“Where should I start? At the beginning, I suppose.” Desinka looked up at Serenity. “The problem is figuring out where the beginning is. I guess the best place to start is - no, that doesn’t really matter. More recently, then. I’ve been delving with a group of people from T’cherna. There are only three of them, so they decided to pick up a fourth here. I’m solo; it worked out.”

Desinka looked animated and cheerful. Serenity was pretty sure she liked the group she worked with and just plain enjoyed exploring dungeons. It made him miss the group he’d done the Tutorial Dungeon with - however stressful some of it had been, he’d enjoyed it. It wasn’t quite the same with Katya and Raz, though that was still fun in its own way.

“We’ve been working together for a couple months, and it’s gone well, so we decided to try some of the newer wild dungeons. On the last delve we found an unknown secret passage - the rest of the dungeon was plains, but the passage ran us into a marsh. We explored a bit and fought off some undead herons, but it wasn’t that bad. We finally found a spot that didn’t have undead cattails - really, undead plants? Why are undead plants a thing?”

Serenity chuckled. “They’re all over Tzintkra. You’ll find them on any world with a strong presence of undead or Death magic, especially if it’s touched the world’s Core. If anything, plants have it easier than animals.”

That seemed to pull Desinka back to the present. “Ah - would you like some tea? I think that’s all we have in the house, really. Dad’s been eating out, and I, I just haven’t been hungry. I’m ill, you know.”

Serenity knew she wasn’t ill, but he wasn’t sure if she realized it or not. “It’s not necessary. Please, continue. You were at the undead cattails?”

Desinka looked doubtful for a moment, but picked the narrative back up where she’d left it. “Yeah, well, no. I was at the lack of undead cattails. We could finally see into the water, and what we saw was a shine, like silver - but it couldn’t be silver. Silver would be tarnished and steel would rust. All we’d seen were some marsh birds, so we decided to check it out. I was the one to dive in, since I’m the best in water. We tied a rope around my waist, just in case, and everyone else stayed on the shore, watching for danger.”

“The silver gleam was a chest. I got close enough to touch it right as I realized the rope was pulling me up. It’d been bitten by an undead crocodile, and the crocodile was pulling me up as it swam at my friends. I don’t really remember the fight. All I remember is trying to get the rope off, then blackness. I think the tail hit me and knocked me out.”

“I don’t know how long it took them to kill the crocodile and pull me out of the water. All I remember is throwing up marsh water and having trouble breathing. They almost had to carry me out. We waited at the dungeon entrance for a couple of days, but instead of recovering, I got really sick, so they brought me back to the main cavern. I don’t really remember what happened, but Dad says he had his friend Hollis look at me. He did what he could, but said that I really needed a different type of Healer to handle the disease, and there aren’t any in the Shining Caverns, at least none with the Healers Guild.”

Serenity could guess what sort of healer wouldn’t be common in the Shining Caverns - one who used Death to heal. He knew a lot of the techniques and had used them a few times, but didn’t really think of himself as a healer. It was just killing the things you didn’t want to let live, so that the things you did want to live would have an easier time. “The Shining Caverns don’t like Death magic.”

Desinka nodded. “Dad thought I was going to die, so he found someone who said they could cure a disease. They said they’d have to keep me for a week, but then I’d be fine. All they wanted in return was for him to deliver something. Dad agreed, he delivers stuff all the time. He said he’d do it when he had me back healthy. It was a couple days after I came back that we were sure I was better, so he took care of the payment the next day.”

“The following day there was a knock on the door. It was the guy who healed me - supposedly healed me. He told Dad he’d also cursed me, and if he didn’t want me to go mad and kill everyone around me, Dad would have to deliver more things for them. We didn’t believe him until he told me to do stuff. It was silly stuff, like go stand in that corner or turn around, but whenever he told me to do something I had to do it. It was the only right thing to do.”

“Dad agreed, of course. The man left us with a box and some vials. He said to have me drink one of the vials a day to not go mad. I know Dad had a plan, but he didn’t tell me what it was. I think he didn’t want to take the chance that the man might order me to tell him what Dad was doing while he wasn’t home. I know he was worried and hadn’t delivered the box yet but I don’t know why.”

Serenity had a good guess as to why. If Messenger Rakyn had a friend at the Hall of Healing, he’d have found out that the place was locked when he went to look for someone who could break the curse. If he’d figured out it happened the day after a mystery delivery from the guy who set the curse, Serenity could see why he’d be worried.

Serenity didn’t know where else he’d have checked, but it was possible he’d also found out that the Mercenary Guild’s curse-breaker was sick. That wouldn’t have helped. “Has he brought anyone else to look at it?”

“No. He hasn’t been able to find anyone. I thought there were a number of people who could break curses.” Desinka looked worried. “We thought we had time, but I drank the last vial yesterday. I haven’t felt like I’m going mad. Just a bit tired is all. I don’t know how long the curse takes to kick in.”

“If it’s what I think it is, it varies a lot.” Serenity had heard of vampires that couldn’t even go a day without blood and vampires that could go a week without any issues, as long as they were well fed before that.

Desinka straightened a bit and looked more cheerful. “Then - you can fix it? Make me normal again? I don’t want to be controlled by that man, either by his words or by needing his potions.”

Serenity knew how to reverse some forms of undeath, but vampirism was particularly difficult. Even the easy ones wouldn’t be possible at his Tier, and he guessed not at hers, because she seemed to be similar in Tier to him. The best hope would be if she hadn’t fully converted - then, perhaps, he could freeze it where it was. He thought she was too far along for that, but he should check and not assume. “I need to look at you closely. This will make my eyes glow. I’m warning you so I don’t scare you, some people think it makes me look undead.”

He was happy to have remembered to warn someone, for once.

Desinka nodded. “Go ahead.”

Serenity turned on Vital Sight and examined what he could see of Desinka. Her lower half was mostly blocked by the table, though he could see hints of Affinity showing through, since the table wasn’t alive to block it.

All of the Affinity was Death-based. Desinka was definitely undead.

Serenity turned off Vital Sight as he thought. Was there any way to achieve her goals without making her Life-based again?

It would depend both on what sort of vampire she was and what hold the man had over her. Was he controlling her through her blood or was he her Sire? Also, why did she seem to emit small bits of Essence? Serenity knew that most sane vampires weren’t monsters; they were Pathed people who’d been converted, and kept their old Paths, though sometimes they were altered by the change.

Was there something about Essence involved to make it happen, even though they weren’t monsters? That would make a lot of sense.

Serenity suddenly realized that this might be an even bigger clue than they’d thought. The curse - at least, what he’d seen so far - converted people into draugr, something that couldn’t happen to the living normally; it usually only happened to dead bodies and used the Death energy released by the death.

What if the curse was someone trying to imitate the vampiric conversion, making the victims into a different type of undead? Draugr weren’t as smart as vampires and didn’t have nearly as many routes to advancement, but they weren’t vulnerable to sunlight and didn’t depend on human blood. They also didn’t have Sires in the same sense, so they would be harder to control - unless the man had found a way to add that?

Draugr were generally much more powerful than standard zombies. A way of creating them from your enemies as a curse that could spread and then placed them under you control would be bad.

If that was true, it was something that hadn’t happened in his previous history. Hopefully, that meant it wasn’t true, or that it would be handled even if he weren’t here - but Serenity wasn’t certain he could count on that. It was bad enough that Serenity decided he needed to stay long enough to find out and deal with the problem if it were true.

It might delay his return to Earth, but this was something that was far better to take care of now when it was new than later when it was impossible to weed out. He’d just have to trust that the people he’d left on Earth could handle it until he got back.

And he’d have to trust that Rissa would let his folks know about the danger they were in.

“Ah - I’ve forgotten your name?” Desinka’s voice pulled Serenity out of his musings.

“Serenity.” What was the next step for her? Well, it never hurt to look at things as closely as he could. “I need to examine your problem. It will be easier if I can touch you to send the magic-”

Serenity broke off because Desinka was shaking her head furiously. “What’s the matter?”

Desinka stared into her lap. Serenity thought she was probably also wringing her hands, but since they were in her lap, he couldn’t tell. “You smell delicious. Better than Dad. Like, well, like food. Whenever I get near you I feel thirsty and my teeth itch. That’s not - it has to be the curse. I don’t want to give into it but if you get closer I’m not sure what I’d do.”

Serenity blinked. Even though he couldn’t see, the reflex was still there. That wasn’t the reaction he’d expected. It was true that she’d probably need blood soon, and given his healing ability and complete immunity to Death effects, it wouldn’t be a problem if he was the one to donate blood.

Serenity laughed. He was using exactly the same sort of reasoning as his friends had back in the Tutorial Dungeon. It hadn’t worked on him then, but it seemed persuasive now. Clearly the difference was which side of it he was on; he didn’t mind giving blood, but he minded taking it.