Suggested Listening

Morning on a farm was always busy, but this morning was worse than most. Yesterday's storm had come with only minutes of warning, as spring storms were wont to do, but this one had a rare ferocity that ripped shingles from the roofs and saw animals lost in weather that their tenders dared not leave to find them in.

Kalis, the patriarch of the homestead, sighed. "I've given up on the cows. If we're lucky, they'll find their own way back, but if I were a bettin' man, I'd say they went into the river. Least we kept the bull and calves, but we'll be short on milk for the rest of the season." He rubbed his ginger beard, stroking the whole length, as was his nervous habit. "It's shaping up to be a lean summer."

Othsa kept her head down, hard at work sewing together new sails for the windmill. They were well off, as far as farmers went, but between themselves, their six sons and three unmarried daughters, and the five farmhands who helped during this busy season, they could ill afford the expenses. "Don't worry, Cal, I can push the oldest along once I'm done here." Forcing cows to mature faster was taxing, but better than borderline starvation.

She grit her teeth while tapping into her limited magical potential. Soft green tendrils extended on her breath, dancing across the cobbled together patchwork of old cloth. This sort of nature magic was much better suited for living tissue, but it could work on anything soft that once came from a living thing. Hours, perhaps days, of work completed in seconds, but her body paid the price as if she'd spent all night hard at work.

She shuddered at the chill that extended through both her body and soul, sapping her strength and causing all the aches of age to flare into the forefront of her mind. She cursed her lack of strength, that even simple magic would deplete her stamina in seconds. As she caught her breath, she imagined that several more of her once lustrous green hair turn gray before her eyes.

Were she better suited to the arts, were her sylvan blood as strong as her sister's, then she could have repaired half the farm by now and have strength left over to make herself look twenty years younger. Then, if she had that sort of strength, she could have had a comfortable life as a healer in the capital or high adventure in the frontiers, rather than the humble existence of a farmer's wife.

If her husband noticed or cared about her failing youth and melancholy, he gave no indication. "I sent Nasko and Soren out to check the road, clear it if need be. We need it now more than ever."

Still exhausted from her brief use of magic, she could only nod. It was true, the farm in part survived on the Wayfarers and Reclaimers who passed through on their way to the more dangerous outlands, and those adventurous sorts were prone to cutting straight through the woods if the roads weren't clear enough for easy travel.

Annoyed with his wife's seeming lack of interest in the farm's needs beyond what her magic handled, Kalis went for the strongbox in the corner of the room. "I'm gonna walk the wall, make sure nothing nasty got through when the shield caved." Not that it matters to you, he added in his mind. Having unlocked the safe while speaking, he extracted his prized possession, a minotaur sarite.

Othsa eyed the glowing orange gem with fear and resentment; she hated the effect the thing had on her husband. He was brutish and short-tempered enough without the magic of that gem to warp both his mind and body into that of a bestial monster. That fear, more than any concern for her husband's wellbeing, pushed her to speak through her fatigue. "Are you sure it's safe to go now? Perhaps you should wait for our sons to..."

"And lose the rest of our stock to some monster from the Outside?" Kalis' tone expressed disdain for that idea. "I'll take Elruin with me. She's enough."

Othsa shuddered, a different set of concerns rising to the forefront of her mind. "Are you certain?"

It was too late to talk him out of his plan; he'd already bound the leather strap holding the Sarite to his upper arm. Orange light pulsed, then traveled through his skin as if his veins were replaced by glowing liquid flame. A moan of half-pleasure, half-rage rose from Kalis' throat as his face distended forward into a mockery of a bull's snout while half a ton of mass was added to his frame in the form of height and muscle. His hunched position was necessary, lest he break the ceiling with the vestigial horns which grew from his head.

"Say what you will about the freak, she's a good worker." Kalis seemed to miss his wife's point; were it not such a common event, she might have forgiven it as part of the transformation. "Better 'n most 'f the men."

Kalis lifted his prize hunting crossbow from the chest as well. It crossed his mind that the weapon might be more valuable than his entire farm. "If she scares the beasts half as bad as the animals, they'll go running 'for we're close. Then..." He lifted the bow to his shoulder, as if setting up a shot. "The right trophy might make up for the cattle."

Crestfallen, Othsa gave up all hope of a moment's reprieve today. "You know best." Best not to antagonize her husband further.

An animalistic snort was all she got in return. Kalis ducked to exit the house, then stood to his full height, half again as tall as any man on the farm, and twice as tall as his timid mouse of a wife. His nostrils widened as he sniffed the air for predators, but found no unusual scent. "Elruin! Git yer bony butt out here!" His monstrous voice echoed across the farm, alerting all but those tending the road of the master's presence. Those who'd worked there for some time recognized the effects of the minotaur shard, and in their wisdom warned the others to stay out of his sight for now.

Meanwhile, a black haired girl stalked the barn while the horses whinnied and backed away as she passed. Through eyes of pure ebony, she watched a world in shades of gray, with flecks of light lining most of the floor. It didn't take her long to spot her target: a creature of soft yellow light not much larger than a human hand, with a long, slender tail. It had fled into the barn during the storm, and if ignored it would reproduce and trouble the animals or steal their food.

The girl gestured, a stream of black energy lanced outward, and the glowing creature vanished. She turned her attention to another creature nearby, raised her hand, then heard her father's shout for her.

She blinked, her solid black eyes returning to their normal deep indigo state, then she hopped to her feet and ran out of the barn to learn what task was waiting. The idea of disobeying father, or that she was being called for any purpose other than a new chore, never entered her mind. Nor did the realization that she had been using magic all morning yet felt no fatigue.

As she left, the rat who came so close to meeting oblivion fled from its temporary shelter, its instincts screaming in terror.

She spotted her father walking toward her, or rather in a direction that would take him past her. She stared up at his warped and inhuman visage, over twice her height, but stood tall like she was told a good girl should. "Yes, sir?"

"Come. We're walkin' the wall." Kalis kept moving, both because he had work to do and in order to hide his face from Elruin so he could cringe without notice; the child was unnerving enough without the enhanced instincts granted by the minotaur sarite. For a moment, he wondered if Othsa was right to warn him, but it was too late to turn back now.

"Okay." Elruin dutifully took up her place right behind her father, alternating between a fast walk and brief moments of jogging to keep up with her now-giant father's long stride.

The trek through the mud would have left any ordinary person exhausted, but neither of them got tired as they followed the wall which protected the farm from the outside. Every so often, Kalis would stop in order to check the crystal shards embedded in the channeling posts while Elruin looked around for more obvious damage to the stone of the wall.

"Entek," Kalis muttered, unconcerned that the child hear his profanity.

Elruin strained to look off in the distance, until she spotted the area where the earth had slid out from under the wall, leaving a portion of it bowed and in danger of collapsing under its own weight. "Can I help?"

Kalis rubbed his beard, considering all the work that would be necessary to mend the wall. "You pick up any earth-moving spells while killing rats?"

"No," she admitted before going silent and waiting for instructions. She knew how her father hated to be interrupted when he was touching his facial hair.

Kalis approached the wall, too lost in thought to consider the girl behind him. This was well beyond Othsa's power, and while he was certain Elruin had power to spare, her magic seemed to be limited to killing small animals and putting the fear of death into every living thing that got too close to her. He'd have to either hire an earth mage, which would set him back a month's income if he got lucky with a Reclaimer, or three if he had to get a city caster to come out here.

The temporary solution, which was to rebuild the wall around the mudslide, wasn't much more appealing. It would take weeks to finish and require hiring more laborers until the work was done. Still cheaper than a city mage, but slower, and every day the breach was left open increased the odds that wolves or some even nastier beast would get under the barrier and kill more livestock.

Suggested Listening

Elruin heard, felt it, before her father saw it. The swell of mystical energy was unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Within the mud, a hand rose, then an arm. Muck dropped off the limb, revealing there was nothing there save for grime coated bone.

"Mother's Mercy." Kalis spotted the movement, then stepped back. He made no effort to pull Elruin away or shield her from the thing which rose from the landslide. He calmed himself some moments later; it was on the other side of the wall. As worthless as sarite shields were against natural creatures, they excelled at driving back the unnatural. It didn't get much less natural than this thing.

It gazed at them through empty eye sockets, a reflection in Elruin's solid black eyes. Elruin felt it, felt him, a song she'd never heard before yet recognized as if she'd written it herself. Hatred, pain, revenge, the song of a life that refused to die, that was willing to sacrifice heaven if it meant he could drag his hated enemy into hell itself. A hated enemy that stood right behind her.

Without realizing what she was doing, the little girl sang the song back to the damned soul before her. Its unheard voice echoed by her own flesh and blood vocal chords, granted strength, a foothold on the other side of the grave. The recognition grew, the connection amplified, and for the first time Elruin knew what it was like to be loved by another person. That the person was an undead abomination did not matter to her. This was the family she never knew.

"Elruin?" Kalis muttered, recovering enough of his wits to recognize something was wrong other than the skeleton climbing out from the muck.

Around them, the sarite-generated barrier shimmered, struggled against Elruin's song. It was designed to keep the unnatural out, not to prevent it from escaping. But an opened gate goes both ways, and the skeleton had an opening it could exploit. It walked toward the barricade, hesitant at first but growing in confidence with every step. She knew him, but he also knew her.

"Quiet!" Fueled by fear and forgetting his own supernaturally enhanced strength, Kalis gripped her shoulder with enough strength that it could have crushed an ordinary child's shoulder. He picked her up like that in order to carry her away from the wall.

Elruin cried out in pain, her song ended, but not the connection which had been created between her and the skeleton, nor the damage which had been done to the defensive shield in the process.

The skeleton opened its maw to screech in silent rage and indignation. He leapt at the wall with the greater ferocity than a bear trying to protect her cub, to be pushed back by the defenses that kept the farm safe from the monsters outside.

Blue flame burned layers of caked mud off the creature as it hammered itself against the shield a second, then third, then fourth time. With each collision, the song dimmed alongside the shield, a race between two unthinking forces to determine which would destroy the other first.

Her shoulder burning, gasping for breath, Elruin lashed out for the first time in her life against her father. Black lightning danced its way across her skin, up Kalis' hand. First it pushed away the orange power of the Minotaur sarite, then it numbed the limb, then it started to kill the flesh which held her trapped.

Kalis now roared in pain; a broad, bestial cry to join the enraged shrieks of the undead, crackle-burn of the barrier, and high pitched gasps of a child forced to defend herself against her father.

Elruin took two steps back toward the skeleton, the song, and the kinship she never knew that she never knew. Despite the pain, she found the strength to sing again. New strength flowed into the skeleton and damaged the barrier further.

"I said shut up!" Kalis struck Elruin with all his strength.

She went flying several yards through the air before hitting the mud on her side. In his haste, Kalis made the worst possible decision; he'd batted the girl closer to the wall. Half unconscious, running on instinct alone, Elruin kept mumbling the echoes of the song.

"Dammit, freak!" Kalis stalked forward. Before, he'd been reacting to the situation, but now his rational mind was starting to catch up. He wasn't much of a mage, but he understood magic well enough to recognize that she was empowering the monster and refused to stop. In his panicked state, the solution seemed obvious: kill the child.

He never had the chance to try.

Empowered and enraged to a point no still-living creature could experience, the skeleton broke through the last defenses of the barrier. He was above Elruin long before Kalis could bridge the distance.

Mud burnt to ash fell, revealing a deep crack across the left eye socket that left one questioning how the bone hadn't fallen off, and scaled silver armor that might once have had padding beneath but was now draped over bones like an ill-fitting tunic. He cut a poor figure as far as guardian angels went, but he would fight to well beyond the death for the little girl behind him.

Kalis hesitated for a moment. "You!" He took a step off to the side, and the skeleton responded by positioning himself directly between him and Elruin.

"Khee." How a creature without flesh could hiss such unrestrained malice was a question Kalis might have asked himself later, had upcoming events turned out differently.

"You're dead!" Kalis recognized how obvious it was the moment after it was said. "I killed you." Two more steps, again testing the creature's behavior; brilliant warrior he was not, but he knew better than to rush headlong into a fight with an unknown foe.

The skeleton matched his steps to keep Elruin behind him again. "Ehsss."

Kalis smiled, though it came out more a sneer. "I knew she wasn't mine." He hefted his crossbow, aiming not for the monster, but for the injured child.

*Crack* *Thump*

He moved fast, positioned himself in time to block the bolt, but it only clipped his bone before embedding itself into Elruin's side. Her song silenced by the metal which pierced her lung. She had just enough strength to turn her head, to stare at the man who shot her.

"Kryaaaah!!!" Her failed defender became her avenger, rushing forward on legs powered not by muscle, but by necromantic energies.

Kalis reacted better than someone so bulky should have, enough to hammer his assailant with his crossbow. Bone and teeth scattered from the blow, but the damage was more cosmetic than actual.

In return for taking his teeth, for taking his life, and most importantly for taking Elruin, the skeleton took his time. A claw raked through Kalis' stomach, spilling a pile of viscera and guts onto the muddy ground.

Blood sputtered from Kalis' mouth to join the mess at his feet. "Guhk!" He stumbled back, before his Minotaur sarite compensated for the injury. It couldn't heal him, not so soon, but it could compensate enough to allow a retaliating blow to the skull.

A blow which meant nothing. In terms of strength, perhaps, they were equal. In all other respects, Kalis was outclassed. He was still flesh and blood, wounded and losing blood fast. His foe was constructed of necromancy, hatred, and a love stronger than death itself. It could not feel pain, it could not tire, and it would never relent. Bestial rage was no match.

Kalis' arms dropped to his sides, bleeding from the deep gashes where the tendons of his muscles were severed. One more blow folded his knee backward and dropped him to the ground.

The skeleton didn't waste time to gloat over his bleeding, dying foe. Kalis would drown on his own lifeblood, and that was the best revenge available. That, and to reverse one last act of spite.

He yanked the Minotaur sarite from its pouch, then ran back to a little girl herself dying a slow death. In life, he'd done quite a lot of wandering the wilderness, and that life began and ended at the power of concentrated magic crystals like the one he now held.

Concentrated lifeforce cultivated in the flesh of a monster like a pearl in an oyster, then used to grant some semblance of power to those who knew how to harness them. In the right hands, they could allow mere mortals to go to war with beasts that rivaled the gods themselves. This shard was an impressive one, to be certain, but it was by no means the upper limit of what sarite was capable of.

With his free hand, he rolled Elruin over, then pulled the bolt through her body, rather than do even greater damage by carving through her with the barbs of the weapon. That step finished, he held the shard above her chest. In his undead state, he wasn't suited for this sort of magic, but there was one method still available to him.

He crushed the crystallized magic to powder in his clawed, bloody fist. Raw magic, transformative energies, and most importantly: regenerative properties. For a few moments, the air itself was alive with magic. In time, that energy would find its way into the grass, the trees, and the various animals of the area. Given time, the magical corruption would likely result in a new monster spawning itself from the native wildlife.

For now, it meant a little girl, his little girl, would survive.

He lamented the lack of flesh, the inability to smile, to cry. Instead he stared down at her for his last few moments in this world. He got his revenge, the hatred that allowed him to defy death itself died, and with it the necromantic flame dimmed.

The construct would remain, fragments of his essence blended with Elruin's Requiem, but its guiding Will left for whatever afterlife was afforded souls like his. From now on, his remains would forever serve as Elruin's silent angel.

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A/N- Not strictly speaking a "prologue" chapter, but not strictly speaking 'chapter 1', so I call it 'chapter 0'.