One of the bat-folk did not return. It was to be expected, but Grae still felt oddly heavy at the sight of them coming home with one less. The hobgoblin wore a string of ears around his neck, now. He went about sawing new trophies from the dead, his blade red and dripping, giving each a quick cut across the neck as he did the bloody work.

“Haveta’ be careful. Humans…” He grinned. “Humans get back up when you least expect it.”

As for the rest, they were sawing and prying and pulling at the bars of the slave cage. With their loved ones reaching through the gaps towards them, their desperation led them to hack through the bars with all their strength, falling into each other’s arms as the gap opened wider and wider and the slaves slipped through.

They were bruised, cut, and skinny as bones.

They stared at the living human with eyes like hot, hateful embers.

“Leave him be.” Grae rumbled. “I need him.”

He was examining the beautiful gauntlet that the man had worn. It was composed of multiple plates of bronze held together with straps. Each of the plates was finally inscribed, detailed with pentagrams and strange, branching patterns of squared and straight lines etched out in gold. At each apex of the pentagram, at each split of the branches, there was a tiny fleck of quartz inserted.

Grae did not understand the purpose of this thing, only that it produced magic. The arrangements of lines and jewels reminded him of the Constellations…

And indeed, there were Stars in the device. Three smooth, oblong stones were arranged in a ring on the piece that covered the back of the palm. Each one was a different color, with a different letter inside, faintly glowing.

Grae saw the words for light, for control, for anger.

But he stopped himself for prying away the jewels. They were connected to something larger. Each gem was inset into a golden socket, and surrounded by tightly-clustered diagrams, words in unknown languages, and pieces of clouded pink quartz.

From the plate that contained the three stars, a pair of chains extended. They threaded through loops in the braces, connecting to the final plate, which fit over the shoulder. Extending from that plate where three tubules of reinforced glass. Two of them were dull and empty; the third sparkled and shone as something moved within, swirling about like a swimming fish. The color was a dull and lusterless red.

Mana.

This was a device for casting. A man-made Constellation.

How infuriatingly clever these humans were. Grae hoped that, somewhere out there, he would find monsters who had made similarly beautiful inventions. He didn’t like to think of his people as dull and thoughtless, unable to make for themselves.

Yet…

He had been that way himself, for such a long, long time. In his centuries of life, what could he have achieved? Even without leaving his dungeonhome he could have carved every wall with brilliant murals. Composed songs. Investigated the mysteries of life and magic.

Anything. He had been free.

Free except for the weight of his own contentment.

He sighed and shook his head, turning to the human. The man was hunched up small, leaning his head across his knees with his legs folded in front of his body. He played with the rough, burned flesh on the back of his hands, where the casting-machine had scalded him.

His chipped fingernails peeled away flecks of dead skin.

“You.”

The sound made him startle. He was unlike the others; they had been rough, muscled, sometimes fat. There was an air of callousness and watchfulness to them. As if all the time they ate and talked and lived they were only waiting for the next chance at violence.

This man was timid and withdrawn. His clothes were cut from a fine and embroidered cloth. There was a sense of something behind his eyes, although he was no less evil than the other slavers. Worse maybe.

He had known what he was doing.

“My name is Oriole. Oriole Cantor. Listen, I can help you. I know- I’ve seen the maps for this region. You’ll never make it through humans lands without guidance.” He had clearly been rehearsing this. The words came out of him in a rambling tangle, overpracticed and overeager.

“If you couldn’t be helpful, you’d already be dead.”

“O-oh.” The man fell silent for a moment. He glanced up at the hobgoblin, who gave him an evil wink, arm-deep in ears and blood. “You’re… not like the others, are you… You’re intelligent.” He seemed to find hope in that, and one word spurred him to the next. “You speak well. You’re like a human.”

“If you think comparing me to a human will win my favor, you are neither intelligent or eloquent.” Grae responded. “Think of what humans have done to my kind.”

The man froze, his face stricken white. He gulped down what he would’ve said next.

“Look at this. Look at them.” Grae watched as the kobolds reunited, as the batfolk mourned their dead. The mushrooms held a silent symphony over their fallen brother, intermingling speech-pheromones in the air to create a scent of rain and ancient pine. “Who sent you into the world to do this?”

“My…” He’d started with a little thread of hope left, thinking he was smarter than his captors. Now that thread was cut. “My father. They were his slaves. He blamed me. S-so, I…”

“I was sent out. I was told not to come back without them. He…” The man had to pause and turn the words on his tongue. He seemed acutely sure any one might be his last. “He’s a cold man, my father.”

“And he gave you this?” Grae lifted up the man-made Constellation.

“Yes. A spellshaper.” He looked at it, his eyes clinging to the brass and gold, the jewelry and the power. Grae could read him. His thought was to snatch it back, somehow. Then he’d try to escape.

“You were right, I do need someone to lead me. But not away from human lands. I seek answers that can only be found with civilization, where this ‘spellshaper’ was made. You will take me to your home.

"And you will teach me how to use this spell-shaper.”

[ Oriole Cantor ]

Red

Order

The eldest son of a powerful merchant. Trained in the use of spell-shapers, due to inherit the family obligations, but largely talentless. Possesses no Constellations.