Baraxas vul Mard

• Human male cleric of Hextor
• Alignment: Lawful neutral (good)
• 2nd level BAB +1
• HP 8

Stats

• STR: 9 (-1)
• INT: 15 (+2)
• WIS: 13 (+1)
• DEX: 11
• CON: 9 (-1)
• CHA: 16 (+3)

Saves

• Fort +3 - 1 CON = +2
• Ref +0
• Will 3 +1 WIS = +4

Class Features

• Weapon & Armor Proficiency
• Turn or Rebuke Undead
• Aura (of evil)
• Domains (War, Law)
• Spontaneous Casting
• Bonus Languages (Infernal, Celestial)

Feats 1 + 1 human = 2

• Self-Sufficient (+2 to Heal & Survival checks)
• Eschew Materials
• Weapon Focus (Flail) (bonus for War domain)
• Martial Weapon Proficiency (one-handed melee weapons)

Skills [(2 + 2 INT) x 4] + 4 human + 4 = 24

• Appraise INT 0 ranks +2 stat = 2
• Balance DEX 0 ranks = 0
• Bluff CHA 0 ranks +3 stat = 3
• Climb STR 0 ranks = 0
• Concentration CON 0 ranks -1 stat = -1
• Decipher Script INT 2 rank + 2 stat = 3
• Diplomacy CHA 2 ranks +3 stat = 5
• Disable Device INT ***********
• Disguise CHA 0 ranks +3 stat = 3
• Escape Artist DEX 0 ranks = 0
• Forgery INT 0 ranks +2 stat = 2
• Gather Information CHA 0 ranks +3 stat = 3
• Handle Animal CHA 0 rank +3 stat = 3
• Heal WIS 3 ranks = 3
• Hide DEX 0 ranks = 0
• Intimidate CHA 6 ranks +3 stat = 6
• Jump STR 0 ranks = 0
• Listen WIS 0 ranks + 1 stat = 1
• Move Silently DEX 0 rank = 0
• Open Lock DEX ***********
• Ride DEX 2 ranks = 2
• Search INT 0 ranks +2 stat = 2
• Sense Motive WIS 2 ranks +1 stat = 3
• Sleight of Hand DEX *************
• Spellcraft INT 1 rank +2 stat = 3
• Spot WIS 0 ranks + 1 stat = 1
• Survival WIS 0 ranks +1 stat = 1
• Swim STR 0 ranks -1 stat = -1
• Tumble DEX ************
• Use Magic Device CHA 1 rank +3 stat = 4
• Use Rope 0 ranks = 0
• Knowledge (Religion) INT 1 rank +2 stat = 3
• Knowledge (Paringuldi) INT 1 rank +2 stat = 3
• Knowledge (Serenshwa) INT 1 rank +2 stat = 3
• Knowledge (The Planes) INT 1 rank +2 stat = 3

Spells Per Day

• 0th level: 4
• 1st level: 2 + 1 domain + 1 WIS = 4

The Grinding Wheel

Day and night, the furnaces of Bal-Gornan belch forth black smokes, which rise to defy the heavens from the very pits of the Hells. The walls stand atop the high cliffs at the gorge of the river Ru-naur, which far beyond the great bridge in hated Seneshwa is called Runoring. Of the lands that live under the Axe, under one god only, I think it unlucky to speak. Rejoice, instead, that royal favor still awards the Long Watch to the sons and daughters of Hextor the Mighty!

The Enemy ever probes for weakness, and the engines of Bal-Gornan strengthen the faithful, though blood and agony be the cost. Praise the names of those who ward the wall in the name of the Scourge, and save your curses for the pampered, preening sons of Heironeous to the east.

As the firstborn of Mard, I was forfeited to the Church to harden me and to glorify the family name. While I was no iron-thewed warrior, my mind was as disciplined as any in Bal-Gornan, and my voice was heeded among my fellows. I rose quickly to lead them in drills, and I tolerated no hesitation, consigning each to the lash when he or she proved deficient. These were the qualities which brought me to the attention of the Inquisitor, whose gaze was more fearsome than my own.

No one who has not marched those ramparts can understand. Inquisitors were said to be more devil than mortal, and were always whispered of when a classmate--or worse, a superior--disappeared and was replaced the next day. Their reach was long, and their terror's longer. Inquisitors lurked behind walls, and might occupy the next bunk, seeking out private doubts and frailties. The implicit lesson for all was to marshal oneself within and without, and this I learned early and well.

"How many are required to stand watch?"

"All, Captain." The wheel turned, ever so slightly increasing my torment.

"What is the price of slovenliness?"

"Failure, Captain." Again it turned, yet panic found no purchase in me.

"What is the price of negligence?"

"Failure, Captain." I very nearly laughed. These were responses a child would not have botched, and the pain could not touch me.

"What is the price of weakness?"

"Failure, Captain." Again, easy.

"What is the price of failure?"

"Ruin, Captain." This was the logical endpoint of that line of questioning, Ruin being defined as the destruction of the Church itself, and what could lie beyond that? What subject would they undertake next?

The Captain of Inquisitors Minor was a commanding figure, and as her scribe I saw and felt the fear she inspired. Her hair had grayed and thinned with age, yet she met repeated challenges with sword and flail, often preferring the latter weapon even against blades. I was privileged to witness her famous bout with the former Captain-Major, whose name we no longer use since the revelation of his Error. Of that fight I will only share the joy on her face as she finally disarmed him; then, not wishing to sully further her instrument of correction, she crushed his skull beneath her heel. From that moment the name of Grenda vel Haal replaced his.

As I was scribe to the new Captain of Inquisitors-Major, my own standing increased. It was a subtle thing at the outset. Priests and officers who had never deigned to meet my eye now sought me out to curry favor. At mess I was the companion of the junior priesthood, and seemed no longer a mere aspirant. Little did I know how much remained to learn! How I would have fled in terror, and would never have known the sweet suffering of the Grinding Wheel.

"Who is charged with obedience?"

"Every man, woman and beast."

Oh, I knew my catechisms. With each turn of the Wheel, the chains pulled and my agonies heightened, yet I knew the answers almost before the questions were asked, and the knowledge was relief. Pain could hold no sway over me, for I knew that each hurt meant life--that had I faltered, the great stone above would crush me in an instant, and that my entrails would feed the fires. This thought, too, seemed fitting, as no doubt it has to every Inquisitor before me.

"Who was the general of infantry at the Siege of Parendal?"

Trickier. Any initiate memorized the name of the celebrated commander of cavalry, his life being the subject of the eighth chapter of the Book of Hextor. But how many would have studied the Lists of Honor in detail? "Bav Mellor...of...of Talgrave, I believe, Captain." How is it possible that then, only then, I felt the sweat of fear? The expected half-turn of the wheel did not come.

"You believe? Of what importance is your belief, or any casual notion of yours?" Still the wheel remained quiet, yet the stone did not fall.

"Yes. Yes. Of Talgrave, Captain." I held my voice steady.

"Which Bav Mellor was that, scribe?"

Here was the agitation for which she had dug, rising to betray me. More than one Bav? His father was a farmer, but a prosperous one, whose family worked the fertile Talgrave lowlands seized by...could it be? "The second, Captain, named for the grandfather who sponsored him." The last was a guess, but the dates were right. I gritted my teeth in what I hoped was a look of confidence.

A long moment passed. The clank of the wheel and a new fire in my limbs reassured me, but I was shaken. The Captain had left mere scholarship behind, and showed no sign of fatigue. For a timeless interval I gave my responses mechanically, my mind unable to keep pace with my tongue. At some point, a metal band was secured on my head, and as a slave began to tighten its screws, I was roused from mere misery into fresh agony.

"Victory through strength."

What? This was not a question, and was an inversion of scripture. Through the pain--damn the pain--I grunted out, "Strength in victory."

The screws were tightened. "Victory through strength."

"No! No, Captain! Strength in victory!" The screws were tightened, and my mistress turned the wheel, and my protests dissolved into gasping screams. I could not think--could not think!

"Victory through strength," I heard her repeat, and my voice echoed hers. "Victory through strength."

At this point her voice changed. "Lift your head." I did, or it was done for me. "What do you see?" She pointed across the chamber.

"I see three slaves, in shackles, before the great fire pit."

"Slaves are assets to be spent," my captain said, quoting the close of Chapter Six. "As are priests. As are aspirants. As is anyone."

"Anyone," was all I could whisper in acknowledgment, forgetting her rank. At once, the strain on my arms eased, and I was aware of the clank of chains falling onto stone. My legs? I could no longer feel them.

"These slaves were captured as they attempted to escape. They would have robbed the Church of years of labor. The Church, in its wisdom, chooses to root out this Error."

I knew what was coming.

"What shall you do with the first slave, who injured two of the hestati? What is mercy?"

"Mercy is for the weak. Kill him." My voice was barely audible, I'm sure, but a taskmaster was there to kick the first slave, who fell without a struggle into the pit. His screams sounded like my own, I thought.

"Who are the weak in this room?"

"The slaves, Captain. The slaves." My lungs filled with air, finally.

"What to do, then, with the second slave, who kept watch while his fellows scaled the wall before him?"

"Mercy is for...for the weak," I gasped. "Kill him."

The second slave fixed my gaze with his own, and through my haze of pain I saw the face of that former Captain-Major, whom my superior had slain.

"Wait," I think I said, but the fellow was already in the pit, and his cries masked my--what? My weakness?

"I can't hear you, scribe!" The Captain's voice was steely and commanding again. "What will you do with the third slave, who hatched the plot that injured our own, and has now led to the deaths of his fellow conspirators?"

My mouth opened, I am told, and what emerged was a piteous gurgle. The third slave's face was my own, I swear it. His eyes were pleading, but his lips did not move.

"Speak up, scribe! Give your order!"

I hesitated, and could not. "Kill me," I muttered.

"Louder!"

"Kill me!"

"Beneath your left hand, scribe, is a button. Push it with but a finger, and you will release the stone above you." The Captain spoke softly. "Beneath your right is a button that will ring the Bell of Doom. Push it and the overseer will see to it that the slave goes into the pit."

I could not speak. All my earlier torments shrieked in my awakening limbs. The grip of the iron band on my head throbbed.

"Choose!"

With the fingers of my left hand, I fumbled for a button. I felt something, and then worlds exploded. There was light, and there was pain, and my Error dissipated.

The Captain's voice came to me from afar, and I began to suspect that I had failed. There was something important to be done, and I was tardy--or worse, in Error. "What is mercy?"

"Mercy is for the weak." That was me speaking.

"Explain," she said.

It was a struggle to speak, to step beyond all the long years of rote learning. "Mercy," I began. "Mercy," I said again, and continued without faltering. "It is indeed for the weak, for the strong have no need of it."

"Is a slave not an asset to be spent?"

Having begun, I could not stop. I was broken. The Wheel had broken me. "Yes, Captain, a slave is an asset to be spent--at need. He is not an asset to be wasted. Your third slave can still work, in shackles if necessary, and he could be an example to the rest--"

Captain Grenda cut me off. "And what of Error?"

I felt a chill, and realized that I was wet. The great millstone above me was gone, having separated the wheat from the chaff. I had not been crushed, but had been dashed with melt water to shock me awake. "Error may be corrected."

"Think, then, I invite you." Here were words never heard before from Captain Grenda, or any in the hierarchy! "When the faithful cry 'Death to the unworthy', what is meant?"

"To dispose of Error, Captain."

"What has your ordeal taught you?" Her tone was dangerous once more.

My mouth betrayed me with further blasphemies. "That unworthiness is death, Captain, but also that life may follow." I closed my eyes, and forgot her rank once more. "Why have you spared me? Why not kill me and be done with this?"

"I needed to know, scribe, that behind your facade of scholar and scourge, a mind still lurked, and a heart. Assets not to be spent, as you have said, unless at need. For we have great need, and there may yet be ample opportunities for you to die. Give me your word tonight, though, and there is work for you. Arise, Inquisitor Baraxas, and look around you."

I found that I could not move from the Grinding Wheel, but did manage to prop up on an elbow. There was the overseer, there was my Captain, and there were three slaves, still shackled and uninjured, and not a one of them looked like me. I began to cough, deep within my chest, and the cough became a laugh. I saw what had been done to me, and had the first inkling of what was in store, and I laughed as I have not done since that night of Blooding.

"These slaves, and their keeper, are deaf," the Captain explained in the voice I had heard her use only in rare moments of leisure. "They are assets, and they are not wasted. They will serve again, when next we who meet in secret choose to recruit. Two more questions remain for you, Inquisitor Baraxas." The title felt strange. "First, how many of these slaves would you truly be willing to kill, or to cause to be killed?"

I thought, suppressing my chuckles. "All three, Captain, or as many as the safety and prosperity of the Church..or honor...demanded." I was surely mad, for once more I could not stifle my next words. "Plus myself, and even you, my Captain. At need. Only at need." I astonished myself, and, I think, Captain-Major Grenda. "But to do more than is necessary would be...Error."

She made no reply, but gestured to the slave-keeper, who led his charges through a doorway and out of my sight. Sighing and stretching, she followed them to secure that same door with a clank that brought to mind my recent tortures.

As she turned toward me, her gray Inquisitorial robes spun, and I caught a flash of blue within. Here was a tunic I had not seen in my years of service to her, and again my heart swelled. This was a night of revelation, and one more remained to me.

"Inquisitor." The Captain addressed me simply, without the disdain I had long known. "You can still die, if you wish, or if I so decide. That will depend on how you handle the next few minutes. She pulled a lever beside the Grinding Wheel, and I heard the whisper of tarps falling behind me. Beneath me, the stone began to turn, and when I beheld the enormous copper-plated idol heretofore hidden, my senses left me for a time. My superior then began to teach me of the true nature of our cause, and we worshiped together before that image of the Enemy.

I recall little more of my Blooding but the words of my new oath, which I do not share.