“The first spell I do is just to find the right body, before I call out the ghost,” Shae says. He’s had to practice necromancy in front of his hired guards a few times over the past year, and he learned the hard way that it goes better if he explains some of it first. “You don’t have to look at anything, especially when I’m done digging, just stay close.”
Arthur loops Duchess’s reins over her head and ties them up away from her feet instead of tethering her. “Is this dangerous?”
“Very.” Shae shrugs out of his coat and slings it over his shoulder, then starts rolling his left shirtsleeve up to his elbow. “Only if something goes wrong, but I expect something to go wrong. There shouldn’t be new ghosts in a graveyard this old.”
A ghost that lingers long enough turns into a fiend or curse or parasite. Something has shaken this spirit from its place of rest within the past ten years, and Shae has a nervous feeling it’s more recent than that. He glances around as he draws his knife from his belt.
“There shouldn’t be demons this far from Lyrisenia either,” Arthur says. “We should—what the fuck are you doing?”
Arthur seizes Shae’s right wrist, stopping the knife’s blade an inch away from his bare left forearm. Shae jolts, nearly dropping the blade. The paladin’s familiar warmth floods through him, overriding the pain of Arthur’s iron grip. His eyelids flutter, and he’s half a breath from moaning at the contact.
“What the fuck?” Arthur says again, and Shae slams back into his normal state of mind.
Which is currently extremely annoyed. He yanks his arm forcibly from Arthur’s grasp. “I’m practicing necromancy,” he snaps. “Because I’m a necromancer. Look away if you get squeamish.”
“I’m notsqueamish,” Arthur snaps back. And Shae isn’t great at reading people, but he looks more angry than disgusted. “Excuse me for reacting the same way anyone would react to you taking a blade to yourself.”
That one sentence deflates all Shae’s annoyance, leaving only confusion and a weird twinge behind his ribs. He’s cut himself in front of plenty of people, clients and hired mercenaries, and they all looked away in disgust or stared in sick fascination. Not one of them ever tried to stop him.
“Sorry,” Shae says after a long moment. He’s not sure who’s more shocked by the apology, him or Arthur. “I should have explained. I need blood to find the disturbed body. It’s either that or dig up every grave on this hillside.”
Arthur doesn’t look happy, but he steps back to give Shae space. “Fine. Do your work.”
The wind rustles through the trees, and Duchess moves to another patch of grass. The sky is a perfect eggshell blue. Were it not for the graves and Shae’s sense of unease, the day would be idyllic.
Shae brings the blade to his arm again and slices, quick and shallow, a few inches from the elbow. A thin line of blood wells up immediately, bright against his fair skin. It’s hardly the first mark on his arm. Faint silver and pink lines pattern his skin, most of them deliberate. Nobody’s ever looked closely enough, nor cared about them, and Shae suddenly feels self-conscious with Arthur here.
But Arthur doesn’t say anything else.
Shae shifts his grip on the knife and murmurs a few words in Lyrisenian. Any language would work, so he uses the tongue he grew up with to say: “Let blood call to bone. Let bone call to blood.”
A tendril of cold snakes from his heart through his veins, spills out from the cut. The blood pools on the surface of his skin instead of falling, and after a moment a round drop of it the width of his thumbnail rises up into the air. It hangs still, trembling, then flies slowly forward.
Shae follows the drop of blood, careful to step around the graves in his way. He’d rather not disturb anyone unnecessarily. They’ve earned their rest. He hears Arthur following behind him, but all his attention is focused on the drop of blood leading him towards the back of the graveyard.
The blood stops at a grave right on the edge of the old fenceline. An overgrown heap of earth guarded by a shoulder-height statue. The statue’s arms cross over its chest, and its face looks up to the sky, but its features have long been worn away by time. Man or woman, young or old, it’s impossible to say. The drop of blood falls, splashing into the crumbling soil and sinking in.
Shae waits to see if the ghost will appear, disturbed by the nearby necromancy. But the graveyard remains quiet and peaceful.
“I’m going to use a spell to dig up the grave,” he says. He thinks he can spare the energy, with Arthur’s aura pulsing around him, and they don’t have a shovel.
“Do you need help with anything?” Arthur still looks tense, and Shae can’t tell whether that’s disgust at disturbing a grave or lingering anger from Shae cutting his arm. But when Shae shakes his head, Arthur just takes a step back and looks out into the surrounding forest. “I’ll keep watch, then.”
Shae stops himself from grabbing Arthur’s arm and dragging him closer. Two paces away is close enough, he shouldn’t be greedy. Instead, he kneels at the foot of the grave and whispers in Lyrisenian, “Please excuse me.”
Not a spell, just an apology, before he places his palms on the ground. His bare fingers dig into the cold soil, and he opens himself up to the energy remnants of the corpse below. He weaves the energy into the dirt, a foot below the surface, and lifts. The surface rises up, grass roots tearing from their moorings. He tilts the whole thing, and the earth slides to the side, piling away from Shae and Arthur.
The ghost should have appeared by now, but it hasn’t.
He repeats the process layer by layer. He’s maybe a foot from the coffin lid when a low growl sounds throughout the graveyard. Arthur swears, and steel sings as he unsheathes his sword. His aura pulses, blinding bright. Shae flinches, blinking rapidly, and when his vision clears, he sees Arthur lunging for the old fenceline.
Facing him is a six-eyed, six-legged vaidkos.
The creature is huge, as tall at the shoulders as Arthur. A twisted cross between wolf and snake, a patchwork of ragged fur and crusted scales. Its jaws hang open, fangs gleaming, and all six of its red-and-shadow eyes fix on Shae.
Memory shudders through him. Burning eyes. A shadow caress. Cold claws in his hands, blood trickling down his wrists, a promise of power. A price he didn’t understand.
Arthur’s voice breaks him out of the reverie. “Do what you need to do,” he says grimly, without glancing back at him. “I’ll take care of this fellow.” He sounds tense but not panicked.
