Book of The Dead

Losing oneself to magick was such an easy process for Tyron. Perhaps he was addicted to it. There were all kinds of addicts in Kenmor; people unable to function without drink, or women, or gambling, or any number of things. Master Willhem could be thought of as an addict. If he weren’t able to work with cores and create, Tyron genuinely thought the old man would simply fade away.

There was something about the sigils, the arrays, the runes, the words, that Tyron found endlessly fascinating. There was nothing greater than time spent plumbing the possibilities, trying to build the same sigil array in new ways, rearranging a sequence to squeeze out any sort of gain.

Dove had often railed against those who believed spellcasting was akin to music, a blend of instinct and knowledge that produced something artful. To Dove, magick was construction, building, engineering. Was there something artful about a delicate and well-built structure? Certainly there was, but in the end the only thing that mattered was the function.

To Tyron, magick was even more fundamental than that. Magick was mathematics, magick was logic, language and sequence.

Every sequence could be formed dozens and dozens of ways, and each of those had advantages and disadvantages. Which one worked best for the particular purpose you had in mind? What trade-offs were you prepared to make? Which components most suited your purpose?

Whenever he learnt new sigils, there was always an extensive process of working backward through all of his most commonly used sequences and trying to construct something new that would perform the same role in a better, or at least different, way.

The way the sigils interacted with the words could change based on the context they were used as well. With the right sequence, it was possible to make one plus one equal three, but that came with drawbacks all of its own. There were infinite possibilities, and perhaps some mages believed it was their artistic expression to select the right ones, or to specialise in certain patterns, creating their own unique blend of magick.

To Tyron, that was almost offensively foolish. Specialise in certain patterns? Combine sequences based on feel? That wasn’t magick, that was clumsy and inefficient. He knew he was a gifted mage, although gifted may not have been the right word, but the choices of others were so confusing to him sometimes.

Why would you limit yourself to certain sequences? Learn all of them, then choose the best, most appropriate one. What need was there to focus on reliable patterns, when one could simply craft arrays using the tools available.

Were Dove with him, he’d be able to answer those questions. Because most mages found it difficult to master the proper pronunciation of the words of power, or the precise formation of sigils. So they mastered solid, generic patterns that they could perform under pressure and apply to many different spells. Not everyone could practise a sigil a few times and then perform it perfectly for the rest of their lives. Not everyone could flawlessly memorise the thousands upon thousands of variables each combination of sigils could send awry and balance them out in their head on the fly.

For someone who could do all of those things, the practices of other mages were baffling. Had Tyron been a regular mage, doubtless he would have ticked off an enormous number of people by criticising their work. At least, as a Necromancer, he was forced to teach himself, and there were no orthodox practices for him to rail against. His methods and designs for his craft were entirely of his own invention, and when he thought of his students, hopefully studying and levelling up in the west, he was pleased to know they were learning magick the right way.

With a final scratch of the pen, he completed his latest re-write and leaned back with a satisfied sigh. His trusty notebook had gone through a lot over the years, and was finally in danger of running out of pages. Idly, he flicked to the earliest entries and smiled at the horrible, half-formed ideas and arrays scrawled in messy writing all over the paper. He hadn’t known anything then, and had been forced to figure out whatever he could on the fly. The end result was that a lot of his scratchings and ideas ended up going nowhere, abandoned only half-formed when he realised they were dead ends.

He turned over the pages, moving forward in time and found it pleasant to see how his thoughts became (generally) more organised, more focused on the right concepts. The spellwork was still terrible, amateurish by his current standards, but that wasn’t entirely his own fault. He’d needed time and space to develop his craft, neither of which he’d had back then. Now he had carefully crafted sequences, tried and tested, along with access to far more sigils and words of power, courtesy of the Unseen.

With the final pages in the book, he’d been writing his latest revisions to the fundamental methods of the Necromancy Class. Several versions of the Raise Dead ritual, the best of his techniques for preparing corpses, along with detailed descriptions and diagrams regarding weaving methods. It was helpful for him to compile this information, solidifying the fundamentals in his own mind, but in his heart of hearts, he knew that wasn’t why he’d done it.

The entire city was in an uproar. The Nobles were howling for blood; now that so much divine ichor had been spilled, they demanded an ocean be filled in recompense. Brutality was everywhere, the fear that had gripped the streets before had been replaced with white-knuckled terror.

And they were getting closer. It was only a matter of time before he was found and forced to abandon Almsfield Enchantments for good. A knock on the door could come at any second, and only Tyron’s wards would warn him when they broke in. That was why Flynn and Cerri had to leave, and he was glad they’d finally listened to him.

Everything would come to an end soon, and so he’d taken the time to write down the one thing he hoped would survive in the event of his death: his magick.

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There had to be some way for him to smuggle the book to the rebels at Cragwhistle. It wasn’t perfect, but the book would certainly help his students develop their Skills and make proper Necromancers of themselves. Even if they didn’t get it, the contents would be useful for any of the undead-related Classes.

He frowned. This wasn’t the right way to think. He wasn’t going to die, that’s what he needed to tell himself. He would succeed, his enemies would be destroyed, and he would return to the west and deliver the book to his students with his own two hands. Only that future would be acceptable, none other could be allowed to come to pass.

Feeling resolved, he pushed the book away and stood up. His study had been mostly cleaned out now, all of his current projects were held within the Ossuary, where he couldn’t lose them, but there were still a few bits and pieces lying about, including a few Repositories he’d been working on.

Tyron strode up to the closest, cocked his head for a moment, then began to work his magick. Soon, the spirit was conjured forth from the stone, a shrieking, gasping spectre, barely visible within the fog that surrounded it.

“Herath, time for another chat,” Tyron stated.

The spirit screamed and tried to claw at him, but the confines of the ritual bound it, and the limitations of its form prevented it from harming him in any way.

You will get nothing from me!

Every time with this.

“You know I will,” Tyron said patiently. “All you do is make things more difficult for yourself. Why do you insist on wasting time?”

Murderer. I will suffer if it means taking even a second from you.

The ever-present rage boiled to the surface and Tyron clenched his teeth before it erupted. Being called a murderer, by this person in particular, was infuriating.

“The stench of hypocrisy is so thick around you I can barely stand it,” Tyron grated. “After what you did to my family, you think you’re in any position to criticise?”

Magnin and Beory deserved to die, the spectre hissed viciously, and I am proud of my service to the Empire.

With a single, extended breath, Tyron pushed all the heat of his anger away until only ice-cold rage remained.

“Now you will serve a new master,” he promised.

Never!

“You don’t get a choice, Herath.”

With a gesture, he ended the ritual and banished the Noble’s soul back into the stone before he snatched it up and strode toward the Ossuary. The arch of bones remained in the centre of the room, anchored to a ritual circle that he would soon need to dismantle, lest the Magisters study and learn from it.

He pushed open the door and stepped out of one realm and into another. Face as hard a stone, he placed the rock down on the altar as he ordered his minions to gather the materials he wanted. With dozens of skeletons on hand, it didn’t take long before the carefully prepared remains of Herath Jorlin had been assembled on the altar.

Tyron strode around the raised platform several times, running his expert eye over every centimetre of the bones, ensuring everything was as perfect as possible. When he was finally satisfied, he moved to stand by the skeleton’s feet and began to weave.

Lost in the work, even his anger faded away as his hands danced and fingers flickered above the remains. Threads of pure magick were spun with dizzying speed as he perfectly recreated the methods he’d designed and mastered. Each joint, each muscle, took shape under his discerning eye, any errors corrected before they could truly form.

The feet were difficult, intricate, with many tiny bones working together. Not all were necessary for a functional, walking skeleton, but Tyron insisted on perfection wherever he could. From there he moved up the legs, paying particular care to the ankles and knees. These joints were the most important for a properly mobile undead, and experienced the most wear.

The hips, spine and ribs followed, until he reached the shoulders. Connecting the clavicle, scapula and humerus was difficult, but less important for a mage archetype. Herath wouldn’t be swinging any swords, after all.

But the hands, the hands were incredibly important. Tyron took a second to concentrate, pausing in his weaving as he summoned the correct structure of weave in his mind. It was intricate, multi-layered and incredibly fine, but without it, the undead wouldn’t be able to properly form the spells required of it.

It took an hour on each hand before he was satisfied with his work. Only when he was fully confident each digit would be fully articulate and precise in its movement did he finish the rest of the skeleton. Of course, that wasn’t the end. He inspected his work again, top to bottom, and finding no error, he moved to the next step.

With the stone in place, he raised his hands and began to speak, invoking the Raise Dead ritual.

Time slipped by as Tyron worked. Forming each component of the ritual with meticulous care and flawless spellwork, he carefully constructed the prison which would house Herath Jorlin, made of magick and his own bones. When he reached the final step, he called forth the spectre trapped within the stone and forced it, wailing and shrieking, into its new form, merging the spirit with the weave, pouring it like liquid metal within its own hollow bones until it took root.

Then began the final work, as he bound the ghost to himself, placing walls and barriers around the soul that would make Herath unable to disobey. Considering he was working on a former Magister, Tyron took extra care, building layers of protection and control that would place the mage entirely within his grasp at all times, and leave him unable to even consider bringing harm to his new master.

When it was all done, the ritual came to a close, and the now familiar dark light bloomed within the hollow sockets of the skeleton.

There was a long moment of silence.

What have you done to me? Herath wailed.

Tyron waved a hand, and the revenant could no longer speak.

“You’ve begun your service to a new master. I wonder if you’ll take pride in bringing death and destruction to all that you served before, Herath, because that’s what you’re going to do. Now, I’m going to dip into your mind and find out exactly what I want to know, and you’re going to tell me, because you don’t have a choice.

“Why don’t we start with everything you know about the location where the gold ranked Slayer brands are kept?”

Another gesture, and the revenant could speak once more.

You will die if you go there, the revenant promised.

“Let me worry about that. Now talk.”