“The ambition of men compels them to break even the most heartfelt vows.”

- A.H. Septimius

“Can you get the door open?” Alyssa called after she tried the grip fastened to the outside and was shortly met with the resistance of a deadbolt.

“There is a lot of furniture piled up inside. Was probably smart.” Mireille shouted back.

“Are you here to save us?” Mildred asked with trepidation.

“No. Sorry. We did not even know there was a village. But when we saw the smoke we knew there had to be someone left alive. And so we chose to come down and have a look.”

“Thank the gods.” Lutz, the tavernkeeper sighed and grimacing massaged his severely scratched arms.

“Can someone get the door, any door, open?” Mireille asked.

Meanwhile, some of the villagers resting in the kitchen had roused themselves, and some hesitantly entered the common room.

The man, still holding his axe, shrugged. “There is the door out back. But it's been snowed in quite thoroughly, so we did not need to barricade it. Might still be easier to shovel a bit of snow than move all that.” He gestured with the axe making Mildred take a step back in caution.

Back on the forest road.

Calvin stood at the cliff and manipulated a lens made of air, scrying for problems below. He had found the old spell in a grimoire from the great desert where the sometimes occurring Fata Morgana had been the inspiration for the technique. Gina and Kira his charges, stood beneath a large chestnut tree, waiting for him to finish.

“Kira, what have we got ourselves into?”

Her friend merely gripped Gina’s hand a bit tighter and then averted her gaze from the scene in the village.

“It would have happened either way. Look on the bright side. At least you are not in the forest with a bunch of bandits. They would not have stood a chance.” Calvin mumbled absentmindedly.

“Calvin Ambrose,” Sarah exclaimed heatedly. “Can you be a tad less sarcastic in this situation? Come with me, and we are going back to the group. We cannot delay any longer. Catch up with us as soon as possible.”

“Will do.” The wizard dismissed the spell with a wave of his hand. “I’m going down. I cannot see into the building they’ve entered.”

Shaking her head, Sarah gestured and walked back to the road, followed by the two girls.

The snow was, in fact, easier to move than the broken furniture. And after getting it all out of the way, Alyssa and Alea healed what wounds they could, and everyone gathered in the common room. From a village of a few hundred souls, there were maybe twenty people left. Not counting possible survivors in hiding outside. But with the weather and the undead, that would not have been for long.

“Calvin, we can’t simply leave them like that, can we?” Mireille looked uncomfortable.

“We are neither the town guard nor the army. We cannot do anything else but leave. We can take a thorough look around and clean up anything dead and moving before we go, but that is as far as I will go.”

“Thank you. We can close the palisade, and there are some weapons, bows, and such. We can hold out until the army gets to us.” Lutz, the tavern keeper and possibly the only person resembling an official authority at the moment, interjected. “We cannot expect you to remain here, but please help us make the village safe for living again.”

“We will not make it to the fortress before the others. And if they decide to retreat back toward Kronenburg as would be smart, we will probably be left behind. Just saying.” The wizard sighed heavily.

“But you said…”

“I know. I will help clean up, as I said. But we have to face it. We will probably be on our own. Traveling at night, I cannot recommend so, when night falls, we will stay here in the inn and try to catch up tomorrow.”

The girls nodded, and the townsfolk looked relieved. An old woman cradling an infant of perhaps two years brushed some tears from her eyes and smiled. “We will pray for you, and if we should by some miracle survive, you will forever be welcome in Clefthome.” That apparently being the name of the village. No one had cared enough to ask ‘til now.

Mireille and Alyssa teamed up as well as Alea and Calvin trudging through the deep snow no one had bothered to clear all the while on the lookout for trapped restless dead...things.

Not only the corpses of the peasants but also any livestock, and as they had seen, even the rodents had become animated.

Some hours later

Alea gestured, and an intense beam of light illuminated the street and the hovels standing beside it, as well as the cliff-faces to both sides. A chicken half rotted and half frozen, scratched desperately at the fence before bursting into flame and then falling still once more.

“That should be the last one.” Calvin brushed some sweat from his forehead. Even in these freezing temperatures, he had to contend with this. Shaking some residual flames into the snow- he had tried to conjure a fire bolt before Alea had made it unnecessary- he grinned tiredly. “Come, let us go back to the inn. I cannot wait to eat something warm after all of this.”

Halfway back, they met up with Mireille and Alyssa, both in good shape visually.

“Everything okay?” Mireille asked and inspected Alea critically.

“I’m well.” Alea smiled at her. Cecily tapped restlessly on her shoulder.

Alyssa was carrying Cyrus with both arms, his long sinuous neck lazily lying across her shoulder and down her back.

“What’s with him?” Calvin asked, one eyebrow raised.

“The snow is not good for him. He is not completely like a reptile but whatever keeps him warm is much less than a full dragon. And he is tired from playing with the undead.”

“Don’t say it like that, please.” The older wizard rubbed his head. “Let’s go inside.

Inside the inn, it was marginally warmer but still cold, and the people depressed. The hope that came with the rescue had been shortlived as one of the villagers, an older man, had died of an illness that the girls had not known how to treat, and the first it became apparent was when he stood back up again as a newly raised undead. The logger had once more come to the rescue and split his head, laying him to rest once again. But the atmosphere had been tense and uncomfortable afterward.

Alyssa looked around, and her gaze came to rest on the pieces of dead rodent someone had swept into a corner. Dark energies had begun to gather there as entropic energy called like to like, and with growing trepidation, she realized.

What was dead once more need not stay that way.

The world seemed well and truly broken.

“Calvin.”

“Yes, Alyssa?”

“The dead won’t stay that way.”

“And…? That seemed apparent from what we saw the last days.”

“I mean. They will not stay dead. No matter what. I think as long as there is some residue that can be animated, it will be.”

“What!? Are you sure?”

“I see it happening just now.” She pointed at the rat corpses.

“That is...bad. We will have to incinerate or somehow trap the corpses outside. Perhaps it is sufficient to throw them beyond the barricade and hope for the best?”

“I don’t think we can generate enough fire to burn everything that needs to burn.”

“So we go with keeping them away from the living until we manage to end the magic that does this?”

“I could try to raise them myself and then force them to walk away.”

Silence hung between them.

“I don’t think I can allow that.”

“But if we simply throw them all over the side of the palisade, they will get in. They are not completely without instincts, and they have time and numbers on their side.”

“I...will think about it. If we do it, the villagers have to stay inside the inn, and no one looks outside. If someone sees you raising the dead for the second time without a direct threat to your life. You will be punished, and the least of it will be your expulsion from the academy.”

“Are there really no exceptions?”

“Other than a pardon from the king, ahem, queen. No.”

“And if we persuade Lieseleta afterward?”

“And you want to put all your hopes on that working? She is not only your classmate anymore, and there are a lot of things she has to consider. She might not be able to help you.”

Mildred, the innkeeper's wife, came over with two bowls of steaming soup. “Here, we have a lot of supplies now that we are so few left. So at least the food should be good.” She lowered her face and drew a shaky breath.

Alyssa felt highly uncomfortable as she realized how jaded she had become over the last few months. From the beginning in Firswending, the bandits, the battles she had lived through to now. Was that really normal? Cold clear darkness washed through her veins, and she knew the answer. But how were Alea and Mireille coping? Suddenly becoming aware of the soup bowl before her hands while Calvin was already drinking his. She nodded and forced out a “Thank you” before taking the proffered dish.

“Don’t mention it, my dear.” The woman gave her a wan smile and walked back to the villagers huddling around the hearth-fire someone had got going in the daytime.

At dusk on the forest road

Zhira, the army scout that had accompanied the group of teachers and their students since the disastrous ambush at the camp, raised her head and looked alertly at the surroundings. “Someone is watching us. Quick, prepare for battle.”

Sarah nodded and drew glyphs into the air, and her robes shimmered like a metallic liquid before the effect faded and was nearly unnoticeable again. The other teachers and some students followed suit.

“Ah. What a welcome sight.” A voice came out of the darkening forest. The group had pressed on into the evening hours, looking for a better place to stay but had so far not found any.

“Who is there?” Sarah shouted back.

“Ah, Sarah. Have you forgotten me so soon? And I thought we had that special something. Teacher to teacher. Did we not?” A person strode from the darkness clad in white robes stitched with gold. He held a long staff in his gloved hands, and his head was covered with a silver skull-cap etched with arcane sigils.

“Gerferak.”

“Mr. Lordrum, please. I don’t think our acquaintance was that close.” The old man laughed at his own wit as the other teachers looked around grimly.

“What do you want, traitor?”

“Oh, Sarah. He who holds the pen can tar anyone with this epithet, can he? And to devolve into name-calling just two sentences into the greeting is a bit low, isn’t it?”

Behind the white-robed wizard, several soldiers emerged as well as some men and women, or teenagers really, in the traditional robes of a magician. Farther into the forest the walking dead staggered forward unsteadily. Some better, some worse.

“So it has come to this.” Sarah frowned and removed a crystal tablet from one of her pouches.

“Ah, ah, ah.” Shaking a raised finger at her, the former master of the tower of time continued to speak. “Don’t go there, my dear colleague. If we really get down to fighting, I can promise you that even if you manage to defeat us, you will lose some of your own. Are you really prepared to do this? We only want you as hostages. To force the realm to listen to our demands seriously. And in return, I will personally ensure your well-being. How does that sound? There is even a hot meal and warm lodgings where I would be taking you.”

Some of the students, as well as some teachers, looked torn at the offer.

“And what, pray tell, are those undead doing with you? Are you responsible for them and the terror they bring?”

“No. We merely have the means to ensure their…compliance. As would you were you not too hidebound to see that sometimes needs must.”

“Lies. They are in league with the undead and thus the Heartstealer!” Escaldis Aldrnarit, the fire-wizard spat, his face livid.

“Ah. As volatile as his subject matter, my dear fire-wizard. I don’t think you should be making decisions in that state of mind. Let cooler heads prevail.” Gerferak Lordrum chuckled as he brushed some snow from his robes.

Sarah turned and sought eye-contact with some of the other teachers, and a silent accord was reached.