“No! No more! You’re going to make me cry,” they barely managed to say through the laughter. When it finally subsided, they sat up in the chair and dabbed gently at the corners of their eyes with a napkin.

“So… Efrain the light lord slayer. I had never thought I would live to see the day.”

“Oh, don’t call me that. Besides, she said she was just a paladin, not a light lord proper. Besides, you have better claim to that title anyways,” said an exasperated Efrain.

“True. But if you are referring to the little incident on the streets of Angorrah, that was a simple misunderstanding.”

“A little mis- half your was body blown off and you had to crawl for a hour to the nearest safe house!” Said Efrain.

Carnes’s smile cavorted once more on their lips as he recalled.

“Do not worry, I made sure the both of them had it worse. The apprentice survived too, he’s become a person of import, now that I think on it,” they said, looking away as they recalled.

“She said that her name was Sphrent, no?”

“Yes, what of it?”

“Sphrent…” Carnes said slowly as they tapped the table gently, then their face soured, “ah, I remember. The Sphrent family are a particularly unpleasant bunch. They were one of the few Angorrah houses that aligned themselves with the military after the overthrow.”

“And?”

“One of those houses.”

“Oh. Oh.”

Efrain put his skull in his hands as he considered the implications.

“So, you’re saying that-”

“That you killed a member of one of the executioner families, yes.”

Efrain groaned, not even caring to correct the inaccuracy.

“So, I’ve got zero inroads.”

Carnes giggled, though whether it was at his misery or the overarching dark comedy of the situation.

“When I return to Angorrah, I will see if I can rummage around. That being said, if I want to connect with the actual church, I’d have to talk to people who would not be happy to see me. But I suppose it is the least I can do after you shared such a magnificent tale.”

“You operate out of the split city? When did that happen?” said Efrain, looking with surprise at the flesh lord.

“For some time now. They’ve learnt to accept my presence, at least those who desperately desire some ‘freshing-up’, and have the coin to pay for it.”

“And are a convenient barrier between you and the church, no doubt.”

“I don’t deny it,” Carnes said as they assumed a elegant shrug, “but even so, you’d be surprised at how amiable some can be.”

“Must be the pink cheeks,” muttered Efrain.

“What was that?” Carnes said, a perfectly symmetric and pearly white smile flashing.

“Nothing. But that still leaves the question of what I should do. I don’t have friendly relationships with the church, unlike yourself, apparently,” Efrain said.

“I think ‘tolerates through clenched teeth’ might be a better description of our relationship,” said Carnes.

“I don’t even have an idea where to start. Do I repatriate the remains? Pin a particularly regretful apology note on them? ‘Sorry one of your sisters-in-arms is dead, but she just happened to be underneath my pendulum when she brought my hall down.’”

“Not the worst possible thing you could do. There are some within their ranks that wouldn’t entirely reject the gesture,” remarked Carnes, reclining in the chair and taking another sip.

“Delectable. One of the reasons I still come to see you, you know, is just how good of a brew you make. You would be surprised how many otherwise brilliant noble wives can spoil a cup. Just when I think I’d have to go all the way to Hebeen, I remember your charming domicile.”

“Now,” Carnes continued, “you do have an interesting conundrum on your hands. I will assume you do not want a crusade levied against your lands. So that leaves us with attempting to make peace, one way or another.”

Physical fatigue was something lost to a lich like Efrain, but even so he could still feel exhausted.

“Assuming that one hasn’t been levied already. You know,” he said, “I really think sometimes that becoming an undead wasn’t the most well-thought-out idea.”

“You are probably correct,” said Carnes.

“Then why didn’t you stop me?” he said, raising his head to look at the flesh lord.

Because it was an interesting challenge, and, I will remind you, you were very insistent about the whole thing. Not that you ever told me why,” they said with a quick laugh.

“A true friend would’ve stopped me.” Efrain muttered into the table cloth.

This time Carnes heard.

“Oh, my dear Efrain, I have never claimed to be your friend. We simply have a shared history and similar tastes, and thus find each-other’s company pleasant. That not withstanding, you seem to be getting tired of crusaders knocking down your doors. Have you considered a re-imagining?”

“Re-imagining?” Efrain said.

“Let us be honest here, Efrain, your current perception… leaves much to be desired. It is all the shadowy remote castles and undead hordes.”

“So what you’re suggesting is…” Efrain said.

“What I am suggesting is that you create a new face, cultivate an different aesthetic, polish off the ‘grim master of the undead’ myth into something more… palatable,” Carnes said, glancing up and down the dark robes and bright bones.

“I never wanted any of this, it just sorta happened,” said Efrain.

Carnes said nothing, merely smiled and drank from the cup.

“Well, now that that I’ve put that idea in your head,” said Carnes, “I would like to see the body.”

After taking one last inhale of his tea, Efrain led Carnes down a series of steps and corridors, finally out through an studiously clean under-croft. Emerging out onto a terrace hugging the valley, Efrain paused to glance over the edge of a chest-high wall, which plummeted down into a gorge. From that the pair turned past a set of heavy doors leading them into mountain-side tunnels.

They stopped when they entered the only cell whose lanterns were lit, peering at the remains of the paladin.

“My, my,” Carnes giggled, “you must have had to scrape her off the floors.”

The rock stretched above and around them, the deep chill of the cell even making the flesh lord’s breath plume. The fur draped around their shoulders began to flex and twist as it moved across their body. Efrain eyed it, seeing the glimmer of scales where its underside was exposed.

“Another one of your creations?” He said.

“Oh yes, she is a treat. I still need to fine tune some of the contraction cycles to ensure an even spread of heat. The scales also need some work, maybe I will use ekthal instead. They are a smoother fit and rather more durable.”

Efrain decided not to ask how Carnes would find such a rare material in necessary quantities, especially from animals that didn’t even live on their own continent.

“In any case, I am afraid ‘little miss paladin’ is not in any fit state for lying in an reliquary.”

The flesh lord’s generous lips pursed as they gently probed the remains, after removing their gloves of course.

“You did not cast a preservation charm?” they asked.

“I was going to, but you showed up, so my priorities were a little scrambled.”

“I am almost touched,” said Carnes as he nudged around chunks of red according to a logic that Efrain didn’t understand.

“Well, I can refurbish her person to be… presentable. Her lower half possessing the consistency and general appearance of berry preserve is not going to make her battle-brothers particularly happy.”

Efrain sighed.

“And the price of your miracle is?”

That earned him another predatory smile.

“Let me take her back to them. I will handle everything when it comes to this ‘repatriation’,” Carnes said.

“Is that wise, as someone who is barely ‘tolerated’? Showing up with the altered corpse of a paladin?”

“In the worse case scenario, I just blame the ‘grim master of the undead’. Beside, they’re far too busy with preparations, last I was in the silver city,” they said, brushing back the frosty hair of the corpse.

“You’ve put a lot of thought into this, haven’t you?” said Efrain, his voice dripping with sarcasm, not bothering to ask what ‘preparations’ they were making.

“Oh, certainly, but here is how I see it. If I repatriate the corpse and manage to convince the elements of the church that will listen, you have a leg-up when it comes to your reputation. If I do not then you’ll still be some quasi-mythical monster of the Frozen Vale. In other words, at worst nothing will change.”

Efrain thought it through. Carnes did have a point - he really had no use for the body. The most he could do was to create an undead, which would be a blasphemy of the highest order to the church. No bridge-building to be had there. Carnes was also right about his reputation - at worst, it would stay the same. For all their references to a crusade, they’d likely not expend so much capital for a single paladin.

And for all the stand-offish history Carnes and their kind had with the household of heart, they knew people within it. They had connections that he could not create without far more time, resources and the ever-present threat of discovery. Still, he needed a little push, just enough justification to push him over the edge.

“All that granted, what do you get out of all this?” he said as he leaned against the rock of the cell.

“Oh, the usual. Reputation, some level of good will, where possible. And,” they said, picking up the paladin’s severed arms and probing the muscles, “I get a idea of just what they’ve been doing to their initiates at the Hearth.”

“So, effectively, you get all the prospective benefits, and I get nothing in a worse case scenario?”

“What are you going to do with the body? Turn it into another mindless servant? You know that they will likely take far more offence at that than me repairing her physical form.”

Carnes had him there. There was nothing for it - at worst, he’d lose nothing.

“Alright,” he said, “you’ve got your paladin.”

Carnes stood up and smiled as they stretched to the ceiling, the muscles in their shoulders twisting and popping considerably further than they should have. They brought their hands back down and around into a sharp clap.

“Excellent. Now, let us get to work.”