Book of The Dead

Chapter B2 C19 - Baby Steps

The skeletons moved with their usual lack of alacrity as they fought. Eerie silence surrounded the minions, advancing and cutting down the rift-kin without any utterance leaking from their glowing skulls.

Tyron was used to it by now, but every now and again, he was reminded of just how spooky his undead were in battle. No doubt this had served him well against the bandits; the former-farmhands would never have seen, let alone fought, anything so unnerving in their lives.

Against more determined and experienced foes, it wouldn’t make a difference. Against infuriated monsters like the kin, it made no difference at all. Arms folded, he watched as the skeletons struggled to pin down their more manoeuvrable foes. The smaller creatures from the rift were no real threat to his minions, and the minor damage they managed to inflict could now be repaired with bone mending, but the undead still struggled to keep up.

Tyron watched them fumble about until they finally managed to corner the last of them and stab it to death. He shook his head.

Without his interference and aid, his skeletons were still relatively woeful fighters. If he didn’t direct them with his thoughts, empower them with spells or employ his magick on their opponents, through his curse or by dominating their minds, they struggled even against creatures weaker than himself.

And he was weak.

Though, perhaps not as much as he’d been before. He looked down at his hands at his side and flexed his fingers into a fist. There was strength there now that he’d never experienced before.

A flat plus ten to every aspect of himself might not sound like much, but it represented a near doubling of some of them. He was stronger and quicker than he’d ever been before. Even if just a little bit, it helped to round out how lopsided he had become with his oversized constitution and intelligence.

“You’re looking pensive, kid. Need to shit?”

“I was just thinking about how different I feel after advancing.”

“It’s good, right? You might be a scrawny mage, but now you can walk up to any seventeen year old in the empire and snap their arms like twigs. It’s great for fighter types too. They get a little extra boost in the brain-zone so they aren’t quite so completely fucking stupid all the time.”

“I was also thinking about how weak my skeletons are. If I don’t help them, they’re pretty underwhelming.”

“Underwhelming? You’re being way too kind. They’re complete trash. Even with your bone stitching at the level it is, they just aren’t that coordinated, nor do they think quickly. With enough numbers, they can surround stuff and club it to death, but that’s about it.”

“I was just hoping they’d be… doing better by now,” Tyron sighed. “I’ve worked so hard to make them as well as I possibly can. It kind of feels like I’ve wasted my efforts.”

He was more than a little disheartened, to tell the truth. He’d been helping his undead in battle either directly or indirectly, sometimes directing them without being conscious of it, ever since he’d begun his journey as a Necromancer. Only now did he begin to think of what they might be capable of without him interfering on their behalf.

“Look, kid. You have done well with them. As far as undead go, the bony boys you’ve put together are good. Just try to keep in mind, you only just advanced for the first time. You are now officially the lowest rung, bottom of the barrel, useless hunk of dung type of Slayer out there. You just walked out of the academy, thinking that you’re hot shit, but everyone knows you’re garbage, they’re just too polite to say it.”

“Thanks, Dove,” Tyron said wryly.

“I’m just saying there’s a long way to go! Wait until you see the feats, spells and abilities you get offered as you level up your new class. There’ll be some good stuff in there, I promise. Not to mention, you need to get to figuring out new ways to assess and create undead. When those basic Skills hit twenty, your skelly boys will be a hell of a lot better than they are now.”

“Still a long way to go.”

“Abso-fucking-lutely.”

The young mage sighed and mentally gathered his twenty skeletons together. As they assembled around him, he pulled his coat a little tighter to protect against the biting wind.

In the foothills of the western mountains, the weather was dismal almost all year round, and now was no different. Grey clouds hung low over ahead, threatening to unleash a downpour that would no doubt soon begin. A freezing wind blew, whistling through the jutting rocks and sending the long grasses to roll like an ocean in a storm.

For a brief moment, he envied the skeletons, and Dove, for their lack of care toward the cold, but the feeling quickly vanished. Being able to feel wasn’t a negative just because it was chilly. Lich-hood was not in his future.

Though he did idly wonder if vampires felt the cold.

“I don’t think we’re going to find much else,” he sighed. “Not many rift-kin made it this far. I probably haven’t even killed enough to gain a level.”

“Doubtful. It’s slim pickings here, that’s for sure. Do you think it’s time to try and move to somewhere with a little more activity? Back to Woodsedge maybe?”

Tyron shook his head. Going back to the site of the break would be a disaster. More than a few Slayers had seen him there, along with his minions, enough that surely someone survived. He didn’t doubt they’d be looking for him there.

Not that there are many options. It’s not like rifts are around every corner and behind every door.

There was another further south, with an accompanying Slayer keep, but the journey would take almost a week, and that would likely be the place they expected him to go. There were rumoured to be unstable rifts in the mountains, though remote enough that no one had investigated.

Until a rift grew strong enough to regularly allow the passage of rift-kin, the empire didn’t bother with them. He could go looking in the mountains, except his complete lack of mountaineering would likely mean such an expedition would result in his own death.

Nowhere to go except deeper into the province.

Except he couldn’t go there either, not until the Slayers and marshals finished their sweep and went back to regular duties. He was frustrated, but he didn’t have many options.

“Come on then, Dove. Let’s head back.”

“Why do you say that like I’m in any way involved? You are literally carrying me. You think I can choose to walk off into the night? I’m a skull!”

“Alright! Fine. Be present as I walk back to the camp then.”

“Why thank you. I refuse. I’m going to sleep.”

“Gods damn you, Dove.”

But the light was already gone from those hollow eyes as the once Summoner retreated into the semi-aware state that passed as sleep for an undead.

Tyron sighed heavily as he began to trudge back. The ground was muddy and the long grass wet, which made the walk perfectly distasteful. He would have enjoyed some conversation, but he couldn’t really begrudge his friend the little control he had over himself. Talking or not talking, sleeping or not sleeping, those were the only options Dove had left to him now.

Again, Tyron felt guilty for the position he had forced the man into. Dove hadn't asked for this cursed existence, and he’d tolerated it with remarkable patience, all things considered. They were well past the time that Tyron had promised he would release the trapped spirit, but he knew he’d be dead without Dove’s help. He still intended to keep his promise and release him, but the time never seemed right.

The Necromancer sighed and rummaged in his pack, withdrawing something hard and round wrapped in a ragged cloth. Held in his hand, he beheld for a few long moments.

“I don’t suppose you feel like talking….” he trailed off.

There was no response from the stone, and Tyron sighed again before he packed it away again.

“Probably for the best. I don’t think you want to know where you’re going.”

Circumstances were conspiring to trap him once again, and Tyron would kick and thrash as hard as he could to make sure that didn’t happen. Without a safe way to progress, and with the plains too dangerous to traverse, he was stuck sitting in a cave, waiting until his time ran out.

There was temptation to go hunting, as he had before. He could find more bandits and kill them, harvesting them for the materials he needed to create new minions, progressing his class through combat at the same time. Monty was still out there, along with the remnants of his bandit group. If anyone deserved death at the end of a skeleton’s blade, it was that bastard.

But he gave up on the idea. It was just too dangerous for him to be down there, but the lack of options left him feeling pressured. He was going to have to do something he didn’t want to try and find a path forward. He could only hope it would be worth the price.

The wrapped stone weighed heavily in his pack as he continued to trudge back. He could still remember, likely he would never forget, the night he got it.

Tyron sat in the darkness after Elsbeth had left. Tomorrow, he would need to leave the farm and head into the wilderness again. Yor would be pissed. This backcountry collection of farmhouses was a shining beacon of civilization compared to the villages in the foothills, and for some reason, he got the impression she didn’t much appreciate the rough conditions. Used to slightly better treatment was Yor.

She’d have to deal with it, the same as he did. This would be a dangerous period, out in the wilderness.

He leaned back in his chair, allowing his light spells to fade and the darkness to enfold him. How had things gotten to this point? Cursed with a Class he didn’t ask for, he’d left hoping to carve out some space for himself, and now he found himself in the centre of a cosmic tug-of-war he didn’t know anything about.

The Dark Ones. The Scarlet Court. The Abyss. He understood little about any of these factions, and yet they were powerful beyond belief, and each interested in controlling his fate.

Why? Why did he matter so much? Was he just a pawn, expected to dance for their amusement? He gathered that they found his struggles interesting, a diversion to distract them from their eternal boredom, but was there something more?

The questions frustrated him, and the only way to get answers meant giving things he wasn’t prepared to give.

What choice did he have?

Of all the prices that had been asked, there was one he could pay. Though he may be damned in the doing of it.

Tyron closed his eyes, and breathed. When he opened them again, a feverish light burned inside. Had anyone been there to see, they would recognise the look on his face as the same he’d had when Dove had been recreated as a skull.

As the first hints of light began to creep over the horizon, Tyron stood before a baleful spirit, glaring at him from within its maelstrom of twisted energies. In one hand, he held a palm-sized stone, while the other hand was held nonchalantly at his side, a grin frozen on his face.

“Nice to see you again, Davon,” he’d said.

You live….

The ghost had rasped at him, cold fury and anger rising like steam from a kettle.

“You didn’t really think I’d be killed by more like you, did you Davon? Your bones fought well, I must admit. How many of your own comrades did your skeleton kill, do you think?”

You will die soon, worm. You will enter this godless mist and I will feast on your spirit.

The smile faded from Tyron’s features, but the mad light in his eyes did not dim. He hefted the stone in his hand.

“I don’t think that’s going to happen,” he said, barely more than a whisper. “I’m sorry about this, Davon. I really am.”

What… are you saying? You threaten me, when I’m already dead?

Tyron looked down, then nodded.

“It turns out, there are worse places for a soul to be. Again, I’m sorry about this, but it’s time we get you into your new home.”

The spirit screamed, towards the end, but locked away in the rock by Tyron’s ritual, there were none who could hear it.