Dead Rainbow

Malum Mazlovado

At midnight he stood to the side of the demon circle drawn on the floor of the secret teleportation level of the south tower. He pricked his arm, dripped blood into the circle, and called forth the demon once again. The black shadowy apparition appeared in the circle. 

"I am ready to take the steps to acquire all of your powers, demon." 

A dark red flash of light sparkled in the demon's eyes. Redwing dropped his robe and across his chest, the name of Mazlovado appeared in an ancient script. 

"You willingly bond your soul with mine?" asked the demon.

"I do."

"Then step into my circle and complete the ritual," said the phantom. 

Redwing stepped into the circle and raised his arms. The demon whirled around him in joyful ecstasy. 

"You will be my most powerful warlock!" hissed the demon. 

Redwing screamed out in pain as the demon entered his body. His eyes took on a red glow and he flexed his body as if his muscles were growing with power. He stepped out of the circle and laughed a maniacal laugh. The demon came to life again in its new body. 

"To see the world through mortal eyes again!" 

Looking through human eyes it saw something unexpected. 

A figure appeared in the corner of the room holding two white crossbows, took aim, and fired. Two arrows of light shot through his arms rendering them both useless. The figure revealed himself by pulling back a dark hood and the figure was also Redwing. The one possessed by the demon was a double, a copy. 

He dropped the crossbows and drew a curved dagger from his belt, lunged forward, and stabbed his clone in the stomach with a poisoned blade. The clone doubled over in agony. 

The real Redwing surrounded himself in dark red mist, cast the vampiric spell around his clone, and began the process of draining him of his powers. The clone and the demon shouted out in resistance.

"What is this trickery!" 

The double's skin rapidly turned a greenish color. Redwing threw a pot of blessed holy water across the demon's symbol nullifying its portal back to the realms of the underworld. 

"Nooooooo!" screamed the double. 

His face was contorted and stretched in the fashion of the demon's face. The double held its arms and hands in the curled twisted way of the demon. 

"There is no escape for you this time, Mazlovado. No Necromancer to protect you. No soul to escape with. You inhabit a soulless animated corpse; one that will soon die and with it you."

The weakened clone body collapsed and thrashed on the floor in a fit, tearing at its flesh, and vomiting blood. Redwing sucked the life and the energy from the demon. 

"I avenge your part in my mother's death!" 

Redwing held out the Talisman of Unrepented Evil. Its purple stone had been removed and in its place set a black diamond. 

"This will be your final resting place, demon, for I now own the soul of Mazlovado!"

The amulet took on a pulsating glow. The clone stopped moving and lay still upon the floor. Redwing radiated with power. He stood in the center of the room as large black wings grew out of his back spreading wide across the entire floor. 

The clone lifted its head off the ground as the demon recognized the boy from the cave all those years ago.

"You!?" was its last word. 

Lightning ripped the sky above the Stone Mountains. 

Redwing kicked the corpse of his double to the side of the room and addressed the demon now sealed inside the amulet. The once black diamond now looked like a clear crystal that contained a drifting dark shadow within. It spun in a whirlpool of continual swirling agitation. 

"When I called you last from that dead world, I was in the past. In my childish enthusiasm, I didn't understand that Melock had sent me back in time. The Necromancer was alive then and Mazlovado was his demon soul. When he gave me these wings he planted the seed of an idea for possessing you, myself, one day. I saw that I was destined to be the next Necromancer. Not just by my designs but as the unholy heir apparent of the Necromancer himself!" 

Redwing took the Talisman of Unrepented Evil turned soul phylactery and placed it around his neck. The spirit of the Necromancer was his. He pulled up his sleeve and there on his forearm was the return of the ancient script and the name he would one day take as his own; Malum Mazlovado.