Chapter 3 Part 4

Bodies littered the ground like leaves beneath a tree on the first day of winter. Sticky blood clung dryly to the waving sawgrass. It was a battlefield. Two rival clans of southlanders had met on the field to settle their grievances. The hot blooded fury and battle lust had drawn an unseen spectator to the fray. Ragnera strolled amidst the testimony of carnage.

His minions were arranging for tensions between the city states of Asille. Already the political strife was building to a point where the king of the mortals was expending vast quantities of effort and funding to maintain the peace. That could not last much longer. It was just a matter of weeks before some event snapped the king's control over the cities.

Ragnera had taken some measures to see to it that Aspberg and House Blackheart was in a good position to reap a cream from the crop, but the other cities would suffer a great deal. In the spectral form that the god of war occupied, he was not visible to the two ragged men who were picking over the bodies. They were removing anything of value and burning the remains. Even carrion feeders had a purpose.

In spirit form, the god drifted up from the field. Spreading his presence wide, he coalesced upon another battlefield on the far side of the world. There too a fight had occurred. He had not missed it. He had been there during the battle, but had departed when the marauding had decreased. The reason for his return was simply a matter of curiosity. The god wanted to know how many souls he had reaped.

It was not a generally known province of the god of war--the former god of war made no use of it--but one of his rights as the god of war was that all those slain in combat were considered his minions. Ragnera could bring a considerable force of warriors to bear if necessary. And what pleased him most was that it would be an army of the fearless dead.

Ragnera moved on. His next stop was at a shrine where a worshiper was asking his blessing in a battle yet to come. Ragnera was not partial to granting favor to combatants, but this case was different. The half ogre gladiator was preparing to enter the arena in the Freon Circus. Ragnera did not think much of the mortal's intellect in fighting ten men, but the gladiator had slain over three hundred opponents in the last year. He was good for business.

Ragnera descended into the shrine as a black cloud of vapor. The gladiator was kneeling before a statue of Serpent Blackheart, the last known form of the new god of war. Ragnera ignored the mistake. Settling a whisp of darkness upon the shoulder of the gladiator, Ragnera spoke.

"I have come at thy request," he said. "Thy want is known to me. Rest assured that thou will do well." He left it at that as he vacated the shrine. Ragnera had not promised victory nor survival. Should the gladiator win, it would be attributed to the god's blessing. Should he die, Ragnera would gain a new soldier.

The god moved again. This time he settled over the altar of a sacrificial temple in his name. A priest was offering a sacrifice to him. The sacrifice was a human girl child of no more than six years of age. Ragnera was pleased. The victim was terrified to a state of shock. Nearby an acolyte carried forth a sacrificial dagger.

The priest, a middle aged man repeated the invoking prayer that summoned Ragnera in the first place. As he spoke, he lay the girl, bound, on the altar. When the invocation was completed, the priest addressed the reason of the sacrifice. He begged blessing on a finely crafted weapon which was the heirloom of a minor noble of Freon.

House Cadaver, the ruling house of the northern city, always rewarded the loyalty of its lesser nobles by commissioning elegant weaponry for the family in question. In this case, a knight of the city had managed to put together enough funds to have the blade enchanted. Now they were asking of Ragnera a blessing to make the weapon powerful.

Ragnera noted the blade's owner, a tall and youthful man with a terrible scar across his left cheek, stood nearby. Ragnera experienced a jolt of satisfaction as he recognized the family resemblance between the man and the girl on the altar. The sacrifice was obviously the daughter of the favor seeker. Ragnera admired the man's resolve. This was an excellent sacrifice.

As the priest concluded his plea, the knife fell and neatly parted the immature, soft chest. As efficiently as a butcher, the priest sliced the body in half lengthwise. He then parted the two sections and placed the sword between them. "Please, Oh Ragnera, your servants beg your blessing and give tithe with blood of our own flesh."

The god was flattered, if that was possible, and responded by blowing out the torches and candles. In the darkness, he touched the blade of the virgin metal. "I name thee Blight, the decayer," Ragnera spoke aloud. "May the wounds of thy infliction not heal."

He withdrew again after changing the sword's enchantment to insure that only magic could close its wound and that each wound would be infected with a gangrenous decease. "Go my children," he added as he snatched up the blood and gore that was a delicacy he found to be very sweet. As the priest rekindled a torch, Ragnera departed.
A touching ceremony, he reflected. With a gesture, he reformed the body back into a whole child. Then he breathed the animated breath of an undead into her lungs. The dead eyes opened and blinked.

The girl spoke with a voice devoid of life. "How may I serve thee master?"

Ragnera gestured and banished the zombie to the lower planes of Hell. There the girl's body would spend eternity as maid servant to the grand daughter he had taken from the altar under Miguel's knife. He had gifted the lass to one of the Dukes of Hell as a concubine. It had made a very strong knot in the alliance he had built in his former existence.

Ragnera drifted high through the sky. Perhaps a visit to his son was in order.