The Astounding Adventures of Ebyndark Nightblade
                             Vol. 1
 
     The storyteller cleared his throat, and the children gathered
around him leaned forward in anticipation.  Hiras was the best
storyteller this side of the Akalar mountains, and he had just
returned from a long caravan journey in the East, so he was bound
to have some good stories to tell.
     "Tell us another one!" One of the children, Holt, demanded. 
     The boy's shouts were echoed by all that were present. "Tell
us a Good one!" 
     "Oh, so its a Good one you be wanting, lad?  Well I have a
good one from the East, one that is worth two talons, it is so
good..."  He let the sentence hang their in mid-air.  Then gestured
to the small box in front of him.
     The children rifled through their clothing, producing out
small round coins, and slowly counting up 50 of them.  Then Holt
took them and dumped them unceremoniously into the box.  
     Hiras shut the lid of the box with a finality that sent
shivers down the boys spines. "Thank you."
     "It all began in the fabled palaces of the East..." He began.
 
               *    *    *    *    *    *    *
 
     Ebyndark Nightblade looked up from the Jewel, it was easily
the size of his right hand alone.  Ebyn was worried.  He had broken
into the wizard's house because he thought that it would be
intensely profitable, but the funny thing about profits was, you
had to be alive to spend them.  Wizards were not wise to fool with,
his master had said, not wise at all.  Most who tried wound up dead
on the bottom of a lake somewhere.  
     Ebyn looked back at the jewel.  It was resting on a red velvet
pillow, with embroidered designs of elephants on it, one at each
corner.  With a quick grab he snatched the jewel from it's resting
place, and shoved it carefully into the black silk pouch at his
waist.  All was quiet, but Ebyn knew that hundreds of alarms must
be going off somewhere.
     He quickly made his way back to the window, and tied a silken
cord around a nearby pillar.  wrapping the cord several times
around his arm he slowly let himself out the window and into the
cool night air.  
     Lowering himself slowly but surely down the tower's wall, he
found himself relieved he was out of the wizard's house.  Thinking
of his nice warm loft where, if all went well, he would soon be.  
     Screeching broke the clean silence of the night, and Ebyn
looked up to see three flying forms diving down on him.   They
looked like little winged demons.  
     Dimps, he thought, damn!  Too small for demons, yet too big
for imps.  He reached into his tight-fitting tunic, and withdrew
half a dozen small shurikens, throwing them into the midst of the
diving forms.  Four found their mark, but the creatures kept on
coming.
     Ebyn withdrew his long katana, and slashing wildly into the
nearest imp, sending it plummeting headless to the awaiting ground. 
Another of the creatures followed, but not before scoring his cheek
with a talon.  The last creature wove and dodged Ebyn's wild jabs
and swings.  Ebyn then brought his sword around in a sweeping
fashion, pinning the thing against the wall, and ending its life.
     Ebyn, hurrying now, continued down the wall like a spider,
pausing only briefly to listen intently for any signs of pursuit. 
Getting to the bottom of the wall, Ebyn ran to the twenty-foot high
wall that surrounded the wizard's estate.  He stopped, walked back
until he was about fifteen feet from the wall, then ran and did a
double-handspring over it.  Landing a few yards from it on the
other side, he got up and ran for his loft.
 
          *    **   *    **   *    *    *    *    *
 
     Volrech's body was perched atop a large black silk pillow
cross-legged.  He had long black hair tied back into a ponytail. 
He must have been at least two hundred years old, but he didn't
look a day past thirty.  
     His eyes suddenly flared open, and breath hissed from his
mouth like a cobra ready to strike.  Sensing an emptiness in the
fields surrounding his house.
     "The Jewel!", Volrech hissed, "It has been taken!"
     Volrech rose from the pillow, his scarlet robes falling into
place about him, and entered a glowing portal on the right of the
room.
     Emerging from a similar portal in a rough-hewn underground
cave that was his Imaging chamber, Volrech climbed the few steps up
to the pool.  The pool was his scrying device, and he would use it
now to track down the thief who stole his precious jewel.  
     "Toluri manchatka kurai!" Volrech shouted, and the pool sprang
to life, lightning crackled over its surface.  Images began to
form, showing Ebyn's taking of the jewel, and fighting the Dimps. 
Volrech realized it had simply been a matter of walking in and
taking it, because he was so entrenched in his meditations, he had
not reset the defenses when he left his material body.
     "Well, what was taken must be regained," he hissed, "Soloth,
attend me!"
     A small ripple in the light in the room grew into an immense
globe of light, from which emerged a huge leathery form.
     Soloth stood nearly eight feet tall, with huge leathery wings
easily measuring twice that across, he had two horns protruding
from his temples, and they arched back in twistedly.  His arms were
muscled like an ox's, and his claws looked as if he could crush  
granite with them.  His teeth were the size of railroad spikes, and
his tongue was long and forked.
     "Yess...?" Soloth offered, his voice deep and grating, hatred
oozing from every syllable like pus out of an improperly treated
wound.  
     "There is someone I wish you to fetch, not harm, just bring
him to me." 
     "As my "Master" wishes." hatred.
     "It is good to see that you do not forget your place, Soloth,
and that you never question the fact that I am your master."
     Soloth's hatred flared for an instant, but the died down. "As
my "Master" says..." He left the sentence unfinished.  Some day, he
thought, the roles will be reversed, and he will be at my mercy. 
Thoughts such as these were the only thing that kept him from
insanity.
     Volrech gestured to the pool, and the Demon watched Ebyn,
imprinting the image upon his brain.  
     "Go!" Volrech shouted, dismissing his monstrous servant. 
Soloth arose and stepped back through the glowing gateway he
emerged from, and disappeared.
 
*    *    *    *    *    **   *    *    *    *    *    *    *
 
     Ebyn lounged in the large bed that occupied almost half of his
little loft.  He was examining the jewel, and its myriad colors. 
Light seemed to shift across it's surface, changing from red to
blue to green and hundreds of colors in between.
     He had still not taken off his tight-fitting nightsuit, and
the plethora of weapons contained within.  He replaced the Jewel in
the small pouch hanging around his waist.
     "Tomorrow," he said to himself, "I will sell the damned
thing."
     Ebyn lay back on the large bed, and closed his eyes, sleep
falling upon him almost instantly.
     
     A scratching sound from the direction of the window awoke him
from his light sleep, and he drew his dagger.  lightly springing
off his bed, he approached the window, slightly ajar, and flicked
it open with the edge of his knife.  
     Flapping exploded in his face as half a dozen pigeons leapt
off his windowsill.  
     Ebyn sighed, and stuck the dagger back into his shoe.  Then he
turned around, and leaned against the window, letting the night air
cool his neck.
     Ebyn did not see the monstrous form rise to window height and
reach with lightning speed through the window to grab him by the
scruff of the neck, Yanking him out.  Ebyn's head whipped back and
he hit the frame hard enough to send him into dreamland.
 
     *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *
 
     "....and hot irons." Ebyn heard Volrech say as he emerged from
his unconscious state.
     "Ahh, I see our little guest is finally awake, so good of you
to join us." Volrech addressed Ebyn the way someone might address
a child.
     "Where?" Ebyn managed.
     "In my house." Volrech responded.
     "Why?" 
     "Oh, I think you know the answer to that one, you have been a
very naughty boy..." Volrech held up the jewel. "This, is mine, and
you took it, and I would just like to know who told you to do so."
     "Nobody, I just thought that it had to be worth something..."
Ebyn's voice trailed off as Volrech's visage turned from smiling
maliciously to scowling voraciously.
     "Come now, you honestly expect me to believe that you broke
into a wizard's house, and with no idea what you would steal?"
     "Yes.  The rock certainly looked valuable, so I took it. I
also took something else."
     Ebyn drew his hand into his shirt and withdrew it again,
clenched in a fist.
     "Stop him." Volrech commanded.
     Soloth grabbed Ebyn's wrist, and held it firm.  
     "Open it." 
     Soloth grabbed Ebyn's fingers and began to open his hand. 
Ebyn complied, opening his hands to show a small handful of powder,
which he quickly blew into the Demon's face.
     Soloth screamed in agony, and released Ebyn, grabbing at his
eyes.  Ebyn dove at Volrech, knocking the jewel out of his hands to
send it skittering across the floor.
     Volrech regained his balance and shouted something into the
wind.  Ebyn suddenly felt himself thrown back against the wall by
some immense fist.  regaining his breath, he looked up to see
Volrech standing above him, left hand blazing with Mageflame, ready
to take Ebyn's life.
     Ebyn lashed out with his foot, knocking Volrech off balance,
and then leapt to his feet, withdrawing a throwing knife from his
shirt.  Volrech also rose and held up a hand, causing three minute
fireballs to come whisking towards Ebyn.  Ebyn dodged two, but the
third struck him in the shoulder.  
     "Cease this foolishness! You don't stand a chance." Volrech
sneered at Ebyn, his eyes alight with the power coursing through
him.
     "Don't count your cockatrices before they're hatched!" Ebyn
shouted, and with an aim born of fury, hope, and prayer, launched
the knife at the jewel lying in the floor.
     The knife struck the jewel and it shattered into pieces, light
pouring from every fragment.  A howling wind arose from nowhere,
and the smell of brimstone was in the air.  Soloth shouted
something triumphantly.
     "Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!" Volrech
cried into the merciless wind.
     Ebyn ducked behind a low table, looking towards the shattered
jewel.  it had turned into some kind of vortex it seemed, and it
was drawing on Volrech alone.  He was being pulled back towards it.
     Ebyn noticed something else, around the edge of the vortex,
you could almost make out hands grasping at Volrech's robes,
pulling, rending, grasping.  Volrech could withstand it no longer,
and with a final shout, a ghostly image of himself was yanked out
of his body and into the vortex with a weird *pop*. The vortex
shuddered, and then folded in on itself, leaving only a charred
corpse.
     The wind died down.  Ebyn noticed Soloth standing upright, the
effects of the pyropowder having worn off.
     Soloth turned to Ebyn, "Pitiful human! I give you this
information just because you aided in his downfall. Go now! This
tower will not survive long after Volrech's demise."
     "Just one thing," Ebyn asked, "Why did the destruction of that
jewel cause his downfall?"
     "The Jewel was the only thing tying him to this plane, he had
made so many pacts and contracts with different demonic entities,
it was his only hope."
     Soloth, with an abrupt wave, vanished in a puff of brimstone. 
Leaving Ebyn to stand amidst the debris, and wonder at what he had
seen that night.
     A loud rumble that seemed like the tower itself was grumbling
in prolonged agony brought Ebyn out of his thoughts.  Ebyn hurried
to the window, and found it barred, as they all were.
     The entire room was falling apart, chunks were falling out of
the ceiling, and the floor was beginning to crack in several
places.
     Ebyn ran to Volrech's corpse, and looked it over.  It had
several rings on his right hand. Undamaged? Ebyn grabbed them and
put them on.  Pressing them and touching the stones  in hope that
one of them would free him from this place.  Upon touching the
second ring an orange glow grabbed his attention. 
     The portal! Ebyn thought seeing the orange-red disk in the
corner of the room.  He ran across the remaining distance between
him and his only chance, and dove through it.  
     
 
     *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *
 
     Hiras looked up at the surrounding faces.  They sighed in
relief.  
     Holt was the first to talk, "Gosh.  That's it?" 
     "Yeah, what happened after that?" Another boy asked.
     "Well lads, that...is another story." Hiras responded, getting
up and brushing the dirt off his clothes, picking up his box.
      "See you tomorrow." He shouted, heading off into the depths
of the market.