With the arrival of the necromancer the great hall of the Rotwald keep had turned quiet. The militiamen, who had been spared the fate of the Duke’s soldiers, scurried past Lord Boniface and disappeared into the dark hallway beyond.

Bones had to step over many a corpse as he made his way through the scene of carnage. The eviscerated bodies of the Duke’s men were piled up in the passages between the tables. He had to tread carefully to avoid the puddles of blood that all but covered the floorboards in a sticky carpet of wasted life.

“Such a mess,” the necromancer said. He slowly shook his head in disappointment as he took in the scene of utter devastation surrounding him. “Such a waste...”

Lord Boniface stopped in the middle of the hall and examined at the lone survivor dangling from the gallery. The man was struggling to keep his balance standing on Victorian’s back. He pulled at the white string of magic that was wound around his neck with blistered, bleeding fingers. But the arcane binding was hard as steel and his efforts were all for naught.

The three men strung up next to him had already ceased their struggling. They hung peacefully from the gallery, faces swollen and eyes bulged.

Boniface tilted his skull head as he addressed Leonora. “I thought that Julia was the one who enjoyed torture,” he said. “End his misery.”

“Yes, My Lord.” The handmaiden bowed her head in reverence to the necromancer. She then approached the helpless soldier.

The poor man’s struggling grew more frantic. He looked on in terror from the corner of his eye at the cold expression of his would-be executioner.

A gentle command rang out through the hall. “Halt.”

Lady Albrecht had arrived. The room once more settled into a state of anticipation.

Diana went straight for Boniface. “Release the man,” she ordered. “We have shed enough blood here tonight.”

“As you wish, Master,” Bones answered.

The necromancer turned to Leonora. “Go on,” he said, “Release him.”

The girl frowned at the thought of sparing the soldier, but complied without further hesitation. At the flick of her hand the white strings of magic, by which the four soldiers hung from the gallery, vanished into thin air.

With the bindings gone the young man stumbled from his perch and landed on the hard wooden floorboards. Exhausted by his torturous ordeal, he remained lying on the ground, frightened of inciting the monsters that now surrounded him. He dared not to look away from the robed assassin holding the dagger, even as the remains of the other soldiers collapsed into a disorderly pile next to him to the sound of ringing chainmail.

Having carried out her Master’s command, Leonora once more bowed her head and stepped back from the improvised gallows. She gave one last look to the remains of the young paladin lying on the bench and a trace of joy snuck into her expression. But the handmaiden was quick to suppress any such signs of satisfaction at his cruel fate.

Lord Boniface closely examined the blood soaked body of Victorian. Having confirmed the man’s death he placed his fingers across his empty eye sockets in a pained gesture and made his dissatisfaction known with a low growl before addressing the rest of the room.

The necromancer cast his hollow gaze around the ranks of the Devil’s handmaidens. “Why is it that none of you thought to protect him?” he asked, green flames of anger flickering in his stare. “Did it not occur to anyone that Victorian might not have been ready for this fight?”

“It’s only the life of a single human,” Julia shrugged in indifference, “Plenty more to go around.”

“Yes, but he was one of our people,” Bones corrected her. “And we are supposed to at least take care of our own. His death was unnecessary.

Need I remind you all that our Master’s undead servants are disposable, not the living ones!”

He looked to the blood that was slowly dripping from the bench and shook his head. “What a blunder. All of this death and nothing gained.”

The necromancer sighed loudly before once more addressing the room. “I am going to ask you all one more time: why didn’t at least one of you try and keep Victorian alive until our Master could tend to his wounds?”

The handmaidens hesitated to answer. Were they mere mortals, this could have been taken as a sign of guilt or shame. But the pretty little monsters that served the Devil were of a different mind for when it came to the value of mortal lives.

“Don’t bother, Bones,” Diana said. “It took my brother quite a lot of time and effort to rid them of empathy.”

She gestured at the scene of carnage surrounding them. “If they feel no compassion for their victims, then they certainly won’t care for you berating them over the death of one man.”

“What’s a human’s life worth anyway?” Julia asked.

“Oh, so we don’t need willing followers now?” Diana asked in return.

Julia shrugged, expressing her honest indifference over the matter.

“Odd,” Diana said. “I thought that we were here to conquer these people, not cull them to the last man. Or am I the one mistaken?”

“We don’t need people like him,” Leonora protested.

“People like who?” Diana asked. “Be more specific, please.”

“The Templars,” Leonora said. She pointed her bloodied dagger at Victorian’s corpse. “Bastards like him deserve to die.”

The other handmaidens all looked to Leonora at the mention of that name.

“He’s a Templar?” Julia asked. “This kid? Can’t be…”

“He is,” Leonora said. “I looked into his mind and held witness to his many sins. The things he showed me…” the handmaiden looked to Julia, “You would be proud of him sister.”

“Really?” Bones asked as he rubbed his bone chin in contemplation. “What could a youth like him possibly have done? He is barely old enough to have given his vows to the Temple.”

“I saw the Black Forests,” Leonora said, “I saw his victims. I saw their suffering and death. It is true. I saw it all.”

“Perhaps,” Diana said. “But I don’t think that it was his past that you saw when you looked into the abyss that is the history of House Rotwald.

Tell me, how many victims did you see, my dear? How many souls sallied forth to greet you?”

The handmaiden was taken aback by her Master’s line of questioning. “Thousands,” she answered. “Too many to count them all! I had never seen such foul and heavy soul before!”

Diana nodded. “That’s because the mind that you looked into; the soul that you searched was not his. It wasn’t Victorian who killed all those people. But it is still his burden to carry.”

“But I saw it in his mind!” Leonora protested. “I saw it in him – his cruelty and the victims of his damned Temple.”

“Tell me, my dove, do you have any idea of who the Rotwalds are?” Diana asked. “What history has made of them?

Anyone?” She looked around the room repeating her question.

“How about you, Julia – care to take a guess?”

The handmaiden shook her head. “A Templar is a Templar, Master. The more we kill the better for all.”

Diana addressed Leonora next, “And how about you, my little dove? What did you find inside of his mind when you so rudely invaded it? What did you see in him? Or, rather, who…”

The handmaiden seemed confused. “How did you–”

There was a hint of false compassion in the Devil’s voice. “I know that you went poking around in his mind back at the Crypt,” Diana said. “But you weren’t even close to frightened enough the morning after. No, you didn’t get to see his darkest side that time. But you certainly saw his curse just now, before he died. Well, a glimpse of it, anyway.

Don’t try to deny it,” the Devil said. “I know why you went behind my back. I understand. You just couldn’t help yourself. Your vindictive nature got the better of you.”

“I did it to protect us all!” Leonora said. “I had to make sure–”

Diana nodded. “Yes, of course you felt like it was your responsibility. After all, only you can judge people, right? I am clearly unqualified to choose my own servants.

Is that what you are saying? Because that’s how it sounds to me right about now. ”

Leonora shook her head in desperate denial. “That’s not what I meant, Master!”

“Your lack of faith in me is hardly unexpected,” Diana continued, “But we will get to that part later.”

The Devil pointed to Victorian’s corpse. “Tell me, what did you find when you searched his memories? Who is Victorian Rotwald?”

“A monster,” Lenora replied.

“We are all monsters here,” Diana said and gestured at Bones, “Both, dead and alive.” She then turned her gaze upon Leonora and then Julia, “Angels and demons.”

“Not Victorian,” the handmaiden persisted, “He is… whatever he is–

The things he has done… Words cannot describe the sights that I saw inside of that horrible mind.”

“Alright,” Diana said. “I can help you with that.

What did you see when you delved beyond that door? What was hiding in the deepest corner of his mind?”

Leonora appeared dumbstruck by Devil’s knowledge. “Did you know about his past?” she asked.

“Details,” Diana said and waved her hand in dismissal, “Minor details. None of it is his, anyway.

What I want you to focus on instead are the things you witnessed as you delved beyond the doorway. Please, share them with us. I, for one, am very interested in hearing about them.”

The handmaiden paused to collect her thoughts before answering, “Death…

Pain…

The Black Forests! I saw the Black Forests of the Temple.”

Diana nodded. “That sounds about right.”

“You knew?” Leonora asked. “You knew that he was a full-fledged Templar?”

Diana shook her head. “No, but I knew that his ancestors had played a part in founding the holy order itself.

You see, the Rotwalds share an old bloodline with some of the history’s worst tyrants as well as its greatest heroes. It is safe to say that they have played their part in shaping this world in more ways than one, usually on both sides of every conflict. That is their curse.

Now, when I asked you a few days ago of how exactly would you about weighing his soul, your answer was that it would drown on its own, if it was heavy enough.

Well? Was it heavy enough for you? Or could it be that it was so heavy that it almost dragged you down into the depths of despair along with him?”

“He has committed so many unspeakable crimes throughout his life,” Leonora said.

“That he has,” Diana agreed. “Now, unlike you, I don’t care about what he did. I am far more interested in why he did it. And the lessons learned.

But first, one more question, if you will. Did you happen to see an angel while you pillaged his fading mind? ”

Leonora’s eyes lit up at the description of the last scene that she had witnessed inside Victorian’s mind. “You have seen it!” she said. “When did you–”

“No, my little dove, I have not gone beyond that door,” Diana answered. “Unlike you I had the common decency not to pry too deep.”

“But– how?” Leonora asked.

“I am old,” the Devil answered. “I know this world’s history. Especially when it comes to its monsters…”

Diana grinned. “And Victorian is one magnificent beast! The whole damned bloodline is filled with incredible people and abominable failures alike. And the Rotwalds are just a small branch of a far greater legacy a thousand years in the making. And their continued existence had value to me…

You see, long ago, Victorian’s ancestors struck a bargain with an elder power. A cruel power, but a great one nonetheless. In return for their service, they asked for guidance, and the creature provided. It delivered on its promise in more ways than they could have expected. It cursed them with a long memory, so that they would never again repeat the mistakes of the past. They asked for wisdom, not knowing the burden of it. Not realizing that infants are born blind and dumb for a good damn reason.

It is in their bones, you know, their blood and flesh – the grand total experience of their kin, passed down from generation to generation. All of their worst mistakes, all of their crimes and suffering; all of it, handed down from mother to daughter, father to son, old house to new.

Poor Victorian over here is one of the many descendants of that accursed lineage, and he bears the combined guilt of all of his ancestors, just like his father did before him. He was born with the curse of having the long memory of an eldritch monster, confined within the tiny mind of a mortal man.

You think that you girls have known suffering? None of it can hold a candle to the spiral of madness that lurks behind every corner of Victorian’s mind. Every door he opens in search of wisdom is another throw of the dice. Every single one of his ancestors has left a mark on his mind and some of their memories, frankly, would scare even you.

He was dreaming of death and suffering long before he first opened his eyes in the hands of the poor woman who bore him. Children born with his curse don’t cry like the others – they have seen too much already.”

Diana turned to Boniface. “You saw it in him, didn’t you?” she asked. “You knew who the Rotwalds were when you positioned that fat corpse of a Duke upstairs to make a move on them. You feared their interference in our plans.”

“I fear nothing,” the necromancer replied. “But I would never rely on his bloodline for anything. Their loyalty is as fickle as is their wisdom. The Rotwalds are too much of a liability to be kept alive. And we don’t want to make them our enemies. They had to be erased.”

“Unlike you, I do enjoy gambling,” Diana said, “With fate, most of all. And it seems to me like Victorian does too. And he had been lucky so far.”

The Devil ran her fingers over the warm corpse of the young paladin. “Those born of his bloodline are destined to either rise up above their peers, or to drown in misery and madness. They are never content, because they must keep themselves busy. Otherwise their inherited memories will torment them to no end.

Madmen, crones and doomsayers – all manner of insane people proliferate his line. But, once in a while, from among the ranks of the weak and feeble minded a strong soul arises. A clear mind, tempered by the cruel wisdom of his bloodline, and capable of unimaginable greatness – that is what I see in Victorian. That is his greatest gamble.

That is the weight of the soul of the man lying before you. That is his value to me. That is who Victorian could be one day – a great man.”

The Devil frowned and wiped her hand on Victorian’s armor. “Just a corpse now...

But I had to push my luck with him. I had to see if he was the last one.”

She snapped her fingers and gestured for Julia to approach. “We need to work fast to preserve him.”

At the Devil’s command Victorian’s body was placed upon the closest table. They removed his armor and clothes to the point where his wounds became visible. Diana herself pulled the crossbow bold from his shoulder. She then bit down on her finger, drawing a few drops of blood. The Devil then smeared them over the gaping cut on Victorian’s neck; a single drop of blood for the hole left behind by the bolt.

At the snap of Diana’s fingers the smudges of blood on her fingers were set aflame. Likewise, Victorian’s wounds were cauterized by her magic. But beyond simply covering up the wounds with scar tissue, the flame of her heart’s blood appeared to have had a restorative effect on his flesh.

The tiny red flames were quickly extinguished, but in their wake Victorian’s wounds appeared to have closed for good, leaving behind a thick layer of scar tissue. But the wounds themselves had not been the cause of his death and a superficial application of the Devil’s magic was not enough. No amount of the arcane could create matter out of nothing. No healing could be performed on a body that was missing its essence – the blood.

“We only have a little while longer before his mind breaks down,” Diana explained and gestured at the pool of blood that had gathered beneath Victorian. “The body is still fresh, but the blood is not.”

The Devil looked to Leonora. “He will need to borrow yours’.”