Warm rays of blessed sunlight laid a welcome mat for Oak, when he stumbled over the door he had kicked off its hinges the night before, right out of the keep and into the open air. He stood on the square in the heart of ruined and mutilated Al-Badra, squinting and shielding his suddenly sensitive eyes.

Long hours in the darkness under the keep made the brightness of day blinding to him.

Blinking like mad to speed up the process of acclimation, he trudged across the carnage he and his friends had left in their wake, dodging between rotten corpses and puddles of intestine and offal. Squelch, squelch, squelch. His wet boots and wetter socks found a comrade in the mushy mud and started their own troupe of traveling musicians.

Hear my coming, and tremble, fools. The man with soggy footwear approaches. His blisters are the stuff of legends!

Oak's vision swam and the rotten, teetering buildings around him blurred, twisting into each other like their equivalents had in the Waking Dream. Then he blinked, and everything was back to normal. Just moldy planks and rusted nails. Nothing more. He trembled, feeling cold and weak. Wounds aching, muscles seizing.

The fever had its hooks in him now.

Taking the easiest route available, Oak stumbled down the main road towards the caravan's encampment. Towards his own tent, and his comfortable sleeping pad. By the Chariot, I want to rest. Hunger gnawed at his spine, but the bastard would have to wait until he had taken his beauty sleep.

Something, or someone, stood on the road. No. Two someones.

Oak squinted, but his vision had gone so dim he could not make heads or tails of the figures in front of him. Cursing, he reached for his falchion, but his trembling fingers couldn't keep a hold on the handle.

Stupid. Use a smaller blade.

"Shit! Hey, Oak! Are you alright?"

Oak tried to pull out his hunting knife, but before his fumbling hands could find it, the dark encroaching on his vision won and his legs gave out. The mud felt pleasantly cool against his cheek. Like a cold, wet cloth. His eyelids slammed shut, and he lacked the strength to open them again. Tired. So tired. Letting go felt relieving. Things would either work out or they wouldn't. Oak was done.

"Figures. How the fuck are we going to haul his giant ass back to camp?"

"I'll go get a pair of oxen. And a cart."

***

Oak was in a barrel, rolling down an endless grassy hill. Bouncing and spinning. Smashing against the inside of the barrel on every unavoidable impact with the hillside. The bumpy, dry ground sped past him way too fast for comfort, but he could not move a muscle to even attempt to slow the barrel's descent down the slope.

With every lightning fast rotation, he saw what lay ahead, and despaired. A tall, gnarled oak grew from the hillside, blocking his path. It was a Gallows Tree. Bloated corpses hung from the thick branches like cherries from a cherry tree in late summer, ripe for the plucking. He tried to will himself to action. To move even a fingertip, but to no avail.

Closer and closer, the barrel rolled. The trunk of the tree looked thicker with every cursed rotation, causing Oak's blood to run cold. The coming impact would smear him across the hillside in tiny pieces, littering his flesh and blood on the dry grass with absolute disregard.

You would need a numbered diagram and a chirurgeon to piece him back together.

The barrel hit a bump and launched at the Gallows Tree as if a giant had given it a helping hand. For a frozen moment, the massive trunk filled Oak's vision.

Hells, here it comes.

Thin barrel staves offered no protection from the combination of mass and ruthless velocity. They splintered into a million pieces and the rings holding the staves in place shattered. Sharp bits of metal pierced Oak's flesh. He smashed against the rough bark, breaking, crunching–

***

Oak woke up with a start, heart hammering in his chest. Cold sweat covered his aching body and his head bounced from the sleeping pad under him in time with the not-so-gentle swaying of the wagon. He stared at the waterproof canvas over his head, trying to knit his thoughts back together.

"Blergh." Oak coughed. His mouth felt dry, tongue sticking to his palate as if glued there by some mischievous little fairy.

"Welcome back to the land of the living, Northerner," Ur-Namma said from the driver's bench. "Sadia, be a dear and give him some water before the poor bastard dies of thirst."

A delicate hand holding a waterskin materialized above Oak like a figment of a dream. He sat up against a crate full of provisions and snatched the waterskin to himself, drinking the contents in one go. By Ashmedai's chicken leg, this is the stuff. Not even halfway satisfied, Oak lopped the empty flask back to Sadia.

"More. Please."

"I am glad you are feeling better, Oak." Sadia hid her smile behind a dainty palm. She sat on a food crate behind Oak, kicking around with her legs. The little spellsinger whispered a word to the flask on her lap, and it floated out of sight, presumably seeking a water barrel.

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In no time at all, Oak emptied another waterskin down his gullet, relishing the feeling with all of his limited mental faculties. He had forgotten water could taste this good. Forget every inane piece of material wealth and useless scrap of power. Here was the greatest boon a man could have, right in the palm of his hand.

Glorious. Completely, maddeningly glorious.

Immediate needs met for the moment, Oak felt it was time to ask some questions and figure out what was what. "Who found me? I need to thank them." he wiped his mouth on his sleeve and stopped to stare at the gray fabric. He had a new, clean shirt on. Ur-Namma and Sadia both deserved a medal for managing that. "And how long was I unconscious for? Where are we?"

"Hmm. Let's go through these in order," Ur-Namma replied. "Onyeka and Baako Sakyi found you close to the edge of Al-Badra. Remember them? They're the brother and sister pair we left with Tochukwu to guard the caravan, while we ventured into Al-Badra to slay the Demon."

"Yeah, I think I remember. Two tall, wiry Koromites who look exceedingly competent?"

"Precisely. Now, you were unconscious for most of yesterday and all of last night. You woke up for a moment in the evening, in the grips of high fever and spouting nonsense, so I doubt you remember it." Ur-Namma glanced back over his shoulder, a look of mild concern on his face. "It was touch and go for a while, but I never doubted you would pull through.

"Hmm." Oak lifted his new shirt and traced the angry red scar on his abdomen. "I can't take the credit for surviving this one. Without Ashmedai's boons, I would have perished."

"Well, I'm just happy you are in one piece, no matter who takes the credit for it. You made a promise, remember?" Sadia poked him on the shoulder with the tip of her boots.

"I ain't abandoning you, not ever. And I won't die either," Oak replied. Ur-Namma scoffed, shaking his head. The elf made no promises he could not keep and thought doing so was not wise. Human foolishness, he called it. Oak saw it differently. This was a promise to strive for something, and Sadia was smart enough to understand that. "You can still count on that."

"Good."

"Yes, splendid. To get back on track, the caravan stayed put all of yesterday. It took some bloody miracle work from Tochukwu to get us moving today, and I don't use that word lightly." Ur-Namma hissed in irritation. "I should not be mad. People had not eaten or drank while the Demon had its claws in them, and the animals were no better off. They needed proper rest. All the same, I almost lost my temper with some of these morons." The elf waved at the wagons traveling ahead and behind their own. "Be glad you slept through the chaos."

Geezer chose that moment to leap in the wagon, missing Ur-Namma by a hair. "Damnation, you mutt! Watch yourself!" The elf swore, his hands flailing as he tried, and luckily kept himself from falling over.

The excited hellhound put his front paws on Oak's shoulders and laid on top of him, licking his face. Oak let Geezer have his fun. The goofball had probably worried himself to death. He ran his hands through the hellhound's coarse black fur and hugged the massive beast right back. Geezer felt heavier than he remembered. The bugger must have grown an inch or two again.

Or eaten an ox.

"I missed you too, buddy," Oak whispered. "More than you know."

***

The caravan made camp for the night in stilted silence by a junction of two sizable streams. Tree stumps and exposed roots riddled Tochukwu's chosen camping ground, causing more than one person to trip in the dusk as they rushed through their chores. At least fresh water was plentiful, and close by. Too high-strung and tired after the horrific events of the last few days, most people did the bare minimum required of them before they collapsed on their bedrolls.

By the grace of the Corpse-God, no one had died while the caravan had slowly decayed under the Demon's influence, but a few people in the grips of illness were in a bad way. Having the runs was bad enough on the road. Having the runs and not eating or drinking anything for a full day was an entirely different level of disaster.

If those folks saw the next morning, Oak would be surprised.

After supper, Yakubu had dragged him away from the light of the cookfire, and the company of others. They sat on the trunk of a fallen tree by the edge of the jungle, staring into the darkness. Watching the shadows lurking between the trees.

Stars would soon light up the open sky. It would be a beautiful, peaceful night.

Yakubu reached out and laid a hand on Oak's shoulder. "Thanks to you, my children live, pale man. Thanks to you, my wife kissed my cheek this morning." Yakubu cleared his throat, fingering the hilt of the sword he carried on his hip. A tremor raced across his chiseled features. "If you had not banished the Demon, my family would have perished in agony. I will not forget."

"Just doing my job, Yakubu, nothing more." Oak looked away, hiding his embarrassment. He couldn't take a compliment to save his life.

"Hah! Just doing your job, were you?" the Koromite muttered, and let out a long sigh, craning his neck back to look at the sky. "Whatever. You did it well, and now you have my thanks." Yakubu clapped Oak on the shoulder and stood up, stretching his muscular frame. "Coming back to camp?"

"Thank you, but I think I will stay for a while. Have things on my mind."

"As you wish." Yakubu scratched his cheek and narrowed his brown eyes, clearly considering something, before he came to a decision. "A time will come when you will have a need for bow and spear. If you call, I will answer."

Without waiting to hear Oak's reply, the Koromite cavalryman stalked away towards his campfire and his family, dodging tree stumps and protruding roots as he went. Oak watched him go, feeling brittle and choked up.

Did…did I just make a friend?

He didn't know what to do about his complicated feelings, so he pushed them aside for the time being. The Demon of Rot and Decay had given him a parting gift, and Oak had yet to examine it in detail. Now was as good a moment as any.

Turning inward, Oak let his awareness sink to his soul.

In his mind's eye, he saw the infernal engine at the heart of his ontology. A spiral shape of black gleaming metal flowing back into itself, surrounded by ever-turning gears. At the very top burned a furnace, belching hellish flame.

And floating around the spiral was a Seal. A skull, endlessly rotting away, decaying into inevitable ruin. Despite staring right at the thing, Oak could not tell who or what the skull belonged to. One moment, it was a human skull. Next, it belonged to a stag. Then a raven. Always changing, always rotting.

Status.

The Seal of Rot and Decay

All things end and wither. While active, all injuries inflicted by you will rot and fester. Whether left by fist, flame or blade, the wounds you leave behind are likely to kill and do not easily heal.

Not bad, spawn of Belphegor. Not bad at all.

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