79: The Lost Chord

  The voice had come from the corner of the room. Kim pointed her sword, Lita raised her staff, and the others brandished their weapons as they turned in that direction.

  A small man with curly dark hair sat on one of the Marshal Magic boxes, legs dangling. He was clad in blue jeans, a black shirt and a tan leather vest. Had he been there all along? A soft chord played behind him.

  "Congratulations," he said, then sniffed. A wet rattling came from his nostrils that Kim found unsavory. "You won the Battle of the Bards, the Ragnar?k of contests."

  "Who are you?" Damon asked. "You look familiar."

  "I'm Dio." He sniffed again. "Or I was Dio."

  "You rule over all of Metaloria?" Fiora said, pointing all around and then down at him, revealing his smaller stature. "You are that Dio?"

  "You look nothing like Dio," Damon said. "Does he?"

  Kim thought he was asking her, but he had turned toward Uncle Gord, who was shaking his head. "No, he doesn't. Dio had gravitas. And a metal calmness."

  "You two know what Dio looks like?" Lita asked. "He's never appeared before us. Only through accounts of the contest winners do we know his description. And he was sixteen hands tall or a shadowy voice or a demon with a giant guitar, long tongue, and spitting blood, and saying he wanted to rock and roll all nite."

  "That last one sounds familiar." Uncle Gord rubbed his chin.

  Damon took a deep breath. "In our world, there was a singer, Ronnie James Dio, the greatest metal singer of all time." He looked at Uncle Gord. "You agree he was the best, right?" Uncle Gord nodded. "And he died. I… I hoped that meant he had come here, to this world. That he was still, well, still singing. Still Dio."

  "You know Ronnie?" the man said.

  "Every metalhead with taste knows who Ronnie James Dio is," Uncle Gord said. "He popularized the devil horns." He flashed his devil horns.

  "He did, didn't he?" the man said. "Well, I'm not him, but I knew him. I played in his band Smelf."

  "I think you mean Elf," Damon corrected. "His first real rock band was Elf. They sang Never More."

  "What in the seven hells of Helloween are you talking about?" Fiora grunted. "Is this Dio, or is it not Dio? And who would be dumb enough to call a band Elf?"

  "I am Dio," the man said. "But I am not that Dio from Earth. I'm the Dio of Metaloria. And the band was called Smelf; we played together in high school before Dio joined the Vegas Kings."

  "I am finding all of this confusing," Lita said. "So let us get this straight. You are not the Earth Dio, but you are the Dio who resides on Rainbow Island and rules over all of Metaloria. Our creator. The most powerful god of metal there is."

  "Yes, that's me," Dio squeaked. Kim thought he didn't sound all that powerful. "But back on Earth, I was known as R?d Bevans. I took Dio's name when I came here because… well, because it's a cool name. It means God in Latin. That's one reason I chose it. Also, I had so much respect for Ronnie James Dio."

  "If you are Metaloria's Dio," Fiora said. "Then kill Blayre, get us off this island, and grant us our wish because we won Battle of the Bards. In fact, killing Blayre would be my wish. So, please do that. Right now. Start by plucking out his eyes and his spleen."

  "I can't," Dio said. "I've been dechorded."

  "Even I know that is not a word," Jam said.

  The man's eyes were so sad. "But it has happened to me," he said. "I need to explain how. You see, I grew up in Lake Geneva, knew this really cool dude called Gary Gygax, who had this truly great game called The Fantasy Game or maybe Dungeons and Dwarves but that's another whole story. Later, my family moved to Cortland, New York, and I went to school with Ronny. We formed Smelf, and we played a few concerts in school, but he went on to fame and fortune in Elf and later Rainbow and Black Sabbath and his solo artist work, and… he did very well. He once told me I was the greatest guitarist and songwriter he had ever known—and he had worked with the very best. He mentioned his compliment to Kerrang once, but they didn't print it."

  "What does all this blatherin have to do with being dechorded?" Fiora asked.

  "It does. You see, I became obsessed with writing the perfect heavy metal song and finding the perfect chord, you know, the lost chord." He let those words hang dramatically in the room. Instead, they hung confusingly.

  "The what?" Lita asked.

  "The lost chord. The one that is the root of all music." Then in a surprising gentle voice, he sang:

  "I have sought, but I seek it vainly,

  That one lost chord divine,

  Which came from the soul of the organ,

  And entered into mine."

  He drew in a breath. "That's a really old song by Arthur Sullivan," he said. "About the lost chord. That chord represents all life. It is the chord that created the universe—all universes. It had to be a minor chord. It just had to be. Anyway, besides the quest for that chord, I had a problem; I couldn't finish a song. I tried so many times. But I just couldn't land the ending."

  "We played 'Something Wicked This Way Comes' at Hammersmith," Damon said.

  An ember of light came into his eyes. "You did? Oh, if we weren't just about to die, I would ask to hear that. How did you end it?"

  "Well," Kim said. "We switched the lyrics to first person at the end and—"

  "Enough about your songs and your games," Fiora said. She glanced at the door and back at them. "What is this dechorded thing? And how do we get you chorded? So we can kill the wizard." She spoke louder than ever; perhaps the concert had deafened her. "Speed up your telling of your tale."

  "Yes, I will. One night in the year 1990 on December 31st, in my little studio in Cortland, full of unfinished spools of reels of songs and demo tapes that I never sent too record companies, my fingers hit the right combination of notes, my mind pictured the chord, and I lifted my guitar and I strummed perfection." Then he motioned with his hand, "and everything here came to be. I was just here, here in Metaloria. It was shockingly fast."

  "Metaloria already existed?" Damon asked. "And you arrived here through a portal or something?"

  "No, I created it. Metaloria, that is. Everything. Actually, the chord created it. Only fifteen years ago."

  "It's more like thirty-five years," Kim said. "If this had happened in 1990."

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Dio's eyes widened. "That long?"

  "That explains why none of the music here is older than 1990," Uncle Gord said.

  "Yes, only the songs in my brain were released upon Metaloria," Dio explained. "Spawners can bring others, but only if the spawners have perfect recall."

  "But your tale has a conundrum," Lita said. "Metaloria has existed for thousands of years. Even the druid history goes back several millennia. We had written about the Metal Gods and the chord that created us. Are you saying you played that chord?"

  "Yes, I played that chord, and it filled in the thousands of years of rock and roll, and every bit of the heavy metal I had been playing and listening to became the theme songs of this world and infused it with the great power of metal, giving everyone gifts of metal health and special abilities and powers and spells, and created elves because I had also been reading Lord of the Rings. And reading The Monster Manual."

  "It truly was a minor chord if you're responsible for elves," Fiora said.

  Dio made a face. "It all happened so fast." Dio played an air guitar slowly. "I was just the instrument. Well, my guitar was the instrument, but I was the instrument playing the instrument. But also for me, it happened all at once and…"

  "So Rainbow Island was floating empty for years?" Lita asked.

  "No. I have always been here. Just that Metaloria from my point of view was formed in the sounding of that missing chord, with all your history intact, and I was there the whole time, a part of it, no longer on Earth. It really was the perfect place."

  "People from Earth get spawned here and die," Kim said. "So it's not perfect."

  "I am sad about that. Because I came from Earth, the chord left doorways or paths here. And wizards and others have been able to pull those people from my old world. The earthlings I have found, I have tried to send back."

  "Tried?" Kim asked.

  "They vanished." He clicked his fingers. "Poof. I like to believe they went back. It makes me feel better."

  "Oh," Kim said.

  "Do you find people's fathers?" Jam asked.

  Dio shook his head. "But Metaloria really is beautiful. I spend my time in here trying to write my songs and hearing the minstrels play all the classics, over and over. It has really been a wonderful life. Then, Blayre arrived at my doorstep. And everything went to Hades in a handbasket."

  "And what did Blayre do to dechord you?" Fiora said. "And I urge you to get to the point."

  "Blayre was holding a head—King Fidds's head; he just appeared there, smoking from some sort of fire, and we fought. Well, he fought; I wasn't ready, and, to be honest, never had to fight before. I mean, only once did I have to destroy that island of the music of the country. Accidentally, I should add. I was trying to move it further away from the mainland and dropped it. Anyway, Blayre raised the head and it sang along with him, making him even stronger. The green power of Fidds combined with the kings' power and he was able to dechord me."

  "Again, explain this concept," Fiora said. "With rapid succinctness."

  "My Gibson SG sits on a stand in the Heavy Metal Ballroom of Perfection ringing that chord. I have to fine-tune it as it plays, making Metaloria rock, in a good way, just a little more. Making things a smidge better at a time. He broke my bond to the chord. That means he controls the lost chord."

  "Why didn't he kill you?" Gord asked.

  "I… I turned invisible. You see, there's a song Dio, the Earth Dio, sings about being invisible. If I sing it, I turn invisible. It's fun at a party. Well, it would be if anyone invited me to parties."

  "It's a great song," Damon said.

  "Yes, it is, and it works. That's why you didn't see me, and now Blayre's been hunting throughout Sacred Heart Palace for me and—"

  There was a knock on the door.

  "He's here," Dio said. "Like a missed note in a guitar solo or an off note in a chord. Like a guitar tuned down a full step. He's here."

  And with that, the door slowly opened.

  80: He Rocks

  The door opened slowly; the hinges made an ominous rasping, squeal as if a death metal singer were trapped inside. They all turned. Damon heard Dio hum a familiar song about being invisible, and at that same moment, the man, the god, the creator of Metaloria, vanished. The door opened further. And King Fidds peered around the corner.

  Damon sucked in a breath; the king was alive! His eyes were wide open, staring at them. "We're saved," he whispered. Maybe Fidds had somehow come back to life and defeated Blayre. He was a cool, powerful dude, and therefore cool, powerful events were absolutely possible. Fidds defeating Blayre would save them so much time and effort. All that was left to do was to collect their medals at a ceremony hosted by a beautiful princess.

  But the curious thing that Damon was wishing he hadn't noticed is that this floated above the king's head:

  Metal Health: no reading

  Fidds's head turned left and right. "Peekaboo," he said. "I've come for the killing. Please line up." That didn't sound like King Fidds, Damon thought. He clutched his Screaming Eagle Staff, which still had the six strings visible. He wasn't certain whether he should play a song or cast a spell.

  Blayre strode into the room carrying the king's head like a lantern.

  "Deliciously amazing!" he said. "All of my dearest enemies gathered in one room. It's like a wedding that will become all red and bloody. Not a white wedding, in other words." The music surrounded him, but it was not one of the various wizard songs he'd used earlier. Instead, it was a single ultimate metal chord sustained forever that made him larger and more glowing and powerful. "I will be a grinder and you will be the pepper. Or bones. Or other grindable things. I am pounding metal personified."

  "You're going to bore us into oblivion," Fiora said, but it was not as loud as she normally delivered her retorts. For Blayre was too bright to look at. Damon glanced above his head at the numbers:

  Metal Health: 25200+++++

  Kind: Human, Male

  Type: Ultimate Everything

  Metal Skill: Ultimate Everything

  Metal Mana: 35395+++++

  Proclivity: Norwegian

  There were many numbers following those first ones, and they were spinning like a radiation counter in Chernobyl. Blayre kept growing more powerful by the moment.

  A guitar followed him, floating like a ghost. It was playing The Lost Chord. Damon knew it was a Gibson SG, the same that Black Sabbath's Tony Iommi played.

  The wizard pointed at Fiora, and she suddenly sat down on a bench with her arms at her side as if bound. "You will rue the day you refused the love of an ultimate rock god of absolute handsomeness and charm."

  Though the boast was laughable, the words echoed around them so powerfully that Damon nearly fell to his knees.

  "Now," the wizard said, "before we begin the dissections, will you please tell me whether you saw a squat man with a doe-eyed look?"

  "We haven't seen him," Lita said. It was clearly hard for her to speak. "Who is this man?"

  Blayre turned his glowing eyes toward her, and she visibly stiffened and took a step back. She couldn't even meet his gaze. "You lie," Blayre said softly. The words struck her like a slap. "I see everything now. All the numbers. All the connections. Do not lie to a god again. Where is he?" He pointed at Lita and then slowly closed his fist, and it was as if a giant fist were closing around her. "Welcome to your death," he said. "Unless you tell me where he is."

  Her arms squished against her body, and she dropped JoJett and let out a cry of pain.

  "Stop it!" Gord stepped between the two of them, though it didn't seem to halt Lita's pain. He managed three steps towards Blayre, which, to Damon, was more than any of them were capable of. "Leave her alone."

  "You are a curious man," Blayre said. "Much of my magic, even at its most powerful, bounces off of you."

  Uncle Gord raised his shield and took another step and another as if through molasses. Inspired by that, Damon tried to move ahead too, but it was pointless; there was too much power holding him back.

  "You will leave all of us alone," Gord said. He was a tough old guy, Damon thought. But this was like getting too close to the sun.

  "No," Blayre said. "You may be semi-invulnerable to magic. But not to hard things. Let me teach you a hard lesson."

  And with his pinky, he pointed at the ceiling, and it came down, burying Gord under a gigantic pile of stone.

  "Uncle Gord!" Kim said. She took a step in Blayre's direction, her sword partially raised. But Blayre waved his hand, and she flew into a collection of old drums, making a loud thunk and several cymbal crashes. "Now, where is the imp?" Blayre said. "And why, of all things, can't I see him? He was in this room."

  "Metal Dad," Jam said. "He's here."

  "My dear, dear Son"," Blayre said. He turned his eyes towards Jam. And Jam, instead of withering, glowed as though a spotlight were lighting him. "Now, child, with your rainbow vision, maybe you can see him and his numbers."

  "He told us how he created this world, Dad," Jam said, taking another step. The young man was growing taller, as if Blayre were already rewarding him for the betrayal. "He said he came from our world. From Earth."

  "Yes, yes, I know all that."

  Jam took another step. "Man, I feel kind of powerful."

  "Find the invisible maggot for me," Blayre said. "And I will reward you with a thousand heavy metal heavens: beaches, beer, girls, girls, girls."

  "I'd be happy with a cool guitar," Jam said.

  "So it shall be," Blayre said. "Look around for our soon-to-be-dead creator."

  Jam turned around, but continued stepping backward as if he were drawn to the wizard. "He isn't there. Nor is he over there." He twisted his head. "He's right over…"

  The door slammed behind Blayre.

  "Dio has left the room," Blayre said. "That coward!" He turned to look towards the door, and his countenance moved off of them. It was like a lighthouse turning away. Damon moved ahead with Lita, and even Fiora was up. And Kim pushed a broken drum out of the way.

  But Jam shook his finger at them. "Don't you dare," he said. "Instead, I dare."

  Then he leapt the remaining few feet towards Blayre and grabbed King Fidd's head and gave it what could only be described as a valiant tug.