Suggested Listening

Priestess Erena locked eyes with the necromancer, the first time they'd seen one another since she came into the church a dirty homeless peasant-girl following Priestess Calenda like a lost puppy. Erena knew the girl was dangerous then, but had no idea how dangerous until much later. How time changes the world. So it was with more satisfaction than might be considered holy that she answered the girl's request. "I'm afraid the church can't help you."

Elruin gazed right back, not knowing the thoughts in the priestess' head. "Why?"

Lemia took the news less well, and stood with her hands clenched. "If this is about us snubbing your useless church, then that just proves we were right."

Priestess Erena offered a serene smile, knowing full well it would do nothing but infuriate the apostates further. "Not at all." She felt full confidence that a Truthsayer would know her words to be fact. "We cannot tell you anything to help, for there is nothing to tell. Bloodmold is and has always been a deadly plague which resists all known techniques of healing magic. It is common knowledge that only by killing the mold first can you hope to heal the patient. And as I understand it, the abomination runes make it impossible to cleanse the mold without killing the host."

"So you're telling us that the only method is killing them."

"I know little of the nature of this accursed magic, but if there is a method, it must be in defeating the runes, for there is none with bloodmold you don't already know." Priestess Erena turned her eyes down. "I will pray that Enge might bless us with a better answer in this time of need."

"Yeah, you do that, I'll go do something useful." Lemia turned and walked away.

Erena considered making an impolite quip asking what that might be, but that would have been petty. Instead, she allowed the young woman to storm off, before addressing the necromancer. "It is good that you're not as impetuous as your advisor."

"You have my apologies." Elruin clasped her hands and bowed. She was not known for her spiritual devotion, but there was no reason to be rude. "Please, is there nothing you've heard of which might help? Even rumors might lead us in the right direction."

"I am reminded of a tale in Origins which tells of King Emarik, who sought immortality by having his body transmogrified to gold. Which, I suppose, would be immune to both necromancy and bloodmold." Erena wondered for a moment if she was, perhaps, too soft-hearted, then continued. "It was not long before the king was melted down and divided amongst his once-loving children. It is a warning, that those who would twist nature to their own will shall suffer unspeakable fates for their hubris. Bloodmold, horrid as it is, was born of nature. This abomination magic is the enemy of nature, so it is there which will be vulnerable."

"As you wish." Elruin bowed again. "I believe we are done here."

"Go with Enge," Priestess Erena said, then prayed in silence long after the necromancer left. Enge had not moved to action when the blasphemer claimed to be Chosen, nor did he seem inclined to act now with this foreign invader using the foulest of magics conceivable to attack his children. Were the world in better condition, she would make the pilgrimage herself.

Elruin found Lemia pacing outside the church. "I think she was telling the truth."

"I know, I know, I'm just frustrated. I guess it was too much to think there might be a solution more merciful than 'burn everything that so much as breathed in the presence of these poor people'. I hope you didn't have to humiliate yourself too much on my behalf."

"Priestess Erena told me the story of King Emarik." Elruin ignored Lemia's huff of disdain. "It did get me thinking, however. Maybe there is a way to transform people, kill the mold, then turn them back? The runes are easy to deactivate, if not for the mold shielding them."

"Only thing I know that'll transform a body without killing it is some forms of sarite, but that will kill weak people faster than the mold. And I guess some dragons have venom that can turn a body into stone, but I don't know if there's a way to reverse the transformation. I also don't know how either trick would react with bloodmold or taint runes. They might be cured, or they might explode like they do when exposed to fire magic."

"Then we must wait for the experts to learn what they can of the runebone magic."

"I have some thoughts about that, myself," Lemia said. "Didn't it seem to you that this sort of runebone magic is exactly the sort we found in that book in Sonhome? More advanced, but based on the exact same principles?"

"It did." Elruin looked down at her armor, crafted of that very technique. Which tied in all too well with her pets' ability to extract life essence. All of them were connected, in some way she couldn't begin to understand.

Suggested Listening

Lord Garit finished the incantation pulse, which reverberated across all of those in witness, then took a breath while waiting for those amongst them to recover from the alien sensation of the magical wave. "As you can see, it's a complicated alteration to your magic, one with notable deficiencies in speed and power, but it will allow you to bypass the body and strike the bone directly with any other applicable spell, including many variations of detection spells."

Elruin frowned, considering the nature of the spell. It worked quite well, but it came with one notable drawback. "Am I wrong, or does this do nothing to save those who have bone runes?" She spoke to Lemia, but Lord Garit was the true target of the question.

"Lady Elruin is astute in noting that, indeed, this will do nothing to protect those with bone runes. If the victims don't carry bloodmold, or some other as yet unrevealed surprise, then healing magic will still break the necromantic runes, but if they do, then the mold will likely kill the victim. We cannot save everyone, so we must devote our efforts to protecting ourselves and our allies first. Such is the nature of war."

In short, Lord Garit as well as all of the priests, nobles, and scholars in this meeting had consigned those people to their deaths. Elruin took a slow breath, then nodded. "I understand, we have a responsibility to our charges." It didn't sit well with her, however. "As such, I will be going to seek out the creator of these abomination runes. I will make it tell me how to stop the runes, then kill it."

Calling a person an 'it' was a dire insult, but appropriate when referring to an abomination mage; they were not seen as human. Perhaps this made Elruin a hypocrite, considering her own use of the undead, but she felt there was a difference between her dollies and carving up living people to use as biological weapons, although she knew she was alone in that opinion.

"Lady Elruin, do you believe that is wise?" Juna took over for her brother, as this was no longer a conversation that could be had without direct address.

"I know I'm immune to the bloodmold, as was Priestess Esra." Perhaps volunteering Cali was wrong, but it was a good excuse to get her as far from the twins as possible for the foreseeable future. "I should be able to find other allies with similar immunities. Perhaps amongst the dwarves, their natural fire magic should protect them. I've controlled and destroyed the undead numerous times before, I can do it again."

Lady Juna's eyes narrowed. "If you can find the source of the runes, or recognize it when you do. It would be terribly shortsighted of us to let you leave under such circumstances, with little hope of success."

"I have developed a spell that can let me see some fragments of a dead body's memories." She looked at the scholars present; such techniques were unusual, but she wasn't alone.

For Lady Juna, there was but one response to such a claim: "Show me."

Suggested Listening

Elruin stood before what was left of the runic bones, then began to play to the bones of the dead as the bones played back, singing the song of the last important memories of their lives.

He walked alone during a dark night, hungry and uncertain of where his next meal might come from. In his desperation, he looked at the houses. Surely there was one which wasn't so well guarded. He smelled then the soaking warmth of fresh bread on the air.

She held her son close, as the morks yipped and chattered in the darkness. They were fools, these men entrusted with their lives. They left too late, insistent that there was still time even after all the delays of making certain her carriage was cared for. "It's not your fault," a voice whispered to her.

He stared down at the moonlight reflecting from the water, allowing his last few tears to drip out into the darkness. She rejected him, preferring instead that useless fop of a merchant's son. He put one foot on the ledge, then heard a woman's sobbing in the distance.

The scent led him down an alleyway that, were he paying attention, he never would have went. No sane man dared go to the darkest corners, for that was where the men who were real criminals would go to hide from the law. He was hungry, so hungry.

The morks scattered before the kind voice. A strong voice that reminded of her father, back when she was a little girl and he was strong and healthy.

"Mommy?" Her son resisted, but not for long. "Where are we going?"

"Somewhere safe."

She disappeared into the forest, the caravan guards unaware that she had left until they heard her screams.

He followed the crying girl's voice. Surely, this was the voice of a goddess, for no mortal being could make notes so beautiful. He was half correct.

The thing crawled out of the darkness three rotten limbs at a time. Sometimes arms first, sometimes legs, or a face, or a different face. Rotting flesh, exposed bone, and the stench of diseased flesh. Across its body oozed sores that pulsed with life, somehow, within the tainted flesh of undeath. They stood, watched, but did not struggle when it reached for them.

Their eyes saw this horror, but their minds saw a kindly old woman willing to aid a starving man, a strong and reliable father worthy of the trust only a child could have, a lonely maiden who should never have to know heartbreak.

They screamed, their flesh burning in agony as the thing carved open their limbs and extracted their bones. Then, it took bones from its own abundant collection of limbs and replaced them. Living gel consisting of unknown life was stuffed inside them, to hold the bones in place and seal the wounded flesh. It would not last forever, but it would last long enough to serve its purpose.

Their minds only a full stomach, a loving embrace, a gently caress.

The things carried them to new destinations to unknowingly deliver their secret payloads, cradling them as a parent cradles a child, as a spider cradles its cocooned prey. Meanwhile, its other limbs went to work carving a new set of runes into the fresh bones.

Elruin watched both in disgust, as the mind and body told two opposing stories, until she lost control of her music and fell back into Lemia's arms. "It... they..."

"Shh, you're safe, you're here with us," Lemia whispered. "Take your time, when you're ready to tell us."

"It's... they were attacked by a composite corpse-thing with dozens of limbs and multiple heads and a body made of at least ten different people." Elruin took her time, as memories faded away like dreams within dreams. "It took out their bones, and replaced them with its own."

"At least I won't have to caution the Guard to not accidentally kill someone innocent," Juna said. "Consider it standing orders to destroy crawling corpse horrors on sight. How does a thing like that hide?"

"They have magic, probably miasma in origin. They used illusions of smells and sounds and attractive faces that were exactly what the victim wanted to see in order to lure them."

"Undead with magic?" One of the exorcists scoffed. Later he might have to be chastised for speaking to a woman the way he did.

"Not necessarily." As far as Lemia was concerned, if he got to speak to a woman that way, she got to speak to him the same way. That it helped deflect suspicion from the possibility of, say, an undead priestess healing people on the outskirts of town was also important. "It could be more runic magic, set to broadcast a lure spell following preset conditions. All the monster would need to do is follow a series of rote instructions built into it by its maker. The level of skill would be significant, but hardly impossible."

"Some of their memories were erased, but only from their minds, not their bodies." Elruin stepped away from Lemia, to stand on her own strength again. "It only controls them until the thing is done."

"Then we're dealing with a dangerous necromancer with perhaps the most subtle of magical spellsets." Lady Juna considered her options. "I'll work out more specific details later, but for now adjust our roster to ensure there are at least two inquisitors at the gate at all times, and make certain all our compulsion wards are checked twice daily."

As defenses went, they were good ones, but they were a defensive strategy alone. "Lady Elruin, we can't afford to part with any Inquisitors, but if you need some soldiers or specific equipment, I'm willing to listen."