My name is Piba Al’kai, and this is the story of how I killed my master.

The caravan crawled closer to the Northern Wastes and the grumbling of the guards was louder each night. The risk, they would say, was too great, but my master was an ambitious dwarf who knew of the great wealth, ancient artifacts and priceless works, left scattered about the tents of some ignorant chieftain after the summer raids. My master’s house, once my own, had waned in power, and he needed this expedition to fund its revival. Had my master not been an accomplished practitioner of powerful magics, none would have dared follow him in to the wastes. Yet magic takes its toll on my kind, and already his body had begun to transform, shifting from flesh to stone, making his movements slow and rigid. His entire left hand was now hard as rock, a point which I could attest with each strike to the back of my head as my own studies failed to produce satisfactory results.

The magic of my people combines the arcane and the power of machines and black powder. It is solid and firm, like most Dwarves, but though I feel the winds of magic, the scrawlings of my books twist in my mind, worming their way from my memory. What did my people hope to accomplish with such cantrips and spells? Such rugged devices could not compare to the simple pleasures of life: the taste of strong drink, the feel of the slave as she quivers beneath her captor, the sweet embrace of soft fabrics on hard flesh. A love for the finer things is lost on them, hence my tutelage with a disgraced master and a suicide excursion to the northern wastes.

And yet, I dreamed. Every night, of sweet voices, alluring beasts, and sensations so powerful it could melt the mind of a weaker being. More often I found myself abandoning my books to carouse with the human slaves brought along to serve the caravan. I brought them ale and wine and shared the whispers in my dreams. Whispers of temptation, indulgence, and freedom. The closer we come to the wastes, the stronger the whispers became, until finally, my master and his guards confronted me as I abandoned my studies yet again to indulge myself.

He threatened me, claimed he would kill me. He was so stiff, so worried about his status and power that he could not see the sensations he was missing. I had to show him, him and the guards, what wonderful feelings they were missing in their simple lives. The whispers spun in my mind, forming words and arching through my finger tips. Dazzling colors shot from my hands, streaming over and through those rough figures standing before me. The look of shock on my master’s face shifted, wide eyes closing, clenched muscles loosening.

They danced then, an incredible sight. Never, to my knowledge, had any of them danced before, but oh how they moved. They danced for me, for my human slaves, around a great fire, until one by one, they collapsed, their hearts bursting. All except my master. As magic had begun turning his body to stone, so to did my gift, and as the others fell, his movements only slowed. I watched, for six days, as his movements dwindled, like a construct losing power but too well made to stop entirely, until finally he froze, a perfect monument of stone standing over the dead.

The slaves looked on me, as the sixth day ended, wide eyed and awed. Most of them fled, finally free of the enchmantment and realizing their plight. One loyal follower though, approached me: “Your face, my lord…” he murmured, as he held up a looking glass. The shape had changed, bones made alien, tusks protruding through my cheeks, like the beasts from my dreams. I felt a smile, a rare thing in my people. I had become a beautiful beast for a new, great power, one that called me to the frozen wastes. I turned North, and my devoted slave followed.