The Heavenly Host

Gastropé looked over at them. Wow, did they look bad. Tizzy’s two friends had holes in their wings; the craggy one even had a broken horn. They all had dark spots covering their bodies. It was much clearer on Tizzy, who was lighter skinned and not scaly, but the dark spots appeared to be bad frostbite and/or cold burns. How cold was a lich’s teat if they could freeze demons? Gastropé wondered.

“Sorry,” Peter said to Tizzy as the demon flew nearby.

Tizzy looked Peter up and down. “You’re a human on a Grove carpet?”

“Uhm, yeah. Sort of a long story,” Peter said.

Tizzy twisted his mouth back and forth a couple of times before saying, “Unusual.”

Zed stared at the demon. “You know about the Grove?”

Tizzy shrugged and pulled his pipe out of nowhere. “I’ve done some business there; been a long time though.”

“You have been to the Grove?” Penelope asked, looking horrified.

Tizzy gave her a wide grin and a completely terrifying leer. “I was indeed, my pretty! Perhaps next time I’m there, I should look you up?”

Penelope shook her head back and forth, not wanting to have anything to do with the octopodal demon.

“How can a demon get into the Grove?” Zed asked.

“Same way as a human!” Tizzy pointed to Peter. “You get invited!” The demon grinned.

∼

Antefalken came up to Tom, wading in what he figured must be a molten iron bath. “So, you about ready to head home?”

Tom smiled. “Yeah. It’s been a good trip, but probably time to leave.”

Antefalken grinned. “Yeah, I haven’t been here for at least a decade. It’s been great to stretch out and relax.”

“Where are the rest?” Tom asked.

“Reggie is teaching Rupert and Talarius to play a card game called blackjack,” Antefalken said. “Last time I looked, the others were over in the main lava flow.”

Tom nodded. “You grab the card players and I’ll get the others. We’ll meet up on the ridge we came over from the Boom Tunnel.”

“Sounds good!” Antefalken took off.

Tom pulled himself out of the molten metal. He had to shake some metal droplets off his legs. He didn’t want any to harden between his scales. He then headed over to the main lava flow.

When he arrived it took him a moment to spot the guys, but he eventually spotted them out floating on their backs in a deep orange hot region. He took to the air and flew over to them. “You guys ready to go?” Tom asked.

Boggy opened one eye. “Already? We just got back not that long ago!”

“Argh!” Estrebrius moaned, keeping both eyes closed. “I ache all over and I’ve still got some bone-deep chills from where that second dragon bit my leg.”

“Whine, whine, whine!” Tizzy groused. “I don’t think my rear left toes have grown back yet! At least you two didn’t lose any appendages!”

“What are you three talking about?” Tom asked, puzzled. “You’ve been soaking in lava for hours now.”

Tizzy grinned. “We got a bloody call from my accursed master!”

“Bloody good bloody call, if I do say so myself!” Boggy added, keeping both eyes shut.

Tom shook his head. “Your accursed master? He summoned you while you were here? All three of you?” This didn’t make any sense.

Tizzy grinned and shook his head, somehow causing small lava ripples. “Well, he called. He was all up in the air over a bunch of liches on dragonback that were kicking his and his friend’s butts, so we all decided to go help out.”

“Best workout in a century!” Boggy sighed.

“Wait, I’m confused,” Tom said. “Your accursed master summoned you and had you bring friends? That makes absolutely no sense!”

“Well, he’s also a friend, so we said what the heck!” Tizzy said.

Tom shook his head. “Your accursed master is your friend? You are now back tracking on everything you and Boggy have told me about wizards and demons.”

“Yeah, Tizzy does that sort of thing,” Boggy said. “However, it’s really a case of him leaving out a lot of details, like who this so-called accursed master is.”

Tom sighed. “Okay, so who is your accursed master? I don’t think you’ve mentioned him before.”

Tizzy looked up and gave Tom a puzzled stare. “What are you talking about? Pretty sure it was your idea!”

Tom stared at the floating octopod and blinked. “What are you talking about?”

“When we entered Freehold, wasn’t it you that suggested that Gastropé be my accursed master?” Tizzy asked.

“Tom sold you into eternal slavery?” Estrebrius looked up and over at Tizzy. “That’s not very nice!”

“I don’t think he got paid, so not sure it was a ‘sale’ exactly,” Boggy said. “At least that’s what I heard.”

“Stop.” Tom raised a hand. “You are confusing me. Are you saying you are still pretending to be Gastropé’s slave?”

Estrebrius squinted at Tizzy. “I don’t know... That binding doesn’t look that pretend to me!”

Tom looked back and forth between the two. He then looked at Tizzy with his demon sight. Sure enough, there was some sort of wizard link or binding going up and off plane.

“Where did that come from?” Tom asked.

Tizzy shrugged and closed his eyes again, relaxing. “It just showed up at some point.”