Gregor The Cripple

Hours had passed. The fading light of daytime was now fully obscured by clouds overhead, turbid and angry.

Together on the roof they stood, master and apprentice. Gregor was investigating the magic circle, while Kaius prepared his final reagents.

“I get it now,” offered the younger wizard. “We are to call down lightning to power the ritual.”

“Correct.”

“And the sacrifice?”

“I would rather call it ‘bait’, if you don’t mind.” Kaius stared at Gregor in his usual unnerving, irregularly blinking manner.

“Well, what are we using for bait?”

Kaius continued staring. “You are to stand there.” He intoned, pointing to a lesser secondary circle, his unspoken answer delivered nonchalantly.

Gregor was incredulous, though not surprised. His body was the product of much magical alteration, conducted by his master without request or forewarning. All this ritual business had a familiar stink about it.

“Old man, I am not in the habit of willing sacrifice.”

“I told you, we are using bait, not a sacrifice.”

“Then what am I to be bait for? What is worth me risking my life to summon?”

“There is no risk, the circle has protections. You will suffer nothing.”

Gregor shook his head. For all his life, Kaius had sought to build him into something beyond mundane. It was not enough to simply be ‘outstanding’. Talent, appearance, intelligence, arcane ability, worldly wisdom, these were all things obtainable by normal people using normal methods. Gregor and his master were not normal people, and they had the wherewithal to utilize extraordinary methods. Thus, Kaius considered it a great waste to merely aim to be ‘the best’.

‘One must aspire to possess transcendental characteristics, and, further, it is not enough to merely aspire, one must actualize these aspirations. You WILL actualize these aspirations.’ he had once said.

Whether or not Gregor himself had such aspirations was naturally not something either of them bothered to discover.

It was not uncommon for Kaius to inflict surprise ritual enhancement upon Gregor.

Though he wasn’t exactly happy with being unconditionally improved, he nevertheless took pride in his eminently capable self.

“I trust that you won’t waste all of your hard work by sacrificing me, but why does it look exactly like you’re trying to sacrifice me?”

“Because, were I to use you as a sacrifice, this is exactly how I would do it.”

“I don’t follow.”

“A functional magic circle is necessary for the sake of subterfuge. The Tartarian Fiend we are summoning must be convinced that I intend to sacrifice you.

“You want to trick a demon?”

“There will be no trick, they can smell those. I shall propose to him a contract offering you as payment. He will fail to complete the task I give him, rendering the contract void.”

“I assume that we somehow stand to gain from this.”

Kaius nodded as normally as he was able, “Do you recall two years ago when the Grand Vizier of Tumair commissioned us to excise that necromancer from his sewers?”

“That exceedingly ugly necrophile with the massive soul gem?”

“You remember correctly.” Kaius produced a pitch-black gem the size of a grapefruit from the shadows of his robe. “I will ask the demon to etch this with animantic runes, such that the soul-essence it contains will be nurtured and grow in potency. Unknowable to him, the gem has been adulterated. He will become trapped in his own etchings.”

Gregor was rather stunned. Such a thing would be immensely valuable – with enough time and effort one could theoretically leverage it to become something more than mortal.

The soul is the vital essence of a being. It is the totality of the self which interfaces with the brain to control the body. The quality of one’s soul has far-reaching effects on every facet of one’s life. Willpower, lifespan, magical ability, and even the capacity to resist the machinations of fate – the capacity for so-called ‘free will’ – are dependent upon the quality of the soul.

Kaius intended to create an artefact that would allow him to improve the quality of captured souls, which he would then presumably use to nourish his own soul – something close to being a catalyst for apotheosis.

“As impressive as I am, this doesn’t seem like an equal exchange.”

“His eyes can see further than yours. He will accept.”

Gregor shrugged, seeing no reason to dispute such a high valuation of himself.

“You’re certain I won’t be sacrificed?”

“Do you not trust me?”

Loath as he was to admit it, the young wizard did indeed trust his master. In all the years they spent together, he had never known Kaius to fail. He was never incorrect, and his magical abilities and knowledge were never insufficient. Most importantly, as far as he knew, Kaius had never done anything to Gregor’s detriment.

Though he was a cruel, callous man, he could not be called evil. Evil requires one to derive pleasure from inflicting their malicious intentions upon the world. Kaius was entirely too uncaring and detached for such predilections. Further, every modification he made to Gregor’s already excellent self ended up being beneficial; there would be no reason to expect Kaius to harm him, whether by intention or by accident.

Thus, Gregor acquiesced.

He moved to stand in the circle.

“What has been done to the stone?” He asked, feeding his innate magical curiosity. Any sorcerer would be in wonder at such masterful spell-work, Gregor was different. As far as he as concerned, this was rather typical of Kaius. Even so, it was still quite interesting.

“I previously invited another demon to inscribe it with an incomplete set of runes, which, when combined with a lesser section of our coming demon’s animantic array will form an emergent tertiary array, which will siphon the demon’s soul and trap him.”

Gregor raised a brow in query. “Won’t our demon notice the runes already present?”

“He will not. They are hidden.”

The young wizard bobbed his head, looking out across the sea of pines surrounding them, the tips of the trees bending severely in the wind. “Mmm. Master, I foresee a problem with your plan.”

Kaius’s head whipped up, not bothering to contort his features into an expression.

“Speak,” He intoned.

“It relies entirely upon the work of others. I know that infernal beings are sometimes incapable of making mistakes, but can you really be so confident in the unverifiable quality of their work?”

“Your point is well-reasoned, however… the risk is low.” Kaius rasped at length. “We will proceed.”

Despite his master’s mitigation, Gregor felt something peculiar in his chest, something he hadn’t felt in a long time. It was a vital quality of humanity that his somnambulant, passive lifestyle had washed from his list of available emotional faculties: smugness.

He was so very smug for having the cognitive acuity to recognize and call to attention one of Kaius’s impossibly rare oversights.

Aware, but entirely uninterested in his apprentice’s feelings, the elder wizard continued, “The risks are low, so we will gamble. In life, one can either stagnate or suffer. You will not be stagnant, so you must suffer the risks.”

***

With the passage of another hour, all daylight vanished. Clouds blanketed the sky from horizon to horizon and seemed to precipitate no rain, producing only rumbling thunder and dazzling violet lightning, the latter arcing brilliantly overhead.

Illuminated by the pale green globes of light which hovered about the rooftop, Gregor and Kaius stood in their appropriate positions.

“Do not speak. Act as if you are the victim of some spell of beguilement.”

The time of the ritual was nigh.

Kaius raised his hand to the sky, following which, a bolt of lightning crackled down and struck a small pile of stones at his feet, imbuing them with a dull glow. Shortly after, another bolt followed, then another. Lightning struck a further five times.

With a hum, all the runes lit, pulsing with intensity after each strike.

The air within the central circle began to boil and churn. In the confusion of space, nearby pebbles and loose bits of masonry rose unbidden and unaffected by gravity.

A hand appeared. It grabbed at the fabric of reality and pulled, producing a ghastly rip and a sound that was utterly unique and alien, even to those who had heard it before.

The tear stretched with elasticity one would imagine wholly uncharacteristic of spacetime as a creature stepped through. When he looked at it, Gregor found himself under the confusing impression that it was actually impossibly massive, even though it appeared to be the size of a person.

Apparently, according to literature on the subject which Gregor quite enjoyed reading, this should be because it came from a realm subject to different geometric principles; a so-called ‘hyperbolic dimension’. Rather confoundingly, the dimension did not actually behave according to the principles of hyperbolic geometry. That was just the author’s approximation of the closest comprehensible term for what such a reality would resemble to inhabitants of this world, given that the only frame of reference against which they could compare it is their own, and that this frame of reference is inherently incompatible with alien laws of physics.

Which is to say, looking at such a creature might just convince a weak-willed observer of their own insanity.

Lightning continued to strike, feeding energy into the spellwork which bound the horror.

The thing was burnt and scorched all over, made of something that was no longer flesh, and indeed may have never been flesh in the first place. It had a small, squashed head, which bore a face of utterly uncanny symmetry. Its arms were of odd proportion; far longer than they had any right to be, with the demoniac creature’s grotesque fingers dangling below its knees.

“What is to be our business?” Was the meaning Gregor derived from its rasped speech, though he could recognize none of the words.

In answer, Kaius produced the soul gem and described his desired modifications.

“And for compensation?” The thing turned to look at Gregor, brittle non-flesh cracking and mending about the axis of every crunchy movement.

“I will give you his body,” spoke Kaius, turning his own head in an equally unsettling manner. “His soul will remain mine, for the gem.”

Presently, the young wizard was doing his best to appear listless, such that the demon would assume him ensorcelled or otherwise magically impaired.

After a long period of eerie staring, it intoned, “This will suffice.”

“Then we proceed immediately.” Kaius, gem in hand, began a swift approach toward his young apprentice.

Gregor was greatly confused be this sequence of events.

They were attempting to trick a demon into creating the object of its own destruction, and thereby escape the burden of payment. But oddly, incorrectly, his master was conducting affairs in the wrong order. It seemed that he meant to make payment before the creation of the object, not after. Thus, Gregor, who was to be the payment, was doomed.

Betrayal. He was betrayed. It never occurred to him that such a thing was possible.

It seemed that Kaius’s years of effort were not spent raising a successor, but rather a fat pig for the showyard. He was merely livestock to be bartered.

Gregor’s face creased, his eyes grew wide under a bunched brow and his cheeks drew back into a venomous sneer. He was incensed, furious. He felt the profoundest, most maddening anger. It seemed as if he had never before truly felt. Yet now, feeling was all he could manage. This all-consuming anger occupied the sum of his faculties. At that moment his whole being was composed of nothing but boiling, spitting rage.

Why? What was the point of this? If he was truly so valuable that just his body could be exchanged for a path beyond mortality, then why would Kaius not proceed with the scam and keep his apprentice all to himself? Ordinarily it was the habit of the elderly wizard to extract as much profit as he could from his every dealing. Accepting such a loss made no sense.

Unless, thought Gregor, that’s exactly what he’s doing. If Kaius went ahead with the scam after extracting the younger wizard’s soul, he would still gain the modified soul-gem, filled with the demon’s soul, as well as Gregor’s body, newly empty and inhabitable.

His master could discard the ancient, failing body that he’d forced to perform well beyond its natural limit and gain his apprentice's young, dashing, and apparently incredibly valuable vessel.

Obviously, this could not be permitted.

“Demon!” He shouted, “He means to trick you! Be warned! The gem will steal your soul!”

He stood within a binding circle meant to contain unwilling sacrifices – such as he now was – naturally, his magic was impeded. He could only cast spells on things within the circle, the list of these things was painfully short. It amounted to himself and nothing else.

The creature from beyond reality snorted, “Runt, you are tricked, not I. There is no soul in this body to steal.”

Miraculously, and completely uncharacteristically, Kaius was stunned by this revelation, confirming Gregor’s suspicion that he was indeed planning to proceed with the original scam.

His mind was electric, racing a mile-a-minute to devise a method of escape. Any lesser wizard would have despaired. A cowardly mage would have certainly given up. Gregor was different, for he had the power of hate on his side! He hated Kaius deeply, and this was his ultimate chance to spite the old bastard.

Yes, it was decided, I’ll escape and live on and become more than that ancient monster ever was, not because of his meddling and machinations, but in spite of them!

But how? He had neither magical nor physical agency, being that the binding circle rendered them both impotent. It was impossible to leverage these things to get out, but perhaps something could be persuaded to come in?

In order for him to escape, it was necessary to deactivate the binding circle, which was powered by lightning. He couldn’t stop the lighting, but he could draw it toward himself.

In the general understanding of sorcerers – that is, both mages and wizards, as well whosoever else sees the practice of magic as their occupation – lightning, as a rule, is attracted to magic. However, this is merely the base-level understanding of a layman. A fulgarmancer, who specializes in this area, would say that, more accurately, electrons and thaumatons are mutually attractive, meaning that one can attract lightning if they possess an abundance of lonely thaumatons. Thus, a ‘lightning-rod spell’ which serves this purpose is vital to the practice of fulgarmancy.

Naturally, owing to his exhaustive education, Gregor was at least a middling fulgarmancer and possessed such a spell in his massive mental repository of arcane knowledge.

He began in an instant, taking advantage of Kaius’s odd dumbfoundedness. The next bolt came swiftly, arcing at an acute angle away form the glowing stones which served as the ritual’s capacitor, flashing toward Gregor’s outstretched palm. Upon contact, it felt like a lance of flaming adrenaline had entered his body and begun insanely bouncing around, waiting for release.

Immediately the elder wizard reacted, raising his hand to the heavens in order to summon more lightning from the thunderhead above. However, the mechanisms of his ritual worked against him.

To harness the immense power of lightning, it is necessary to store the received energy temporarily so that it may be released in a slow, steady flow. Otherwise, the ritual would only be powered in the instant that the bolt met the magical conduit and for a very short while afterwards.

This is why the circles binding Gregor and the demon did not fail immediately; the energy buffer needed time to deplete.

Unfortunately for Kaius, though he could compel the bolts to come to him, there was no way to compel the clouds to produce them regularly, and his ritual was expensive. Irregular deliveries of energy could be afforded, but missed deliveries could not.

Thus, the ritual succumbed to entropy. Gregor decided – rather magnanimously – that if his master wanted lightning, he would send some.

CRACK! Before Kaius could notice the runes go dark, tongues of plasma forked their way over to the old man, who, being that he was presently summoning lightning to the stones and not to himself, was not at all prepared to catch them. They found no purchase on his impressively enchanted robe, but snaked into his uncovered hands and face, from whence they spread wherever they pleased.

Mutely, his muscles contracted, impelled to movement by something other than magic for the first time in over a decade. His heart began to beat according to an alien rhythm, and he toppled, legs alternating between seizure and spasm, unable to maintain balance. Needless to say, this interruption in his constant magical maintenance of vital function could have no possible consequence other than death.

Truthfully, Gregor admitted to himself, Kaius would have been able to effortlessly defend had he attacked with any conventional spell. But, wonderfully, lightning moves faster than mortal men can think. It felt a bit like cheating, which was fine by him, for he’d be dead without a doubt if he had failed to incapacitate Kaius with that attack.

Kaius the Elderly hadn’t survived a century and a half of near-constant magical violence by luck. He was an absolutely terrifying duelist owing to his magnum opus, The Veil, or ‘Kiaus’s Veil’ as it was called by others, which was widely regarded as an unbeatable spell. It granted him the insane ability to achieve both absolute invisibility and intangibility. Kaius was completely unassailable once he disappeared, and Gregor had no confidence in surviving past that point.

Wasting no time, he leapt from the binding circle, intending to loose his remaining lightning at the stones and re-power the runes keeping the demon captive.

The demon, wily and ancient, had other ideas.

“I will not be denied my prize!” It rasped, grabbing Gregor’s right arm with its own freakish appendage. It pulled him, stumbling, so that his hand was with the creature inside its binding circle.

Gregor snarled. Seeing no other option for escape, he discharged lightning downward, directly into the waxen etchings and chalkwork.

The runes lit with a cold hum, an invisible barrier cleanly severing Gregor’s hand and wrist. Before he could even feel the amputation, he made his escape, vanishing from the rooftop with the telltale snap and flash of teleportation.

In his final moments under the eerie green light, Kaius managed a halting croak, “I have made a wizard of him… my part is... done…”