Efrain sighed as he entered the hall, a smatter of snowflakes flinging themselves with abandon over the door frame. Seven pillars in, he paused to gaze as the massive pendulum whispered across the hall, gliding in between the columns and into the dark beyond. with the barest whoosh, it came back again, the mass of steel slicing through the air in near silence.

It was a ridiculous set piece, lacking all practicality, but Efrain had become quite fond of it. The periodic motion almost hypnotizing - back and forth, back and forth. It was soothing in a way few things were in this castle - once or twice he’d even felt the barest fingers of sleep creeping up his spine.

He had quickly quashed those urges however - sleep, or any unconsciousness would dissolve the ties that bound him to this world. No amount of automation or routines he could establish would alleviate that flaw, and that would not do. He still had a lot more to do, places to see, and many, many books left to read.

The mortality of the sentiment drew a certain dry amusement for someone who was primarily composed of bone and air. Mortals simply did not have enough life to live. He was proof of that - centuries after he’d cast his flesh away, he still hadn’t had enough. He sometimes idly wondered if would be better to let go, to let himself drift away as the world moved on without his presence.

The throne sat in the half-light of the hall, a squat thing of right angles and silver inlays. It was a procurement from the previous owner, some warlord four or five centuries previously. When Efrain had stumbled across the castle in his explorations of Frozen Vale, it was moments from pitching over into the valley below. It’d taken decades and eye popping amounts of resources to restore most of it.

At the moment, said throne was piled high with velvet cushions that might seem at odds with a walking skeleton. That one of the most misunderstood things about being a lich, most people thought you couldn’t feel anything. Pain had mostly been lost to him, true, but he could feel pressure or impact. The minutiae of objects, its roughness and texture, even hot and cold could still be felt. A mug of tea steamed in his left hand and, although he certainly had no way of drinking it, he greatly enjoyed its warmth permeating his fingers.

The tea had a lilac blossom base with a healthy helping of cherry jam. Efrain would’ve preferred the dried fruits for the increased aroma, but alas, his stores were empty. He could’ve sworn that he purchased an unholy amount of them some months ago, but it seemed his calculations may have been off. The jam was more for the benefit of any prospective guests, but the last one had poked their head in some time ago.

In any case, the only reason he still bought tea and butter and spices was the feast of scents that he could make with them. After he lost his sense of taste, part of the package when one lacked a tongue, apparently, smell effectively replace it. It was another mystery of the set of enchantments that re-animated him which he refused to unravel for fear of losing another of his remaining senses.

The chill of the hall was rather biting, so Efrain pulled his robe tight around his bones and settled into the cushions. As he picked up the tome off the armrest, the gentle aroma of the tea drifted up like incense. The pendulum swung back and forth with its woosh, his companion in otherwise silent hall. As he drew back the velvet bookmark on twelfth volume of Persepolis’s Abstract Poetics, he felt a certain tranquil bliss - that all was right in his little corner of the world.

So, naturally, the ceiling of the hall exploded in a shower of rubble. Something that glimmered and glowed streaked down to slam into the floor tiles, a cloud of dust rocketing up to obscure it. Efrain had put up his hand to shield his sight, although that happened to be quite ineffective. The cursory enchantments broke as the raw sunlight touched them, diluting the unnatural darkness that had consumed the room.

Efrain was frozen as a blurry figure emerged from the cloud to announce themselves. Relatively short, but broad with interlocking plates and chain mail, their gait quick and confident. As they hefted a sword and shield, their voice resonated through the hall.

“I am paladin Dalia Sphrent, and I have come for you, creature. You are judged guilty of treason against the Church, murder, necromancy, and other crimes too numerous to name. May your sins be purged in the light of the four, and may your heart find its way to their embrace.”

There was a silence, save for the clattering of a few pebbles still falling and the march of her footsteps. Efrain wanted nothing more than to take a deep sip out of the cup. But he physically couldn’t, so he resigned himself to taking the spiritual equivalent of a deep breath.

Then, in a flash of nigh-religious fury, he hurled Abstract Poetics at the approaching figure.

Despite its relative density, it proved to be a rather ineffective strategy as the text ponged off her raised shield, who slowly lowered it to look down at the volume.

“Did… Did you just throw a book at me?” she asked, her conviction now replaced with utter disbelief.

“I just laid that mural in you blockhead,” Efrain sneered.

The woman hesitated as she glanced around the room, then defaulted back to politeness, as most paladins did.

“I beg your pardon?”

As the fit of temporary insanity fled from Efrain, he realized that throwing that book was probably not the best idea. The paladin was dressed in a master-work of bronze accented steel, twisting around her body in ways that simultaneously defied and somehow left little to the imagination. Efrain was tempted to scoff at whatever crusty and frustrated old church forge-lord made it.

“I said,” Efrain repeated emphatically, “you broke my new floor. Do you know how hard it is to get craft-lords into the Vale? You have to transport them, feed them, pay them…”

“What?” said the paladin, disbelief falling into the abyss of complete confusion.

“So you sink all that time and those resources into the thing, then yet another incessant dolt comes crashing down and destroys it,” his jaw clacked as he spoke, punctuating the occasional word.

The paladin pushed back her visor to stare at the shattered tiles, she noticed for the first time how colourful they were and just how many she had broken. Her rigorously polished helm enclosed a rather young face, at first glance anyways. A stray brown strand fluttered in front of pink cheeks, sweat slicking around a pair or large grey-green eyes, flickering with confusion. She felt a flush as heat began to creep up her neck, her confident posture beginning to shrink at the withering verbal onslaught.

“Wait, it’d be completely dark here without the… er,” she gestured back at the generous hole in the ceiling, “you’d never be able to see it.”

“Maybe you can’t. I can see just fine in the dark, thank you very much. Do you even know how much extra I had to spend on the purple dye?” he said. It wasn’t entirely a lie - his vision had indeed grown far more sensitive in the dark, though it wasn’t true night vision.

“I’m… sorry?”

As soon as the words left her mouth, her head shot up, eyes now aflame as anger crawled across the confusion. Efrain reached to pinch the bridge of his nose, but found nothing but his nasal cavity. Self-consciously, he withdrew the digits and laid his hand on his armrest.

“Alright, so, a flaming idiot come crashing down into my home, utterly destroys the work I had spent time, effort and money on, and screams about how much damage I’ve caused,” he punctuated each point with a clack of his jaw.

“So, what can I do for you today?” he said with a searing sarcastic enthusiasm.

“I’m a paladin, it’s my duty.”

“Oh fuck off. How many houses do you destroy on a regular basis?”

The paladin took a slow step forward, then stopped again as she tried to comprehend what exactly was happening. The hordes of undead she’d sheared through never talked beyond grunts and shrieks. But this one could make some noble ladies jealous with its barrage of oratory.

Yet it must be a higher undead to retain so much of its personality - that’s what her teacher and the scripture had taught her, so… Ah! That was it, of course, how simple could she be? Because it was a higher undead, it must be more evil and therefore this whole bait was nothing more than a distraction. Refreshed in the soundness of her logic, she hefted a great sword as tall as she was.

Efrain on the other hand, was not particularly pleased by the sudden reemergence of conviction. For the first time, he considered the hard steel and wondered whether she’d hurl it at him if he tried to run. In any case, the look in the woman’s eyes was now a mixture of rationalized self-assuredness and zealotry. He’d been confronted by enough adventures to tell, and knew from experience it was an inadvisable combination.

Well, it wouldn’t hurt to try diplomacy, he thought as he raised his hands in a placating gesture, the bone digits looking awfully bare compared to the bright steel of her gauntlets.

“Alright, alright… I’ll be honest, I was and continue to be very upset that you did that. But I can rebuild it at some point. Speaking of which, how did you even get up- never mind, can I offer you some tea?” He said, hoisting the mug and shaking it gently to show her.

“I speak no evil, and I shall hear none,” she said, slamming her visor down to heft the great sword and raising her shield. That was a sound indicator that she’d probably wouldn’t listen to any logical rebut, he supposed.