Charles Gaylord

 I was born to a large farm family. I had six brothers and three sisters that all helped my parents with our wheat farm. The farm was relatively large, and although my family owned rocky land, our crops grew decently. This was all thanks to the town’s wizard, Eldric. Eldric was a portly fellow who spent his nights alternating between studying old tomes in his tower and filling his ever-expanding gullet with sweetbreads from the local bakery.

 So much sweetbread did he buy that our wheat farm couldn’t keep up with the bakery’s flour needs. Eldric wouldn’t stand for a lack of sweets though, and came to our farm with an offer. He would enchant our lands and crops to double their yields, so long as we would give the baker (and thus him) a discount on our flour. We happily agreed, and began to enjoy wonderful crop yields. Eldric had a renewed source of sweetbreads, and all went well.

 Each week, Eldric would come by and cast spells on our crops, and each week he would buy his sweet bread. He would even cast spells on my family, to help us work faster, and feel stronger. We saw our production go up and up, and we made so much money that our farm was able to afford new steel farm equipment, shipped directly from the capital, Ashe! I even had to come up with a few new tools for harvesting that much wheat. I took my hand sickles and attacked them to chains so that I could slice even longer swatches of wheat as I swung.

 Our bliss was short lived, though. The spells that Eldric cast on us each week soon took a toll on my family. We began… to change. It was just small things at first. My eyes began to bulge, my mother looked to be sweating all the time, my brother’s ears grew pointed like a cat’s. When my youngest sister Kim grew a tail, the town began to shun us as freaks and abominations.

 We pleaded with Eldric to help us, to change us back. He said he would do what he could, but that he wouldn’t be able to concentrate without his sweet breads. He kept casting the spells on us and we kept working the fields, hoping he would be able to change us back. Weeks passed, and the changes continued with no indication of stopping. Each week Eldric would promise he was close to a remedy, but that we needed to keep producing for him.

 When my father grew spider-like eyes, the town decided they had had enough of my family. An angry mob of our “friends” had gathered outside our house, and they began setting fire to the fields surrounding our house. With pitchforks and clubs they approached our farmhouse to dispose of the “freaks.”  Feeling the heat of the burning fields through our home’s walls, we grabbed what tools we could use as weapons, and prepared for the worst. But when the torches began landing on our roof, we had to step outside and face the mob.

 What an unsightly scene that was. A town in arms against its brothers because they are not normal, and a small family facing down and angry mob while wanting nothing more than to be normal. The mob descended on us with their crude weapons, beating my family to unconsciousness, and preparing nooses. Soon only myself and my youngest sister, Kim, were left conscious and cornered. The mob was held back by my spinning chains, but the flames from the burning field behind us were creeping ever closer.

 And then, in what I can only describe as a Fiendish Miracle, Eldric arrived. All of his bulbous person flew through the air to finally settle above our farmstead, and he was shrieking. “No! These are MY experiments, you are not allowed to destroy them! You will regret this! Kimberly, eat their souls!”  He began cast a spell, focused on my terrified sister entirely. As Eldric began to cast, the mob halted, unsure how to react.

 Kim looked up at me, fear in her eyes, silently begging me to protect her. My chains finally still, I held her and hoped Eldric had simply gone mad like the rest of the town. She began shrieking as he was casting the spell, and broke free from my arms with an unnatural strength. I could see tears streaming down her face as she walked towards the mob, her expression locked in a grimace of agony. As she got closer to the mob, Eldric’s casting got louder and more fervent, and she began to… Bulge. I was powerless to do anything against this man, floating 15 feet above the world, as he controlled and warped my sister.

 Kim shuddered as her skin stretched, and I could see bright red muscle bulging from inside of her tiny frame. It was as if her body were too big for itself, stretching in strange places. Her tail great large, and began whipping violently as her fingers turned into vicious claws…  And then…  With a sickening tearing sound her skin gave way,  ripping to shreds as a massive clawed demon emerged from her once beautiful shell. The beast roared, and more small pieces of my sister fell from it as it began to claw through the mob.

 Eldric laughed and turned back to me. “And now it’s your turn, boy. I hope you like those bug eyes, because they go with spider legs!”  He began casting another spell, focused on me. Immediately, my whole body was wracked with pain. My vision blurred as I too, began to show signs of something underneath my skin. My head throbbing and features twisting, all I could see was the demon that used to be my sister tearing through the people I used to consider friends.

 I nearly passed out as my arms grew violently, right then. My hands used to go down to my hips, but now they drooped all the way to the ground. They grew a second elbow, too, just like legs of a spider. In that moment, I knew I was dead. I knew that within myself was a massive spider who was going to burst forth and destroy me. I knew this with certainty, and accepted it. I would never see my sister’s smiling face again, I would never again feel the sun on my back as I worked in the fields.

 In that acceptance, I found clarity. This was Eldric’s doing. It was all him, and his foul magic. We had trusted him, trusted that he was helping us and that we would help him, but he tricked us. He played god, twisting us to his will with impunity. His foul magic had corrupted his own mind, it had corrupted my family, and it had destroyed my sister. He would not come out of this unscathed. He, and his casting kin would not come out of this unscathed.

 I was raised on stories of wizards who’s power corrupted them, but never thought it was real. I believed it to be like the evil elves they say live under the ground and come up to the surface only to enslave farming towns and disappear again. I now knew these stories to be based in fact, and would not let them continue. Too many wizards believe that magic makes them better than others, too many wizards feel that can act with no consequence. I needed to prove Eldric wrong.

 I took up my chains and sickles again, and flung them skyward towards the pig of a man. I guess I was lucky that my arms had been stretched, because now my reach was great enough to hit the bastard. I saw the surprise in his eyes as the sickle flew towards his face, and he put up his hands to shield himself. With a single quick slice, my sickle bit deep, severing his left hand and leaving him screeching in pain. He fell from the sky, holding his stump and screaming incoherent words.

 With his spell casting ended, my vision cleared and the pain immediately stopped. Though my arms were still long and grotesque, I was fully in control of myself again. Not waiting to see how Eldric would react, I immediately took off running past the massacre that was happening in front of my home. I sprinted across our property, and up the main road towards Ashe. I didn’t stop running until all of the smoke and flame had faded from my view, and the last thing I remember seeing was the demon turning from the gathered villagers back towards where my family lay unconscious and Eldric lay bleeding.

<p class="MsoNormal">                 I wandered towards Ashe along the main roads, hoping to hop a ride on one of the Caravans that head along the road. With my longer arms, flagging the caravans down wasn't hard, but keeping their guards' steel away from my throat   once they saw me was. After a few narrow escapes, I decided it better to walk off the road a bit, and skirt the roads in the nearby forest. It was in there that I met Chulgor and his master, Jurrindar.

<p class="MsoNormal">                 As I wandered through the forest on my third day looking for something to eat, I stumbled upon a deer. By now, I had gotten used to my long arms and they seemed to be useful more often than not. It is pretty easy to get within 20-30 feet of a deer in the forest, and it just so happens that that is my range with a sickle.