After coming to my agreement with the Silver Prince, things continued at a comfortable pace for some time. Because of the scale of our group and the safety that it brought, we had a much higher profit margin when compared to most of the other adventurers in the town, and we eventually settled into a routine of launching an expedition into the city proper only once a week, as with that we could still afford to keep everyone paid well enough, perhaps even a little better than most groups could offer reliably, as a fair number of other adventurers, mostly fighters and sneaky types, eventually came to join the group over the ensuing months.

And, even as we grew larger, swelling to nearly eighty men and women, (though more of the former than the latter) we also grew stronger. Fighting the skeletons in the city kept the men's heads and sword arms sharp with real combat, and training and fighting in small groups was encouraged by gambling of all things. I did fear that the adventurers were getting perhaps a little too comfortable being injured, knowing that I could heal them, but often I was too focused on my own study to worry about it, leaving management mostly to Mary, Karsten, and Strong.

Life magic, despite my apparently enormous talent in it, was proving to be a hard thing to control.

Case in point, the rather eldritch landscape that was starting to be formed in the fields and forest north of the old capital. One particularly memorable morning I tried to make a connection to a singular plant with rather ridiculous results.

"When I tell you to channel magic into a flower and cause it to grow into a circle, I do not mean you should spin it and everything around you into grotesque spirals, Church-child." My elven mentor stood as if weightless on top of the tangled spirals of grass which had trapped me and everything else in the area in a mass of spiraling stems which filled the space and seemed to be trying to restrain me.

"I am aware of that, thank you." I grimaced, trying to lift my arm, the stem of a ridiculously large and distinctly out of season daisy clutched in my hand but trapped in the grass like everything else. "Would you mind cutting me out of here?"

"Hah, certainly." He laughed, drawing out a long knife and splitting through the tangled mess. "Though perhaps it would be better to leave you down there, it might be just the motivation you need to learn control."

"I'm not lacking motivation," I said, dragging myself out of the crap, which had stained my plain robe green. The clothing was a compromise with Then in regards to my state of dress while practicing. "It's just not easy."

The tangled patch was not the only odd sight which I had left in my wake in the area, what had once been a small patch of forest now stood supernaturally massive, the oaks now towering more like Sequoia, and various areas surrounding it seemed right out of fairy tales, patches of clover taller than me, and bushes growing sideways in twisted shapes.

Frankly, it all looked like a very odd tourist destination.

"If you have not done it yet, then you lack motivation." The elf smiled, hopping down from his gravity-defying perch. "Control is a matter of mental strength, not something which can be achieved by rote practice, you know this from your healing, else you would be giving everyone boils."

"It's not that simple." I groaned. "The power comes too easy, it is like if I were to put my hand on the lever of a pump and that it would gush forth ten thousand gallons if moved the slightest touch." I groaned as I finally managed to wiggle my hand free from the plant's grasp, and began pulling at the rest of the stems binding me.

"If your slightest touch pours forth gallons than you must make your touch slighter."

I rolled my eyes at the elf, climbing up from the leaves. That wasn't nearly as easy as he said it was. When I bonded to nature to cast my spells it was like dunking myself in a tidal wave.

"Whatever, I think I'm done for the day."

"You will never achieve control by running away from it."

"I'm aware, but I won't achieve the control I need by throwing my head into a brick wall again and again either. At least not today."

"...Fair enough, Church-child, we will continue tomorrow."

I nodded to the elf, and after getting properly dressed once more I walked back towards camp. I was looking to find Mary or Karsten and maybe pester them about something. Mostly I just wanted to take my mind off of the life-magic training and my own lack of progress.

My female companion was the first one I spotted, as her fiery hair was visible from half-way across the camp. "Mary," I waved, "what are you up to?"

"Oh, Abbot? Done with your training already? Well, the men from the merchants guild came in with new supplies this morning, so I was going to haggle with them."

"Haggling?" I smiled. "That sounds fun." I hadn't done much haggling, that was mostly Mary's job. She was really good with financials.

"Do you want to come?" Mary asked, smiling, and I nodded quickly.

"Alright." She reached down and scooped me up. "I'll take you over there, maybe having a priest around will help."

The merchants guild ship was easily recognizable sitting in the deeper part of the River. Unlike most of the barges that came down or even the ferry, it actually used a sail, and was armed with a few cannons clearly visible on its sides, apparently to hold off bandits, though that seemed unlikely this far south.

"Ah, Maria, how are you on this pleasant day." The lead merchant greeted, I had seen him a few times around camp but only spoken to him personally once. He was a swarthy-skinned fellow, who's family apparently originated all the way at the northwest corner of the continent, way up in the Clay Desert. The region was isolated by the storm-flood and the western part of the great bowl of mountains that sheltered most of the continent. "And the little priest as well, greetings fair and honorable Abbot."

"And greetings to you as well Saul." I nodded. "How was your journey down-river?"

"Ah, quite pleasant, the autumn is just beginning to set in and the trees are cast in such lovely shades of red and gold. I quite like it."

I nodded. This far south autumn was already in full swing. While my routine magical saturation seemed to be keeping the patch I trained in supernaturally green, the rest of the sparse woodlands around the cursed city had lost their leaves some time ago. I imagined that at home the leaves were probably still golden.

"That does sound lovely." Mary cut in, and I glanced up to see a ruthless glint in her eye, "but I'm not here to talk about your trip. What did you bring with you, Saul."

"Ah, as sharp as you are pretty, my lady, and I was sure to bring some of my best stock now that I know such a large group as yours has formed here. Many replacement blades, helms, indeed I even have some newly made armor, fresh from the Forges of Brindon." The man smiled cheerfully.

"Would you care to take a look?"

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"Cold night eh?"

"Yeah, gonna be miserable up here in a couple of weeks."

"Tell me about it." Stewart spooned himself a small cup of the boiling liquid out of the pot. They were always issued the use of it if they took gatehouse duty, but It was a true blessing in the oncoming winter.

Aside from the north gatehouse, the city of Mirno had six others, though they lacked the garrison and fortified area of the north one, and the gates themselves were kept sealed at all times, they still had guards posted at them. They were there both to keep the undead within the walls suppressed, and to maintain rest stops in effect for the guards actively patrolling the walls. The tall if crumbling structures provided shelter from the elements, while still normally being defense enough against the monsters below.

Unfortunately, this night was anything but normal.

The distant clatter of hooves was the first sign of their coming, waking Stewart from his milieu. "somebody's coming."

"At this hour?" John mumbled, staggering to his feet. "The hell do they want."

Before they could get out onto the battlements, the sound of a bell rang out, and a chill-shiver ran up the guards' spines, entirely independent of the winds. Stewart grabbed his crossbow, but before he could make it to the ladder, a clanking sound began to resound.

The guard's eyes met as they felt the floor shift slightly beneath them, and heard the sound of rusted hinges tearing.

"They're opening the gate!"

"I know," Stewart said, moving to the window to look beyond the walls. "Riders."

And riders there were, standing at the foot of the wall as the ancient metal drew open before them. Three figures road atop Jet Black Horses, whose eyes seemed to glow a hellish red.

'Nightmares.' Stewart cursed under his breath.

Stepping back, he grabbed hold of John. "Run to the Prince, tell him that three dark riders on Nightmares have breached the southeast gate, and should enter the city. He'll need to martial an-a-ahhh" Stewart felt his breath constrict as a ghostly hand wrapped around his throat from behind.

Then a sword, glowing with a ghastly blue, punched through his chest, and he lived no longer.

John screamed and scrabble back away as the wraith emerged from behind his friend, a ghastly apparition of a skeleton formed of shadow and cold, two pinpricks of cold blue light flaring in its eyes.

He could only stare in horror as the wraith that had killed his friend sank into the floor, it's bloody sword going with it as if it had never been there at all, and Stewart's falling body the only evidence of its coming.

He could hardly think, could hardly move, much less lift a spear, or even run away.

The clattering of hooves, riding hard onto the cobblestones of the dead city woke him from his terror, though in a certain sense they only served to reinforce it.

When he had gathered his wits he climbed to his feet, still shaken.

Still, his friend had been right. The prince needed to know about this.

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Agamemnon watched as the shadowy mist drew back into the ring on his companion's finger. Bellanjia was no true master of necromancy, not the way her master was, but her abilities were still sufficient to remove the worthless fools employed by the Silver Prince. Especially when she was so close to the power which had brought them here.

She raised the ring before her, communicating with the servant within. "He has killed all who saw us, or so he says."

"Good. But even that I doubt will keep the Silver Prince from noticing our presence. He is old, and not lacking in power."

"Then we should hurry." The third member of their party interjected. "Even if you two manage to defeat the guardian, binding the curse itself will take time."

"True," Agamemnon nodded. "Bellanjia, I will clear a path, but you must keep the dead off of our rear. These corpses recognize no master."

"That will change in time." The witch said, and he was sure that she smiled beneath her hood.

He nodded slightly, before pushing his mount into a gallop, far faster than any normal horse could move. He swung his maul down in a wide arc to send the first of the worthless chaff of this place scattering to the floor in a clatter of broken bones.

He tried to smile, the violence bringing old memories of this place to life, memories of so long ago, far before he had come to serve his current master. Memories of when these streets were flush with life.

Yes, it was two more blocks forward, and then down the river and across the bridge. That would put him in front of the Great Temple of Ulthor, and beneath it his target.

His bony hands shifted their grips on his maul as he sent another one of the worthless automata that walked the streets clattering to the ground as if to prove the superiority of his own binding when compared to theirs. There were more coming now, and he knocked them aside with the ease and contempt one would an unruly dog.

And truly, what more were they?

He brought his horse to a trot before the bridge. His long-dead eyes widening at the tide of skeletons that filled its sides.

"The curse does not wish to be bound it seems." The old artificer chuckled as he rode up behind him. Bellanjia staying farther back to prevent them from being surrounded. "No matter, I have brought a solution for this eventuality."

He glanced over at the old man, who had drawn out a dark gray pearl from his pocket, clutching it between his fingers as he began to utter words in the dark tongue.

"Uoeoun Auor Eoiael"

Agamemnon felt the air shift at the touch of the words, bending and fluctuating around the pearl before the old man cast it forth into the crowd.

For a moment, there was dead silence, before a cone of Shadows shot forth like a geyser of darkness at the center of the horde, and began dragging the very air around it into itself. Bones crunching and rusty old weapons shattering as the bridge was cleared of the skeletons in less than a minute, and taking a fair chunk out of the stone beneath it as well before the shadows finally retreated.

"A soul pearl?"

The old man nodded.

Agamemnon would have snorted were he alive, but he settled merely for resting his maul on his shoulder. "We should move, now, before they can regroup."

"Aye, there are no more of those to spend, and it would be best to save your strength for the guardian. We must hurry."

The bridge deposited them just before the gates of the old temple. A construct built in the image of the old god of darkness, the palace of the warlord Nevan when he had ruled the city.

He could feel the air pulse with the energy of the curse here, with the power of undead literally seeping from the ground. He brought his mace to his side in readiness as he showed open the front gate.

Nothing moved in the once-grand courtyard, now covered in vines of what the mortals called grimmash. Some tried to reach out, trying to attack and entangle his horse. But blasts of fire from Bellanjia kept them back. Her hand glowing molten red as she spoke her spells in quiet whispers.

He could almost feel it as he dismounted and approached the door, the center of the curse, so close that he could feel it's ashen breath even on his own dead tongue.

But he did not let his guard down, for he knew the Guardian was still yet to contend with.

"We must find an entrance to the catacombs." The artificer said, tapping his heel on the ground. "I can feel that it is beneath us, but I cannot place its presence. Not exactly."

"Of course you cant." Bellanjia nodded. "We are already inside of the core."

"That had occurred, but for it to be so great…"

"Every hapless fool who has died in the city for a thousand years has added to its strength, why do you think the mistress left it here so long?"

"Quiet. Both of you." Agamemnon said, his senses flaring.

“We are not alone.”

His hand tightened around his grip as with the silence of his companions, the sound of scales scraping on cold stone floors became obvious.

The Guardian's minions were here.

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