered what that would be like in this place.

He waited for Jaceb, then let himself listen to the whispered words of the dead again, letting them carry him down the corridor.

#

The glowing eye-lights of the dead and damned were not particularly illuminating, and Draconicon stepped on multiple squishy and crackly things as he walked down the tunnel that Jaceb had created. More than once, he felt his foot go right through a body, and when it did, he felt the ice again.

Every time, that chill sunk right into his bones, reminding him of the full power of the ring of Hell just outside the tunnel. That touch, that horrible freezing embrace, took away even the motivation of command. He could not move, not until Jaceb nudged him forward again.

Of course, the necromancer suffered similar moments. He broke through the bodies, as well, and if he did not fall over - which broke contact with the ice and its draining qualities - then he needed the same touch. The pair of them watched each other's backs as they kept moving, kept walking, always moving forward.

The angel was always at the edge of view, moving faster than either of them could manage. He would occasionally stop, looking back at them, and if he had gotten too far ahead, they'd have the privilege of watching him wait until they were a hundred steps away or so before walking forward again. Every time, it was clear that he was looking down at them, and the dragon barely suppressed his growls at the treatment.

At least I can feel annoyed, he thought. I should be angry, but considering the alternative here...

He took a deep breath, then let it out. It was like he was breathing out his reasons to keep moving, in some ways. The longer they were here, the less that the commands from the dead seemed to work. The dragon stumbled, falling to his knees, and even the whispers to get up were hardly reaching him.

"How does anyone live here?" he asked, almost feeling like the voice was coming back to him from outside, like his words were coming from someone else. Was he that detached from himself? "How can you..."

"Y-you don't live here," Jaceb said, and his voice was almost the same. "Y-you exist here...Y-you s-see, y-you t-think, and y-you w-wish t-that y-you w-were anywhere else..."

He certainly was wishing that at the moment. Even now, he could perfectly recollect why he wanted to leave. He could remember what the dragon-gods had done to him. The knowledge, the facts, everything else was right there in his head...

But without something else behind them, without that push that made facts something worth knowing...

Think...think...you've always been good at thinking and figuring things out. You knew what Jaceb was doing, you knew how to turn the ring into a fortress. How do you make it through this? What are the rules? What are the loopholes?

Even the self-berating lacked the usual heat that he normally brought to bear. The dragon managed to force himself to his feet, holding tight to the words around him. Logically, he knew he needed to. In all other ways...it seemed pointless. Completely, utterly pointless.

And if the words were ever to stop, he knew he wouldn't be able to continue without something from someone else.

Think.

Why?

Because you have to.

Why?

Because if you don't, you're going to die.

Is it such a thing to live?

It wasn't even a moment of depression. There was nothing suicidal in the thought, nothing that declared that life was too cruel to live. It was merely an absence of any reason to continue. No matter how much logic he threw at the problem, there was nothing to catch. No sparks, no light, nothing to push him forward.

"Jaceb."

"Mmmph?"

"Talk."

"W-why?"

"Talk about...talk about why you want to leave. Tell me what you want to do."

"I don't...I don't..k-know..."

"..."

He took a deep breath. How to move forward?

Why?

Think of it like a thought experiment. Test out the things. No reason, but thought flowed easier than action.

They were following commands. Commands of the dead. The dead didn't matter to him, but they were helping him forward.

The dead mattered to Jaceb. The necromancer was having an easier time than him.

What did that mean?

It meant that a command from someone that mattered drove you forward more than the command of something that didn't. Like anywhere else, connection still mattered here. Emotions were gone, but the logic of that was sound. A priority list based on pure facts, one that operated from an external nudge.

"Tell me to get you out of here, Jaceb," he muttered.

"G-get...me...out...of...here..." the mole whispered.

"Again," the dragon grunted, pulling himself forward by a step.

"G-get me...out of...here..."

"Again. Don't stop."

"G-get me...out...of here..."

It wasn't much, but it was better than the dead. It was better than -

THUMP!

The sudden impact slammed him to the other side of the tunnel. Jaceb wasn't much better; he landed with his back against the dead, while the dragon hit the wall with his shoulder. No pain. Not that he could feel, at least.

Draconicon turned to the other side of the tunnel. Even in the low blue glow, he could see a massive series of cracks through the woven bone wall in front of them. Wisps of white spread through the gaps, sliding through like ghostly fingers.

"Jaceb...do monsters roam the ice?"

The mole nodded.

"Big ones?"

He nodded again.

"Oh, gre-"

THUMP!

The second hit did more than throw them back. A large head broke through the wall of bodies, and even discounting the bones that hung from its mandibles, the creature was a grotesque mix of insect and mammal. It roared at them, sucking in a breath that chilled the air further than ever. If ever there was a thing to be feared, this would be it, but that breath left him with nothing.

"It's taking away our will to live...isn't it?" the dragon asked, surprised at the calm in his voice.

"Y-yes...it is very...very g-good at...t-that."

Considering that it was wriggling further and further forward, sending more cracks down the body tunnel, and they still weren't running away, he would agree. He could think of a hundred reasons why they didn't want to be there, a thousand different spells that he might have thrown to try and get them out of it...

But action...

Was there any point to action?

Logically, yes, of course...but here? Now? It felt impossible...

The creature had pushed six arms through the hole, the cold of the ice ring flooding through after. Whatever the monster was, it seemed completely immune to the cold. Probably because it was a beast of Hell, he supposed.

It looked back and forth between him and Jaceb, as if debating which one of them to eat. Finally, it seemed to turn towards the necromancer.

I wonder if the angel is just going to keep going? He doesn't owe us anything. I wouldn't be surprised.

So much for keeping a strong fighter.

There were more than six arms to the creature, he realized. There were at least ten, with more possibly outside the tunnel. Draconicon watched as if in a daze as it wrapped two pairs around the mole, lifting him up. Jaceb didn't even twitch as it held him, breathing around him and sucking the cold past the mole as the dragon just...watched.

This is wrong. I should do something.

But there was nothing he could do. Even though he remembered telling Jaceb that he'd take him out of here, that he'd get the mole somewhere where he'd have a second chance at life, he couldn't bring himself to take that final step. There was every logical reason...but he had no...motivation...

My necromancer...

The spear. The spear and the claim.

The claim, most of all. Draconicon felt a rumble deep inside, a feeling that every dragon in existence felt when something in their hoard was threatened. It pulled at him, dragging at him.

"Jaceb..."

"W-what?" the mole whispered.

"Are you...my necromancer?"

"W-what -"

"Are you...my...necromancer?" he whispered. "If you are...say it..."

"I...am...y-yours..."

Yours.

It was not a romantic statement, nor was it a statement of loyalty. That was not what dragons looked for. It never was, never had been. They weren't the sort to look for a statement of the heart, or a statement of service.

They looked for statements of ownership, things to add to their collection, their treasure, their hoard.

And one never, ever threatened a dragon's hoard.

I...am...allowed...this!

Whether it was an action beyond thought that allowed him to move, or something else entirely, Draconicon leaped forward. Black fire warped to orange and red, flying up from his fingers like a burning inferno.

One swipe cut through four arms on the side of the creature facing him. It dropped Jaceb with a howl, and before the cold could sweep through and take him again, the dragon brought his hand back up, forcing the blades of fire to extend. They pushed out, down through the bodies, and then -

HISSSSSS!

Through the creature itself. The thing fell into pieces, cut into six slices, everything seared with the blazing heat of the fire claws so that nothing could leak out. He stared at the body, slowly shaking his head as the cold began seeping through the hole again, drawing the heat out of him and out of the fire.

Soon, the fire claws faded away, leaving nothing of his determination to keep the mole safe. But at least the creature was dead.

"Are...y-you okay? Do y-you need -"

"I'm fine, Jaceb."

Motivation. He had to hold onto motivation. He had to keep finding the loopholes. His thoughts...his thoughts worked fine, as did his thought processes. The problem lay in applying the solutions he came up with, seeing which ones would work and which ones would not.

At least he'd found one. He could protect the mole. Which meant he could fight, if he had to.

"We should keep moving."

"W-we s-should, y-yes."

Neither of them did...not until they heard the rumble in the distance.

Draconicon looked through the hole the creature had made. Out there, along the icy plateau, things were moving. Things...that did not look friendly.

"Move, Jaceb."

"Y-yes, s-sir."

It was only after they managed a few dozen feet down the tunnel that he realized what Jaceb had called him. He wondered if that was intentional.

The End