“When you compare the sorrows of real life to the pleasures of the imaginary one, you will never want to live again, only to dream forever.”

- Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo

“How did you know what that cat-thing was?” Mireille was the only one that wasn’t breathing hard. Even Calvin was a bit out of breath. Age and lack of exercise combined to rob him of his vigor.

“They are rare, certainly, but the more common monsters are usually killed by the local authorities, and mages are only needed in exceptional situations. Alps, on the other hand...can be a mite troublesome. Finding them and then catching them. Nearly impossible for someone without magic. So we academy mages get to see them more often than their scarcity might suggest.”

They had been walking for hours now. And despite the somewhat light-hearted banter, the group was subdued and very aware of the fact that they were getting farther and farther away from their goal while being hunted.

Alea was stumbling by the time they finally stopped for a rest by midday. Butler One had taken her arm while also hefting her backpack and other supplies, but it was barely enough.

Alyssa looked around and stretched. She felt fine actually. The dark magic suffusing the country replenished her more than any rest could ever do.

“So, eat something even if you don’t feel like it, and then we rest for half an hour.” Calvin rubbed his hands together and warmed them on the gently glowing tip of his war-staff. An old trick he had copied from some older mages that were normally good for nothing more than swilling beer and gossiping. But sometimes, they had useful wisdom to impart.

They sat under the bare branches of a willow tree overlooking a frozen forest lake. The winter sun shone from above, and the brilliance of the ice was nearly too much to bear for long. A coldness brushed her neck, and with a sigh, a weight settled on her neck as the dead cat draped itself around her shoulder. “Is something the matter?” Alyssa whispered and turned her head to look at the Alp.

Green eyes fixed on her amethyst orbs, then drifted to the side, fixating on something in the forest. Claws slowly pierced through the coat, pricking her flesh as the feline vanished into the dappled shadows of the trees.

“There is something in the forest!” Alyssa stood up, stuffing the rest of the bread into her mouth. Patting her gloves against each other to get rid of the crumbs, she focused and, after hastily swallowing, intoned the spell for Dusk-Eyes and, quickly after that, the Shielding Mists.

She felt the void energy long before she saw anything as a prickling cold much more acute than mere temperature.

Breaking branches, heavy but muffled thuds as hooves hit the snowy ground.

Bursting from the woods a good two dozen skeletal horses wreathed in the merest hint of darkness broke from the forest as branches whipped at them and bushes were trampled flat. The riders were skeletons wearing rusted armor held together by spite and darkness. Pitted weapons were raised with mechanical discipline. The first among them wore a crown of tarnished silver, and the remnants of scraggly hair brushed his shoulders. Empty eye sockets glowed with pale green light.

“Take cover behind the trees!” Calvin shouted as he brushed along his staff, gathering fire energy forming it into an incandescent ball.

Mireille conjured lightning around herself and brandished a sizzling spear of electric blue.

Alea began a long incantation, gathering radiant energies.

Alyssa threw herself to the side as a javelin thudded into the ground where she had been standing. Cyrus shielded her with a scaled wing.

Racing forward, lightly maneuvering with supernatural grace through brush and trees, the undead riders reached them. The crowned warrior stopped behind the other riders and the bare skull adorned with a deathless grin regarded them indifferently.

Mireille jumped over one of the oncoming horses, rider and all, and with a flick of her weapon, burst the ribcage in a thunderous explosion sending the spine, skull, and arms spinning to the side.

Alea was not ready as they reached her; Butler One grabbed and threw her behind a tree, where she fell on her backside, grimacing more from humiliation than pain.

A flaming sphere impacted another group sending gouts of flame and steam into the air but the darkness around the horses intensified, and black energies flared around the fist of the wight before the rider broke through the fire and smoke to bear down on Calvin.

Alyssa clenched her teeth and raised her left hand. Unnoticed by herself, she grinned wildly as the jewel in her wrist began to suck in copious amounts of mana. An incantation forced itself through her throat, bruising vocal cords not made for the words she spoke.

Her will formed tendrils of midnight black, shooting into the approaching undead, hitting their cores. The white became blinding while the black deepened into an abyss bereft of color, like a flash of lightning in reverse. The darkness throwing out shadows of light.

“KNEEL!”

Dead horses broke down and pressed themselves to the ground. The riders made of bone not held by any sinew, earth, and grit frozen to the too-pale bodies and skulls bowed their heads.

The crowned wight looked at her. He was the only one still standing. A sigh blew through the clearing and over the frozen lake. And then he spoke, his voice a scratchy hiss.

“My time has passed. My soul is sunk in darkness, and yet they pull me into the light. What do YOU want from me, little girl? There are no dreams, no hope for me. But I have hate aplenty. Dare you use it, use me?”

Calvin held the ball of flame tethered to the warstaff and raised an eyebrow while taking a step to the side. He was confident that they would survive the encounter but less so that it would be without injuries. So he hesitated.

Confronted by the intense stare of the wight, Alyssa stumbled over what she wanted to say, and silence spread. The undead shifted and gripped his mace tightly.

“I need your help. My enemies are the people that raised you. If that is sufficient to make you submit, tell me. If not...I think your former comrades won’t help you anymore.” Swallowing, she squinted against the glare of the sun on snow.

The wight scoffed at that, “It matters not. I will have my revenge this way or another. Little girl, you reek of power, and yet you are soft as cotton. Which is true? Which is false? It will be amusing to see.” His gaze lingered, and then he nodded, “I will follow you, for now.”

“You...mean that? You really want to have those…” Calvin made a sweeping gesture losing control of his fireball but thankfully dispersing it relatively safely.

“Yes.” Alyssa did not know where her calm came from. “I need more protection. And I will not go back to the fortress. I have to go west.”

“What’s gotten into you!” Calvin shouted and then, remembering the situation, looked at the tall wight seated on the skeletal horse warily. “We should talk.” Seeing the interest in the wight's eyes and the other skeletal riders getting back up, he continued, “Without the audience.”

“I have to kill the lich queen!” Alyssa shrunk back after her outburst.

The undead warrior laughed with a grating sound. “You might have overwhelmed the weak bindings with your own magic, but that is nothing before the might of the Heartstealer. I dare say even this power is not wholly your own.” The light in his eyes dimmed. “Keralis Erh. Those bastards. Good that I have nothing to lose anymore. It matters not to me. But if you want to continue living, you should listen to the girl. I feel the power beyond the mountains grow with each passing day, and if it is not checked soon, all of this will fall under her sway.”

“You talk too much.” Calvin ground out. “And she is still a student. There will be others to take up the fight- She most certainly will not need to!”

“That is a bold opinion. Of those here, she is the only one that could compel the husks and me. What makes you think another fireball would have had more effect?”

“She is still a girl. There are armies, squadrons of mages back in the capital.”

“Yes. And if I remember anything from my former life, there they will stay, isn’t that right? The nobles will protect their lands, and then they will protect the crown. It is always the same. Not that I begrudge them their self-interest, but she is here and willing. She has power, and perhaps she has a chance. Honestly? You will all die horribly and be made into my likeness.” He laughed again.

“Good that you are having fun.” Calvin fumed.

“What he said is not wrong, isn’t it? All this time, the threat of Ulsolm was known, and nothing was done about it. In Firswending, they said- It is contained. Meaning that it is not bothersome enough to really do something about it!” Alyssa interjected.

“They sent all those to the north they thought had no future, no potential.” Mireille walked up to them and said. “If they really wanted to end the threat, they wouldn’t have done that, wouldn’t they?”

Alea was hiding behind Butler One and between her hands hung the eye construct made of light glyphs.

“You did not ask, but I think our alliance warrants it. My name is Calmund Gotthard von Nordmark.” The wight spoke.

“Nordmark?” Alea asked and inspected him.

“What’s so strange about that? They used what they had on hand. Where do you think they would have gotten an old war-wizard like me? From the royal crypts…?”

“I only thought you might be my great-grandfather.”

“Mh. When I look at you, I see some of my lineage in you. What’s your name, girl?”

“Alea von Graufurt.”

“Ah. Graufurt, that backwater.” If he still had lips, he would probably have wrinkled them. The tone was scathing.

“And Nordmark is looking very good lately?” Mireille looked at him with a combative expression.

“They ruined it. The lands are soaked with void, and the peasantry are dying. If the war does not finish it the undead will. My grandchild is a power-mad idiot. Those lands here will become a waste, a monument to greed and stupidity. On that, we are agreed. Makes Graufurt no less an unimportant speck on some map.”

“We are really taking those undead along? Really?” Calvin sighed.

“It’s much safer this way,” Alyssa said quietly.

The wizard shook his head and gripped his staff, and waved for them to follow.

Alyssa felt the tendrils connecting her to the dead. The bond to the wight was tenuous at best but strong enough that she would realize him breaking it before he did so. At least, that was her hope. Sending a mental command, the rider spread out into the surrounding forest, following along without being so visible. She thought it best not to burden their friendship any more than necessary. The wight was not so considerate and rode alongside them, his gaze boring into her back whenever she was inattentive.

Evening found them at a small village. The gates stood open, and a large pyre had burned on a snowed-in field before the low palisade. It seemed to have been some time ago. New snow dusted the black ashes with some blackened bones in between.

“Who goes there!?” A shout from a guard came from a rickety tower made of three tree trunks lashed together in a tripod configuration with a small wooden platform on top. There was a tarpaulin stretched over some wooden poles offering a little shelter beneath which stood a man clad in dirty furs with a bow held in hand.

The wight stood back with the skeletal riders inside the forest's edge. It had taken some convincing by Alyssa, which did nothing to alleviate Calvin’s worries about her having enough control.

“Travelers seeking shelter for the night!”

“Stand where I can see you!” And then the guard called down, much softer this time, “Quick! Close the gates! Them’s bandits!”

“We are no bandits! We simply prefer a roof over our head if possible!” Calvin called.

“They heard us!”

“We have some money and can pay!”

“They want our money! Is the gate not closed yet!”

Calvin put his face in his hands.

An older woman walked up to the slowly closing gate and raised a hand which made the as-of-yet unseen persons stop.

An aged but melodious voice sounded, “Christoff, don’t be so hasty. If they meant us harm they would hardly let us close our gates in peace. And if I’m not mistaken, those are the colors of Kronenburg’s Academy. Am I right?”

“Madam! Good to hear a reasonable voice! We are cut off from our colleagues and simply want shelter for the night. We can pay and be on our way by next morning. Hardly a bother at all!”

“Come closer. Then we will discuss this without shouting it to the whole forest.”

Walking up to her, they saw that behind the ill-fitting branches bound together to form a gate stood a group of young men armed with pitchforks and spears. The older woman nodded at them in greeting while inspecting them cautiously but without apparent hostility.

“I am Myra. And what comes closest to an elder around here? The former village chief was sadly killed by undead and lies with those that had risen in the field beyond.” She motioned at the burned patch of ground. “If you don’t cause trouble, I will not send you into the woods. Traveling as you do, you should know the catastrophe that has befallen us.”

Calvin nodded at that.

“Do you have any news if someone is doing anything about this?”

“I fear the answer would disappoint you. The kingdom is beset on all sides, and I fear their help will take some time. The Nordmarks…” He gauged her reaction, and as he saw the tightening of her eyelids, he nodded and continued. “Are responsible for it all.”

“I feared as much. Come in.”

They sat together in the largest hut, eating some warmed-up soup seasoned with dried roots. The tales they had to tell were grim, and the atmosphere depressed.

Finding an empty hut was not difficult as the population was a mere third of what it had been in autumn.

Alyssa gazed into the dying embers of the fire still burning in the hearth, huddled with Alea and Mireille beneath several blankets while Calvin kept first watch. The shadowy cat eyed her from the shadows blinking once and then vanishing into the darkness. Cyrus was lying across her feet, nearly cutting off her circulation, and she shifted to make his position more comfortable.

“Can’t sleep?” Mireille asked softly.

“Mh.” Alyssa turned and regarded her friend.

“It will be an early departure. You should try to get some rest.”

“I know. But I can feel them in the forest, and Calmund is restless. I feel his thoughts. He remembers blood and fire and battle. He once killed some strange green folks out in the mountains.”

“Can you tell him not to disturb your sleep?”

“As if he would listen.” Alyssa perked up a bit and shifted closer, the warmth making her drowsy enough that even the dreams of the old undead did not hold her back from drifting off to sleep.

Vanessa pulled Iseret forward, and with a shimmer, they both appeared in another patch of forest. It was night-time, and an owl hooted in the distance. On a hillside to their left drifting clouds of ice-crystals denoted the presence of frost-wraith, and the vampire marked their position in her mind before comforting her friend. “It will get better if we do it more often. The astral plane is very inhospitable, but I think I have learned to give you breathable air?”

Coughing while trying to stay silent, Iseret nodded. “That is true, but the dust…” She coughed again. This time her hands were flecked with a bit of blood. “I fear the dust is corrosive or contains some shards of metal or crystal or both.” She coughed again, more softly this time.

Vanessa looked alarmed and spoke a short spell glowing water rose around her raised hand, and with a touch, flowed along the graceful arc of Iseret’s neck before soaking into the skin briefly illuminating it in pale blue and pink. “Better?”

“Yes. Thank you.”

“We should not be more than a quarter of an hour behind the girls. Let us make haste and see what they have been up to.”

In a trackless expanse of emptiness, a blackness that was the absence of every color and light, sat a girl with pale white hair and eyes the color of a storm at dusk. Before her sat a cat made of frost and shadow. “Good little kitten. Was it hard? Did it hurt?” The girl petted along the lustrous black fur. “How is she who is me? She never calls for me anymore. It is so lonely.” The hand brushing along the cat's flanks tightened a bit, and with a hiss, the creature vanished only to reappear some undetermined distance away. “If you don’t want to play, go back and protect her. I don’t want to see her here too soon.” The girl pouted.

Singing to herself and turning her head away in a silent dismissal, she rocked back and forth while hugging her knees. The cat blinked glowing green eyes and vanished into the darkness.