The docks of Ratavabaros teemed with the organized chaos of dusk, the setting sun tinging the harbor waters a bloody orange, as if the sea bled for the sins of the sailors.
Elara/Samael stepped firmly onto the creaking planks, his small body raised in a posture that defied his apparent fragility. The salty cold bit his thin skin, but he did not tremble; the infernal pride, forged in millennia of domination in Hell, did not allow Elara's body to succumb to mere mortal weaknesses.
He slipped his small hand into the inner pocket of his worn tunic—an automatic, almost instinctive gesture. His fingers touched the familiar weight of a few cold, heavy silver and copper coins.
It wasn't much, but it was enough: there was always a little money on hand, as if fate itself, or perhaps some remnant of his old infernal cunning, ensured he would never be completely destitute. Samael didn't question its origin—he simply used it.
An elderly dwarf, with a gray beard braided in intricate knots and a blacksmith's hammer hanging from his belt, stopped when he noticed her alone, his wrinkled eyes narrowing in curiosity mixed with pity.
Grom: Hey, brat! (he growled, his voice hoarse like crushed gravel) What's a human brat like you doing wandering around here alone? Ports aren't places for lost children. Where are your parents? You look hungry.
Elara/Samael looked up, her eyes fixed on him with an intensity not belonging to a child. Samael felt his pride boil—accepting charity would be a humiliation he wouldn't tolerate. He crafted his words with the cunning of a demon, a childlike voice but laden with subtle authority.
Elara/Samael: I am not lost, sir (she replied, raising her chin proudly). And I need no pity. My parents taught me to fend for myself. I have coins to pay for what I eat.
He pulled a handful of dwarven silver coins from his pocket—square pieces with runes engraved on them, the metal still warm as if forged yesterday. They clinked in his small palm, a sound that made Grom's eyes gleam.
The dwarf snorted, scratching his beard, but a reluctant smile appeared on his face. Dwarves respected those who paid their own bills.
Grom: Coins, huh? (he laughed, crossing his muscular arms). That's spirit! A brat with full pockets and a sharp tongue. What does a little thing like you have to offer besides silver?
Elara/Samael smiled slightly, Samael's pride guiding the gesture. He held out a coin to Grom, twirling it between his little fingers with a dexterity that didn't match his apparent age.
Elara/Samael: Tales from the abyss (he murmured, his voice low but hypnotic). Chains that bind souls, forges that melt down to hell. In exchange… a warm place in your forge for a night, and perhaps a tip on where to buy decent bread without being cheated.
Grom took the coin, testing its weight with his thumb, and nodded slowly.
Grom: You bargain like a true dwarf (he said, putting the coin in his belt). Come on, then. But no tricks, brat. Dwarves don't like unpaid debts.
As they walked along the streets paved with gleaming metal, Elara/Samael kept a firm step, ignoring the weariness of her short legs with sheer willpower. Her body was fragile, but her spirit was not.
Elara/Samael: I pay with truths (he said, his eyes gleaming). Truths that burn hotter than your forge.
Grom opened the low door of the forge, the heat enveloping them like a forced embrace. He pointed to a rough bench, rummaging through shelves for bread and cheese.
Grom: Sit down and eat (he ordered). But tell me: what's your name, little bargainer?
— Elara — she replied, sitting upright, nibbling at the bread as if it were a royal banquet, not a necessity. Internally, Samael thought: "I take what is mine, without bowing my head. And I will always have enough."
Elara/Samael: Why do you help me, Mr. Grom? (she asked, testing the limits of the bargain)
Grom: Because a good story is worth more than gold in Ratavabaros (he retorted, seriously). And you smell of interesting trouble. Tell me, or the exchange is over.
Elara/Samael nodded, beginning to weave words like ancient chains—veiled stories, disguised truths, enough to repay the hospitality without revealing too much.
But the distant clinking of infernal chains echoed in the breeze that entered through the open door. The Kyton hunters were coming, sniffing out the traitor across the planes.
He raised his gaze to the night beyond the forge, Elara/Samael's eyes gleaming with a cold, defiant amber.
Elara/Samael: They're coming for me (she murmured to herself, her voice heavy with ancient pride).
Grom: Who's coming? (asked Grom, frowning, his hand instinctively going to the hammer on his belt).
Elara/Samael: Enemies who will learn to fear a "brat" with coins and secrets (she replied, rising with a grace that didn't suit her childlike frame). But I won't run. I'll pull them to me.
Grom looked at her for a long moment, assessing her as if weighing a steel bar.
Grom: Whatever you are, girl… (he said finally, his voice low) If you need a hammer by your side, Ratavabaros has plenty. And I owe you a warm night.
Elara/Samael smiled slightly—a smile that mixed her innocence with his cruelty.
Elara/Samael: Put the hammer away, Mr. Grom. It's not time yet.
Grom's forge pulsed with the low hum of embers and the distant clang of hammers in neighboring workshops. The heat was dense, comforting, heavy with the smell of hot iron and charcoal.
Elara/Samael sat on the rough bench, her little legs dangling without touching the ground, but her erect, almost regal posture contrasted with her frail body.
She nibbled slowly on the bread, savoring each crumb as if it were a hard-won luxury, not a fulfilled need. The remaining coins jingled softly in her pocket as she moved—a constant reminder that she depended on no one.
Grom sat on the opposite bench, the hammer resting on his knee like a natural extension of his arm. He watched her with the gaze of someone weighing raw ore before deciding if it's worth forging.
Grom: So, Elara. You said you bring truths that burn. Start paying the debt. What does a human child know of chains that bind souls? Elara/Samael paused chewing for a moment. Her eyes—blue like those of an ordinary girl, but with an amber glint that Grom would attribute to the light of the forge—locked onto his.
Elara/Samael: I know chains aren't just iron. They're broken promises. Oaths turned to hatred. Souls promised to someone and, instead, given to another. When a chain breaks… the sound isn't metal. It's something screaming inside.
Grom tilted his head, his beard brushing against his chest.
Grom: Beautiful poetry. But poetry doesn't forge blades. Have you ever seen it happen? Or have you only heard about it?
Elara/Samael: I have. I've seen chains break and what's left of them turn to black dust. I've seen what happens when the one who held them decides they no longer want to be a slave. And I've seen the price paid for it.
A heavy silence fell between them. Grom drummed his thick fingers on the hammer handle.
Grom: You speak like someone who's been on the other side of the anvil. As if you've been hammered and shaped.
Elara/Samael smiled slightly—a smile that didn't reach her eyes, but carried a spark of ancient pride.
Elara/Samael: Perhaps I was. Perhaps I still am.
Grom snorted, but didn't laugh. Instead, he stood up and went to a high shelf, taking a small pewter mug and filling it with warm mead from a nearby barrel.
Grom: Drink. It's not charity, it's part of the bargain. Dry stories are worthless.
He pushed the mug toward her.
Elara/Samael caught it with both hands, feeling the heat rise through her fingers. She took a small sip—the sweet, strong liquid burned as it went down, but she didn't grimace. She drank it like water.
Elara/Samael: Good. Strong enough to drown out bad memories.
Grom: Or to awaken the ones we want to remember.
He sat back down, crossing his arms.
Grom: And now tell me, brat: why do you think "they" are coming after you? And who are "they"?
Elara/Samael looked at the half-open door of the forge. The night outside was darker, the distant clinking now clearer—a sound no ordinary dwarf would hear, but which to him was as clear as funeral bells.
Elara/Samael: They are collectors. They take what was promised and not delivered. When something escapes… they hunt. And I escaped.
Grom frowned, his eyes narrowing.
Grom: You speak of demons?
Elara/Samael: I speak of chains with a will of their own. And of those who hold them.
A long silence. Grom scratched his beard, thoughtful.
Grom: In Ratavabaros we have runes to ward off things worse than thieves and krakens. But if what's chasing you is the kind that doesn't respect fire and iron… maybe you need more than a warm night and a piece of bread.
Elara/Samael stood slowly, her small body seeming larger under the reddish light of the forge.
Elara/Samael: I need time. Time to decide if I run… or if I pull them to me first.
Grom stared at her for a long moment. Then, with a grunt, he stood up too.
Grom: Stay here tonight. The forge has a cot in the back. It's not a palace, but it's warm and nobody enters without me knowing.
Elara/Samael inclined her head, an almost graceful gesture.
Elara/Samael: You owe me nothing, Mr. Grom.
Grom: I owe you a good story. And I think yours isn't over yet. Now go to sleep, brat. Tomorrow the problems return with the light of day… or with the darkness, judging by the way you talk.
He nodded, walking towards the back of the forge. Before disappearing behind a leather curtain, she turned one last time.
Elara/Samael: Thank you.
The word sounded sincere, without forced pride. Grom only grunted, returning to stirring the embers with the poker. When Elara/Samael lay down on the simple cot, wrapped in a thick blanket that smelled of smoke and metal, the clinking outside grew closer.
He closed his eyes, his small hand in his pocket, feeling the comforting weight of the coins.
Elara/Samael (thinking): Let them come. I have my magic, I have my pride… and now I have a hammer that might strike on my side.
The Ratavabaros night wore on, and hell knocked at the door—but for the first time in millennia, Kyton was not alone. Grom's forge trembled with the rumble of the embers, but the heat was no longer enough to ward off the cold rising from the ground.
It was a cold that didn't come from the Ratavabaros winter—it was the cold of Hell, seeping through the cracks like invisible fingers, icy and dry, the opposite of any flame. Hell was neither cold nor hot; it was a void that stole the warmth from everything it touched, leaving only ashes and the echo of screams that never warmed.
Elara/Samael lay on the cot, eyes open in the darkness, the blanket heavy as a shroud. She tried to conjure the spectral silver line, the one that had once been born golden and black, full of hooks and promises of pain. Nothing. Only a useless tingling in her fingers, as if the power had been ripped away along with the broken chains.
Elara/Samael (thinking, hoarse inner voice): I was the Predator. Now I am only the prey.
The cold of Hell still crawled through the cracks, but it was only a distant discomfort—Samael didn't feel it as a threat. Within Elara's small body, her essence flowed intact, the infernal blood coursing strongly through her fragile veins.
The chains had broken, but the power had not. It had merely changed form: more subtle, channeled through a shell no one would expect.
Elara/Samael rose effortlessly from the cot, her amber eyes gleaming like live embers. The coins in her pocket clinked once, comfortingly. She reached out her little hand—and the magic responded instantly, fully, without hesitation.
The clinking of the infernal chains drew closer, rhythmic, arrogant. Three Kytons emerged from the liquid darkness seeping through the half-open door, their iron masks cracked, their hooks dripping black viscosity. They paused, assessing the little girl who stared at them without blinking.
Kyton (multiple, overlapping voices): The stolen light. The dog without a leash. Lilith sends her regards.
Elara/Samael smiled—a small, cruel smile, not one belonging to a child.
Elara/Samael: Send my regards. Tell them the dog remains wary and dangerous.
She raised her hand. Fireball exploded in the center of the three demons—a perfect sphere of black and gold flames. The explosion illuminated the entire forge, consuming chains, iron flesh, and masks in a violent flash.
The Kytons were thrown back, smoking bodies crashing against the walls, dwarven runes glowing in protest before fading away. Grom, hammer in hand, blinked in surprise.
Grom: By the gods… girl, that was…
Elara/Samael: That was just the beginning.
The middle Kyton rose first, hook raised, chain whipping in a deadly arc. Elara/Samael spun her body—Cloud of Daggers—several swirling daggers shot from her hands in perfect sequence, each striking the same spot on the demon's chest. The iron was sliced, the mask cut, the scream echoed like metal being tortured.
He falls to his knees, the chains crumbling into dust. The second Kyton tried to flank her from the shadows. Elara/Samael flicked her wrist – Flaming Hands – erupted in a precise cone, black and white flames licking the air. The demon was engulfed, incandescent chains writhing like snakes in agony before breaking apart.
The third advanced from behind, its hook aimed at the nape of her neck. Grom swung his hammer to intercept, but Elara/Samael was faster. – Arcane Shield – an invisible barrier appeared around her, violently reflecting the hook. The chain ricocheted, wrapping around the Kyton's own leg. He stumbled.
Elara/Samael: – Witch's Lightning! – A beam of dark blue energy ripped through the air and exploded inside the Kyton.
The chest swelled and imploded with a violent crack: ribs burst open, fried flesh split into burnt strips, organs vaporized into luminous goo. Incandescent chains broke and flew.
The eyes melted in their sockets, leaving smoldering holes. The body collapsed in seconds, becoming a crater of charred flesh, twisted metal, and icy mist reeking of ozone and sulfur. The ground cracked, the air became charged with deadly static.
Silence... Only the crackling of embers and Grom's heavy breathing.
Elara/Samael lowered her hands. The small body did not tremble. There was no blood in her nose, nor exhaustion in her eyes. Only cold calm, Samael's pride intact. Grom approached slowly, his hammer still smoking.
Grom: You… you are not an ordinary child.
Elara/Samael: I never was. I am so much more...
Samael looked at the destroyed door, at the night outside where Lilith's whisper had last echoed—now only silence, an emptiness that settled like dust after a battle.
Samael remained motionless for a long moment. The weight of what had just happened was not in the air, but within her.
Elara/Samael: She won't come back. Not tonight. Maybe never again.
Grom lowered the hammer, but didn't sheath it. His hands gripped the handle with unnecessary force, his knuckles white. He didn't sigh with relief; he simply took a step back, keeping the forge between him and the girl.
Grom: Then it's over.
His voice was rough, devoid of the camaraderie of before. Elara/Samael nodded, her fingers brushing against the pocket where the coins jingled. He felt his gaze—no longer the gaze of a mentor to an apprentice, but that of a survivor of a natural disaster.
Elara/Samael: She saw what I am capable of. She calculated the cost. Lilith does not waste her strength where she knows she will be destroyed.
She turned to him, her blue eyes filled with a seriousness unbecoming of a child. Grom didn't hold her gaze. He turned his face toward the smoking crater where the Kyton had dissolved, feeling a chill that the heat of the forge couldn't quell.
Elara/Samael: Tomorrow we'll forge something new, Grom. Something for what comes next.
Grom let out a dry, humorless laugh and took another step back toward the side exit.
Grom: If there is a "tomorrow," girl... or whatever you are. For today, the forge is closed.
He didn't wait for a reply. He stepped out into the dim light of the workshop, letting the silence fill the space between them. It wasn't the silence of peace, but of insurmountable distance.
Elara/Samael walked to the cot and lay down. The girl's body was exhausted, but Samael's mind was vivid, savoring the victory. He closed his eyes, allowing himself, for the first time in ages, to lower his guard. Hell had retreated. The silence of the forge was, finally, synonymous with peace...
Or so it seemed.
Grom hadn't actually left. He remained in the shadows, motionless as a gargoyle of soot. His eyes were fixed on the small figure on the cot. He saw the power it emanated—it was something ancient, dark, and terrible.
Grom: That's not a girl...—Grom's mind screamed, panic overcoming reason.—...It's a demon. If I don't end this now, no one will.
The blacksmith gripped the hammer handle. His knuckles cracked, but the sound was swallowed by the crackling of the embers. He held his breath.
One step... Heavy, but muffled by the sawdust on the floor.
Another step...
Samael breathed rhythmically on the cot, seemingly asleep. Grom towered over the girl, his gigantic shadow swallowing the faint light that remained. Cold sweat trickled down his brow. With a choked grunt, a mixture of terror and duty, he raised the warhammer above his head. The target was not a battle; it was the child's skull that housed a monster.
He brought the blow down. With all his might. To kill.
CLANG!!
The sound wasn't of metal crushing bone. It was the sharp, deafening sound of steel colliding with something immutable.
The hammer stopped abruptly inches from the child's face. Grom's eyes widened, his arms trembling with the effort of pushing the weapon down, but it didn't budge an inch.
Elara/Samael hadn't moved. She hadn't even opened her eyes at the moment of impact. She had only raised her left hand, palm open, stopping the massive head of the warhammer in mid-air as if it were made of feathers.
Then slowly, her eyelids opened. The human blue had completely vanished; now they were two pools of intense scarlet, gleaming in the dim light like live embers, staring at Grom without surprise, without anger... only with icy disappointment.
Samael: I thought you were smarter, Mr. Grom.
With her hand, she forces the hammer to the side, forcing Grom to look into her eyes. At that moment, the little girl was gone; it was only Samael. Her face began to melt, revealing parts of her true face.
Samael: I have no words to describe such audacity. — his tone mocking — You really thought you could hide from a being born in darkness... — His voice rose, clearly irritated — ...by hiding in darkness?
With a flick of her wrist, she propelled her hand. The impact sent Grom — and his hammer — flying across the workshop. He crashed against the anvil with a violent bang, falling to the ground, coughing and struggling to catch his breath.
Samael sat on the cot, the tranquility shattered, the aura around him tinged with red, darkening the atmosphere.
Samael: It seems I was wrong. Fear always makes you mortals... so predictable.
Grom coughed, spitting blood and soot onto the stone floor. His ribs protested with sharp pain, but terror numbed the worst of the impact.
He tried to crawl backward, his heels scraping the dirty floor, searching for anything—an iron bar, a pair of tongs—to defend himself. But the workshop seemed to have shrunk. The air was thin, heavy with the smell of ozone and sulfur.
Samael walked with deliberate slowness. There were no horns, no wings, no clinking of metal; only a cold, sharp presence. Those scarlet eyes did not blink; They burned in the twilight like two open wounds in the fabric of the world, pulsing with the raw power of the magic that coursed through their veins.
Grom: — Just kill me... — he choked, his voice faltering as his back hit the cold wall. — Finish what you started, monster.
Samael stopped. The girl's face, transfigured by the essence of a Kyton no longer bound by physical constraints, contorted into an expression of pure mockery. He let out a dry, cutting laugh, a sound that vibrated in the wooden beams of the forge like the crackle of static electricity.
Samael: — Kill you? — He leaned forward, the girl's pale skin beneath the scarlet glint of his gaze. — Why, Grom... I am a lord of pain, an architect of suffering. I am not an irrational animal that bites on instinct.
She reached out her small hand and gave two light, humiliating taps to the blacksmith's blood-stained face. The touch wasn't of warm flesh, but carried the electric tingle of contained magic.
Samael: — I won't kill you for a simple reason, something you mortals should learn before preaching morality: "Don't bite the hand that feeds you." You gave me bread, you gave me mead, and you gave me a roof over my head when emptiness surrounded me. I pay my debts, even those I didn't ask for.
She stood, her posture impeccable. Sparks of black and white energy danced between her small fingers, disappearing before touching the ground. She didn't need hammers or swords; she was the weapon itself.
Samael: — Besides, a master of magic needs skillful hands to shape the vessels of their power. You are a valuable resource, Grom. And I don't waste good tools just because they had a useless panic attack.
Samael walked to the center of the workshop. With a snap of his fingers, he expended some of his mystical reserve. The flames of the forge, which had been low, roared instantly, turning white and blue at his command.
Samael: "I don't need a sword, Grom. I have my magic. I am the unquenchable fire. But this body..." he looked at Elara's small, plump hands with disdain, "...this vessel is limited."
He revealed his disfigured face.
Samael: "You saw what happened, the result of using my magic for too long. It needs a catalyst so I don't burn it from the inside out every time I decide to reduce an army to ashes. And let's face it... I like this body too much to reduce it to ashes."
He approached the anvil, and the air around him began to distort, as if space were being bent.
Samael: — You will forge a bracelet. But not from ordinary iron. We will use steel tempered in the blood of those Kytons I just slain. You will hammer the runes that I will draw with my own power.
Grom swallowed hard, the heat of the forge now amplified by Samael's aura. He knew what a sorcerer was. He knew they didn't study magic; they were magic. And a 5th-level sorcerer was capable of incinerating an entire inn without even breaking a sweat.
Samael: — Why are you still standing there? — His tone was calm, but carried the authority of someone who could conjure a Cloud of Daggers into the dwarf's lungs with a thought. — Wipe the blood from your face and take the tweezers. You wanted to forge something new? Very well. Let's create an arcane focus that will make Lilith's eyes bleed with envy.
Grom, driven by a fear that went beyond death—a fear of being the next victim of a magical experiment—walked to the forge. He began to pull the bellows, but the rhythm was dictated by the scarlet gleam in Samael's eyes, which pulsed in sync with the flames.
Samael: — Every blow of your hammer must be precise, blacksmith. If you miss by a millimeter, the contained energy will explode, and not even Ratavabaros dust will remain to tell the tale. Understood?
Grom simply nodded, his hands finally ceasing to tremble from the pure instinct of professional survival.
Elara/Samael: — Excellent. Let's go.