After waiting with bated breath for the butcher on patrol to pass, Sarthel directed his summoned horrors to draw essence from other fresh corpses, all while responding to Jeanne d'Arc's relentless questioning. The Inquisitor's barrage of queries had already hung a thread of impatience upon his features beside the brazier.
With a trembling right hand, he tapped a rhythm, appraising the girl before him. There was no admiration in his gaze—only cold scrutiny. The Burner hung at the ceiling like a hunter's trophy. The brazier's orange glow illuminated her scarred limbs, and the subtle sway of her body seemed to mimic gentle waves.
If his observations were correct, she knew far too much about pacts with the Outer Gods. But why would an Inquisitor have such knowledge?
He studied her expression. "Have you finished your inspection?" he asked.
"I have. Every conceivable trap has been questioned. The rest…" Jeanne d'Arc's face twisted with undisguised loathing, eyes half-lidded as flashes of murderous intent danced within, "the rest is only my nausea at this surreal scene—the signing of a pact with a Dark God. Can someone pour a bucket of cold water on me? This is absurd; I cannot restrain myself from burning this accursed parchment. I am near madness."
"Shh—quiet," he said, a mocking smile slitting the shadows. "To encounter me, your savior, before feeding to the dungeon hounds, is fortune enough for you."
Her expression mirrored his in an uncanny synchrony. "Disgusting fortune indeed. Were I not the main actor, I might well have laughed myself to death at such absurdity."
Enough. Arguing with this woman promised no end. He shook his head, commanding the writhing black mass to slither from the shadowed corner, climb the walls and ceiling, and creep toward the shackles binding Jeanne d'Arc's arms. The cell floor lay thick with black ash, remnants from corpses only recently slain. The moss-grown walls, once damp and foreboding, now exuded the dryness of decay, as though a single step might raise a storm of dust.
Jeanne d'Arc glared at him, eyes aflame with fanatical faith. "Do not let the servants of the Dark Gods touch me, or we shall perish together."
Only capable of dragging me to hell, then.
Sarthel raised an eyebrow impatiently, his tapping sharper. "Why are you such trouble? Shall I fetch your mother to coax you down with kisses?"
"I wonder the same—why is your covenant so troublesome?" Jeanne licked her parched lips, voice taunting. "Just obey me. You Dark God worshippers are all alike, helpless before a beautiful girl. Only the holy flame can make you regret being born."
"First, I am not a Dark God worshipper."
From his right hand, a longsword materialized—black and crimson, flames dancing along its edge as if freshly forged. "Second, how dare you call yourself a beautiful girl, illiterate village fool?" He stabbed the sword into the shackles, then flicked it aside. "Finally, obedience to your orders would only see you sold to the Church as a condemned. I never believed Burners possessed hearts capable of gratitude."
Snap. The shackles broke. In the stillness, the sound echoed clear.
Sarthel stepped back, impassively watching her tumble like a broken sack, sending half a leg's height of black ash into the air.
Jeanne raised herself against the wall, struggling to move. Even her skills in killing monsters or heretics were momentarily beyond reach.
"Ugh, that hurts..." she muttered, squinting at the firelight, a brief flicker of her youthful self betraying in her gaze. "Can you provide some healing? I cannot reach my Lord's warren from here."
"The lower dungeon warren barely connects to the Light Temple. Does that mean… you're practically useless here?"
"I can crush your neck with one hand without spells, heretic," Jeanne shot him a glare. "Inquisitors do not rely on sorcery—the corpses of heretics I behead with my sword could fill a city."
The black ash settled. Flames flickered mischievously. Sarthel scanned her waist, then the shadowed corners.
"So where is your sword? Fed to the dungeon hounds already?"
"..."
She did not answer, only frowning. Fine. If I had not been reborn into this body, you would be either hound fodder or material for my spellcraft.
"Sign with your blood," he leaned closer, half-crouching, presenting the ancient, grim parchment. "Then I will provide healing and weaponry."
"I told you—I cannot read." Her gaze pierced him like a needle.
Perhaps an instinctive revulsion toward Dark God pacts, in addition to illiteracy.
"That is good news," he said, calmly mocking. "Cannot even write your own name?"
"Ah, and what of it? You are annoying, like a buzzing fly!" She rolled her eyes. "Do we need literacy to root out heretic nests? To punish heretics on the rack? To burn followers of the Dark Gods?"
"Very well. I shall write for you."
He whispered, glancing at the cell gate. From the darkness came a rapid tapping—like knuckles beating on human hide drums, dense and terrifying. Sarthel imagined countless gigantic arthropods traversing the corridors. The sound gradually faded.
After a time, he grasped the girl's gaunt, scarred right hand, guiding it to the parchment—it felt like clutching a tattered rag.
"What is this? Why must I hold hands with a heretic? Am I some orphanage aunt? Lack of motherly care, or girlfriends? Were I your mother, I would hand you to the tribunal myself." Jeanne's brow furrowed in discomfort.
"I do not wish to shake hands with a Burner either," he said, ignoring her faint resistance. "The wailing souls in your hand exceed the material my spells consume."
Sarthel drew the sword across her index finger—a shallow cut. She did not flinch. Such wounds were as natural as breathing.
Jeanne studied the heretic's covenant. By her hand, strange letters glimmered blood-red in the firelight.
Then a deep echo resonated within Sarthel's mind—not human. An invisible chill lashed at him, like countless dulled blades scraping his flesh.
He knew Jeanne heard it too.
"Accept it," Sarthel murmured.
Her head bowed lower, perhaps to contain the revulsion—against the whispering Dark Gods.
"Can you hurry the hell up?"
She nodded once, begrudgingly.
In that instant, Sarthel perceived himself as a raven, the blood-red moon rising through the mist. The ground sprouted countless rotting fingers like weeds. On the limestone slopes, a massive humanoid silhouette crouched atop a cliff, swarmed by thousands of malformed fiends, whirling like black autumn leaves. The dancing spirits—coal-black, massive—crawled, charged, twisted, and scattered.
Bone flutes played morbid tunes; the flailing, skinless victims beat rhythmless drums with their own flesh, spines protruding, heads and limbs dangling like banners in the cold wind.
No beginning. No end.
The projection of an Outer God…
The vision broke. He lowered his gaze. When their eyes met, he saw in the Burner extreme confusion, and noticed her fingers on the ground—broken by herself—the pain severed Sarthel's sight of the vision and hers alike.
He withdrew attention, reclaimed the parchment, and drove his black longsword into the floor.
"…I am defiled."
"The Outer Gods do not defile an illiterate village girl," Sarthel said impassively. "Your self-regard is impressive."
"My faith has been defiled."
"Your great Lord will forgive you, Burner." Sarthel did not lift an eyelid. "Moreover, my power is limited. Healing magic is scarce. Attempt self-harm again, and I will break your limbs and bag you."