Petty Squabble [ROUND 3] [Goldhenge]

Originally posted on MSPA by Dragon Fogel.

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Parsley silently followed the Baron and the lady, glancing around with the mirror shard the entire time, saying nothing as he familiarized himself with the true nature of his surroundings.

At first, Parsley had taken the room to be a barn. Technically, that might have been true once. But now it was simply a large empty room, with only two noteworthy features. One, obviously, was the enormous mirror he had taken the shard from in the first place.

The other, far more disturbing feature was the blood covering the other walls, formed into various incoherent messages and arcane symbols.

What puzzled Parsley the most was the fact that the mirror revealed the true nature of the barn, yet neither the Baron nor the lady seemed to react to the image it showed. For that matter, would it not have revealed to Archibald the true nature of what he held - that it was a sacred relic? Why, then, had he fled?

Was Parsley alone able to use the mirror to pierce the illusion's veil? But how could that be? What was so unique about him?

And then Parsley recalled that chilling day.

"You and I are alike in one way," the old alchemist sneered.

"What nonsense are you babbling?" Parsley said. He tried once more to transform his restraints, but found himself unable to somehow; he didn't feel even the slightest change from them.

"We both have a gift, boy," the man chuckled, leaning on his crooked staff. "Something that makes us different from others. Something that makes them hate us, fear us."

"Hate you, perhaps," Parsley grumbled.

"Come now, boy," he cackled. "Can you say none have ever looked at you with fear, knowing your power? Knowing that you could change their throats into bread with just a touch?"

Parsley said nothing.

"But you - you squander your gift. The sheer chaos you could cause with it! The destruction, the death, the power! And what do you do? You change some horseshoes and pay for replacements."

"It's a dangerous power," Parsley muttered. "I'd never use it for evil."

"Evil? Pah! Good, evil - these are the words of people who lack vision, boy! Those of us with such gifts are better than the mortals. And I - I am supreme among the gifted."

He stepped closer to his prisoner.

"For I have learned how to take the gifts of others."

He pointed to the gem adorning the amulet around his neck.

"You see this gemstone? It is a special artifact, which only the gifted can use. I have a collection of such trinkets, but none has served me as well as this one. It holds my soul, you see. Allows me to live on in another body, while carrying the last body's gift with me."

He laughed weakly as he removed the amulet and placed it around Parsley's neck.

"But the last vessel I captured was a clever one - he could age things quickly. Used it on his body just as I switched in. I was worried I might rot away before I found a new vessel. Had to move to another village, just start capturing people. Hope that a goody two-shoes with a gift like you would show to find out what I'd done with them."

The old man coughed.

"My original gift was to find others like me. That's how I knew you were my target. But I had to do some poking around in your master's mind to find out what your gift did; I didn't want to be caught off guard again, after all."

He laughed, pointing to the other bound prisoner.

"No gifts, so it was easy enough. Another of my artifacts allowed me to see into his mind. The old coot was tough to break, but I finally managed it. I know all about you, Krose. Everything you've done since your master took you in, all those years ago."

He laughed.

"I'm looking forward to seeing the look on his face when his own pupil kills him. I wonder, which organ should I change first, for the slowest, most excruciating death?"

Parsley scowled.

"What good will it do you to have my body if I can't escape these bonds? You'll be as trapped as I am."

"Hmm hmm hmm! I've got more tricks than you do, boy. Even without my gifts, I know more about alchemy than anyone on this world. I know how to make those bonds, and I know how to break them."

He cackled.

"But you don't. You haven't the faintest idea why your shackles won't turn to bread."

Parsley glared at him.

"Now, just hold still while I fetch the amulet's twin, hmm? Then we can begin the transfer."

The man wandered off to a chest and started taking out items. Parsley desperately tried to think of a way to escape.

His master was wounded. His arms were bound, and his hands were held in place by something strange that he couldn't transform. At first he wondered if his power was sealed somehow, but he soon found he could change the small pockets of air within the shackles.

They had to be made of something that he couldn't transform. But what? What in the world could there be that he would be unable to change into bread?

Then the answer struck him. Bread itself!

The bindings had to be made of bread. Some unusual variety, clearly, but nonetheless bread. Straining his neck, Parsley found he was able to reach his left hand and take a bite.

It tasted awful. He spat it out immediately. But he had torn away a large chunk of it, and soon had his hand free. The old man turned at the noise, and saw Parsley contorting his left arm painfully until the tip of his finger touched the amulet around his neck.

"NO!" the alchemist screamed. "YOU'LL RUIN EVERYTHING!"

Leaning on his walking stick, the madman lunged at Parsley, clawing at the amulet to prevent his soul's container being transmuted to bread. Undaunted, Parsley grabbed at the stick and changed it, snapping it in two, then clubbed the aging alchemist over the head.

He fell to the ground. Parsley struggled to reach the metal bindings holding him to the wall. then once his arms and neck were freed, he tore off the bread from his other hand.

"You make the worst bread I've ever tasted," he grumbled at the unconscious man, as he rushed towards his master. "I'll deal with you and your amulets in a moment."

As Parsley freed his master, the alchemist slowly came to. He realized he had lost.

But he was not unprepared. He reached a withered hand into his pocket.

And, by the time Parsley had roused the senior hunter, the alchemist and his chest of mystic artifacts had vanished.

"Hey, Parsley, you okay?" Baron Stein asked. "You look pale."

"We may have greater problems than the demon," Parsley said, glancing once more at the incomprehensible red scrawls.

Had that wicked man found a new body? Was this his new base of operations?

Had he simply vanished with his artifacts again?

Parsley had always hoped that the cruel alchemist had been unable to find a new body, and simply spent the rest of his years rotting away.

But this mirror that could pierce a veil of illusions... It seemed that only Parsley could make use of it. The alchemist had been obsessed with artifacts which could only be used by the "gifted", was this mirror one of them?

More worried than ever, Parsley walked out to Stein's vehicle, strangely silent.