The Prophesy: Book 2 - The Right Hand of Destiny

 

The mood at the castle was sombre: Ruby was back, but in a terrible state. Her body's vital organs had closed down, one by one, and the brain activity was a mere speck of what it normally would have been. The damage to her higher functions was extensive, far more than Silver Moon's had been during birth, or Samson's during his accident. The kidneys were, for all intents and purposes, dead, and blood poisoning was setting in, even with the princes removing the as much of the toxins from her blood stream as they could find. The skin was turning black from necrosis all over; clearly indicating the end was near.

King Diamondcutter and Queen Amethyst never left her bedside, and Prince Thorsten and Princess Opal took turn taking care of their little brother while their parents stayed with Ruby.

On the morning of the third day, the princes, eyes black with fatigue, decided it was time to take a decision, and they called everyone to Ruby's side.

"Queen Amethyst, King Diamondcutter, we are losing the battle," started Harp. "We have been unable to find more than a speck of mental activity, and it concerns primarily maintaining the breathing cycle and the blood pressure. All other functions have vanished, and even triggering neural firings has not induced any coherent response. For all intents and purposes, Ruby is brain-dead. The heart beats because the command is autonomous and, for the most part, independent of brain activity. Her kidneys are dead and she has not urinated since she was brought back; her digestive system has halted, and her liver is showing severe signs of damage. Her blood is now full of toxins due to the gradual destruction of cells, and, as you can see, she has necrosis everywhere. Gangrene has set in her feet and lower legs because the arteries have collapsed. She is dying and there is little we can do to stop the cascade of shutdowns. Even if we managed to keep her alive, the healers would have to amputate both legs above the knee, and both hands. She would live a vegetative life, totally lost to this world, but in extreme pain, for all we know. The pain centres are in the cerebral trunk and are part of the primitive, reptilian, cortex. Amongst the functions supplied by this primitive brain are breathing, thermal regulation, and pain and pleasure, to list a few, but no higher order things such as consciousness of self, or the capacity to communicate subsists, other than at the basic pheromone level, which, as you know, is at best weak since olfactory senses have diminished in most. Some days, I wish mine were back to before, because some people really need to stop being at war with water! Even then, Ruby would not be able to understand the signals. As for eating, deglutition is out, and the bowel movements have stopped, so even if she managed to swallow without filling her lungs as well as her stomach, it would not go far."

"What are you saying, prince Harp?" asked Amethyst, afraid of hearing the damning words.

"We have two choices: first, we let her go, which, to be honest, would be best, since it would reduce suffering both on her part and yours; second, we put her in a stasis pod. She will be dead to the world, forever, living, if you can even call that, a vegetative life. Paschal had hopped to the stasis pods and is ready to prepare one for her, but he says given her state, he is not sure the pod will accept her, or simply give up. Assuming the pod accepts her, you will not be able to see your daughter any more, because a pod is sealed, and the content is invisible to the outside observer. It is another form of death as far as you are concerned, one which would give you the illusion there is hope, where there is none. You would live her death daily for as long as you live, and be unable to grieve her and overcome the loss. I believe that would be the worse option possible, Queen Amethyst. And who knows? Maybe holding her there would remove her from the cycle of life and death, thus depriving her of the gains this cycle affords every living organism. To be blunt, it would be the ultimate act of selfishness. We are born to die, we die at the first cell division and continue until the last; life is a controlled death. Each breath brings us closer to our last one; each breath brings us life, but also death in the oxidisation of our tissues, the damage done by free radicals, and other aspects of the cycle we are an intimate part of. Each action we take gets recorded in the Collective Conscience of the species we are a member of during a cycle, Amethyst. You were there when I explained to Thorsten who we are. One day, all of you, all life will be part of a Consciousness and work as one to maintain the cycle, each receiving giving up what must in order to sustain the Conscious Life. We are merely the forerunners of this, Amethyst, but in order for the Cycle to continue, we must acknowledge we cannot break it for personal short-term gains. For it is short-term gain, Amethyst. You may live to be a hundred, two hundred, or even a thousand years, but what are these durations in regard to the age of the Universe, expressed in billions of years? We are as short-lived as a firebrand thrown into dry grass to propagate life and feed from its destruction. And what contribution would Ruby be able to do, prisoner of a living dead body, her Essence encased in a broken container, frozen still for all time, until the Universe itself comes to its end? Are you willing, for your own little self, to deprive Ruby the right to live another life, even if that other life is as a rabbit or a squirrel, or, indeed, as a cactus?"

"Are you telling me I eat children?" said a horror-stricken Queen.

"We are all children of someone else, Amethyst. When you eat that rabbit stew, the rabbit had a mother and father. When you eat that salad, it was the offspring of another salad. I have been eaten countless times, and have done the same. When you die, your body will feed your children, if only because its components will find themselves recycled into the food chain. In a way, you have been feeding them and they have been feeding of you ever since they got conceived. Each time you wash, dump, or eliminate wastes, you also eliminate part of what was you. This, in turn enters a long cascade of reactions that end up in your plate either as salad or stew. This is life, Amethyst; so stop looking at me like I was a monster. What I am saying to you is that we are so intricately linked to each other we cannot live in isolation. Even the stasis pod is dependant on that in a roundabout way. It is only the nature of the exchanges that differ."

Harp looked at the other royals, and resuming his long speech, talked to the assembled dwarves.

"We will retire to let you discuss what to do with Ruby. Please hurry, for you have little time before nature decides for you that the second option is not an option anymore."

***

"You sure did not use white gloves while exposing things, Harp. Even I was shocked," commented Annabelle, looking at her son.

"Sometimes, shock therapy is the best remedy. Amethyst refuses to see reality face to face and admit that Ruby is lost; dunking her head-first in it seems the best way to kick her in the butt and bring her brain back into gear."

"You do seem to like dunking a lot!" replied Harold. "I wonder how many dukes, barons, and other people you have left their dignity dripping on the floor?"

"Not many, just enough to make my point!"

"Are you running for the 'Understatement of the Millennium' contest, Harp?" asked Samson.

"No, for the 'Maximum number of dunking in a single week' one!"

After a good laugh, well needed given the mood of the past days, Harold asked about the visit to the Tunnel, whose discussion had been put on the back burner with Ruby running away. The four princes, with an occasional clarification from Yamato, began to tell the story of the trip.

***

Harp and the three princes, accompanied by duke Yamato had moved back to the King's Lands, looked at the still encased palace, and moved up the road to the Tunnel's entrance. A careful exploration of the first level had revealed no one had been in it except bats and rodents, and a hibernating cave bear, which was quickly translocated to the zoo, along with her two pups. Three more lives added to the Ark program.

After the ground level, the group began exploring for ways to either climb up in the structure found at the Elvin side of the Tunnel, and finally found stairs not too far from the gaping holes at the middle of the artificial mountain. Unfortunately, collapsed blocks of rocks, rusted steel rods, and other rubble blocked the way up, although it had probably held dozens of landings, maybe even a hundred or more. The descent down was a lot easier, but ended in a steel door that seemed to be blocked from the other side or to have been movable and to slide within the walls themselves. The way it seemed organized told Paschal that the door probably led to further steps continuing to descend further.

The group retraced their steps up and proceeded to explore the other branch of the T. It led to a huge room containing piles of rust arranged in an orderly fashion, and other piles of the same along the walls. The royals could not make sense of this so they returned to the crossing and proceeded along the tunnel leading outside of the Kingdom. To their surprise, they discovered the tunnel was still clear right to the exit. Again the upper levels were blocked by rubble and the lower levels led to a steel door similar to the previous one. A return to the entrance revealed orcs had been there, but the traces stopped at the exit of the room leading into the tunnel. They examined the area outside and found it was covered in a deep reddish and gray layer of snow, but that nothing else seemed to be living in the area. The spectacle of burned out tree stumps and nothing else was depressing; the only sound that could be heard was the wind's howl; not a single animal could be seen moving. They returned to the tunnel, as the wind swept the snow in swirls that made visibility non-existent and threw ash dust in their eyes.

The other branch of the T led to another huge room, but this time, nothing could be found. However, a tiny horizontal crack at the bottom of the furthest wall attracted Yamato's attention because of the snow that seemed to have managed to enter through it. The royals examined the wall and Paschal suggested that, at one time, the wall could be moved somehow, but as the rust had destroyed the mechanism, it was now fused to the wall. Apparently, the ancients opened and closed that vertical wall at will, but for what purpose?

Unable to understand what they were seeing, the royals returned to the crossing they had just left and looked at the series of vertical holes that seemed to plunge endlessly into the ground.

Harp suggested he could fly down and use Bata to light his way. After all, if he could go up there was no reason he could not go down. The idea was approved amongst a plethora of recommendations about safety.

Harp began his descent and after about five hundred feet, noticed an opening in the wall, facing the same way the one he had entered; he reported his find to the others and continued down. It became apparent there were many underground layers, each separated by an interval of a hundred feet. He was expecting to find the tenth such opening when he noticed the wall change. He found himself encased in a cubicle closed on all sides, and he could not go further down. Furthermore, the expected hole was missing! Some quick thinking decided Harp and he used a tiny blast of magic to pierce a hole in the offending wall where he had expected the opening to be. Bingo! There it was! Using Bata as a torch, he quickly cut through the severely damaged wall. The rust quickly gave way under the intense light, and, shortly, Harp found himself showered with flying bits and pieces of metal sparks. Fortunately his mithril chainmail protected him from burns, and the leather winter coat added further protection.

Clearly the landings had a second door, which made sense; after all when that cubicle was not aligned with a landing, it would have been dangerous to the inhabitants, reasoned Harp. Suddenly, it flashed in Harp's memory: in one of his previous human lives, he had been leaning on one of those doors and died when it unexpectedly opened while the cabin had not been there! He was in an elevator shaft! Now to open that door! Again Harp used Bata as a blowtorch, but either his memory of these doors was off or this one was particularly thick! After spending an hour slowly cutting through the hardened steel, Harp was getting close to finishing the opening and decided to push with magic as he finished the cut: No use ending up flatter than a pancake if the massive steel door suddenly fell toward him as he finished the cut!

Finished with the door, Harp pushed it away with magic, focussing more power at the top to make it fall backward. A tremendous sound was heard and travelled to those waiting at the top. Much to their relief, Harp told them that all was fine and that he had gained access to the lowest level. After shining Bata around in a wide arc, Harp discovered he was in a long hallway that seemed to be covered in steel. So much steel would have pleased his dad's need to recover everything for the next fifty years, thought Harp as he chuckled. The next thing that attracted Harp's attention was the presence of skeletons. Some showed signs of butchering. The drama unfolded in Harp's eyes: these poor souls had been down there during the Great Cataclysm, and had been trapped! When they had run out of food, they had resorted to eating each other! Why had they not left by the stairs or, indeed, used that elevator? It dawned on him they could not open the doors, because the power source had been cut off! Someone had deliberately left them to die by cutting the energy required to open the doors and operate the elevators!

The royals joined Harp at the level using teleportation, and Paschal began drawing a map of the level, using his steps to measure distances. It became apparent the level was huge and covered maybe ten square miles. The disposition was such that the entire system presented, according to Sitar, a structure that was consistent to offering the maximum possibility of defending it, while maximizing the storage space. However, they could not find any indication it had been planned as a living area. There were no water sources, no bunks, and no work areas, only mile after mile of boxes wrapped in a translucent material that had turned gooey with time, but seemed to have been used to protect the wooden boxes.

They found a stairwell and Harp cut the door out before they used magic to move it out of the way. The passage was empty of any trace of life form, clearly indicating the stairs were not the preferred way to travel from one level to another. They reached the ninth level and proceeded to cut the door out as well. Again they were met by mile upon mile of tunnels.

"I am sure the dwarves would love to explore that place!"

"Yes, Samson, I am sure they would, but I believe it is unsafe for them to do so. There may be unexpected dangers there and we have made sure nothing enters or leaves that necropolis. We have set wards that will block any attempt at either action," replied Sitar.

"Anyway, dad, we have only begun to explore these artificial caves. I have a feeling there is a hundred square miles of caves to explore just at the side we began to look into. If the cave complex on the Elvin side is of similar extent, that makes for two hundred square miles of stuff."

"Have you looked into the contents of the boxes?"

"Not yet, Healer. Yamato is cataloguing the labels found outside of them before we begin to touch them. There seems to be a wide variety of contents if the shape of the boxes is any indication. It is a miracle they are still readable, but their surface is covered by a transparent substance, much like those books you have shown us."

"Why are you so worried, boys?" asked Annabelle.

"The ancients probably had diseases we are unaccustomed to; furthermore, they had a mania of being at war all the time; susceptibility seemed to have been one of their most advanced qualities, and they loved to create the deadliest weapon they could imagine," replied Sitar. "I do not want to expose anyone to unstable, toxic, or biologically hazardous material if I can do it."

No one commented, as they all agreed to Sitar's cautious approach.

"If this trove is to be moved out of there, we will never have enough space, boys!"

"Yes dad, I know!" replied Harp. "I have been experimenting with a new storage format, called tessaract space. By folding space in a certain way, an object will take a thousand times less space than its unfolded form."

"That is an interesting idea, Harp! How did you come up with it?"

"Francesca, remember that book about genetics you showed me, dating from the ancients? It mentioned that the genetic material contained by a human cell was over six and a half feet long; that miracle of compactness was achieved by three-dimensional folding of the DNA. It occurred to me that this could be applied to our storage problem. Then there was this mathematics book, which explained the mathematical underpinnings of tessaracts. It said something to the effect that by folding the space between atoms in a certain way, the shape, or, indeed, the entire functionality of the object or life form could be preserved in theory. The ancients had been working on the problem of applying the nice mathematical model when the Atom God struck them down."

"And I would bet you solved the problem?"

"Yes I did. The application of folding space to teleport from one place to another is an application of a tessaract nature. In fact, all magic feats are based on tessaract applications. The problem with the Ancients is they did not really believe in magic and that blocked their access to the elegant solutions we have found. The discovery of this fact has had an immense impact on my understanding of the true nature of magic. At first, I thought that mithril and orichalque collected magic like a fishnet collect fry; but now I know different: these minerals fold magic in a certain way so it collects within their crystalline lattice, which happen to be structured like tessaracts. They are natural tessaracts vaults. All I needed to do was to figure that structure and see if it could be expanded to contain more than magic."

"And have you succeeded?"

Figure 9: A tessaract

"Yes I think so dad. I will not bore you with the mathematical intricacies, but I have found a form that resides in an eleven-fold space, which can contain anything of any size. If this work, we could put in that space everything and anything and it would be no bigger then a cube measuring a cubic yard. I need to test it, but we have time. The inventory of these caves will take weeks."

"What happened to the string theory of magic?" wanted to know Samson.

"It still stands. From what I understand, orichalque, and to a lesser degree, mithril, collect these strings by spooling them, carding them like we do wool, spinning a yarn. As we know, matter deforms space; this is what makes an object have inertia. The crystalline structure of these two elements grabs magic strings and spools them in as we move through space. This is what makes us magical too. Even as we sit, we move since the entire planet moves, so we collect magic. The thing that makes us different is we collect it more effectively than others, and know how to use the spool's contents to do things. The realisation of this has led me to better understand how we build wards: we weave them with magic yarn, so to speak. It also explains why we were able to create that eleven-fold ward around your castle, Samson. We weaved it in all eleven dimensions, effectively enclosing it in a container without leaving a single dimension open for access. Getting back in will call upon unravelling the wards by pulling on all eleven dimensions at the same time, and only we know where to start and how we weaved it. Anyone attempting to break in would have a backlash that would probably leave the person incapacitated for months. The magic string's structure is intimately linked to these eleven dimensions, and this is how they do what we call magic. By affecting the eight other dimensions, we manipulate reality in the standard three-dimensional world, much like when you manipulate reality on a sheet by moving a pencil in a three-dimensional world."

"That's fascinating, Harp."

"It doesn't stop there, it also explains why we can pull magic from the environment. We simply willingly speed up the spooling process, and we can therefore rob other spools of their contents by catching their own strings. That's how I emptied the orcs' spools and collected their own magic for my own use. Yes, dad, orcs have magic spools, like everyone and everything. They just do not know how to release it and are unaware of its existence. The benefit of this is two-fold: first, they do the collecting for me as they move around; and when I drain them of their magic, it leaves them so weak they are unable to put up a fight for days on end, until they can collect enough stray magic to rebuild the minimum required for the sustenance of their conscience of reality. They go into a coma. It can even kill them if I drain them dry."

"You sound like a vampire of these old grandma scare stories!"

"Probably vampires are doing exactly that, dad, pulling the magic string until their victim is as dry as an insect after an arachnid's meal. The story of these people much resembles what we do, in a way; just, in the stories, they drink the blood of their victim, more likely because they do not know how to drain magic otherwise, and it has become a sort of morbid ritual due to ignorance or incapacity to effectively grab the strings. They could reach the same result without all that gore if only they understood what they were doing. Not that I will ever inform them of it; they are untrained mages, with no ethics whatsoever; the less they know the better. Can you imagine one of these nut cases suddenly going on a craze and killing millions in a single sweep, just to satisfy his need for magic? There are many other fascinating aspects of vampires that lend credence to this theory: They seem limited in their use of magic to some primitive aspects of it, mostly the hunt for preys, characterized by abnormal speed, strength, and stealth. They also seem unable to conserve the magic they spool effectively, as if their mechanism is defective and unwinds, requiring repeated feeds because they are always hungry. Even their sensitivity to sunlight may be explained by the fact that their spooling mechanism is defective: the mass of the sun pulls on our magic, and it spins on itself as well, pulling strings from interstellar space. We halt that by putting in place stoppers, but if their spool stops are inexistent or ineffective, each time the sun comes around, they get drained savagely and must rush out to feed in order to survive, come night. If they exist, they must lead a miserable life, hiding underground as much as possible during the day, and the deeper the hole the better."

"Well, I'm impressed, Harp. And as for the primary reason you boys went there?" wondered Harold.

"I have installed a force field that will block orcs, crocodile priests, the Minotaur, and that pesky king. All the rest will trigger an alarm, except rodents, birds, bats, and insects."

"There is another thing that bothers me about that place," Francesca said.

"What?" Enron asked.

"How come the air was breathable? Normally, a necropolis without ventilation has noxious vapours that kill the imprudent explorer. Yet, you seemed to have had no such issues."

"I had the same worry," replied Harp. "However, we felt that there was an efficient air flow, albeit it was remarkably dry. The few rooms we opened also showed good ventilation, and we found that there were vents both near the ceiling and near the floor. Those places were designed with a lot of care. It is disgusting to think that some criminal hand killed these people by cutting their energy source. The vast majority died of thirst, while the most resolute ate their cadavers to gain sustenance and fluids! These last days must have revealed the worse in mankind, as a war for survival exploded at each level."

Harp's description sent shivers down everyone's back, as each pictured in their mind what Harp was describing according to their private fears.

"What should we do about these bodies?"

"Nothing, Francesca. They have found their peace, and it would be highly disrespectful to move them from their last resting place to satisfy social conventions, especially since their society had discarded these conventions in its last days. Let them rest in peace."

All accepted harp's eulogy, and the subject was closed.

***

The arrival of the Dwarves Royal family put an end to the discussion. It became apparent the queen and Opal had cried their hearts out, as their eyes were red and their face showed signs of sorrow. Diamondcutter and his son, Thorsten, seemed to be barely holding together at the seams, while the youngest son, although he did not understand the problem at hand, felt something bad was up and kept quiet in the arms of his mother.

"What have you decided?" asked Harold.

"Nature took the decision out of our hands. Ruby expired a few minutes ago," Diamondcutter replied. "She now had undertaken the voyage that will someday bring her back within the cycle of life in another form, be it here or elsewhere."

"We are sorry for your loss. What would you like us to do?"

"What do you mean?"

"As far as funeral arrangements are concerned, I mean?"

The two parents looked at each other, as if the need to dispose of the corporal remains of their daughter had not even crossed their minds yet.

"What are the options available?"

"First, there is the size of the funeral to decide: simple, with only family members and guests, or state funeral, with all the pomp this implies. Second, do you want her buried, entombed in a crypt, or burned on a pyre? Royals generally end up in granite or marble caskets with a thick slate portraying the person enclosed within in a peaceful, restful pose, as if the person was sleeping. There is the sarcophagus that is also an option. The funeral pyre may be as simple as a pile of scanted wood set afire and as complex as the fiery blaze of a ship floating away on water. We also offer the ritual of the falling star to our braves that died on the battlefield. Since my own dynasty has yet to lose a member, we have no set rules. Maybe yours does."

"We used to do a commemorative service to remember the good sides of a person and forgive her bad sides; then the person was set in the royal crypt to dry out and mummify before it got put in a granite casket with the name, the date of birth, the date of death, and a short sentence describing what the person wanted to be remembered by. On the inside cover of the casket was inscribed the genealogy of the person to the fifth level, starting with the grandparents and ending in the grandchildren if the person had lived long enough. That data is recopied into civil lists, scrolls that are preserved in the Royal Library, which you so kindly brought with you, Harp. In the case of a child, it also included a toy in the casket, the favourite one. As for the ceremonial, it implies the body lies in wait for a day, while people pay their respect, and then it is carried on a stretcher, and brought to the crypt where it stays for three years before being entombed. By then it is dry."

"I see. Unfortunately, mummification is impossible here because the weather is too humid; we could put her in a bog, but the mummification process takes a lot longer and does not by far, give the same result as drying. It is an acidification process in an environment deprived of oxygen."

"What would you suggest?" queen Amethyst asked.

"The process should be as follows: we lie her in waiting until dawn in two days' time; then we move her to the ducal crypt under the castle, to put her in a marble coffin. I am sure Paschal can do a good one quite rapidly, using magic. Marble is rare around here, so it will be indicative of her status. Most dukes got buried in granite. I noticed she held to that doll, even on her deathbed, so we place it inside it with her. Frankincense and myrrh will be burning all the time of the wait."

"Why is that?" asked Thorsten.

"Your sister has been dying for a long time, and her body is degrading very quickly. The smell will get awful, and probably already is getting to people that pass by the mortuary chamber. These things will mask, to some extent, the odour. Paschal? Can you do a coffin made of balsam fir for the wait? The fresher the wood, the better it will be. Plan the coffin to be watertight, because the body will lose a lot of it, and we do not want the coffin to drip. Next, when you do the marble one make it big enough to include the wood coffin."

"OK, dad. What was her favourite colour?"

"Pink," stated Opal from a bench.

"OK, I will drape the coffin in that colour, and also use pink marble. Give me five minutes to find the required tree outside of the town, and I will duplicate planks from its signature. Dad, what would you use as a sealant?"

"Pine oil for the wood, and tar for the joints."

"What is so special about balsam fir?" wanted to know Diamondcutter.

"It has, in itself, a very strong scent, that will also help mask any odour; adding the pine oil, another very strong natural essence, will compound the effectiveness of the balsam, plus sealing it. Tar, albeit it has an unpleasant smell, is a lot more acceptable to the nose than the alternative!"

"I didn't know all that!" exclaimed Thorsten.

"Thorsten, how many people have you killed in your life?" Harp asked.

"None. Why?"

"The freshly dead body has a very peculiar, very sweet smell to it. As a wolf, I can tell how long a body has been dead just by a whiff, from miles away. I can also tell when a living organism is near death because of its odour. A sick person gives off a stink that can even tell me what that person's ailment is. I can tell when a female is ready for ovulation as well and when a male is nearing sexual maturity." Harp winked at Thorsten, who was clueless as to the reason of it.

A few minutes later, Paschal popped back in the room.

"It is done. The fir coffin is assembled; the princess is in it, sealed off because of her condition. Dad, where do we hold the wait? I need to put a catafalque in place for the coffin."

"Let's use the grand hall of the ducal palace. It is wide, easy to access, and has a good aeration. Please move the coffin to the hall as well."

"I'll be right back."

It took about five minutes for Paschal to rematerialise within the royal family room.

"It is done. I hope all will be to your satisfaction."

"I am sure you have the greatest sense of decorum, my son. I am not worried."

***

The royal funeral procession organised itself in the purple chamber found at the left of the grand hall, while criers were sent across the city to announce Princess Ruby's death, and the bells tolled a sombre march. The portico's doors were wide open as royal guards stood immobile in a double hedge, composed evenly of dwarfs, elves, canines, humans and equines.

The royals were the first to enter the hall: First came Ruby's parents, Amethyst and Diamondcutter, immediately followed by the heir to the Dwarf throne, Thorsten, and behind him Opal carrying the Benjamin of the family. A distance of three steps separated the dwarfs from their liege lord, King Harold and his wife Annabelle, followed by the heir to the Throne of the Wolf, Ian, riding on Silver moon. Immediately behind came princes Paschal, Sitar and Harp. Two feet behind the last of the Wolf Royals came King Samson of the Throne of Nature, followed by his son Enron.

Then began the procession of visitors, again in a specific order. The first to come were the members of the Wolf Throne, including the human, canines and equine nobility; immediately after them followed the vassals of the Throne of Nature, and then the nobility of the Dwarf kingdom. To everyone's astounded gasps, the fairies' Princess had made the trip from her hideout, accompanied by her most important nobility; but the shocker was the apparition of Bjorn the Troll and his family, whose size more than took the fairy and dwarf delegations by surprise. It would come to light that Bjorn had been elected king of the Trolls, all of which was due to Harp's rescue of the last tribe. His youngest son's health was a sight to behold, and, even with the events underlying the meeting, his joy at meeting Harp again was a sight to behold.

Then came the common people, in an endless procession that lasted until vespers that day, a process to be repeated the next day from prime until the last visitor had walked by the coffin, well past matins. The next morning would see the conclusion of the entire process, with the commemorative service, the eulogy, and the entombment. Every hour, the guards would change in an elaborate ritual that impressed even the most compulsive dwarf obsessed with protocol and decorum.

The next morning, at prime, the bells again tolled their sorrow, as Crown Prince Thorsten tried to deliver a positive eulogy of his sister. To say he had toiled hard on that speech would not render justice to heart-wrenching effort he put into it. After spending hours on words that just could not come forth, he resorted to calling in Harp and the other princes to the rescue. Harp's solution was blunt: tell the truth.

"How can I tell all those people she was a bitch, that I suffered humiliation and insult all these years; that if I fell sorry for her early demise, I also feel relieved because my life, even if it is harsh, will at least be bearable? How can I tell my parents that it will take years for me to forgive her, if I ever find the strength to do so?"

"I admit it will be difficult, but review your dealings with her. Try to find the humour in these situations, Thorsten. When you can finally laugh with her at your own frailties, not only will you have beat her at her own game, but you will be healed, and be a stronger man from it; remember how steel is hardened: from repeated beatings, exposing to cold baths and the heat of the blast furnace, from bending and folding. Consider all these humiliations and dirty tricks as your forging! Tell of these events as formative not as destructive. But do not look nor feel weak or rancorous. Show them you have strength of character no one thought possible. It may be the most important speech you will ever have voiced, Thorsten, because it may define you and who you really are now and for your entire reign when your dad retires or dies."

So it was that Thorsten recalled her worse pranks at his expense, laughed at his foolishness, made fun of his limits, and generally made the assembly laugh their heart out. But the goal was reached: everyone was taken aback at the Crown Prince's dignity, the maturity he showed in face of the tragedy, and how adult he was in dealing with his sister's dirty character. No one missed the fact that Ruby was unpleasant to live with, and she came out of the eulogy tarnished, even if Thorsten did not say a single word against her openly. Her actions spoke for themselves. In the end, everyone agreed: Thorsten would do a fine king, when his turn came.

The entombment was anticlimactic after Thorsten's performance. Only royals of the three houses accompanied the coffin to its final resting place. Paschal had outdone himself: The massive pink marble sarcophagus was ready, and after magic lowered the balsam fir coffin into its arms, the cover, weighting over six tons, slid over closing the door to the last home of Princess Ruby. On the cover was then installed a sculpture, representing Ruby as Harp had found her, holding her doll.

***

By sext that day, everything was finished and life could resume its mad course. Thorsten's eulogy had left a sour taste in his parents' mouth, not because of how it was delivered, for it had been a masterpiece of good taste, but from what it had revealed about Ruby, and, accessorily, about Opal. The royal parents were no dimwits: they were certain that Opal, although never named openly during the entire speech, had contributed to the realisation of the dirtiest of them. The little princess seemed oblivious to the brewing thunderstorm, and missed man signs that would have forewarned her of the upcoming storm. For her, Ruby was gone, she was sad, but things like that happened and life would resume its roll. Ruby's death was but a bump in the road, no more.

Thorsten, on the other hand, was acutely aware of the tension, and wondered if his honesty would not come bite him in the ass. As the royal families converged to a quick buffet that had been set up in the now vacated Great Hall, Thorsten instinctively stayed back and away from his parents, joining the four princes, and the delicate princess of the Fairies, Iridia. Ahead of the group was the always-boisterous Ian, who had taken an immediate liking to the furry prince of the Trolls, whose name sounded like Timor. As usual, Ian was in his birthday suit, riding Silver Moon, which barely managed to keep the prince at the height of the now fast-growing Troll. Timor had been growing like weed on a fertiliser pile since the Wolf Royals had last seen him, mostly due to the rich food made available to the tribe by the care of the Elves. Right beside Thorsten, carrying prince Sven of the Dwarfs walked Harp. Paschal and Sitar walked behind them. Annabelle and Harold closed the royal group.

Harp and his brothers had taken great care to supply a varied meal, adapted to the dietary necessities of each guest. If the canines and the Trolls appreciated raw meat with some occasional fruit or vegetable, the Elves and the equines found a rich supply of fruits and vegetables, even clover at the great satisfaction of the equines. The fairies, on the other hand, seemed to be content in drinking nectar, and were pleasantly surprised by the variety offered. Cooked meats and vegetables were available for the Elves and humans as well.

Princess Opal had been on her best behaviour since her sister's futile attempt at running away. However, a nagging feeling about the meaning of Thorsten's speech kept haunting her, and that feeling increasingly irritated the stormy little princess. It was only a matter of time before she would be back at her usual self. Push away natural inclines and they come snapping back at your behind the moment you let your guard down. The occasion presented itself at the royal table, as Thorsten was talking quietly to Harp and Sitar about the events of the past few days. The princess felt ignored and grew ever more agitated. Finally, she couldn't hold herself anymore and deliberately made Thorsten's plate fall on his lap as he was turning his head to talk once more to Harp.

"Clumsy oaf!" she exclaimed, playing to perfection the outraged victim. Unfortunately, she had missed the watchful eyes of her mother and the reprehensive smirk from princess Iridia, who had correctly guessed her intentions. The hot sauce spilled mercilessly between Thorsten's legs, which wore his tartan the usual way: bare-assed! As Thorsten, panicked tried to get out of the way and protect his privates from further damage, he fell back off the bench on the floor, further complicating the issue. Harp immediately realised what had happened, and although he promised himself he would get that little bitch at the next possible occasion, he focussed on helping Thorsten out of his misery. He quickly teleported Thorsten to the bathroom and joined him to help out. The tartan vanished and the extensive burns appeared to the appalled eyes of the two boys. Paschal, Sitar, and Enron quickly joined Harp and as the others blocked the pain signals from reaching Thorsten's brain, Harp began healing the boy's genitals.

King Diamondcutter had made a hasty dash to check on his son, as Harold told him where he was. He opened the bathroom door to see a severely burned prince looking wildly around, tears flowing freely from his eyes. Under his amazed gaze, he saw Harp rapidly cool down the skin surface with ice, followed by the reconstructive surgery he undertook to restore his son's body. It took half an hour before all traces of damage either in depth or superficial had disappeared.

"What happened son?" asked a worried king.

"I don't know, dad. I was talking to Harp, and suddenly the plate just fell on me. I was not even touching it, busy doing something else."

"What was that, son?"

"Holding both of Harp's hands, expressing my worries about the speech."

"Diamondcutter, I agree with his statement; your son needed reassurance and I was holding his hands when the plate was thrown in his lap. Had I not acted quickly, your son might have lost his penis and balls."

"Who is sitting on the other side of you, Thorsten?"

Both princes looked at each other and exclaimed in unison: "Princess Opal!"

Paschal interrupted them for a few seconds. "Thorsten, play with yourself, please?"

"Uh?"

"Touch your genitals, pull the foreskin back, and rub the balls and your penis. I need to make sure the nerve pathways have been properly restored!"

"Oh!"

The prince delicately rubbed his body from the belly down, as Enron, Paschal, Sitar and Harp traced their signals from the affected regions to the brain. Thorsten was getting redder by the second as he realized suddenly his dad was watching him and he was also getting the fathers of hard-on!

"Are you feeling any pain?" asked Paschal.

"No, it's quite enjoyable. In fact it's the first time I have a hard-on without any pain whatsoever. Before that, the hood sort of was stretched too tight and I was always in pain when it happened."

"I figured as much, Thorsten, that's why I gave you some slack and also added about an inch to the foreskin cover. It will protect your glands better."

"Is that what it's called?"

"Yes. Diamondcutter, I think some basic sex education is in order for your son."

"Can you boys handle that for us, please? We feel uneasy talking about these matters to our children."

"Maybe, but Opal sure knew where to hit to hurt Thorsten the most!"

"I know, Harp, and she doesn't know what's going to hit her when I come back to the table with you boys."

"Daddy, are you mad at me?"

"Why should I be mad at you?"

"So many things. The speech this morning for one: I was not very forgiving of Ruby in it. Then I'm such a clumsy oaf! And finally, I touched myself down there, and so many people say it's bad!"

Diamondcutter sat his son, still bare-assed, on his lap, facing him so they could be eye to eye.

"First, Thorsten, that was the most beautiful speech I had ever heard! It was honest, considerate, and truthful. It showed to me you could take my place right now and govern the Dwarf kingdom with dignity and a maturity I did not possess when I got the crown after your grandfather fell in a pit at our old home. Second, you are not clumsy, you are a victim of your sister's treachery, and the day of reckoning is drawing near for her. Ruby's death turned our attention away from her actions but today she threw in our face our inaction. She will be dealt with severely. Third, every single boy plays with himself. I did it, and so did all your uncles and cousins. The one that claims otherwise is a liar and should not be trusted with a blunt fork at a table, much less in a dark hall. And fourth, Paschal explained to us that he needed to make sure you were fully functional. The only way to make sure of that was to make it function. Given how it worked out, I must say that Harp is a marvellous surgeon. Not only has he restored you to perfection, but also he has healed you of an ailment that would have prevented you from ever enjoying what must be enjoyable, or even stopped you from performing entirely. Look at yourself, Thorsten: you have not a single blemish, not a single burn mark."

In for the copper coin, in for the gold, thought Thorsten. It had been years since he had sat on his dad's lap and it felt so right. "Dad?"

"Yes son?"

"When I hold Harp, I feel warm all over, and safe. Like I'm complete. Is that wrong?"

"Does it feel good?" Diamondcutter asked his son, looking at his eyes.

"Oh yes! I never want to leave his side! If I could I would hold his hands all the time, and I have that urge to hug him so much!"

"If it makes you feel good and Harp is OK with it, it is good, and if he feels the same way about you, it is better still."

"What is that feeling?"

"Love, Thorsten. It may be hero worship, puppy love, or true, unabashed love. But it is definitely love. I can guess what you think at night, the last image you have before falling asleep and the first image that comes to your mind when you wake up in the morning is Harp's face. It is also true when you are alone and have nothing to do: you think about Harp and how you miss him."

"How did you know?"

"I loved and love to this day. I think about you, Ruby, Opal, Sven, and your mother all the time. Yes, even when I am pissed at her inadequate raising of you and I feel guilty of negligence for not having stepped up to the bat earlier."

Harp kept silent in the background, not wanting to interfere with the private moment between the king and his heir. Anyway, he had some thinking to do. How did he feel toward the prince? Was it simply a duty, or real affection? Was it simple friendship or something deeper? And if so, how deep? Harp's attention returned the moment as he heard Diamondcutter's next question.

"What would you do if someone tried to hurt Harp?"

"Anything to protect him and everything to avenge him." This was said in such an icy voice that even the king felt the coldness of the resolution, the total devotion his son had put in that short answer. Beware who would stand to harm Harp, he thought. Even mountains would break under his son's fury. The other princes realised that Thorsten had grown into his position as the fifth side of the hexagon without them noticing it. He was one of them, even if he did not yet show magical powers openly. All that was needed was a trigger and Thorsten would explode with power. Harp had been right at his assessment of the Crown prince of the Dwarfs.

Thorsten did not realise the impact his curt reply had on the others, and cuddled in his dad's arms content to be held anew. The two dwarfs hugged silently for almost half an hour before Thorsten regretfully distanced himself from his dad's torso, and, looking at him, asked if it wouldn't be polite to return to the reception.

"You are right son. However, even if you are cute without any tartan, I think we need to go get you another one."

"There is no need, Diamondcutter. Thorsten, stand up!" ordered Harp.

Thorsten immediately did as asked and an elaborate tartan appeared, fresh and perfectly folded.

"That one is magical, Thorsten. You could get all the hot sauce in the world on it, and it would never cross the fibres to reach you under. It is fire-resistant, will never wrinkle, will always be clean, and never tear. It never will shrink, and it will grow on you and with you. No non-magical blade can penetrate it, and any impact to it will make the immediate area repulse the offending object, be it a knife, an arrow, or a sword. Now, let's go piss off Opal, she deserves it."

The five princes and the king returned to the Great Hall together, to a scene they had not expected.

***

As the king's back was retreating in the hallway, Opal couldn't keep quiet. In the silence that marked her dad's fast departure, she uttered something everyone heard clearly.

"That Thorsten will do anything to attract attention! What an oaf!"

The remaining royals turned toward her and princess Iridia said clearly, for all to hear, "Actually, princess Opal, the prince is no oaf, but you certainly are not innocent either."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean what I said, princess. You intentionally made that ewer of hot sauce fall on your brother. It was conveniently located between his plate and yours. I clearly saw your hand grab a knife and discretely push the ewer until it fell off the table."

"I did no such thing!"

"Are you calling me a liar, Lady Opal?" asked Iridia, in a sweet tone that any person would have taken for a clear warning to retract or face the consequences.

The situation was clearly headed toward a confrontation, and the other royals couldn't see how to diffuse the situation. As princess Opal was going to reply, Harold stood up, momentarily stopping a damning diatribe from the dwarf princess.

"Princess Opal, stay quiet! You may be young, but you know the rules of governance as much as we do. We will not tolerate any more scandal from you."

Just as Opal was readying a virulent repartee, a strange song could be heard over the royal table, and the princess froze. Suddenly she stood up, climbed on the bench and then the table, and began talking. It became an unpacking of dirty clothes of unheard of proportions. Everything that Opal and Ruby had done to discredit Thorsten and harm him physically came out in minute detail, including planning and execution. Her participation in her older sister's plans had started as soon as she could understand simple directives, and had escalated until the two girls competed ferociously for the most twisted means to destroy their older brother. Opal's viciousness had nothing to envy to Ruby's, and she was well on her way to outperform her master in evilness.

Harold looked around the royal table and noticed the only person talking apart from Opal was Iridia. She was the one singing that song and it was proving as effective as the Blade of Light in extracting the truth. The confession went on and on, growing ever more odious as the girls gained experience in treachery. Even if Opal lived with the delusion she was only following her older sister, it soon came to light she was as much an instigator as Ruby had been.

Just as the king of the Dwarfs came into the room, Opal began to explain her views about her goals in life and the ways and means she planned to use to reach them. The plan was machiavellic, and showed without doubt that Opal had outsmarted her older sister and was getting ready to double-cross her as soon as the two male descendents of the family were dispatched.

"As soon as dad will kill Thorsten because he will believe the heir has tried to usurp the throne by doing a regicide targeted at his so precious person turned bad because it will have killed Sven, Ruby and I planned to deal with him. After all, he cannot be any brighter than granddad was! The old fool fell for the 'Help, I fell on a ledge' trick like a new soft rock miner! It was so easy to push him in the hole when we got rid of him! Mom is such a pushover it would be easy to force her to retire in a cell, in the lower mines! But the nicest part is that Ruby thought she could kill me easily. She had been collecting rattraps and planned to have me eat some poisoned food on her instigation. She was an idiot: I followed her and saw her collect the baits. It was not a great feat of thinking what she was doing when I saw her wash the baits and evaporate the water to recover the white powder! She was collecting the poison to deal with someone, and that someone had to be me since we shared the rest of the targets and none were to be poisoned. Sven's death will have to be well planned, so as to have the maximum impact on dad; when he gets mad he stops thinking, and Thorsten would have been dead before dad would have recovered his senses. Ruby was for drowning the runt, but I favoured an arrow in the pest while dad held him. It would kill Sven, and rebound on dad's armour. The rest would be history. I had planned on stealing Ruby's poison reserve and cook her favourite cake for her, using it as sweetener... for me! Oh how sweet that would have been to see her die from that poison while laughing at her demise in her face. Mom would not have outlived Ruby by a day after she had been disposed of. I believe in a clean field when I do dirty tricks! But now I have to review all the plans. I cannot count on that stupid Ruby to do the dirtiest work for me while believing she had the idea. And then there is the problem of that meddling blade of Light and the Wolf Throne. Delays, delays! I hate delays! Ruby always told me I was too hurried. For what good it served her to wait! I have so much planning to do and here I am in a feast held in the memory of my older sister, may the orcs eat her heart when they conquer this forsaken place!"

***

Diamondcutter was fuming as his daughter's diatribe came to an end. As Opal looked around, confused as to why she was standing on the table with everyone looking at her in disgust, the memory of what she had revealed suddenly came back to her.

"It's not true! I never planned these things or did them!"

Mitsuko became an angry fiery red, clearly demonstrating the falsehood of her statement. This infuriated Opal and she made a mad dash for the offending blade, almost crushing Iridia in her rush. She never made it to the blade as a giant hand, the right hand of Timor, caught her by the neck and his left hand imprisoned her wrists in a steel grip.

Diamondcutter looked at Harold, and, with a knee on the floor, stated the damning request in a cold voice:

"By right of Vassal to Liege lord, I request the penalty due one found guilty of regicide, namely my dad, king of the Dwarfs, by this person, named Opal! By right of Vassal to liege lord, I request that Opal and her sister Ruby be removed from the registry of the Royal line! By right of Vassal to Liege lord, I request that their bodies be disposed in a tar pit, to join their follow souls in the darkness of time to be forever forgotten! By right of Vassal to Liege lord, I request that their name be forever forgotten, their birth declared non existent and that their life be purged of all records. By right of Vassal to Liege Lord, I request that no record of this tribunal be kept. I never had daughters. None were ever born, and none ever died. No record of their existence must subsist in archive or memory."

"Husband! She is but seven!"

"Her body is seven, wife! Her mind reeks of corruption older than this world! If Harp can access memories dating seventeen thousand years, what stops our daughters from having done the same, but under the influence of an evil we have no idea of? Some essences are good, and others are bad. If she ever gains access to anything other than earthly powers, only a Seer would know how far she would reach in her destructive rampage! I will not let this abomination survive!"

"Luckily, I sense no real capacity at magic in her, King of dwarves. A simple physical destruction may not, however, suffice. I need to ascertain what drives your daughter to recommend the best course of action."

"Harp, the judgement of the King's bench is death, as she cannot escape the consequence of a regicide. However, proceed to the analysis and suggest the proper means to me within the next ten minutes."

"Yes, dad. Please wait while I proceed."

It took less than two minutes for Harp to return to the others, wide-eyed.

"I will have to encase her soul in a bind, dad. Killing her would release an evilness, which has haunted this world ever since its inception. I managed to gather enough information during my brief contact to tell you that a vassal of that entity, who planned to swallow it at her death from execution, inhabited Ruby. It escaped because Ruby's death was not the entity's doing and it could not lay claim to the soul that harboured the vassal."

"And what is the name of that entity?"

"Let us bind it first, because calling the name out might trigger it. Brothers, dads, we need to bind and create a ward. Let us proceed."

It took an hour for the mages' combined powers to create the proper barrier around Opal's damned soul, preventing the escape of the dark one.

As the royals came back from their trance, Harp turned to Timor, which held Opal in a tight grip, and remarked: "You did good holding her wrist. I searched her memory and she carries enough poison on her to kill an army. Break her neck when I say so. I will capture the ward and set it adrift toward the interstellar void. Are you ready?"

Timor grunted his reply and waited, watching Harp. The moment Harp moved his head up and down Timor's grip closed on the princess' neck and broke it cleanly in a twisting motion. As the soul and its casing left the body, a dark entity seemed to try and emerge from its prison. The pitch-black entity tried desperately to break the barrier woven by the royals. The prison began moving upward, crossed the futile barrier afforded by the castle's upper landings, and gained speed as it left the planet. The mages saw another fleeting dark entity in hot pursuit of the ever-accelerating prison.

"Now, what did we just see?"

"A prince of Darkness getting what it had coming."

"And what or more exactly who was this prince of darkness?"

"Arhiman, and a servant of lesser importance. It has been around for so long it thought it was the Creator. It is the instigator of the first murder. I suspect what attracted the two to the girls, Amethyst, was their greed for power at a very young age. It was then child's play for the demons to take control of them under false promises. Given the order of things, I think the servant roamed the earth, and, attracted by the magical core of Thorsten, figured it would be easier to control a younger child; before long, Arhiman came along as per a call from his familiar, and convinced by his servant of the potential, decided to take the second girl. When he realised he was trapped in a non-magical body, it was too late. Arhiman probably decided to get even with his familiar at the first occasion for setting him up like this. The time he would have spent in the girl would have been infinitesimal compared to his life expectancy, which borders on eternal, but demons are vindictive by nature. There is nothing you could have done, and Thorsten is not to blame. He is who he is, and is in no part to be held responsible for this fiasco."

"Why did it follow that black cloud?"

"The servant? It is bound to Arhiman, and cannot stay far from it. The ejection of the master demon acted like a slingshot and threw the other demon forward at an incredible speed. It is in for a rough ride! Once it reaches the maximum length of the bond, it will be pulled back and sent flying in another direction."

"Does a major demon have more than one familiar?" wondered Thorsten.

"Yes. Several hundred, to several thousand depending on how long it has been free-roaming. Arhiman is old, very old, and probably has several thousands bonds to him and playing slingshot. Arhiman will also be in for a very long trip, since each time a bond reaches its maximum extension it pulls on him. Not pleasant, I would wager, but given the nature of demons, maybe they enjoy it."

"You imply that demons can be bond or free, and that Arhiman was once bonded, is that correct?" asked Diamondcutter.

"Yes, that is correct. He was bonded to a demon that corrupted Sumer, a very ancient civilisation, named Anzu. Arhiman filled his contract with Anzu and once that was done was freed. Arhiman moved off to another domain, and became the demon of zorotrianism."

"Are there many demons?" wondered Thorsten.

"Way too many. They corrupt and use the weaknesses of people to control them. As everyone has weaknesses, if they are patient enough, they generally get their way. For these girls, it was the hunger for power; for others it is greed and the search of earthly possessions; for others, it the unbridled search for knowledge. Any excess, any weakness is a door to them. Remember, we are free to do anything, but not to excess. The moment a thing controls us, they sense it and use it against us. In a way, what is hindering their progress is the mediocrity of our ambitions. Unbridled ambition is an open door to their visit and control."

"But what are they?"

"You do ask complicated questions, Thorsten. They are disembodied spirits, souls without body. They feed on the souls they conquer, and reproduce by that method. Once a soul is devoured, it becomes an empty shell for their offspring to inhabit. In a way, their visitors were cannibalizing the spirit of these two girls, but, being subservient to them, they could not even escape by committing suicide. Their inner pain was very real, but they attributed it to external factors rather to what was eating them from the inside."

"Will they live long?"

"Who are you referring to Amethyst? If it is the girls' souls, then no, they were well on their way to be completely assimilated. If you are referring to the familiars, they will feed on each other until only one survives. Arhiman will feed on them through the bond, until even the last one is an empty shell. Then, he will perish of slow starvation. There is no social security for devils."

"Why " began Amethyst, her eyes looking at the body of Opal.

"Why didn't I take out the Evil and let her live? Is that what you want to know?"

"Yes!"

"For many reasons: what drives us is our soul; it is what makes us realise there is a world outside of our body, but also tells us the difference between Good and Bad. Now, Arhiman had eaten up most of what was the original soul, and extracting the Demon would have required the total excision of what was left. Her body would have been an empty house, attracting vandals. One day, another Evil would have taken residence, and we might have noticed it too late to stop the body from proceeding to criminal acts. Meanwhile, the body would have been a living dead, in the full sense of the term. A zombie, as the ancients called these life forms, totally obedient to any and all suggestions, unable to take any initiative, to distinguish between a good action and a bad one. She would have been a danger to all, a time bomb awaiting the passage of the first roaming spirit. The risk was too great."

"What about Sven? Is he not at risk? Or was he attacked already?" asked the king.

"Sven's 'house' fits his soul, it is too small for Evil to set foot into yet. He is not really aware of being distinct from the Universe. He is in Gestalt with it. Gestalt is an ancient word, in a dead language, German, meaning 'fully integrated'. He will be at risk when he begins to differentiate himself from the World, and become able to talk. However, I have taken the liberty to encase his kernel, the soul's house, in a magic shield. The shield is big enough to let the house grow and reach maturity without Sven falling prey to a soul-snatcher. Ian, dad, is totally different. I have no need to worry about him, he is Human, Elf, Wolf and Equine all in one, and has access to our Collective Conscience. No Evil Prince will ever dare get near him unless it has a death wish. His soul is already more protected than any entity I have seen, and once Thorsten and the dragon boy come to complete the hexagon, nothing, at whatever level, will be able to reach him with Evil intentions. Just look at his health! Not even microbes can touch him, already. He is never sick, never cold and never too warm. And he is stronger than most ten year olds, even if he is barely a month past his first anniversary. Have you seen him run and literally fly off to land on the back of Silver Moon? He is a mage, a powerful mage, and I have a lot of problem waiting for him to talk so we can start teaching him the proper use of magic. He has innate magic, very strong innate magic. But there is more, lots more. That young one will prove to all it is possible to teach new faces to an old monkey, namely me. Ian is the Omega, the ultimate Gestalt of Conscience. When Thorsten and the dragon boy come into play, Ian will integrate Dwarf and Dragon Conscience into the Gestalt. Bjorn, do not worry, I am sure your people will be included, as will the fairies, princess Iridia. Now, how he does it, mystery."

As Harp was finishing his explanations, Paschal disposed of Opal and Ruby's bodies. No trace was left of their existence. They were expunged of all records, and their earthly possessions disintegrated into their component atoms before being dispersed in the atmosphere, outside of the kingdom.

The Dwarf royals had so many unanswered questions, but they had the good sense to realise that their liege lords were extremely tired. Amethyst and Diamondcutter retired to their apartments, while Bjorn and his gigantic wife did the same. Princess Iridia had taken a shine to Timor since he had saved her life and, since he stayed with Harp and Thorsten, she decided to stay with them also, nested on Timor's furry shoulder. Sven and Ian, always accompanied by Silver Moon and his milk nanny, Samantha, stayed in the same room as the older princes, playing with wood cubes. Soon, Silver Moon rested on his flanks, offering a cuddly nest to everyone, and Samantha closed the box and lay between Silver Moon's hoofs. Snores and other noises of well-deserved rest could be heard in an otherwise peaceful den.

"Rest well, little ones, tomorrow is another day, and who can tell what it has in reserve," said Iridia to the snoring nest, before she herself succumbed to the day's turmoil.