Undermind

She were drowning; drowning in a sea of corpses. Thrashing and biting and tearing, she fought to stay afloat. The dead, ever at her beck and call, had turned on her. She were but one, and they were many. And they wanted nothing more than to drag her down; for her to be one of them, and for them to rise in her place. She felt herself slipping, sinking, and she kenned if she went any deeper, she would never rise again.

Light, pure and bright, pierced the grey sky. Behind the light, a face. She couldn’t see the face, but she kenned ’twere there for her. The owner of that face had always been there for her. With a voiceless cry, she reached for the light.

The light answered.

Something reached down for her, and she snatched at it with greedy fingers. A rope; thin and knotted. ’Twere tenuous, but ’twere all she had. She clung to the rope, and it pulled her toward light and freedom.

But she were not alone in her bid to escape the dead sea. From her legs dangled a line of corpses, crawling over each other as they too fought to escape their plight.

Her ascent faltered and slowed. The rope strained against the pull of the voluminous dead. It began to fray. She held firm, determined to fight to the bitter end. But ’twere only a matter of time afore she would fall, and vanish ’neath the waves, never to return.

Never to see her again.

The gaunt bundle of skin and bones lay in the sand, eyes open, but unmoving. Its skin was cold. Far too cold. The thing that had been her friend did not react to her touch in the slightest, but those eyes—those dark, unblinking eyes—they were locked on her face, following her every movement like a cat watching a dangled treat.

Gathered around them, Kveld and Zarie and a crowd of mer villagers all stood in frozen silence. Even Rover Dog looked bewildered, an expression she was not used to seeing on his face.

“Ruhildi?” said Saskia. “Are you in there somewhere? Say something if you can.”

Ruhildi’s lips parted slightly, but no sound emerged.

“It’s okay,” said Saskia, feeling a stirring of hope. “Try to blink your eyes.”

Slowly, as if with great effort, the corpse’s eyes opened and closed, opened and closed.

Saskia sagged in relief, feeling a fresh flood of tears spill forth. Ruhildi may have suffered a…setback, but she wasn’t gone. Enfolding her arms around her friend, Saskia felt the press of dead skin against her own. The dwarf didn’t return the hug, but she didn’t need to. Not yet.

“We’ll get through this, somehow,” she murmured.

“Saskia…’twere just a blink,” said Kveld. “It may not mean what you think it does…”

“We can easily test that,” said Saskia. “Ruhildi, blink if you know who I am.”

A slow blink.

“What about him? You know who he is, right?” She pointed at Kveld.

Another blink.

“And them?” She looked at the wide-eyed mer, gathering around them. They were staring at Ruhildi in…not quite fear, but something close to awe.

The dwarf’s eyes remained steadfastly open.

“See?” said Saskia. “Ruhildi has never seen the Waveriders before, so she has no reason to know who they are. But she does know you and me. It’s her.”

“I…want to believe,” said Kveld. “’Tis just that…no-one returns from the Halls Beyond. No-one.”

“Really?” said Saskia. “After all the weird things we’ve seen, you find that so hard to believe? Ruhildi is a necrourgist and my vassal, so who’s to say her soul—her echo—can’t return to her body?”

“Necrourgists raise dead flesh and bone,” said Kveld. “Only the flesh and bone. Echoes…they do not come back. Not even a necrourgist can recall an echo to its body. Not even the tyrant on the amber throne can do that.”

“Well someone can, because Ruhildi’s daughter came back, for a brief time, in the Battle of Spindle,” said Saskia. “You may not have seen her there, but I did. Ruhildi did. If it weren’t for Nadi, the Chosen might have killed us all that day.”

Ruhildi’s mouth opened and closed the moment Saskia mentioned her daughter’s name, but again no sound came out.

“The bone crawler?” said Kveld. “The one that broke the Chosen’s sword?”

“Yeah, I think she was in there. Then there was my dad—Calburn—who haunted my dreams for a while. Not sure if he counts, because he didn’t have a physical body, and other incarnations of him exist on other worlds. Anyhow, my point stands. It doesn’t seem at all implausible to me.”

The crowd of mer parted, making way for an elderly mer with the most heavily wrinkled face she’d ever seen on one of his kind. A glowing amber pendant jiggled on the end of a chain around his neck as he limped slowly forward, supported by a gnarled walking stick. He spoke with a high, creaky voice. “Spirits of the sea wish me to examine the revenant.”

Saskia blinked. “Spirits of the sea? The revenant? What are you talking about?”

He pointed at the waves lapping at the shore. “Spirits.” Then he pointed at Ruhildi. “Revenant.”

She opened her mouth to speak, but Zarie interjected. “You are a sage, yes?”

The elderly mer inclined his head, which Saskia took to be an affirmation. “Hilmyr, first among sages. So I am named.”

Turning to Saskia, Zarie spoke in her own language. “The Waveriders told me much as we journeyed together. They believe the sea is made of the echoes of the dead. Their great sages listen to these echoes; learn from them.”

“He seems to think he knows what Ruhildi is,” said Saskia. “Have you ever heard of a revenant?”

“No. I will ask him to explain.”

Zarie did so, and Hilmyr told them, “She is a revenant: a spirit plucked from the sea, returned to her shell.”

“The spirits tell you this, yes?” asked Zarie.

Again, Hilmyr tilted his head forward. “Spirits tell me many things. Spirits tell me you are one of our long-lost cousins returning from distant shores. Spirits tell me you travel with a demon. Spirits wish me to examine the revenant.”

Saskia drew in a breath. He may be strange, but there was clearly some truth to what the so-called spirits were telling him. There was real magic here, not just superstition. Something akin to her own knowledge magic, perhaps?

“Okay, Hilmyr,” said Saskia. “Take a look and tell us what the spirits see in there.”

Slowly, and with obvious discomfort, the elderly mer knelt in the sand, then leaned down until his nose was almost touching Ruhildi’s, and he was peering directly into her eyes. His pendant drooped across her throat, flaring brightly as it touched her flesh. The dwarf didn’t flinch back or show any sign of unease at the invasion of her personal space.

After a while, Hilmyr grunted, and rose creakily to his feet. “I must prepare an awakening ritual,” he said. Then he began to hobble away, his walking stick thudding into the sand.

“What?” said Saskia. “What did you see?”

“Spirits of the sea wish me to awaken her slumbering shell,” said Hilmyr, without stopping.

“Huh?”

“Her shell is her mortal body, yes?” said Zarie.

“Her body isn’t just sleeping,” said Saskia. “It’s frocking dead.”

“The sage believes he can wake her,” said Zarie. “We should go after him, yes?”

“I suppose…”

It wasn’t as if she had any better ideas. She lifted Ruhildi—so light; barely more than skin and bones—and stepped after the slow-moving sage.

They walked a long, windy path up onto a small bluff overlooking the surging sea. Hilmyr’s house was little more than a creaky shack, perched precariously on the edge of the cliff. It seemed odd that someone so well-regarded by the villagers would live in such a hovel. Was he some kind of monk, who gave no thought to worldly possessions?

Shelves lining the walls of the shack were stacked high with vials of liquid and containers of dried plant and animal parts. A complex assemblage of tubes and containers dominated the centre of the building. And that was when she realised. This was not his home. It was an alchemy lab.

“Do you recognise any of these potions?” she asked Zarie.

“Rejuvenation elixir,” said Zarie, pointing at a red-brown concoction resting against the floor. “Made from trow’s blood.”

“I need to find out what else goes into those,” said Saskia. “My arlithite-infused blood loses its effectiveness soon after it leaves my body, but I assume these elixirs last much longer.”

“Half a span, if stored properly,” said Zarie. “I know how to make them, but Hilmyr’s apparatus is not the same as we use back home.”

“They probably have access to different ingredients here, too,” said Saskia. “My oracle sight might be able to help us find and identify alternate ingredients. But we should ask Hilmyr, once he’s finished…doing what he’s doing.”

Muttering to himself, the sage snatched up an assortment of potions and containers and torches and unidentifiable knick-knacks off shelves, before ushering them outside. He led them to a circle of burnt ground on the cliffside, surrounded by five blackened braziers. “The revenant must lie there,” he said, pointing at the centre of the circle.

Saskia set Ruhildi down in the spot he indicated.

Hilmyr lit the braziers in a strange sequence, crossing back and forth across the circle, sprinkling a dark powder in his wake. By the time he reached the fourth brazier, she realised that the path he trod was that of a pentagram. A thick, acrid smoke settled over the area, despite the swift breeze that should have carried it away.

Villagers gathered around, pointing and whispering. One of them led a fat, bleating beast into the circle and tied it to a post. Was that…? Oh crap, that was a sacrifice, wasn’t it?

Sure enough, after Hilmyr was done preparing the ground, he drew a long knife and began to chant…not words, exactly—at least none that her oracle translator recognised—but a series of short, syllables, gradually rising in tempo and volume. As his chanting reached its crescendo, he yanked the beast’s head back and whipped the knife across its throat. It fell limply at his feet.

With the flick of his hand, he splashed its blood across Ruhildi’s face. There was an audible pop. He winced and massaged his wrist. Again, the dwarf didn’t respond in the slightest to his actions. Her eyes remained glued to Saskia.

More chanting, and the sage circled Ruhildi, scattering pale grey powder over her body.

Hilmyr drew to a halt, casting his hands into the air. His pendant flared brighter than the sun, and he spoke with a multitude of voices, cascading over one another like waves on a beach. “Awake, sister of the sea,” the voices crooned. “Awake! Awake! Be our hand, our eyes, our voice.”

The fires of the brazier went out. All was still and silent. No-one breathed.

Ruhildi’s eyes never left Saskia’s face. She didn’t blink; didn’t speak; didn’t so much as twitch a muscle.

Minutes passed. Someone coughed.

“I don’t understand,” said Hilmyr, scratching the bald spot at the top of his head. “Spirits bade her to wake. It should have been enough.”

“Well it wasn’t,” said Saskia, unable to keep an edge of anger from her voice. Was this all just a sham? The sage may have real magic, but he could still pull the wool over everyone’s eyes, pretend powers he didn’t actually have. Would her friend be forever trapped in a decaying body, unable to move or speak?

Dejected, she lifted Ruhildi out of the circle. “I’m sorry, Saskia,” said Kveld. “We’ll find another…”

“Another what?” she hissed. “Another charlatan?”

“Another way,” said Kveld.

“Princess should rest,” said Rover Dog, his face creased in sympathy. “Morrow will be better. You will see.”

“You have a place we could sleep for the night, yes?” Zarie asked the other mer.

“Yes, spirit walker,” said a young, heavily pregnant woman. “We have lodgings fit for mer and trows and…the other guests. Right this way.”

Saskia lay by Ruhildi’s side that night, trying and failing to sleep, despite her exhaustion. She felt as if she was missing something blindingly obvious, but her sleep-deprived brain just was taking its sweet time giving her the answers she so desperately needed.

She looked Ruhildi’s mirror on her oracle interface. Still there. Still grey and deathly. The blue vial representing her friend’s essence supply was still only a quarter full—

Saskia sat bolt upright, almost knocking her head on a low-hanging arch.

I am an idiot, she thought.

Ever since they’d landed on this island, she’d been feeling a continual pull on her vast ocean of essence. It was happening even now, at a time when her vassals should be sleeping. Garrain and Nuille may be awake, or maintaining spells even in their sleep. But this pull was stronger than she usually felt from them. And she now realised what it could be.

The zombies and skeletons Ruhildi raised didn’t need to eat or drink or breathe. But they had to be fuelled by something, right? That something was essence. What if it was the same with Ruhildi, in her present state? What if she needed essence simply to sustain herself? What if by limiting Ruhildi’s essence supply, Saskia had been starving her?

Of course, she could be completely wrong about this. But it was worth a try, right? Again she cursed herself for not thinking of it sooner.

Saskia slowly filled the blue vial in her mind. Up until the two thirds mark, she felt a corresponding increase in the amount of essence being drawn from her. After that, it began to level off.

Ruhildi’s back arched. A hissing sigh escaped her lips. Her eyes darting wildly from side before meeting Saskia’s.

“Sashki,” she said in a wheezing, rattling voice. She coughed, and hoicked up a mouthful of coagulated blood and mucus. “Be wary, Sashki. I’m not alone. I don’t ken how much longer I can—”

Ruhildi gasped and flailed, thrashing and clawing at the walls. And when she spoke again, it was with a different voice—or several voices, speaking as one. “Oh the sweet taste of air! Sister of the sea, we are—no! What are you doing!?”

Her friend flopped on the bed for several seconds, then sat up, reaching for her arm. There was a look of panic in her eyes; an expression Saskia had rarely seen on her. “They’re climbing all over me, Sashki! I…don’t think I can stop them.”

Saskia closed her eyes, struggling to calm her roiling emotions and consider the situation rationally. Now was not the time to freak out. Moments earlier, Ruhildi had spoken with the voices of the so-called spirits of the sea. Clearly, this was some kind of possession. When Ruhildi came back, they had come back with her. And now they were contesting ownership of her body.

Hilmyr’s awakening ritual had been a sham, but not in the way Saskia had assumed. Oh, he’d probably believed his own words, or at least chosen them carefully. Her oracle truth sense had detected no outright lies. But the spirits with which he communed hadn’t sought to help Ruhildi out of the goodness of their dead hearts. They’d been looking to hitch a ride back into the living world. That had been ritual’s true purpose.

Well frock that.

“Okay, what do I need to do?” said Saskia.

But now the eyes looking back at her were no longer Ruhildi’s. The dwarf sprang for the door, lightning fast.

Saskia was faster. She snatched up the struggling dwarf in one hand.

“Oh no you don’t,” she said. Calling out to her friends, she said, “Uh, a little help here?”

Rover Dog burst through the door, followed a few seconds later by Kveld and Zarie. After she hurriedly explained the situation to them, Rover Dog held Ruhildi, while Saskia sat and tried to think of a way to do an exorcism.

“We cannot go back, demon!” pleaded the voices of the spirits. “Please, let us stay. We will help—”

“I don’t think so,” said Saskia. “That’s my friend’s body you’ve invaded. And she wants you gone.”

Tuning out their pleas and threats, she activated Ruhildi’s mirror on her interface. The view, when she activated it, was not what she expected. She was hanging from a rope, high above a raging sea. Not a sea of water, but one made of corpses. The dead clung to her legs, and to the rope below, and some had managed to climb over her, reaching for the amber light parting the clouds above.

Instinctively, she knew that the light came from herself. And the rope represented her bond with Ruhildi; that of a vassal or…something more? From dream conversations with her father, she’d gotten the impression that a vassal’s bond would end with the vassal’s death, but clearly that hadn’t happened here.

The corpses were obviously the spirits of the dead. Parasites, the lot of them. They had to go.

“Can you hear me, Ruhildi?” she asked.

“Sashki, I do hear you. How are you…?” The voice didn’t come from her physical ears, only through the mirror view.

“Never mind that,” said Saskia. “You’re a necrourgist. These are corpses. Can’t you, I dunno, make them go away?”

“I already tried,” said Ruhildi. “My magic doesn’t work in this place.”

What was this place, exactly? A truly horrific afterlife, or just another metaphorical dreamspace? If she had to guess, she’d say it was the latter.

“Try now,” said Saskia. “I’ve re-enabled your magic.”

Actually, she’d just upped her friend’s essence supply. But she didn’t have time to explain that. And if her hunch was correct, it didn’t matter. The power of belief was paramount in dreams. If her friend believed her magic would work here, it would work.

Ruhildi was silent for a long moment. Saskia could feel her tugging additional essence. Maybe this wasn’t so metaphorical, after all? She kicked at the corpses grasping her legs. One of them fell free, and as it fell, it popped. Limbs and body parts sprayed outward, tumbling into the sea below.

“Thank you, Sashki,” said Ruhildi. “Now ’tis time to put the dead in their place.”

She looked up at the corpses that had climbed over her, shoving her out of her own body; the ones that even now were speaking out of her mouth, pleading with her not to—

Pieces of them rained from the sky.

Watching the carnage unfold, Saskia felt a curious mix of relief and horror. She really hoped this place was just a metaphor, and her friend wasn’t actually obliterating their souls. No-one deserved that. Well, almost no-one.

Emboldened, Ruhildi turned her gaze downward, and began to disintegrate the corpses clawing their way up the rope behind her. She worked her way down its length, until the tower of the dead collapsed, and the rope came free, swaying violently from side to side as it shot up into the sky. The veil of dark clouds parted, and then…

She was looking up at Rover Dog’s frowning face.

“Put me down, you big brute,” said Ruhildi, glaring up at the troll.

“It’s h-her,” confirmed Saskia, her voice catching in her throat. “It really is her.”

No sooner had Rover Dog released the dwarf than Saskia proceeded to smother the dwarf in a tight embrace.

Ruihildi’s flesh was still cold and dead, and her heart still wasn’t beating, but she seemed slightly less…skeletal than before. She’d probably never look as she had before, but maybe in time, and with the right clothing or makeup, she’d be able to pass for a living dwarf.

“This is all my fault,” choked Saskia. “I’m so s-sorry. I wish I could—well, at least you’re still…you.”

“You can put me down too, Sashki. Not that I’m not fair glad to see you.”

“So how do you feel?” asked Saskia, wiping her eyes as she set her friend down.

Ruhildi frowned. “Fair odd. Can’t feel my heart. And my corpse sense is telling me there’s a corpse right here.” She thumped her chest.

“And you’re…okay with that?”

Another long pause. “I suppose so. I can’t change it. My magic can keep the rot at bay. I still have my wits. I don’t see many downsides to being mostly dead.”

“Mostly dead, huh? I guess that’s better than my word for it. So, you don’t…feel a hunger for brains or a thirst for blood? Or an aversion to garlic or sunlight?”

Ruhildi cocked her head sideways. “Like as not, your blood won’t heal me any more.”

“Not what I meant. I’m gonna assume no on all counts, unless you tell me otherwise.”

Not a vampire or zombie, then. So what kind of undead creature was she, exactly? A lich? That would fit the necromancer theme, but liches also stored their souls externally in phylacteries, so even if their bodies were destroyed, they could come back. Where was Ruhildi’s soul, if not inside her own body?

Without warning, her friend sprang into the air, higher than anyone her size had any right to jump. Saskia fell back with a startled cry. The dwarf hung upside-down from the rafters, grinning down at them.

“Methinks I like being mostly dead,” said Ruhildi. Landing lightly on the floor, she did a cartwheel. “Aye, I’m liking this a lot.”

Saskia chuckled nervously. “Let’s not be too hasty. We don’t know how much your body can handle.”

“What’s the worst that can happen? I die of it?”

“No, the worst that can happen is that you explode into chunks of meat and bone that I have to clean up.”

Ruhildi looked thoughtful. “’Twould be best if I don’t cast a bursting corpse spell on myself.”

“No. Please don’t.” Saskia felt an insane giggle bubble up from within. Before she knew what was happening, she was on the floor, laughing so much it hurt, and wiping thick tears from her eyes.

Ruhildi patted her on the back. “Thank you for bringing me back, Sashki. ’Tis not your fault, what happened. Even if you hadn’t taken in all that arlium, I’d have gotten sicker and sicker, until it killed me. Like as not, I’d have succumbed afore lowfall. ’Tis better that it happened the way it did; when it did. Now I can help you every step of the way, instead of being a burden.”

“You would never be a burden to me. I…” Saskia blinked at her friend. She hadn’t told Ruhildi about what had happened at Fireflower Isle. So how did she know…?

Looking overjoyed and confused in equal measure, Kveld threw his arms around Ruhildi, enfolding her in a fierce hug. Zarie smiled broadly and joined the embrace. The tempest didn’t know Ruhildi that well, but travelling together, even for a short time, had forged a bond between them.

Rover Dog nodded at them. “Alive or dead, I am happy have friend squishy back.”

“’Tis good to be back, Doggi,” said Ruhildi.

Hilmyr, it turned out, was somewhat less than thrilled to see Ruhildi back in full possession of her body. The spirits of the sea had apparently been voicing their displeasure to him. “You will leave,” he ordered, his wrinkled face twitching with rage.

“We’d be happy to,” said Saskia, trying not to let her own anger show on her face. “But we will need a lift off the island.”

“I don’t care how you leave,” said the sage. “Only that you do. And never return!”

“We will take you back to Fireflower Isle,” said one of the Waverider women who had transported them here. “Please, don’t take Hilmyr’s words to heart, travellers. He has grown bitter with age. But he will join the spirits soon, and then we will have a new First Sage.”

“I don’t expect his successor to look on us fondly,” said Saskia. “The spirits of this place…they are not friendly toward the living. Be wary of those who listen to them.”

The journey back across the sea was smooth and relatively pleasant. Still, it was a great relief when they finally stepped onto dry land again, and made their way up the slope to the edge of the crater where the dragon rested. No sooner had they drawn near than it stirred to life—or unlife, as it were.

“Okay, guys,” said Saskia, turning to face her friends. “We need to decide our next move. But before we do, I need to talk about what I saw in a series of visions I had while I was absorbing half this damn island. I should have mentioned it sooner, but I was preoccupied with…well, you know. It’s important, though, so here goes…”

She told them about the dragon, the woman and the troll who had set out to seal the arlium volcano that had once poured into the sky from this very island.

“I’m pretty sure the woman was one of those arlium manipulators or metamagicians we’re searching for,” continued Saskia. “She managed to turn the molten arlium of the volcano into the solid structure that gave Fireflower Isle its name. Sadly, I don’t think she survived the event. But I know the trow survived—and, in fact, is still alive today.”

“How do you ken that?” asked Kveld.

“Because,” she said, turning to Rover Dog, “the trow in my visions was you.”