It had felt wrong to tear so much of the Master’s Will from his body, like a leech, but Mona had been left without a choice. And now, it had opened the way for a chance like this—a chance that Phaedra might not be able to contain her. It was the first time she’d felt a glimmer of hope since they’d been captured, and Mona intended to push things as far as she could.

She allowed the blaze to grow beyond her, to consume all it could, and then with her breath she spread the flames outwards, shattering the containment chamber.  Mona continued to shape the flame, sending it out in waves towards the guards and towards Phaedra.

Phaedra had watched it all, unyielding even now, then calmly pressed a button on her console before ducking beneath it.  A siren began to go off.  Phaedra must have prepared for this.  Of course she had.

Mona released more fire to her sides without looking, and she heard screams. With a quick glance she saw that only two guards, both behind her, were still standing. For now, she should focus on Phaedra.

Some of the energy Mona had absorbed had apparently gone to her body, rather than her sorcery. This was the first time she had tried to draw on his power without a spell in mind. Ever since she’d taken his power she’d felt a surge of energy, and time seemed to pass slowly as she sprang forward, dashing through the still shattering glass, feeling a strange feeling of hatred come over her, a desire she had never before known to kill Phaedra and the others who had captured her, to slay them and see their blood stain the ground.

She weaved to the side, hoping that when Phaedra sprang up again, Mona wouldn’t be where she expected. She moved low to the ground, forming another flame in her left hand, ready to cast it towards the first glimmer of green skin. Mona weaved further to the right, and was closing in on Phaedra’s console when Phaedra at last revealed herself, now wearing a gas mask and running towards the door.

As she did so, a rain of white, foamy mist began to spray from vents in the ceiling.  Mona ignored it, stretching out her hand and focusing on her target, releasing the flame orb towards Phaedra’s back.  The fire dashed outward, but was caught in the falling spray and shrank in size.  It still hit Phaedra, but seemed to only singe the back of her jumpsuit.

Mona looked around, trying to find a place free from whatever fire dampening agent Phaedra had prepared.  But the entire room was coated in it, and more was still spraying from the ceiling.

The door to the lab opened, and more guards began to file in.  They stepped over the dead bodies of the few she’d killed, slowly closing in from either side.

Mona’s eyes took in the scene coldly, readying another flame in her hands which sputtered and shrank even as she tried to conjure it.

“Please,” Phaedra said.  “As if I didn’t prepare for you here, Mona, in my lab?  What did you expect to achieve?  Your hotheadedness will get you in trouble.”

The guards had reached Greg’s bubble and surrounded it.  He was still leaning against the glass, looking pale and weakened.

Mona raised her hands, the fire dissipating. “Fine.  You’ve made your point.  Don’t do anything you’ll regret, Phaedra.”

The new High Priestess smirked at the previous. “Desdemona, my dear, I’ve never regret a thing in my life.”

“Take her back to the dungeon,” Phaedra said, and then she smiled. “In a way, Desdemona, I should thank you. You gave me some incredibly useful data today. You’re more powerful than I ever could have hoped. Perhaps you were right. The godling’s power is almost infinite, if properly harnessed.  Too bad for you that you only have one way to use it.”

And then Mona felt hands grabbing her arms and carrying her away. The last look she spared was for Greg.

I’m sorry, she thought. I tried to free us. To free you, my Lord.

But she had failed once again.

 

---

 

The guards carried her back to her cell in the tower dungeon, where she’d spent most of her time slowly going insane since being captured. Phaedra had visited once or twice to gloat and to lay out the terms of Mona’s subservience, but mostly she had been left by herself.

Well, herself and the paladin. Their cells were somehow right next to each other, and Mona wasn’t sure if Phaedra had done it to fuck with her, or simply because they were both in the highest security part of the dungeon, which consisted of only a handful of cells at the lowest point in the tower, where the dark rock extended directly above the portal to the Void. So perhaps there was not much breathing room.

The conversations with Rhea had started the first day Mona was thrown in here. The dog girl must have heard someone get dumped in the cell next to her, but hadn’t seen Mona. She’d whispered a quiet hello.

“Hello,” Mona had whispered back.

There was a moment of hesitation, and Mona wondered if the paladin had recognized her voice. But then came the reply, “I’m Rhea.”

I know. “I’m Delilah,” Mona said, and she honestly didn’t know what had possessed her to use her mother’s name.

“Why are you in here, Delilah?”

“I took something from General Shatterbone,” Mona said. In a way, it was true.

“Oh,” Rhea said. “I don’t condone thievery, but I’m sure you had your reasons.”

Is she serious? Mona wondered. Even in the dungeon, the paladin hadn’t lost her moral superiority.

“I had many,” Mona said. “Why are you in here?”

“I tried to kill Greg-Theryx,” Rhea said, and Mona was surprised how direct the woman had been. Many demons would take exception to that. “I understand if you don’t want to—”

“It’s fine,” Mona said.

“You don’t care I tried to kill him?”

“He didn’t die.” It was strange, she thought, to use the Master’s own excuses. But it made her feel closer to him, somehow. She dreamed of being able to hold him in her arms again, to run her hands through his black hair. Though the paladin may have tried, she hadn’t taken him away from her. Mona’s hatred was reserved for Phaedra, the woman who had succeeded. “Doesn’t really matter what you tried to do, Rhea. I’m hardly in a position to pass judgment on anyone from down here.”

“Do we have a chance, Delilah?”

“What do you mean?” Mona rested her head against the cool stone, trying to find a position that didn’t make her incredibly uncomfortable. Sadly, it proved impossible.

“To get out of here.”

Mona wondered that, too. “I’m not sure. But we have to believe we do, so that we’ll be ready when the chance comes.” Mona closed her eyes and imagined Greg standing at the door to her cell, come to rescue her, like in some kind of fairytale fever dream.

Earlier today, her chance had finally come to escape. And instead she had been returned to her cell by bored guards as if nothing had even happened. Returned to her chains and stone. Mona fell forward until her weight was suspended by the shackles, the metal digging into her body. The guards locked the cell, and walked off. One of them began to tell a joke involving dark elves, but they soon moved too far away to hear.

“I don’t know how to get out of here, Rhea,” Mona whispered. Even with a quiet voice, Mona knew the paladin could hear her. Her hearing was absurdly good.

“We’ll figure it out.  Don’t worry.” It seemed a strangely nice thing to say, and for a moment Mona forgot who Rhea was, forgot she was technically her enemy. Perhaps, in a dungeon, your cellmates became your friends, no matter who you were on the outside.

“You shouldn’t bother. I’m not someone you need to worry about.”

“You stole from General Shatterbone, Delilah. That doesn’t mean you deserve to die down here. The idea is absurd. Now, if we were in Lycanta, your case could be taken to an independent tribunal, where it would be resolved by trained mediators.”

“That sounds complicated.” Mona wanted to rub her aching forehead, but couldn’t reach. “Listen, Rhea. Did they bring you any food and water earlier?”

“Some while you were gone. Sorry.”

“No, it’s fine.” Mona sighed. “After what I pulled, they’re going to make me wait.”

“Did you kill anyone?”

“A few, I think.” It was strange, Mona thought, how concerned she had been when she had almost killed Rhea. How fearful. But now her attempts to escape had killed many. If she ever tried again, and she already knew she would, she’d kill many more. And yet all she felt was a sad emptiness, nothing like the guilt when she had burned Rhea to a crisp.

Mona was starting to get used to it, to killing people. If it was the only way she would be able to survive, she would deal with the gnawing guilt later. And if they were loyal to Shatterbone… Well, they’d made their decision of who to follow, hadn’t they?

“I’m sorry,” Rhea said after a few long moments, catching Mona by surprise. “It is a sad thing, to take a life.”

Mona took a while before responding. She thought of the guard who had been standing closest to her, and his face as he had burned. He’d seemed young, like most of Shatterbone’s loyal followers. In the end, she had done that to him, and hadn’t even escaped. He, and the rest, had died for nothing. “It is sad, isn’t it?”

“I’d say a prayer for them, but I’m not sure you’d like that.”

“Would you really let that stop you?”

“No, but I would say it later, too quiet for you to hear.”

“Well, go ahead,” Mona said with irritation. “It doesn’t matter to me.”

“May Sun-Domia grant their souls the mercy of her light, and shepherd their passage to heaven. Or if their spirits have fallen to the Void, may they know the blessing of her mercy in due time.” Her voice was even, filled with a calm belief.

“They were demons, Rhea. They didn’t ‘fall’ to the Void, they were already touched by it, they just couldn’t hide it as easily as you.”

“We’re nothing alike.”

Mona felt it fraying, the tenuous bond between them as prisoners. Not that it mattered, since it was all based on a lie. “Delilah” could be a friend to a forlorn paladin. High Priestess Desdemona Fell could only ever be an enemy.

Still, it was nice to pretend. “You make it sound like a death sentence,” Mona said. “Or something to be ashamed of.”

“Are you not ashamed of it? The horns of a goat, and fel skin like a colorful reptile?”

How did she know? Mona thought, for one paranoid moment. She had always thought her horns were rather goat-like, much to her dismay. But no doubt Rhea was only speaking generally, of demonkind rather than her, specifically. “I’m not ashamed. My form is my form, Rhea. Are you ashamed of yours?”

“Some of our baser instincts are best kept out of the public eye. Restraint is a virtue in the eyes of the Goddess. Perhaps it is different for you, as you know nothing else. But when I am a beast, my thoughts flow differently. I truly do become an animal. I would rather remain in control of myself.”

“If you could choose a permanent form, would you?  To be a woman, or a canine?”

A beat of silence.

“I never told you what I was,” Rhea said, her voice much quieter now, laced with cold anger.

Mona’s stomach twisted. A foolish mistake, but perhaps one she could still come back from.  “It’s been the talk of the tower, you should know.”

The paladin clicked her teeth.  “No. I thought your voice sounded familiar. But I think I must have badly wanted someone to talk to.”

“The tower is a lonely place. I also wanted someone to talk to. I worried you’d recognize me, but you betrayed no sign.”

“I’m not sure if it matters what happened between us. You’re no longer my enemy, now that you’re down here with me. My enemy is the lord of this dungeon—your so-called master, Greg-Theryx. I did not expect him to discard you so soon.”

Mona couldn’t help herself—she laughed. She felt tears form in her eyes as the absurdity of it all washed over her. This poor paladin was still under the impression she had a Dark God to oppose, and moreover, that said Dark God was Mona’s reason for being down here.

“It’s not like that,” Mona said. She was tired of lying, in truth. And it didn’t matter if Rhea knew. No one would believe her, anyway, and with them both being captured, it all seemed moot. “He’s… Greg-Theryx isn’t here, Rhea. He didn’t answer my call.”

“Don’t try to trick me, Desdemona.”

Mona took a deep breath. She would have to start from the beginning. “When I summoned Greg-Theryx, I got someone else. I summoned a mortal soul from another plane named Greg. Just Greg.”

A long silence passed on the other side of the cell.

“Nice try,” Rhea said. “But I’m not a fool.”

“I’m serious.”

“Are you really trapped here? Or were you sent to deceive me into talking to you?”

Mona laughed. “I wish this was all a ploy, believe me. But the truth is, the man you think is Greg-Theryx is locked at the top of the tower, as surely as you and I are trapped down here. He has been overthrown in all but name.”

Now it was Rhea’s turn to laugh. “You’re telling me the Dark God Greg-Theryx was betrayed by his own followers? I must admit, you are bold to tell such an unbelievable story. Return to your Master, Desdemona. Tell him his attempts to gain my trust are doomed to failure, no matter whatever foul deeds he has imagined for me.” Then, too quietly to make out the words, Mona heard Rhea whisper something that sounded like a prayer.

Well, Mona had tried. Honesty was for fools, anyway, and talk was cheap. She tried to find the least uncomfortable position to sit in, then at last closed her eyes with her head against the unyielding stone. In truth, it made no difference how she sat—every muscle of her body ached.

For a long while, silence reigned in the dungeon.

 

---

 

Hours passed in half-sleep, never quite comfortable enough for Mona to rest. Though her stomach was empty and her throat burned for drink, it seemed an age before a tray of food and a carafe of water was finally brought to her. Unfortunately, Phaedra was the one carrying it, and at the sight of the green witch, Mona tensed, her eyes watching the other woman carefully. Phaedra had only ever brought pain and misery. This time would hardly be different.

“I wouldn’t expect me to be worth your time, Phaedra,” Mona said.

Phaedra was flanked by three guards, and in her eyes there lay a cruel malice. The guard closest to her carried a small metal case rather than a spear, and at the sight of it, Mona’s stomach twisted. She had a feeling she was about to endure another experiment.

Phaedra strode forward, though she was careful to stay far outside the range Mona could reach. “You may not be worth my time, but you’ve certainly cost me a great deal of it.”

“‘It takes great effort to retain stolen power,’” Mona said, as if she were reading with the Book of Grievances in front of her. There was something satisfying about the way Phaedra’s eyes shifted as soon as Mona had recited scripture to her.

“It is not stolen!” she shouted. “The Master doomed us all. He is not what we needed him to be. It is only natural that he serve us in the best capacity he can, if his natural aptitude is deemed low.”

“And who decides his natural aptitude?” Mona asked, with a smile. “You did.”

“Don’t deny it, Mona. You know as well as I do that we were all fucked if he had kept on like that.”

For the first time in their conversation, Mona blinked. Though it pained her to admit it, she understood this feeling. She had shared it herself, at least at first.

“He made mistakes,” she admitted. “But I don’t think you’ve made our situation any better with your half-brained takeover.”

Phaedra rolled her eyes. “He was obviously motivated primarily by horniness and greed. He was not at all fit to lead us.”

“Horniness and greed? I suppose you were able to win him over, then, with wealth and women?”

Phaedra’s brief silence said everything.

“You’re just upset that he didn’t pick you.”

“Well, why did he choose you?” Phaedra spat.  “You’re nothing special, Desdemona.  Just a little demon from the slums with a cross on her shoulder and a lot to prove.  I bet the Generator told you some inspiring bullshit, didn’t it? And you actually believed it? You should have known your place.  You belong in the gutter.”

Mona laughed bitterly. “Do you know what the Generator said to me on my naming day, Phaedra? It was only two words. It said, ‘Give up.’”

“You’re full of shit, Mona. I’ve never heard of a message like that.”

It was the truth, of course, but it made no difference. Mona had burned the printed card a long time ago. “I guess I was lucky. Rather obstinately, I decided to reject its advice. In the end, I suppose that damned contraption knew how to get through to me after all.”

Phaedra shook her head. “Why did I, in all my greatness, have to play second fiddle to you? Why didn’t he ever see me? Was my genius truly so unremarkable?”

Mona had no answer to Phaedra’s strange mixture of megalomania and self-pity. “Perhaps genius becomes unremarkable when it is paired with such an ugly spirit.”

Phaedra smiled coldly, then turned to her subordinate and exchanged the food tray with the metal case. “Give that to Lady Desdemona after I’m gone,” she told the guard. “She’ll be thirsty.”

From the metal case she removed a syringe filled with a glowing red liquid. There were no lights in the cell, only outside the bars, so Phaedra and the syringe cast a long shadow.

Mona’s soul trembled. For the first time in her life, she felt dread. Part of her had always believed she would escape, or that he would somehow come for her. Until the moment Phaedra had removed the needle and held it in the dim light, Mona’s faith had never once wavered.

Phaedra motioned with her free hand to the other two guards. “Hold her still.”

Mona watched in fear, straining to summon even a hint of fire, feeling only the collar around her neck heat uselessly, the fire within her reduced to a gentle warmth.  Two guards grabbed her by the arms and pinned her against the stones. She managed to kick the right one in the shin, but he brought his knee up into her stomach and knocked the wind out of her. She sagged, coughing. Phaedra approached by circling around to one side, as if not quite sure the fight had left her rival.

“Fuck you, Phaedra,” Mona spat. “There’s no need for theatrics. Just get on with it.”

“That I can do.” In one long, smooth motion, Phaedra advanced to where the guard held her right arm. Phaedra reached forward and touched Mona’s shoulder, her claws running along the curve of the pink muscle she found there.

Mona squirmed away but Phaedra reached out and grabbed her again, then sank the syringe in. It must have been a large gauge of needle, for it felt like the sting of a giant, venomous insect. Mona felt dizzy, all of a sudden, the world spinning around her as her stomach threatened to spill what little it contained.

“I’m sorry, Mona,” Phaedra said. “But I hope you understand by my doing this how much I love and respect you. You were far too dangerous to keep around like this. But this should take care of that.  From the data I gathered during the experiment I was able to ascertain a simple truth—if your own Will is weakened, so is the bond between you and the godling.”

“What?” Mona asked, gasping for breath. “What did you do…” She sucked in deep gasps of stale air, reaching out towards a distant, flickering light she saw somewhere beyond her vision, as if it might save her. And then she felt something shatter within her—a great breaking within her spirit, as if her soul had been crushed under immense pressure. A shockwave tore through her as every cell in her body erupted in blinding hot pain. Her spirit felt as if it had been broken into countless pieces, a mass of flickering remnants where once there had been a blazing, ever-burning sun. Only then did Mona understand what Phaedra had done. The substance had struck at a level below the physical. Mona’s Will itself had been poisoned.

“You’ll be much safer to keep around, now,” Phaedra said. “Declawed, in a manner of speaking. Tamed, as you should be.”

“When the Master learns what you’ve—”

Phaedra’s laughter echoed from everywhere, somehow, and Mona no longer knew where she was, if she was anywhere. “When the Master learns what? I promised not to kill you, Desdemona. I never said I’d allow you to act like a hellion. As for the godling, he has no choice but to bend, does he? Next time I return, maybe I’ll take a piece of your flesh to him. As a gift, and a reminder.”

The last threat barely registered. It would have been easier to lose a hand, or an ear, than to bear the shattering of Mona’s one and only spirit. Phaedra had already taken the most precious thing she could.

Perhaps the High Priestess knew it, the totality of her victory, the lack of anything else to say, for she left without a word, and Mona only knew the witch was gone when the last guard placed the food and water by the wall, close enough for her to piteously reach for.

Once the cell door slammed shut for the last time, Mona finally steadied herself well enough to sit up from the ground. Her head felt like it had been smashed with a hammer, and her body felt like she’d fallen off the cliffs below Dreadthorn, hitting rock after rock on the way down to the Void. And her spirit? It felt like it had fallen in completely. She felt no warmth within herself, only a disconcerting emptiness.

A piece of herself had gone missing.

Infuriatingly, Phaedra had been right. Mona’s throat burned as if it had never seen water, and she reached for the carafe before the food. She had just begun to drink in slow, measured gulps, careful not to spill, when she heard a voice she hadn’t expected to hear again.

“Desdemona,” Rhea said, the paladin’s voice steady in the quiet dark. “I understand this will be a small consolation.  But let’s suppose, for a moment, that I believe you.”