Chapter Text
Ketheric stood before Myrkul, any residual warmth now gone from his body. All around was darkness and cold, but the Paladin still knew his god was there from Myrkul’s imposing presence. The chill of the Bone Lord’s domain seeped right to his marrow, as the chill of the Bone Lord’s voice sent ice into his mind. “Ketheric Thorm, you have proven yourself unworthy to be my Chosen.”
Ketheric said nothing, thought nothing, felt nothing. No matter what happened to his soul, one thing was for sure: He would never see his daughter again. So what point was there in defending his actions, or pleading for mercy? Not that Myrkul would ever show grace to anyone.
“In times past, I would have found use for you, somewhere,” continued Myrkul, “but recently, I have lacked the energy and time to put up with such failures. Or be reminded of them. Thus, I banish you. I commit you to Kelemvor’s judgment. Away from my domain, away from the last god who would ever have turned their gaze to your plights. You have become failure incarnate, and your bones will turn to ash before I ever allow them back into my presence!”
Wind whipped around Ketheric, and suddenly he was falling, tumbling, gaining speed until he slammed into tumultuous waves. Had he been in a mortal body and not simply a soul, the impact would have obliterated him. Instead, he desperately attempted to right himself and tread water, old reflexes taking over. Looking around, all he could see was a dark, cloudy sky above, and frothing, angry waves surrounding him.
Without warning, an eddy swirled around him and sucked him down, pulling him beneath the surface. Again reacting out of mortal panic, Ketheric held his breath as long as he could, but when he finally let it out, he found that he inhaled neither water nor air. It was like an emptiness entered his lungs and then exited, like even his breathing was ghostly.
Eerie blue-green light illuminated the depths below him, and soon he saw what looked to be a seabed rise up to meet him. The eddie deposited him on the sand, much more gently than Myrkul had tossed him into the waves, and as Ketheric took in his surroundings, he saw that he stood in a field of swaying seaweed. The pressure of the water was near overwhelming, but the initial panic of drowning had worn off, replaced by that familiar heaviness in his chest.
“Ketheric Thorm,” came a deep, even voice from all around him. He turned, and saw three figures side by side, all dressed in dark gray, hooded robes, standing a few paces away. “You have come to be judged.”
There was but one voice, and yet it seemed to emanate from all three of the figures, as though they were each one part of something bigger. “I presume you are Kelemvor?” Ketheric said, straightening his spine. He had made peace with his damnation long ago, and while the fear of the unknown lingered in the back of his mind, the Judge of the Dead was just another god. What did gods know of his suffering? His wife was gone, and he would never see Isobel again. No matter where he was sent, Ketheric knew: he was already in his own hell.
“Correct,” said the voice. “We shall now judge your deeds: good, evil, and neither. Should your scales tip towards good, you shall be ascended. Should your scales tip towards evil, you shall be damned to the hells.”
“And should my scales balance evenly?” Ketheric asked, folding his arms.
The hooded figure in the middle tilted its head, as though amused. “No scales can be truly balanced.”
“Unless they are yours, yes?” Ketheric sighed, then continued, “Very well, begin the trial.”
For what seemed like hours, Kelemvor recited Ketheric’s life choices, from the moment he gained conscious thought, to the moment of his death. And at the end, when he was asked if he had any last words to share, Ketheric simply stated, “Any regrets I may have are punishments of my own making. I will not beg for mercy nor will I ask for forgiveness. My time of petitioning gods is as dead as I am.”
“Very well,” said Kelemvor. “Ketheric Thorm, you are sentenced to Phlegethos, the fourth layer of the Nine Hells, to be forever punished while never fully achieving purification. Your warmongering is fit to be of the divine realm of Inanna. Your need to rise in ranks shall be thwarted, as all around you, devils will be your constant overlords. Your broken pledges to gods shall result in being turned over to devils.”
There appeared on either side of Ketheric two winged devils, dressed in red leather, cackling to themselves as they took hold of his arms. Their touch felt cold as ice, at first, and then heated to a burn. Ketheric grunted in pain, but did not pull away. If this was to be his fate, so be it.
“You will be stripped of rank,” continued the Judge, and the armor that Ketheric had died in vanished from his form. “You will be stripped of magic.” He felt the inherent connection to the Weave drain from his limbs, leaving him feeling exhausted and weak. “You will be stripped of dignity.” The devils at his sides tore his clothes, leaving nothing but scraps of fabric hanging from him. “I sentence you,” finished Kelemvor. “Let it be so.”
With a unified shriek, the devils conjured a portal directly beneath them, and dragged Ketheric down, down, through putrid air and suffocating smoke, to Avernus, the first layer of the Hells. There, Ketheric was shoved into a line of other damned souls, processed by name, sins, and layer, and then branded with the information, the death sentence magically burned into his arm.
The whole thing was very methodical, almost bureaucratic, and Ketheric recalled how Asmodeus had banned direct portal travel from the mortal planes to any of the layers below Avernus. Never one to step blindly through a situation, he noted the harried attitudes of the devil guards, the discontented grumbles, the quartermaster’s call of “Step quickly now, as lively as you can! Seems there’s more souls being damned every day.”
Upon reaching the end of the line, he saw eight different archways, each with a swirling black void obscuring whatever lay beyond them. A devil read his arm, and then directed him towards one of the archways, and as Ketheric approached, he could have sworn he heard screams coming from the other side.
Squaring his shoulders, he stepped through, and found himself in a massive room made of obsidian walls and ceiling. Candelabras lined the walls, their flames casting an unnatural red glow, and at one end of the room sat two spiked thrones upon a black dais. Upon one throne sat an older, bearded man wearing blood-red robes, and on the other sat a young, raven-haired woman in a long black dress.
“Oh my my, we got Ketheric!” Said the woman, her voice smooth and airy. “How exciting, I was so sure Zariel would get him.”
“I’m honestly surprised Myrkul didn’t obliterate him on the spot,” replied the man, his voice hoarse and high. “To have your Chosen fail you so publicly? Sad.”
“And to whom do I have the pleasure of addressing?” Asked Ketheric, no small amount of sarcasm in his voice.
“Pleasure?” Repeated the woman. “Oh no no, pleasure is reserved for us devils. You have the pain- the honor, the horror- of addressing Lord Belial and Lady Fierna, rulers of Phlegethos.” Then she leaned forward on her throne, fixing Ketheric with a stare that was as hot and as wild as a forest fire. “And you will show proper respect for my father and I, lest I dismember your soulform and hang your parts as a chandelier.”
Ketheric held her stare for as long as he could, until he felt his mind start to dissipate into sulfurous vapor, and forced himself to look away. “Ooh, this one promises to be fun,” Fierna said, a giggle in her voice.
“Should we give him to Vas?” Belial asked, his bored tone contrasting his daughter’s excited one.
“Yes, let’s!” Fierna exclaimed, clapping her hands. “Poor Vas hasn’t had a good one in ages.”
“Very well.” Belial waved his hand lazily, and Ketheric watched as his surroundings melted away, replaced by a much smaller room made of gray stone.
The room held nothing but a cot, a bucket, and a dull metal table with straps at both ends. On one wall was a glass window, gothic style, that looked out over a black-and-orange landscape. In the distance rose pointed mountains, and above everything was an angry, red sky. There was no sun.
There came a knock at the door, but Ketheric did not turn around as he heard someone enter. He continued staring out the window, hands clasped behind his back.
“Well hello there,” came a brash, slightly nasally voice. “Oh dear me, did they not give you proper vestments upon your arrival? For shame, I’ll need to see to that.”
Ketheric took a deep breath and turned to look his visitor in the face. He was short, his shaggy hair and scruffy beard beginning to gray, his torso wiry and his legs thick. He wore black leather pants and a loose, open vest of a matching color. This vest revealed much of his skin, and Ketheric noted that he bore many burns and scars, two of which were clearly surgical; these were clean, precise, and each lined the underside of his pectorals.
“Welcome to my tower,” the man said, grinning and offering a mock bow. “My name is Vaseid, but you can call me Vas when you’re screaming and begging me to stop. And you-” he swept closer and yanked Ketheric’s branded arm into his sight with surprising strength. “-are Ketheric Thorm. Ah yes, the once-failed Cleric, twice-failed Paladin. Sorry, you murdered for bad gods. If you had murdered for good gods, you wouldn’t be here. Alas, ‘tis the life- and death- we lead.”
He released Ketheric’s arm and spun to pace around the small room, as though he had too much energy and no idea how to release it. Something tugged at the back of Ketheric’s mind- a memory, vague and fleeting. Where had he heard the name Vaseid before? Specifically in reference to Paladins…
“Your little torture table does nothing to scare me,” he said to the strange man.
Vas looked at the table with the straps, then back to his prisoner, eyebrows raised. “Well that’s good, because honestly, I hardly use that thing anyways. It’s more for the decor; you know, hellish vibes and all that.”
“I suppose you usually talk your inmates into insanity?” Ketheric said drolly, crossing his arms.
Vas threw his head back and released a sound similar to a hyena’s cackle. “Oh I love it when they act apathetic! Makes it more fun when I inevitably break you.” He stepped forward and grabbed Ketheric’s beard, yanking him closer.
Ketheric’s reflexes took over and he immediately reached up to grab hold of Vas’ neck. The man released his beard, twisting out of the way, but not fast enough to escape Ketheric’s grip on his wrist.
“You will find that I am not like any other prisoner you’ve had before,” Ketheric growled, his voice steady.
Vas smiled sweetly at him, and opened his mouth to retort. The voice that came out was not his, but was a voice that Ketheric hadn’t heard in centuries: his mother’s. “Ketheric dear, why are you doing that? Stop it at once.”
Shocked, he loosened his grip on Vas, and the man snatched his wrist free. “How- what- what was that?”
Vas’ smile changed into a wicked grin. “That, my dear, was the gift I was given for being a particularly wonderful prisoner. I was just like you, after all. And who knows, maybe if your behavior is good enough too, I might even get you off easy. I mean let you off easy.” He giggled, making his eyebrows jump in a mockingly suggestive manner.
Ketheric suppressed a sigh, struggling to maintain composure. “So that’s what you’ll do, speak with the voices from my past?”
Vas shrugged. “And other stuff. Psychological torture is my specialty, but I never pass up a chance for some good old fashioned slicework.”
Cocking his head, Ketheric said, “And was that who you were? In the mortal realm? Someone who delighted in submitting to a devil’s banal command?”
Vas held his gaze as he replied, “You’re one to talk. Whoring yourself out to three gods during your time up top? Truly impressive.” Then he again spoke in Ketheric’s mother’s voice. “Selune’s blessing guided you at first, didn’t it? Oh but, my boy, you gave her up. Abandoned her. Abandoned all we taught you.”
“That’s right,” Ketheric sneered, a crack snaking its way across his calm facade. “I turned my back on Selune, but only after she turned her back on me. Not even her daughter could save Isobel, so why would I follow-” He cut himself off abruptly, still fuming, but forcing himself not to reveal anything more to his torturer.
Vas smiled, scrunching his nose, and said in his normal voice, “Good boy. Now, I have other prisoners to take care of. Do make yourself at home.” And then he sauntered out of the room, slamming the door behind him, leaving Ketheric to his thoughts.