Book of The Dead

Ariez Sathin, Lady of House Sathin and inheritor of the divine blood of Hammar watched as the black and purple clouds rolled over the city. Her city. Baristaya had been a minor frontier outpost when her family had taken over the rule from a defunct Noble house. Under the leadership of the Sathin family, the city had prospered and grown for hundreds of years through hard-fought, painstaking gains.

It had taken five generations to finally drive back the Dust Folk closest to the border, destroying their wells and rooting out their sacred caves hidden amongst the dunes. With fewer raids and less competition over the dunes, people had been more confident to settle closer to the sands and Slayers had arrived to hunt the monsters prowling the border. It had taken another four generations to lobby for and complete the irrigation works, funding the project through the pittance the house collected in taxes at the time. When it was finally done, the amount of arable land inside their territory quadrupled overnight. Leasing the land to tenant Farmers brought much-needed income, and a larger population, which meant more taxes and revenues. When the crops were harvested, prices of food dropped sharply and all of a sudden, Baristaya didn’t need to pay usurious prices to import food from inland houses who turned their noses up at the border Lords.

That money had been poured into the road network and security, another six generations to finish quarrying the stone, having it brought in via ship and then carted over land before it was cut and laid. Even with the aid of magick, laying down roads on such sandy soil had been a nightmare, requiring a long and painful, and expensive process to ensure they wouldn’t shift and crack over time, requiring the road to be laid all over again. House Sathin endured. If they were going to do something, then they were going to do it right.

Finally connected, commerce and traffic from the outer villages flourished. With a wide, secure and well-made link between Baristaya and the inner cities, trade boomed, bringing prosperity to house Sathin and the people over whom they ruled by divine right. It was at this time that others saw what her house had made of the once pitiful and meagre borderlands and conspired to take them for themselves. What followed was four generations of vicious politicking, currying favour with the Duke through flattery and enormous bribes, casting slander and sabotaging their rivals. Knives in the dark, poison in the cups and the ever-changing tides of influence and authority.

Their place had only become secure once the border alliance had been finalised. Now wealthy enough to fight with the larger houses, so long as they cooperated, House Sathin and their neighbours had shown that they were willing to get their hands bloody in order to defend what was theirs. Slowly, the pretenders and threats to their holdings diminished and faded into the background, allowing the house to turn their attention once again to the prosperity of the family and the land.

Baristaya had grown to become the jewel of the desert, the palace in which she resided, the capstone upon all that her family had built.

Would it really be taken from them by one man?

”My lady, the children have gone ahead, as you requested.”

Hands upon the railing, Ariez gazed out over her land. Only a day before, she had seen shining sands in the distance, but now they were hidden behind a veil of shadow and darkness. Only a day before, the sun had beaten down upon them with a searing heat, yet now it was shrouded and hidden, a chill clinging to the air.

”Lady Sathin,” Massan rumbled, ”It is time to leave. All of the others are already gone.”For a moment, her hands tightened on the railing, her knuckles whitening as she clung to the gilded wood. With a sigh, she forced herself to release her grip.

”I’m coming, Massan,” she said. ”Have all the people been evacuated?”

He hesitated, a subtle emotion flickering across his dark features.

”They are in the process of evacuating, my lady, but have not all left yet.”

”What? Why not?” she asked, concerned.

Clearly reluctant to speak, Massan eventually opened up, knowing she wouldn’t leave the subject alone until he did.

”There simply hasn’t been enough time, Lady Sathin. The guards are trying to keep the crowds orderly at the gates but panic could spread like wildfire at any moment. If there is a rush, hundreds, maybe thousands would be crushed to death in the press. Others... others are refusing to leave.”

”What?” Lady Sathin gasped, appalled. ”Why won’t they leave? Don’t they know what’s coming for them?”

Who knew what the Necromancer would do to the people who remained in the city when he arrived? She could only imagine they would be immediately slain and added to the enormous army that even now moved to surround Baristaya.

Massan could only shake his head helplessly.

”The old and the infirm, my Lady. They don’t believe they can escape in time, and don’t want to even if they could. They are tied to their homes and memories. We forced everyone out of the border villages, regardless of what they wanted, but our people are too busy maintaining order. We don’t have time to go building by building and drag everyone out.”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

His face fell.

”My mother has refused to leave,” he confessed heavily. ”She won’t listen to a word I say.”

Lady Sathin bit her lip, a bad habit she had developed as a girl that her aunt had never managed to beat out of her.

”How long until the city is surrounded?”

”Four hours, my Lady. The undead are moving much faster than we anticipated.”

”Are they ever,” she muttered.

Whenever she had imagined the undead army of Arihnan the Black, it had always appeared as a slow and inexorable tide of death in her mind. Certainly it was depicted that way in the histories, spreading out over the countryside like tar. This horde was eating up the kilometres, marching farther and faster than any army she had ever heard of, their cloud of darkness boiling ahead of them. Despite being as prepared as they could be, given what they’d known, the border houses had still been caught off guard.

Four hours... it wasn’t much time. In fact, it was hardly any time at all. If she pulled the guards away from the gates, then the risk of fatalities would rise exponentially; if she didn’t do anything, then there would be thousands—maybe ten thousand—people still inside the city when the undead swept through like plague. Neither outcome was acceptable to her.

Massan frowned.

”My Lady, I know that face. No.”

She frowned.

”You have no idea what I’m going to do,” she said.

”I don’t need to know the details,” he said, shaking his head, ”I know it’s going to be inappropriate and dangerous. I’ve guarded you since you were a little girl, I know how your mind works.”

Lady Sathin pursed her lips. She didn’t like being addressed this way, even by her most loyal and longest-serving guard, but he was correct.

”If both options are unacceptable, then we must create a third,” she said firmly.

”And how do you propose to do that, my Lady?” he said, resigned.

”We will parley with the Necromancer.”

”Divines above,” Massan groaned, ”kill me now.”

Two hours later, the tide of miasma was practically lapping at the walls of the city, covering the land in a blanket of shadow and death. In place of the sun, three moons of radiant chill shone down on them, raining dark magick like ink. Lady Sathin sat upon her horse, regal and composed, or as regal and composed as she could while a Mage acted as a glorified umbrella, using a shield to keep her clean.

”I don’t know how I let you talk me into this nonsense,” her husband, Lord Leras Sathin groaned. ”You want to try and negotiate with a madman. Why not try and debate philosophy with the monkeys while you’re at it? I’m sure they’ll be just as receptive.”

”Hush, Leras,” she said absentmindedly. Her mind and her eyes were focused elsewhere, towards the heart of the dark cloud ahead of them, to be exact. Was there movement? The Necromancer had to have seen their flag of parley by now. Would he send out a delegation, or perhaps come himself? Or perhaps he would refuse and simply continue to march forward. She knew the latter was by far the most likely outcome, but she had to try. If he refused to negotiate, then they would flee ahead of the horde and nothing would be lost. Hopefully.

”You haven’t seen what those flying things can do,” Leras muttered darkly, eyes on the sky. ”I’ve lost too many people to those nightmares already.”

”I have your assurance that our guard here is sufficient to kill the creatures if they attack,” she replied. ”Shouldn’t you want them to strike?”

”I do,” he said, still looking up, ”but I also don’t.”

”Look, over there,” Ariez declared, pointing suddenly.

”I don’t see anything,” Massan said. ”Perhaps it is time to leave.”

”No, I saw something,” she insisted.

”Damn, I think she’s right,” Leras said, frowning.

Her party was deceptively small, only thirty of her best people. In truth, there were more buried amongst the sand and significantly more waiting just inside the gate to the city not a kilometre behind them. If things went poorly, she expected they would be able to fight their way out. It was a risk worth taking to save her people. Massan’s mother would not become an undead soldier in a madman’s service. She would not allow it.

From the heart of the miasma ahead, an undead appeared. Riding on a steed of smoking bones covered in heavy armoured plating, it looked like something out of a nightmare, a creature of death and darkness conjured by the Divines to scare children, and adults. Atop the intimidating steed rode a figure just as ghastly, with ethereal green fingers wrapped around the reins and wearing bone-plated armour of its own.

Although it bore no flag, it also appeared to carry no arms, perhaps a sign that the Necromancer had agreed to speak? Soon, more undead appeared, but not a great horde rushing towards them, as they had feared. Instead, there were only ten. Just ten.

Ariez saw Leras weighing the approaching undead, his eyes hard, calculating. Subtly, she shook her head. If he saw the gesture, he didn’t show it, only continued to measure with his gaze. They had flown the flag of parley and arrived without weapons, as ancient tradition decreed, yet that didn’t mean they were harmless. If the chance came to strike the Necromancer down, she knew Leras would be sorely tempted to take it.

If he did, and failed, then not only were the people inside the city doomed, but possibly they themselves. Besides, they didn’t even know if the Necromancer was amongst the group approaching them.

Then, she felt it. A pressure, like a weight sitting on her chest, making it hard to breathe. The air around her seemed to become thick, more difficult to force into her throat. She could tell from their reactions that the others felt it too. Leras’ face tightened while Massan moved forward subtly, trying to put himself closer to the source of the threat.

As the undead drew closer, she could see a figure in the centre of the group. The details were hard to make out, but they were walking, a staff gripped in one hand. A living hand.

It looked as if the Necromancer had emerged after all.