Torean blinked. “As in, it is a Blade of Unlife Slaying?”
The god of justice nodded. “Indeed, an extremely well crafted, very powerfully imbued Blade of Unlife Slaying. Perhaps one of the most powerful I have ever seen, at least in this size of a blade.”
Torean grimaced in disbelief. “Truly.”
“Indeed. Although the wielder would also be an important factor.”
Torean frowned. “Then it was, as we suspected, a Blade of Life Slaying. A proverbial soul-sucking blade.”
“Exactly.” Tiernon rubbed the bridge of his nose in frustration.
“Yet, the blade is dedicated to you? It has your aura?” Torean asked.
“It does now, after whatever the demon did.” Tiernon nodded.
Torean squinted. “Every report we had of it said it was dedicated to you before the demon as well.”
Tiernon nodded sourly. “Priests who had seen it or touched it have reported it to be dedicated to me, and Sentir Fallon has said the same, as did the other archons who examined it.”
“So that would mean that Sentir Fallon had acquired and consecrated…” Torean trailed off.
“…an abomination in my name?” Tiernon finished for his brother, nodding at the same time.
“That is absolutely forbidden,” Torean said. “He would have had to know this.”
“Indeed, one would think so after using it,” Tiernon agreed. “However, given that the other archons who examined the blade saw nothing either, there were likely very powerful masking spells on it. Something that would have hid its true nature from Sentir Fallon.”
“Whether or not there were masking spells on it to begin with, once an Attendant Archon consecrated it to you, at that strength, it is doubtful any mortal would have been able to detect the abomination. Your presence would likely have overwhelmed it,” Torean noted.
“Indeed. Unless you were struck by it and found your soul being drained, it is doubtful you would have noticed. Although I would have thought the other archons would have noticed,” Tiernon said. “And now that things are reversed?” He stared at the dagger, rotating it. “That gives me an idea to pursue. If it’s truly a full reversal, then perhaps if we can detect other good properties it has, we might infer other nefarious properties it may have had.”
“Do you have the skill?” Torean asked.
“No.” Tiernon shook his head. “I can think of two people that I know, off the top of my head, that could do it. Unfortunately, Sentir Fallon severely pissed both of them off by killing Orcus; and neither has spoken to me since then.”
“Well, when you permanently slay the leader of the pantheon, it does tend to annoy the other members,” Torean said.
“Pantheon?” Tiernon chuckled. “You remember how much Orcus hated people referring to the Tartarvardenennead as a pantheon.”
Torean grinned back at his brother. “Remember how he nearly punched you in the face at the wedding reception?” They both laughed.
“Over forty thousand years ago, and I still remember.” Tiernon shook his head.
“That reception should have been our first clue as to how bad an idea the marriage was,” Torean reminded his brother.
“Things certainly went downhill from there, for both families.” Tiernon nodded in agreement, his face becoming much more somber thinking about his father and step-mother.
Torean shook his head as if trying to clear it. “Enough — we need to get back to the problem at hand. Where did Sentir Fallon acquire it?”
Tiernon shrugged. “Sentir Fallon told me that one the Knights Rampant in Etterdam had discovered it on a quest several centuries prior, and that it had been in a storage room in a temple when he located it.”
“Hmm,” Torean said.
“Indeed.” Tiernon grimaced.
“The presence of such a negatively charged device close to the heart of the Church, in Etterdam, Astlan and other places might explain some of the other issues we’ve observed,” Torean said.
Tiernon chuckled softly and bitterly. “You mean like the corruption of Holy Dogma?”
Torean nodded silently. It would explain much of what they had been concerned about the last few millennia. “We searched and searched, but the masking of the consecration would likely have thwarted our agents.”
The two sat there silently contemplating this before Torean spoke up again.
“So how would a so-called greater demon manage all of this?” Torean asked. “He apparently came out of nowhere, pretending to be summoned by Lenamare, provokes the Rod, sets up a fight with Talarius, then manages to break your ciphers and steal your mana, reverse the blade and relight Doom. It all seems too impossibly coincidental.”
Tiernon shook his head. “My thoughts have been obsessed with this puzzle since we last spoke. The only thing I can come up with is that these recent events were a setup by Orcus and his people. The Lord of Doom was only wounded; he’s been hiding, biding his time and plotting his revenge. We have now seen his opening gambit.”
“On the bright side, if this is Orcus, rather than a new warden, he would have no more interest in releasing our prisoners than we do; possibly less,” Torean said.
