“Can you fix him?” Daemodan asked, taking his mug of tea. Madhavi walked the third mug to her brother’s new pet. She ran clawed hands through his soft, nearly white curls and tilted his chin up toward her. His eyes - one ice blue and one red - were glazed over, almost lifeless. What little life she saw held… rage. She smiled at him, stroking his cheek.
“Are you sure that’s wise, MoMo?” she said, sipping her own tea.
“Can you do it or not?” Daemodan sighed. “What will you give me?” she countered. He growled. His annoyance made her shiver with barely contained glee. Her home was payment for his hunters; her true prize was upstairs in the spare room she used for her personal hobbies.
“You could always have Jaysen try instead…” she continued. His claws dug into the mug he held.
“Jaysen is busy,” he snarled. “Just do what you’re told.”
“Or what?” she giggled. She stopped giggling when he took firm hold of her neck. She gasped, croaking, eyes bulging.
“Or Cavian will find himself without a sister upon his return. Learn your place, Madhavi. Get it done.”
Daemodan squeezed on her neck for emphasis, dropping her as he exited her home. She raged at him, lobbing his left-over mug at the door. It shattered on impact. Her chest heaved and eyes watered. He would regret his actions. She would ‘fix’ his little toy - and pull him under her sway just like she’d done to Jaysen.
***
Eventually, the inevitable happened. Xandrix gleaned that Jaysen was well enough to Travel and forced their tiny band to make the hop from Cartha to Kormaine. The Corrupted hunter was done wasting time and Jaysen was out of excuses. The human-run nation was so drastically different than Cartha it nearly hurt. It was cold, despite being late summer, with snow and ash falling from the sky. Jaysen felt each tiny flake hit his face, and smelled the ash collecting on top of his head. He also heard the rumble of thunder above his head and felt the charge of energy on the air created by a Hex Storm. It made the spot between his shoulder blades tickle uncomfortably and the hairs on his arms stand on end. He didn’t like it. The entire area felt unnatural. Some of it was the Hex Storm, but there was an underlying sensation that made the Corrupted olve uneasy.
“Where is the king, Jaysen?” Xandrix snarled.
They stood somewhere outside where there was no cover. There were demons nearby, most of them shying away from where Jaysen stood. There was a hierarchy in the Demon Realms that only the very bold or the very stupid dared to cross. Being what he was, Jaysen sat at the top of the hierarchy as did Roth and now the new one that had been created. Madhavi sat just above them as the daughter of the Red. All of his spawn were accorded a spot on the hierarchy. Everything else bent to their will - usually. Chaos was still chaos no matter what form it took, and commanding chaos was often like trying to hold water in an open palm. The few demons that roamed did so against orders. The majority of the horde had been ordered to the northern part of Kormaine. According to Xandrix, their tiny band was in the northern most part of the southern region in a city called Tatengel. Xandrix, Jaysen liked to point out, was the bottom of the barrel in the demonic hierarchy; an abomination in the eyes of demon and mortal kind.
“You tell me,” Jaysen replied, leaning heavily on his staff with feigned boredom. The Corrupted hunter growled, grabbing Jaysen by the collar.
“I don’t have time for your games, dammit!” Xandrix hissed. He was not normally so rough or demanding. Something happened that Jaysen was not aware of, something from Daemodan - or worse. His voice echoed through the ash, disturbing the beasts nearby, even at a hiss. He was not angry; he was afraid.
“And I don’t have answers for you. I came to the Node. I assumed he’d be here - or near enough,” Jaysen answered calmly. It did no good to retaliate with anger. It was clear, now, that neither of them wanted to be in Kormaine. “What did he threaten?”
“WOOOO!!!!”
Their attention was diverted by the echoing howl of the idiot they were both saddled with. Jaysen sighed and heard the same from Xandrix as the man let him go. Roth bounded about, clapping at things in front of him so that it created a hateful echo that rivaled the thunder above or chased the citizens of the city around like they were insects. The Node was near a well that was within arm’s reach of where Jaysen stood. While he was not standing under any kind of cover, the way things echoed suggested an open courtyard near several buildings of short stature. The echo did not go very far, drifting away into the roar of the Hex Storm above.
“Find the king,” Xandrix repeated with a little more patience in his gruff voice. “I’ll deal with Roth.” Jaysen listened to his surroundings, to the song on the air; Hikaru was the Node’s name. It was confused and concerned. The Hex Storm … frightened it. Jaysen had never felt fear from a Node before, it was not generally a thing that they experienced. What did a Node have to fear? Jaysen lifted his head to the sky, shutting his eyes and stretching his senses outward. Doing so made his head hurt, made horrible memories come barreling through his mind until he
