Tales From Sios: The Wishing Well Arc

Chapter 9: T'spenhe The Anamoly

Novi 21, 4980vaxm
Near the border to Indomabilis on the Côte Bizarre in the Almecca Kingdom. Late Autumn

T'spehne sat aloft with legs crossed, hands resting clasped in its lap as it levitated at the tip of a grand fir tree, staring down at the bloodied field where a spire encased in silver and gold etchings now stood from the center of the clearing.
'Give them an inch, and they try to ascend godhood.' the anomaly reflected in thought, unflinching in its high vantage point while watching the demon below when a crisp fall wind began to blow from the direction of the great red sun, drawing the anomaly's attention to that purple display in the morning air as the sun rose and continued its ascent. T'spehne raised a hand to adjust the goggles on his cephalopodic head, the burning glare of the sun quickly becoming unbearable despite the protection, prompting the anomaly to begin its descent as it kept its thin teal boney hand up to shield itself from the radiance of the siosen dawning.
When T'spenhe reached the forest floor--his eyes still tracking the succubus across the clearing between the view offered through the tree line he stood behind--he felt a thought intrude.
'Ooh, merde! What is that aroma?' The thought was a blend of the elven and common tongue, forcing the anomaly to suddenly whip its head behind it to scan the area for the expected elf.
'An elf? Perhaps a lone ranger deep in this forest, too far from any civilized outpost.' T'spenhe mentally reasoned when a new thought interrupted, 'Smells of death...heavy, heavy, decay...'
This thought differed from the first in volume and language suggesting a second person, '...not alone, but traveling with a human..'
'What in the name of Gadrok is this?' This question, coming from a third mind, made the anomaly quickly pull up its hood while it pictured the human disguise it frequently used, and as T'spenhe felt the magical essence wash over him he knew the change had already occurred to his usually abnormal appearance. The anomaly slipped between trees, making sure to avoid the grove and risk the demon feeling his mental presence while maintaining a path to lead him further from this side of the grove, thinking all the while, 'Gadrok...hmm...Gadrok the miner I believe. A dwarven god? A dwarf, a human, and an elf. Let us see what the demon does with this...'
T'spenhe rounded a massive tree trunk after deftly navigating the underbrush of the thick forest floor, at top speed, before abruptly coming to a stop. Huddled close to the great pine, where his new visage showed zero sign of the effort it just made, he looked back from the cover of the tree. Waiting and watching, the anomaly's now fully fleshy pale fingers grasped at the tree bark before suddenly releasing, and with a moderate amount of mental effort, it summoned its natural ability to levitate. With modest concentration, T'spenhe began to rise and his body slowly and steadily ascended. It was a few seconds before he was at an ideal position amongst the piney branches, still in the cover of the forest canopy, when a small party of three appeared within the trees--oblivious to the anomaly--and cautiously approached the edge of the tree line. Their thoughts swam in murky confused horror as they looked on at the scene, but T'spenhe felt a flutter, not much unlike arousal, for the thoughts of the elf that began streaming with magnificent logical flow.
'So vile...wait. Merde, this is the work of a' the elf transitioned from thought to a vocalized warning in a forceful whisper that the anomaly could barely discern, "Cease, a demon is near. We should turn back now!"
The male dwarf was quick to scoff before chastising the female elf aloud, "Ain't no demon that scares Relvuhl the Lucky!"
The other man, the human, added quickly with an arrogant and mocking tone, "Well Relvuhl, go test your luck..."
This made the elf speak up after she ducked behind a trunk from the two potentially drawing attention with their reckless volume, "Demons care not for your luck Dwarf. I'm serious we-"
"We know you're serious Alowyn." The human offered back trying to stop the confrontation from building, but the dwarf was already offended.
"This one will care about mine!" Relvuhl exclaimed as he rushed out into the bloody clearing, ripping an axe from each side of his waist in stride.
T'spenhe's eyes darted from the group to follow the dwarf in his foolish attempt at a surprise attack. He saw the dwarf clear about 20 paces before a carcass caught his boot and sent him head over heels with a loud crash as his heavy steel armor rang across the ground.
Suddenly a slurping-pop resonated out and Dante was squatting over the foolish dwarf, hands casually on his knees as he looked down on the bearded buffoon, head tilting his amusement.
"Followers already? Splendid!" The dwarf went to push himself up after the demon addressed him casually with feigned reasoning, but the succubus hopped its stance onto the prone dwarf's back and continued his speech while he forced the dwarf onto his face, perching like a brilliantly sculpted gargoyle, "You are a short man but all who look to me for salvation I shall let sip from my bosom and find nourishment from my splendor!"
While Dante spoke the dwarf struggled and finally got enough space from his thrashing to offer the minimum room to tuck his arm under and roll, but Dante let his wings unfurl and held his balance, while gently letting his legs extend down to the ground before landing on his bare taloned feet. His face turned into a sour scowl as he stated rather unimpressed, "You are an ungrateful little man. I wonder if your friends are more appreciative of their new patron."
T'spenhe looked from them out in the clearing to check on the elf and human he knew was still hiding in the tree line, althewhile, the human thoughts were an unending rabble of concern that the anomaly suspected drew Dante's focus as his voice cut the air confirming his hypothesis, "Fear not mortal! Come prostrate yourself before me and know my mercy."
T'spenhe heard Alowyn whisper meekly to her remaining companion, "Don't Richard-", but the man stepped forward and brandished his longsword and pretended not to notice the pleas of the elf.
"You dare draw your steal on me human!" With that Dante unsheathed his scimitars and pointed them out to the side and front with a quick flourish.
Suddenly the dwarf came to his feet, holding one of his axes he managed to collect when he rolled away earlier, as he cried out, "For Gadrok!"
Dante was quick as he lunged at the now standing Relvuhl offering only a lazily swung slash, with his scimitar in an over-extended slash, letting the dwarf catch the blade with the hook of his axe in an expected parry while the off-hand scimitar flashed in with blinding speed and found its mark through the dwarf's neck. Dante spun his whole body ripping free the pierced scimitar in throat, spraying a crimson mist to speckle the ground anew around the still mortified, yet certainly dead dwarf.
Richard hollered out the dwarf's name as he charged the demon, stampeding over the deer bodies in his path, with vengeful tears streaking down his cheeks.
Dante curled his lip in disgust at the man's courage while he relaxed his stance and stood without bracing for the assault, letting his shoulders ease before the man reached him. At the last second Dante flashed a smile before vanishing with a popping-slurp, allowing Richard's sword stroke to catch the ground and rattle his sword while it jarred his arms.
Once he recovered the human reeled about scanning for the demon, with wide eyes that held an ever-growing hatred mixed with the creeping's of fear, when the elf screamed out from behind him, yelling, "Run, Richard!"
This spun Richard on his heels where he looked upon his elven companion who was now held in the demon's embrace; her arms flailing helplessly as Dante forced her to her knees by the shoulders--with his scimitars already sheathed once more on his hips.
"Don't you dare!" Richard roared as he moved to rush them, sword raised high.
Dante spoke up, halting Richard in his tracks when his raised voice offered some clarity, "I do dare. Do you? Perhaps you should be the one who stops daring, or your pretty little weird-eared child will surely find out who shan't have dared!"
"Richard just-" Alowyn's voice was abruptly cut short as Dante clasped his human-like hand over her mouth.
("Be seen not heard.") Dante's words held a sultry allure as he suggested to the elf whose visage instantly released all tension.
"What have you done? Don't hurt her!" Richard's question held wholly to fear before his pride found root and his tone resonated with threatening devotion when he shouted out the last.
T'spenhe suddenly launched from his vantage point, soaring before landing out in the clearing, and drawing the attention of both sides and ending the exchange, if only momentarily. 
"A fourth member...and this with wards?" Dante cocked his head under the weight of the discovery as his mental probe broke against the anomalies thought barrier--granted through his magical amulet that was hidden along with his terrifying visage. He was under the guise of a human with a barreled chest and gawky limbs wearing the drab garb, T'spenhe had murdered the previous owner long, long, ago, of whispering muted greens and sharp embroidered aqua accents.
The kneeling elf snapped back to her senses, while the demon seemed distracted, and dove from the succubus, but Dante--with dry enthusiasm--sent his leathery purple wing over his shoulder at her knocking her prone before she ever made it fully upright.
T'spenhe stood to the human's capable height before he addressed the demon, matter-of-factly, with a graveled tone of the human he was portraying, "Your wrong demon. I keep not the company of these children of Sios."
Dante's eyes narrowed at the disguised anomaly with cold calculating intent before he took a sudden step forward, pinning the elf who was tempted to rise with his taloned foot while blurting out, "What are you?"
"Another demon!" The human called Richard cried out, despite not being the intended recipient of the question, as he shifted his sword point from Dante to Tspenhe and back again.
T'spenhe cocked his human features towards Richard as he began to slowly advance, one careful footstep after the other without hesitating, as he corrected the trembling man, "I am no demon." With slow gestures; the anomalies' hands coming up after his words left him showing empty callused, albeit normal, human paws while he maintained his course, picking his footfalls around the rotting deer that spotted the field without ever breaking eye contact.
"That is far enough!" Richard barked as the other man's calm advance brought a bubbling of paranoia to burst forth as his blade stayed ready now only pointing at the disguised T'spenhe.
T'spenhe heeded the man and halted, before reasoning, "Your instinct is well placed human, it is wise to fear me, but I am not the one who killed your ally or beat your lover..."
Suddenly the man turned his head back to Dante, the blade still fixed on the anomaly with mind refreshed of his ally's peril when he shouted, "Release her!"
The demon broke into a fit of laughter at this, clutching his sides as his body hunched over bearing more weight on the female beneath his foot who groaned as he pressed her into the bloodied ground.
Between breaths and guffawing Dante mocked, with exact vocals twisted into dramatic anguish, before falling back into ruckus hilarity, "Release her!"
This made Richard growl before turning his attention fully onto Dante, bringing his blade from the would-be gawky human, but once the weapon found its new target T'spenhe quickly moved his hands up to his temples and tapped only his index and middle fingers, sending a blast of brain-waves to ripple through the air and wash over the distracted human whose eyes clouded as body lulled forcing the sword to slip out of the now vegetative grasp and fall to the ground with a dull clank.
Dante's hilarity found its end as his head snapped over to the human imposter and his eyes narrowed once again.
T'spenhe, wasting no time and paying little attention to the demon behind him with the elf, rushed over to the brain-dead man. The anomaly, b-lining behind him, grabbed Richard by the shoulders before he kicked the back of the zombified man's legs bringing him down to his knees and holding him aloft by his leather jerkin by the scruff.
"This is what I am." The anomaly held onto the man with one hand and brought the other up to the hood of his aqua-rimmed cloak, pulling it back and revealing the horrific truth of his splendor as the magical illusion dissolved and his visage was free to behold to all there.
His tentacles appear and are already attached to the kneeling man before him. Each of the four bluish-green elongated organs was coiled about the man's head and neck simultaneously, blocking his face from view, but the man remained stunned.
"And what is that?" Dante puzzled back while looking on with handsome bewilderment.
"I am an aberration, one dreamt of by mortal horrors, one of the anomaly species, Ģůīæžçŋĵĵï· in my native tongue, but your kind refers to my kind as the Cerebri Messorem. Or in the trade tongue-" T'spenhe responded flatly, telepathically to Dante, but was cut short by the demon's blurting out in a sultry yet incredulous tone, "You're a Brain Reaper? Bloody Hell! Wait, are you... You're challenging me for these potential worshipers." Dante concluded poorly as his eyes narrowed once more.
"Hardly. I am here to guide you." T'spenhe responded, flat and devoid of any emotion, using his mind; having already tapped the frequency of Dante's brainwaves yet the mind of Dante remained hallow as the demon spoke once more, though this time in the Tanari tongue, "Non sum sultas. Consilium tuum non utile fuit. Esto licet horrificam tuam invenio ac-spireantum."
As Dante spoke the man held by the anomaly's tentacles suddenly roused, but the arousal was muted and quickly turned to stifled panic as arms reached to claw the slick teal grasping organ to no avail. However, Richard's mind towered with rage relentlessly in an echoing tantrum cadence. T'spenhe could see it, though with the goggles it was obscure, yet still legible. The rantings were a vibrant scarlet that glowed and blacked simultaneously in small bursts all about its usually invisible field, a humming pitch of startled fury, "I am Richard Fjoirn, son to the moon's whisper, holder of the blood of the first marches, gods be damned I will have vengeance!"
T'spenhe regarding the mental anguish watched as he sent his frequency of mind to ripple and blast forth in shades of brilliant green that shone like explosive wonder, but only to those with eyes tuned to such wonder, sinking into the sprawling chambers of the human's brain and calling forth with all sinister ambition, "Hmmm, you think these thoughts before it ends? Your pride is hefty, but your intelligence is adequate, albeit you are a mere snack, with memories and ideas barely worth exploring, but we shall anyways."
As T'spenhe spoke in the human mind he used his tentacles to retract a tiny claw from each tip and in unison the limb-like organs began burrowing into Richard's skull forcing his hips to gyrate as legs feebly attempted to find footing only to fumble about slapping and sliding across the dark blood covered grass. Within seconds the anomaly had the skull cap removed with a sickening suctioned cusp of a 'pop' that sounded like scthurhlhlPfppfpff. The man's limbs continued to lash out fighting the inevitable with stiffened protests undiscernible from rage or pain drowning the silence as T'spenhe watched with what appeared to be slight amusement, while the elf pinned by the demon's stance starred on with eyes holding pandemonium and mouth straining for air but no sound escaped.
Meanwhile, Richard's mind raged like a storm spinning and wheeling for circumstance and proof that his fate was somehow not to die here when T'spenhe reasoned with the clairvoyance, "You are dying here Richard," the name ringing throughout the chambers of the mind as the anomaly elaborated, "These are the final moments for your clarity, child of sios, son of the moon's whisper. I am going on an adventure and your brain will become my catalyst of experience, after I properly prepare it, of course."
Richard's mind flashed a puzzled and brilliant shade of purple soft like lavender but somehow serious in tone, "No please gods don't let him! DON'T LET HIM, I beg of thee!"
This made T'spenhe hunch over with what could only be described as a laugh composed of a horrid chittering, like seashells angrily clicking one another by the score before he telepathically interrupted, "No not even gods would dare intervene. You put much too much gravity in their devotion to you. There are far more powerful and ancient beings who rule the essence you are made of. As the man harvests the field for grain to turn to sustenance, I too harvest and my gains are your species' experiences, while my spoils are the chemicals your brain excretes in heavy doses when you are born and when you die, but mainly when you sleep. For in truth all mortals are just a dream and yours happens to end horrifically, but know that I honor my kill, as the hunter does his doe and in eating you pieces of your essence will live on in me; to experience the cosmos and then the planes of existence their abound. Be happy your fate was not that like your elf companion, for her screams will echo long after your heart stops beating. Doubt it not."
With that T'spenhe ripped free the brain of Richard, holding it up with all four limbs as the body fell forward. The anomaly, with head tilted back, goggle-eyed to the now bright blue sky, before bringing the human organ to near float within the writhing tentacled embrace when he gracefully dissected the mind splitting it precisely into each perfectly maintained lobe and with eerie malevolence, the anomaly moved the pieces inward to were the elongated teal organs meet into a toothless orifice. Dante broke the air as the anomaly swallowed the sections whole one by one, "Why are your wards up if you intend to guide me?"
T'spenhe swallowed the last section loudly before curving his spin and bending back the opposite way as he purred his satisfaction from the ecstasy that rolled over him, all while holding a bony dark blue leathery hand up; with thin short pointed black nails that aimed upward as the stretched out palm faced the demon, affirming solemn concession for the succubus' patience.
Immediately Dante bristled, but he held his tongue and didn't show the slight, as abruptly. Instead, he bent down to the elf and grabbed her by the cheeks with one hand from above, wrestling her frantic head swivels like one might a swamp predator, to do so.
"(Be a good girl.)" The whispered words were like satin forcing the elf's large almond eyes to glaze over to a murky acceptance as her struggling ceased.
"That's better, now get up," Dante assured coolly before ordering her, as he removed his foot from her back and allowed her to stand, still grasping her firmly by the cheeks when she did so.
T'spenhe, now strolling over to the demon while straightening his magical cloak with tentacles as his hands remained clasped before him before he began speaking mentally, but was cut short, "My wards are to protect-"
This time Dante held his hand out with retaliatory appeal, only his gesture differed from the anomalies, with palm facing inward and only a single, defiant, finger was left raised to pretest the interruption.
"What is your name creature?" Dante questioned the enchanted mortal, but T'spenhe cut him off with the thought, "The creature is one of the elven species. A female."
Dante turned his head to the anomaly who stopped short of them before declaring with a sneer, "I knew that!"
The anomaly rolled his shoulders as if to slip the half-lie before he managed telepathically, letting his curiosity get the better of him, "What will you do with her?"
Dante turned back to the elf and beamed jubilantly before he said through gritted teeth, without looking away from her, "I will show you what horror you inspire within me, Reaper." As he spoke his wings began to shrivel into his spine as the ability wreathed him in illusion with his innate demonic arcana and his form settled into that of Richard, the smirk now playing on the human lips with striking green eyes and moderately handsome features hidden by auburn locks.