Chapter 4

▓ In the Shadows ▓

He was preparing himself for his part in the inductions, one of the few times a year that he had to appear. It took a great deal of work for him to be presentable. Nobody could be allowed to see his true face unless they were a slave. To the few allowed to see him privately he was a man in a black hooded robe. Most thought it was for effect. It wasn't.

Beneath the robes he was a deathly pale man with deep purple bruises, a few of which had turned into lesions. Most of the hair on his body had fallen off, including his eyelashes. One look at the man and you knew he must be dying. None of the healers in his stable had been able to find the cause of his body's apparent failure. None of them knew how strong his soul was.

He looked into the mirrored altar and had a momentary sadness over his lost physical beauty. He was able to quickly shake the feeling and move on with the task at hand. Dark magic such as this took great focus and attention to detail, or the results could be horrifying and permanent. The price had to be high in order for the magic to be strong. He chuckled about the myth that a blood sacrifice was necessary. Sacrifice was necessary but it didn't have to be blood, unless it was a very powerful spell. He was proud to admit he had performed such complicated and powerful spells, successfully. This wasn't such a spell. This sacrifice was merely his time energy and the youthful beauty and innocence possessed by the slave staring blankly at the altar.

It didn't really matter which slave he used as long as they were young, healthy, good looking and relatively innocent. His voluntary slaves weren't innocent, really, but he could use those whose purchase had been without harm to others. Innocence is relative, after all.

 He needed to get started. The ritual would take a day to complete and would last only half as long. Another price to be paid. His slave would lose their youth and beauty in order to restore his body to the dashing young thing he would have been. Leaving the slave in a state similar to his current one, only woefully worse. The pain would make the slave want to cry out in agony however, with his voice little more than a whisper now, they wouldn't be able to make a sound. They would writhe in pain and flirt with insanity. Prices must be paid after all.

Their innocence served another purpose, altogether. Innocence is an attribute of the soul rather than the physical body. Its loss would leave the slave an evil shell of their soul. That was why the otherwise subdued slave was enchanted. He was in control but once he stole that part of a soul they became a deadly, uncontrollable beast. They were usually too weak physically to do much harm but magic wasn't physical and their souls certainly weren't weakened by evil. He didn't want to chance going without it though. That innocence cloaked his shadowed soul from any possible seers in the crowd of inductees and spectators.