I am Palaskar of the Infernal Knights, and this is the story of how I took my first hundred souls. * It was mid-summer, and the great training room of the Paladins' Guild was filled with a hundred-odd voices, some shouting, others talking, still others merely grunting with effort. There, beneath that great arched white roof, above the sweat-stained floor worn smooth by countless generations of feet, I sparred with old Master Hubbins, twisting, circling, lunging, parrying, riposting, parrying again, with the crude wooden approximations of a paladin's two-handed sword that all the novices, even I, used. I spared a moment to glance over at Julia's reflection in the mirror that lay on the wall. She was grace in motion, a fluid dragonness in white, meleeing with Joseph. He was large -- for a human -- almost my size, with a bearlike power to him that his rough black beard only accentuated. She was small, even dainty, blond hair cut shoulder-length, and almost hiding the slender points of elven ears. But for all his power, her agility made her his match. "'Ware, Palaskar!" shouted Hubbins. The wooden tip of his sword struck me solidly on the skull. "What's wrong, boy, you're usually better than this," he chided. "I was thinking." "Better less thinking, and more doing!" chuckled Hubbins. He paused, out of breath. "We'll do more to-morrow. Off with you, lad!" Lad, indeed. I was half again his size. As I trundled off to my cubicle, I stopped to get a good last look at the trainees. They were mostly human -- some dwarves, some elves, but by and large human: flat face, no tail, no scales, visible and vulnerable ears. I reflected on the statistics. Eighty assorted humans, fifteen slim elves, five grouchy dwarves, and one orphaned draconian, me. Although "orphaned draconian" is really a contradiction in terms; all draconians are orphans, left to fend for themselves the day they broke out of their shells. They only call me that because I was found and adopted by the paladins, instead of wild animals. They've trained me since before I can remember; the paladins are my family, friends, and teachers all rolled up into one. How I hate them. * Days later, I passed Julia and Joseph in the white arched hallways. She kissed him, once, briefly, only the lips touching. Then she spun away, giggling. Joseph went to chase after her, but saw me coming down the hallway, dark and brooding like a dragon. "Palaskar! What's wrong? You look like you've seen Death himself!" "Nothing, my friend; just an old wound, a hands breath from the heart, is what's bothering me." "You're a bit young for old wounds." He grinned. "Maybe so." I grinned back, showing dagger teeth. I left them to their lovers' games, in the white arched hallways of the Paladins' Guild. It was then, I think, that I began to think of the Sword. * In the annals of the Paladins' Guild there is mention of a weapon most fierce and awesome, the Infernal Sword. It is said that the Sword is the extension of the black soul of a knight so vile as to have devoted himself utterly to depthless hatred and unending violence. It is said that the Sword is so powerful as to dwarf the might of even the greatest paladinic blades, for with each death it steals the souls of the departed, adding to its power, without limit. The Sword, it is also said, is cursed; its wielder will never be free of it, an even he shall die. I cared not. Here was power, that which I had been deprived of all my subservient life; here was love, in the form of a sword; here was vengeance for my lonely, mad, bloodthirsty soul! I would make my own Sword, and with it, I would war against the world that had so cruelly wronged me with the accident of my birth. O, that had I been born human, or even one of that long-vanished race, a dragon, rather than this half-formed wretch! Where there was peace, I would bring war; where there was love, I would ring hate; where there was hope, I would harbinger despair, death, and madness! I swore it by the Four Gods and Lars. * The night was dark and cold, with a storm building, as I began to forge the Sword. The wind blew through the cracks of the old Blacksmith's roof that I stood beneath. Here, in the old city, the City of the Dead, my work could at last begin. I remembered the instructions as though they were engraved on my soul. 'Take one sword, cold wrought of iron.' I took the sword out of my backpack and laid it on the anvil. 'Hammer it with hate, while murmuring words of madness, on the forge of a dead man. 'I hammered madly into the blade, all the time murmuring words of love, hate, and desperation. The wind began to howl. With each blow, the sound seemed to reach into my very soul. And with each blow, the blade slowly became blacker and blacker, until it seemed to eat even the feeble moonlight that streamed though the old shop's windows. The wind was roaring now, overshadowed only by blasts of thunder. Suddenly, the sword burst into unholy flames. 'Quench it in the blood of a Paladin.' Ignoring the pain, I grabbed the sword by the hilt and drove the blade though my abdomen. Blood streamed forth, quenching the sword. With a wrench I withdrew the sword. It left no mark. I laughed in a mixture of delight, pain, and madness. I was a Paladin no longer. I was an Infernal Knight. * I returned in the morning to the guild, interrupting mid-morning practice. "Where have you been, boy? You're late for practice. " Master Hubbins eyed me critically, then noticed the sword that was welded to my hand. "Faerwon protect us!" he cried. "That's an Infernal Sword!" "Yes it is," I said quietly. "And I mean to use it." Without further pause, I attacked. It was over quickly. Master Hubbins was old and slow. As his corpse hit the ground, I raised my Infernal Sword high above my head and plunged it deep into the corpse. Crackling blue energy surrounded the corpse and my sword. Within seconds, the corpse crumbled to dust, its soul energy now stored in the sword. The trainees, frozen with shock, hesitated as I began to cut them down. Then they sprang into action. Little good it did them. My hatred of them gave me power, and they fell before me as wheat before a farmer's scythe. I killed them all: Mishakael, with his strange laugh; Edward the irrepressible; Rondar the quick; Kaelbeth, with eyes almost as sad as mine; Morgan, she of the red hair; Danytn with the steel-silver eyes; Bentur, strong and silent. . . Joseph too. How surprised he looked when I severed his spine! I killed them all -- all save one. I left Julia there on the floor of the Paladins' Guild, crying incoherently. Then I left the Paladins' Guild, to wander all the lonely ways of the world. &n