The Eredar looked down upon the warlock and smiled his fanged, malicious grin. “Release him.” A succubus approached Arrens and drew a clawed finger across his cheek before whispering a spell that removed the shadowy tendrils that held him in place. “Now then, warlock, your training can begin. You’ll find a ward has been placed upon you to prevent you from changing into your demon form. In time, that ward will be removed. For now, however, you will feel pain you have never before felt. You will understand the torment each and every demon you have subjugated has felt. And when you feel you can take no more, you will beg to serve me so that the pain will end and you will feel nothing but pure, raw power.” Kro’thar’s laugh was booming.

 

Arrens sat up on the stone altar and rubbed his neck where the tendrils had held him the tightest. “I would sooner die than serve you or your kind, demon.”

 

Kro’thar looked at him with amusement. “You may very well get your wish.” Looking to a Doomguard standing nearby, the Eredar spoke in the same unfamiliar language Arrens could not understand.

 

The large, winged demon approached Arrens and swung a large fist at the professor’s jaw. The unexpected blow sent the warlock reeling. Pulling himself up, Arrens wiped a hand across his face, the coppery taste of blood filling his mouth. The demon approached again. Arrens attempted to morph into demon form to protect himself, but found himself unable to change. Whatever ward the Eredar had placed upon him was too strong. He had to escape, to put some distance between himself and the demons surrounding him.

 

 

With a thought, the Doomguard paused. Recognizing exactly what had happened, Arrens mentally told the demon to continue approaching him. That took…nothing. So easy… he thought.

 

The Doomguard lumbered towards Arrens and gripped him around the throat. The grip, while uncomfortable for Arrens, was not meant to harm him. He heard Kro’thar laugh some feet away clearly enjoying the show.

 

 

Lifting Arrens in his arms, the Doomguard leapt high into the air, his large wings spreading their full length. From below, the Eredar bellowed, “If you kill him, your pain will be neverending, worm!”

 

Ignoring the Eredar, the Doomguard continued to slowly elevate, his actions firmly under Arrens’ control. “Make haste away from here,” Arrens said quietly. The Doomguard began flying quickly away, the barren landscape before them offering little hope but distance between Kro’thar and his band of demonic cohorts. Arrens heard a roar the likes of which he had never heard before from below. Kro’thar had recognized what happened, sending an enormous bolt of shadow at the Doomguard. “Faster! Fly faster!” Arrens yelled. The Doomguard’s wings soared through the air as the shadowbolt continued to close in on them. It struck the Doomguard in his right wing searing a hole through it. Screaming in pain, the Doomguard quickly lost altitude sending the two of them careening towards the ground below.

 

Sacrifice yourself, Arrens thought as they fell fast and furiously. The Doomguard grabbed Arrens roughly around the torso and placed himself beneath the professor. When they crashed, Arrens heard an unnatural crack from behind him as he struggled to catch his breath from the wind being knocked out of him. Dragging himself to his knees, he saw a large, ashen gray rock the Doomguard had struck, its neck twisted in an unnatural angle.

 

A rush of wind and the Doomguard was gone. Arrens slumped backwards, trying to find a marginally comfortable spot, half-hidden behind the lump of cold, grey stone. He tasted blood, sucking his lower lip into his mouth and wincing. Pain still radiated from the burning scar on his arm, and his robes were soaked through in places with some combination of blood and fel-ooze.

At least, he thought, Aely can heal that kind of thing without much hardship.

Aely.

Tarquin’s horrid, mocking laughter filled his mind, and he smelled again the acrid fire that had taken them both into oblivion. The fire he’d conjured. His own magic had murdered the woman who had made him remember what it really meant to love.

He couldn’t find it in himself to even weep.

Oh Aely, I’m so sorry.

+++++

Arrens’ voice broke through her troubled sleep and Aely fell off the couch, landing on the floor of Arrens’ University apartment with an uncoordinated thump. She rubbed at her face, and then her arm, both oddly sore for having landed mostly sitting up on the carpet.

Aely…

She looked at Roger, who didn’t seem at all concerned that she’d just come crashing down to his level.  “Tha’ explains th’ radge dreams. Can ye hear him too, air is it jus’ me?” The wolfhound looked at her quizzically, as if she’d asked him a complex theoretical magic question. Which, to be honest, she probably had.

Aely… so sorry…

“Guess we ought t’ find out whether he c’n hear anythin’ in return, yeh?” Roger lay down at her feet. With half a sigh, Aely turned her thoughts inward, trying to ignore the fact that she was talking to the disembodied voice of a man who’d disappeared without a trace over two weeks ago.

Love? Yir sorry f’r what, exactly?

+++++

“…sorry f’r what, exactly?”

Her voice echoed in his mind. Arrens shook his head. Get a grip, Caltrains. First you’re talking to her like she can hear you, now you think she’s answering you. She’s gone.

“c’n hear ye fine. No’ gone anywhere. Th’ hell are ye?”

Arrens sat up, somewhat taken aback. How… are you hearing me? Aely? Is that you? Almost immediately he heard her voice again.

“Yes, I… Icecrown. Don’t know.”

But… but Aely, I watched… Are you alright? Are you alive?

“Very much alive. Been feelin’ half ay… goin’ through. ‘s like I’ve go’ yir ghost, only … my head.”

Still huddled behind the rock, Arrens heard more demons approaching. “Fel!’ he swore under his breath. Chancing a peek around the edge of the boulder, he saw dozens of them steadily closing in on him.

 

“Find him! And bring him to me!” he heard Kro’thar yell in demonic. He laughed, and Arrens heard him say something he did not understand. “Naztheros adare re rukadare archim ze daz ante!” Half a dozen imps began hopping towards Arrens, mischievous grins dancing across their demonic faces.

 

Arrens groaned in pain. I’m not sure I’ve got the energy to fight them all, he thought.

Aely’s voice flashed through his mind again – clearer than before.

 

“Ye spent yir life learnin’ t’ control an’ summon th’ powers ay th’ Nether. So yir there – yir swimmin’ in th’ very stuff ye use here, ‘cept ye dinna have t’ CALL it. It’s all ’round ye. Yir a warlock, love.”

 

She was right. As she usually was, Arrens laughed to himself. He took a deep breath and stood to confront the approaching imps. As one, they spotted him and began casting their dangerous fireballs. With a simple thought, he found himself controlling all six of them, their words of magic dying on their hideous lips. He turned them towards a group of succubi to his right and forced them to attack. One by one, the succubi fell, their shrieks drawing the attention of the felguard to his left. Arrens focused the energy of the Nether at the axe-wielding demons and watched as bolts of shadow radiated from his hands at his foes, each one falling dead upon impact.

 

 

Kro’thar stood in front of Arrens and snapped his fingers. The six imps exploded in a fiery death. “You are, indeed, a worthy adversary, human…for lesser demons, perhaps. But do you truly believe you can face the power of one such as me by yourself?” The demon laughed. “You think you can control the powers of the Nether after so little time upon this plane? I will teach you what true power is.” The ground beneath Arrens crackled as a blistering heat began emanating from the scorched earth below. Arrens ran, dashing behind the rock he had huddled behind earlier. “Run! Run, human, because this little game of cat and mouse amuses me. When I catch you, I will make you mine. Or I will kill you. It matters little to me anymore.” 

 

The boulder Arrens leaned upon splintered and crackled. Little by little, it disintegrated into a fine dust. “Look around you, warlock,” Kro’thar boomed. “You’ve no place to hide now. Come. Face your destiny. You’ve infused yourself with fel powers already. You’re well on your way to becoming a demonic entity! Give into the powers that course through your veins, human. Given enough time, you will have powers unimaginable upon your home world.”

 

Arrens straightened up slowly, his injuries making standing a difficult task. “And what would you have me do with those powers? Turn them against the same people I’ve fought alongside with for for all these years? I would sooner die a thousand deaths, demon.”

 

“Then you shall have your wish. Pity. You would have made a fine slave.” Kro’thar began casting a spell.

 

From what Arrens could hear of it, he knew it would be devastating. His thoughts were frantic. He knew standing still would result in his death. Fleeing would simply exaggerate the injuries he’d already incurred. If only I could remove the ward and change to my demon form, at least I would have a chance…

 

Aely’s words came back to him. Ye spent yir life learnin’ t’ control an’ summon th’ powers ay th’ Nether. So yir there – yir swimmin’ in th’ very stuff ye use here, ‘cept ye dinna have t’ CALL it. It’s all ’round ye. He looked down at his hands, willing himself to transform and feeling again whatever boundary the Eredar had placed on him. Arrens reached out, trying to find something – anything – in the shadowvoid around him that would protect him from the oncoming doom in Kro’thar’s hands.

Barely visible, in the center of the back of each of his hands, a faint blue glow pricked its way through his skin. Kro’thar finished the spell. Arrens watched as it barreled towards him, black and menacing even in such a menacing place. He braced himself for death.

A death which didn’t come.

The blue glow on his hands formed into sigils, and as the spell enveloped him they burned into his skin. He gritted his teeth – and the Eredun spell dissipated with a loud crack, leaving him and the Eredar blinking at each other in confusion. Arrens looked back at his hands, fresh arcane burns twitching at every nerve, his skin charred and angry.

Yva’s sigils.

He began to laugh. A quiet laugh, almost to himself, cut short by the furious Demonic roar as Kro’thar flung himself towards Arrens. “YOU THINK YOU’RE CLEVER? I WILL BREAK YOU!”

Arrens rolled sideways, the Eredar’s arms grasping his own. With that touch, the air around him crackled again, and, though his flesh burned under the touch, the ward was gone. In a flash, two demons fell wrestling, one huge and crimson, the other deep purple and winged – the form of a human warlock transformed.

 

They rolled, gray dust flying into the darkened air surrounding them. The Eredar’s searing touch was lessened in his demonic form, yet Arrens knew he was still not as strong as the larger demon. Kro’thar swung a mighty fist that hit Arrens in the side of the head causing his ear to ring loudly. Arrens swung back connecting solidly with the demon’s jaw. “Your puny attempts are laughable, warlock. You think you can hurt me even in your ‘true’ form? You have so much to —- AH!” Kro’thar yelled as Arrens dug his long claws into the flesh of the Eredar’s head. In what felt like a heartbeat, Arrens saw the demon’s life flash before his eyes. From the creature’s time on Argus as a recognizable Draenei to what he had become now before him, Arrens saw it all. The deaths of countless civilizations were on this demon’s hands as they sought more worlds to conquer, their thirst for power unquenchable.

 

Kro’thar managed to pull Arrens’ claws out of his skull; both the wound and the warlock’s hand were covered in fel-ooze. “You’ll pay for that, human.” The Eredar grabbed Arrens’ demonic form around the neck and squeezed. Arrens gasped for breath, his long nails clawing and digging into the demon’s hand as he felt himself lifted up and off the ground.

 

Kicking, gouging and clawing found him no purchase. Arrens didn’t have the energy to cast a spell. His thoughts immediately flashed to Aely. H-h-help…love…

 

As quickly as he had entered the Nether, he was gone.