It was minute, so tiny were it any smaller it couldn't be said to exist at all. A fleck of arcane energy that drifted on imperceptible paths until, suddenly, it winked out of existence. Or did it? No. There it was. A seemingly new speck, ever so imperceptibly larger than the previous, had now appeared, but elsewhere. Was it the same one? Or had the old died to make way for the new, sacrificing itself for that sliver of growth?

Tyron leaned closer, though it didn't help. It was with magick that he sensed the minute changes of energy within the bones before him; even so, he felt the proximity made a difference.

"Come on now," he whispered.

There it was again. Another shift occurred, a vanishing on one side, a reappearance on the other, an insignificant growth appearing once more. It was strange to say it, but this really was magick to Tyron. Casting spells was like constructing a building, the means and methods were known, the materials reliable and understood. They could be employed gracefully, even artfully, but ultimately it was construction all the same. But this? This was unknown, this was mysterious. The process of taking that which was strange and breaking it down to something that was understood, was intoxicating.

New materials, new tools to work with. A fundamental shift in what was possible and what was not. The strange new wonders he could create if he were to extract even a fraction of useable knowledge from this investigation were almost beyond imagining. Impossible towers of arcane majesty. Spells that pushed into territory once thought to be fanciful and impossible. A glittering bridge made of glass. A castle formed on an unyielding foundation of air.

Who knew?

For the moment, it was simply tiny bubbles of death magick, vanishing in one place, and growing in another, but he hoped it could become much, much more.

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," he chuckled as he continued to lean over the collection of bones in front of him. "One step at a time."

"It's fucking creepy when you talk to the bones. You know that, right?"

The strange, detached voice of Dove rang out from his right. His concentration disturbed, the young Necromancer leaned back and turned, frustration written on his features.

"Dove, I'm also talking to bones when I speak to you, aren't I?" he pointed out.

"That's true."

The skull sat proudly atop the open pages of a book, the glowing orbs within its eyes the only sign of the spirit confined within. A proud silver ranked slayer, a Summoner, forger of contracts with celestial beings from the Astral Sea, reduced to a ghost bound within his own remains.

"By the by, I'm not sure if you ever explained why you stuck me in just my skull. Not that I'm complaining… all right I am, but it'd be fucking nice to have, you know, hands and legs. Nice things to have, hands. And legs! Don’t get me started."

Tyron pressed the heels of both hands into his temples as he fought off a headache. It wasn't just Dove's irritating patter, but rather the long hours of concentration he'd put into his latest test.

"Dove… I'm sure I explained this… several times," he said. "I was able to stick your spirit into the skull, but I had, and still have, no idea how to connect it to the rest of your limbs in a way that would give you control. I have no idea how to bind mana to more than a single object, full stop! The fact I managed to do it at all is…"

"A miracle, yeah, yeah. You are big on blowing your own horn kid, anyone ever tell you that? You should stop at any rate. Blowing yourself is extremely bad for your health. You'll go blind."

"Surely you were living proof that's not the case."

"Oh, ho! Firing back are we? What happened to the timid little mage boy I first met outside of Woodsedge?"

A pause ensued as Tyron began to reflect on that question, but before he could say anything, Dove interjected once more.

"Don't you dare say 'he died'. That would be so fucking cliché I'd have to manifest some guts just so I could puke. Are you kidding me? Not to mention you're a Necromancer! The dramatic irony alone would force me to kill you and then myself. Again."

"Fair enough," Tyron shrugged.

He glanced longingly down at his experiment before he sighed and turned away. He didn't actually have to observe the process, merely measure it after another five hours had passed. Even so, he enjoyed watching it. Measuring the outcome was one thing, but understanding why it happened the way it did was another entirely, and something he was no closer to finding an answer to.

He walked over to the book sitting atop the fairly flat rock that served as Dove's throne and collected the skull in one hand.

"How's it looking?" Dove asked.

"Promising. I've been able to confirm the phenomenon. Even if only two, small bones are placed together, this process begins to take place. Small flakes of death magick appear, then begin to pass back and forth between them, growing stronger in microscopic increments along the way. The more bones there are together, the quicker the process starts, and the faster it accelerates."

"The interesting part is where the death magick comes from in the first place," mused the skull as Tyron carried him back toward the cookpot. "It can't just spontaneously appear out of nowhere, it has to be converted from ambient energy."

"I agree. But we don't know how that can occur naturally, without outside influence. We change magick all the time when we cast spells, but that's a manual process with our wills to guide it. Is there an outside influence? Is there something inherent within the remains that causes the magick to change? It's not like death magick is just floating around everywhere, it's always found in places associated with the dead."

"Hence our working hypothesis."

"Right. There is something inherently magickal about the dead. Some spark, or influence that causes the energy around them to change. Once the process starts, it accelerates until the bodies, or bones, become fully saturated and that's how natural undead are caused."

"I'd love to know how skeletons form their musculature in the wild," Dove said.

"Are you kidding me? My fingers ache, constantly. If I didn't have to do the threading myself it'd save a hell of a lot of time."

Neither mentioned the opportunity they'd had to witness the process themselves. When Tyron had gotten carried away and left two full sets of bones laid out beside each other in one of his tests, then passed out from exhaustion as the process continued. When he finally woke, he found the skeletons had been smashed to pieces, his own minions standing protectively around him. After monitoring the process close to its completion, he'd lost consciousness at the precise moment the final transformation had begun. If his own undead hadn't intervened, he'd have died to uncontrolled 'wild' skeletons of his own creation.

He decided to halt any experiments that dealt with creating fully realised undead, until it could be done under safer conditions. His current store of bones had been separated and packed away where they couldn't interact with each other much. Just to be sure, he still checked on them daily.

He placed Dove down on a new rock, one of the few that circled the still smouldering fire and performed a role as serviceable, if uncomfortable seats. After a quick stir, he pulled up a ladleful of stew and served himself before he sat down.

"How old is that stew, kid?" Dove asked.

Tyron stared deep into the reddy, brown muck in his bowl as he thought.

"Two days?" The rising tilt of his voice made it more a question than a statement.

"Maybe don't eat it. Watching you decompose after dying from endlessly shitting yourself isn't exactly high on my list of 'things to do once you're dead'."

"It's fine," the younger man scoffed before he tucked in. He winced. "It tastes like shit… but it's fine."

"You're the one who cooked it, kid. You're only mocking yourself."

That was true. Tyron was the only member of the group who still had to eat. Dove being a skull and Yor being… what she was.

"You know my aunt and uncle ran an inn? I used to drop into the kitchen and get a hot, fresh plate of whatever they had on the go whenever I wanted. Aunt Meg could cook, that's for sure. Highest skill level in town."

"Pah. I've been in the capital. The food there makes what your auntie served up look like pig swill after it's been recycled through the arse of a pig."

"Piss off it does," he scoffed. Then he took another spoonful. "Tell you what, pig swill doesn't sound half bad right about now."

Luckily for him, his constitution was so high he likely wouldn't suffer any adverse effects even if the stew had gone bad. One of the benefits of being a Necromancer, the class made sure you were tough enough to survive the deprivation that came from living with it.

"Any idea where Yor is?" he said after forcing down another mouthful. "I thought she was supposed to be back yesterday."

"She was. I suspect she might have been a little more thorough than the task may have called for."

The two shared a look.

"I mean she tortured the shit out of them," Dove said helpfully.

"I know what you mean, Dove! Blood and bone, I don't need you to rub it into my face."

The Necromancer pushed a hand through his dark hair as he stared at the coals, a gloom settling over him. The idea of something that he had summoned to this realm causing that kind of pain and suffering didn't sit well with him. Not at all. But what was he to do about it? He couldn't send her back, he didn't know how. He couldn't defeat her in battle, of that he was quite confident. He'd seen the speed she could move at.

Perhaps after he'd advanced his class. He was close now, he only needed a few more things to fall into place. Ever since they'd left Woodsedge three weeks ago he'd worked tirelessly to prepare himself for the change. It was imperative that he raise his core skills to ten before he reached level twenty. That was the basics of proper class advancement, everyone knew that much.

Until Corpse Preparation, Corpse Appraisal and Raise Dead had been mastered, he simply refused to progress.

Even the time pressure that bore down on him like a bell tolling his death, he wouldn't compromise on this. He couldn't. What did it matter if he reached level twenty if he only had suboptimal choices, stunting his potential from that point onward? That would be one step forward, three steps back.

"I'll talk with Yor when she gets back," he decided. "She can't keep doing as she pleases."

"What pleases me, may be beyond your understanding, dearest."

The cool voice of the vampire came from outside the cave and soon her perfect form could be seen approaching from the darkness, a large burden slung over her shoulder. Once she reached the fire she flung the corpse down without ceremony, flicking dirt from her shoulder with a suffering expression.

"I do hope you graduate from cave dwelling at some point soon, Tyron. This is a phase that I shall soon tire of."

"Hey, if that's the case, I have some great news for you," Dove enthused. "As it so happens, you have the option, and this might sound wild, to fuck off back to where you came from, literally any time you want! How amazing is that?"

"I still don't know why I haven't extinguished that guttering filth you call a soul, human."

"Shut up, both of you."

Tyron had placed his food aside to stand and approach the body Yor had brought back. More experienced in the practice than he'd ever thought he might be, the Necromancer passed his eyes over the body as he shifted it, inspecting each limb, the colouration of the skin, even checking the condition of the teeth.

A man, malnourished, probably in his mid-twenties. Calloused hands suggested regular manual labour, and the missing teeth suggested either terrible dental hygiene, or this individual got into a lot of fist fights and sucked at it. There were no obvious wounds on him, certainly none that would have caused his death. Interestingly, there was actually a cut on his leg that looked as if it had been badly infected. Without treatment, that alone might have killed him…

The other notable thing about the body, was the total lack of blood. He'd been completely exsanguinated.

"Again?" he asked.

Yor raised one elegant brow as she looked down at him, crouched above the corpse.

"I have to eat," she stated, "you can't expect me to starve myself to death for these," she gestured, "creatures."

"They aren't creatures, they're people," Tyron said, his chest tight.

"They are food. And before you complain, we agreed, do you not recall? It is too late to regret your bargain now."

The words fell on him like a hammer and he sagged, the anger draining out of him.

"You're right. I agreed."

"If I'm being honest, kid. You're taking this a little too hard. These were dead men no matter what. You need to harden up and that's the fucking truth," Dove said.

They were right. He knew they were right. He just needed time to adjust his thinking, that was all. He couldn't go from… a regular person, to such a casual view of murder overnight.

"At least the mayor will be happy," he sighed.

"I don't think that prick has been happy his entire life," Dove remarked. "I've seen door knobs with more personality."

"I must agree," Yor sniffed. "Now if you please, I will go to cleanse myself."

Well, another set of bones to work with if nothing else. Another bandit to add to the pile. No longer feeling hungry, he tidied up his plate and emptied out the cookpot. In the morning he would need to wash it out more thoroughly, but he wasn't going to drag it down to the stream in the dark. With nothing else to do he fetched his butcher's tools and prepared to work.

"Hey, kid."

"No."

"C'mon. You can't tell me you aren't curious."

"Dove, I am not taking you to peek at Yor while she washes."

"You really suck sometimes, Tyron. You know that?"