The gibbering mass of hideous dretch shoved me before the great sandstone throne, cloaked in shadows. Glints of ruby glittered from a dark, coiled mass; scales, and jewels, and, I feared, blood.

“KNEEL, MORTAL,” she thundered. Her voice was deeper than an earthquake. My knees buckled; my gut turned to ice. 

“TELL ME YOUR NAME.”

Zelldethourn

Species: Marilith

Huge Fiend (Demon/Tanar’ri), Chaotic Evil

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Armor Class: 18 (natural armor: scales)

Hit Points: 420 (30 d12 + 150)

Size: 30ft long, 2.5 tons

Speed: 80 ft/turn

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STR: 20 DEX: 22 CON: 19 INT: 22 WIS: 23 CHA: 25

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Saving Throws: STR+9, DEX+8, INT+8, CHA+10

Damage Resistance: cold, acid, piercing, slashing, bludgeoning, all non-magical attacks

Immunities: poison, fire, electric, fright, charm

Senses: Truesight 200ft, Passive Perception 15

Languages: Abyssal, Infernal, Celestial, Undercommon, Draconic, Telepathy 120ft

Challenge Rating: 25 (80,000 XP)

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Innate Spellcasting: Zelldethourn may cast the following spells without components:

At will: Animate dead, firebolt (max level), telekinesis, bestow curse (9th level), phantasmal force, disguise self, identify, dominate monster, dimension door, eyebite.

3 times/day: polymorph self, polymorph other, finger of death, dispel magic (9th level), etherealness, greater invisibility.

1 time/day: geas (9th level), true polymorph.

Mystic Theurge: Zelldethourn is a master spellcaster, capable of casting both arcane magic, as a Level 19 Sorcerer, and divine magic (by channeling the chaotic evil energies of the Abyss), as a Level 16 Cleric.

Twisted Wish: In exchange for the soul of a mortal, Zelldethourn may cast wish on that mortal’s behalf as a free action. Upon death, said mortal will appear in Zelldethourn’s menagerie as a larva. Zelldethourn will inevitably twist the wording of the mortal’s wish to her own ends.

Weapons:

Dominion Rod: 6ft brass rod set with a ruby mined from the heart of Nessus; forces submission. (+6 unholy greatclub, 2d10 bludgeoning, may be used to cast dominate person [9th level, 3 charges/day], shatter [9th level, 5 charges/day])

Cold Iron Knife: 1.5ft iron dagger, beaten cold from iron mined in Mechanus; cuts away lies. (+4 vorpal dagger, 1d10 piercing/slashing, may be used to cast discern lies [9 charges/day],  invisibility purge [7 charges/day], geas [9th level, truthspeaking, 3 charges/day])

Golden Leash: 10ft whip made of unicorn leather; binds victims to service. (+5 whip, 2d6 slashing, may be used to cast geas [9th level, servitude, 3 charges/day])

Magical Items:

Book of Names: basilisk leather bound spellbook. Contains the truenames of nearly every sentient being Zelldethourn has encountered. (may be used to cast dominate person as a free action on any sentient being Zelldethourn has met before; upon meeting a new being Zelldethourn will use any means possible to determine that being’s truename, including deception, charm, dominate person, intimidation, or geas)

Cutting Key: Magical key flaked from obsidian mined on the border between the elemental planes of fire and earth; the key’s teeth are razor sharp. Can cut through the veil between worlds. (can cast gate [3 charges/day])

Moon Mirror: Magical mirror crafted from quicksilver gifted from the Unseelie Court; reveals the viewer’s most fervent desire and deepest fear. (can cast detect desires [9th level] or fear [9th level] as a free action)

Zelldethourn is an extremely dangerous elder marilith. Like most marilith, she enjoys manipulating events from the shadows, but unlike her sisthren she rarely enters combat herself, and prefers to employ her prodigious spellcasting abilities from a distance. Despite being an elemental of the Abyss and a being of pure chaos, Zelldethourn has an unusual grasp of lawful mindsets, and is adept at manipulation through magical debts, oaths, and geasa. A collector of servants, familiars, and minions, she will almost always be accompanied by various animal companions, including her abyssal cat familiar Sodrillion, and a number of goblinoid viziers and courtiers. Being an incarnation of pride, she revels in her appearance and prefers to be naked, adorned only in lingerie and jewelry of legendary value.

The AI woke me with a gentle chime and a pump of cortisol into my neckport; the ship was docking. I was excited. No one had met Cassandra O’Brian in person for at least a cent-cycle, let alone been invited inside her habitat, but she had insisted that I personally escort the Singer Sargent back to the Met. An original Singer Sargent! One of only three left in the system, and she had two of them, and she wanted me to pick it up. In my 87 cycles curating I had never felt so honored. My gills fluttered as I clicked the shunt into place and o-liquid sluiced through. I had spoken to her a dozen times on the sib but still, I was nervous. 

I shouldn’t have worried. She was waiting for me at the airlock, beaming. She actually hugged me! I was terrified of breaking her glass torso with my exosuit (the art-grav on her asteroid was set to old Earth levels, way higher than I was used to on Titan) until she laughed and told me it was diamond plex and I couldn’t break it with a sledgehammer. Not that I had any idea what a sledgehammer was, but I instantly liked her. She was warm, and funny, and I think very lonely. 

We had tea in the courtyard before she took me up to see the Sargent, an odd experience: me sipping lapsang through a pressurized straw port in my faceplate, her savoring small bites of shortbread before spitting the mush into a delicate silver ewer (a Tiffany!). A real tree (an oak, she said) stretched branches overhead, swaying gently in the habitat’s breeze, and Enceladus glowed coolly in the dark sky. It reminds me of the moon, back on Earth, she said, wistful. White rabbits hopped across the grass.

The tour through the castle was one of the best experiences of my life, truly mind-blowing. She had a Velazquez! (The old woman cooking eggs) And a Gribbon (“Real Cry [Texas]”) and an Aldridge (“Sonnet Eyes”)! On the roof there was a sundial that she said was over five thousand standards old, from Egypt (“Not that it works here, of course,” she complained), and she took me into a tiny room, dim like a shrine, with a single pebble resting on a cushion in a glass case. The Makapansgat Pebble, she said, hushed and reverent. I’ll admit I cried. 

We stood in front of the Lady Agnew for a long time, just looking, in that kind of silence you can only have with a real friend. Perhaps I flatter myself, but I felt like we had become real friends. After a while we packed the Lady into her floatcrate together, and she slowly walked me out, clearly taking her time. I paused in front of a portrait of her I hadn’t noticed during the tour (a Thorn masterpiece) and she smiled. “You know I have a portrait of my old body, too,” she said, a little too casually. I caught a glimpse of a tiny silver tube snaking out of her frame to suck up a tear as it welled from her eye, and her voice got just a little hoarse. “I don’t look at it much.” 

I was ready to get home and tear into this kebab; I had an early morning tomorrow and I let my friends bully me into one more (two more, three more, five more) drink(s). I needed to crash and I was just trying not to puke as I stumbled down Sauchiehall St when a woman shuffled out of the shadows ahead of me.

“I’m sorry I don’t have any cha- are you alright?” I said. She was soaked, and shivering; at first I thought she was homeless until I saw her heels and minidress, way too little for a Glasgow January but that’s Sauchiehall St for you. She lurched forward, limping, muttering something I couldn’t hear. “Urtsss,” she said. 

“Are you ok?” I asked again. “You got a ride home?” She stepped into the light, and I jumped back. Her eyes were black pits, her mouth smeared with red. She had a knife in one stiff arm. Her skin was grey and blue like a bruise; parts of her were peeling off like old paint. She moaned, rattling and wet.

“It hurtssss,” she said.

“The Harpy, Celaeno,” read the brochure. “The Dark One, the Duskbird. She heralds the coming of true Night; she is the End of our world. On display by special arrangement at the Midnight Carnival.” 

I could feel her cool regard from the shadows of the cage. She hated me, a hatred as pure as joy. She cast hate like a shadow. 

“Why?” I whispered. I shivered in the summer air, and dared draw no closer. “Why do you hate us?”

She smiled. “Because my heart is broken,” she whispered back.