Page 171 of Grave Situation

“That sounds nice,” Coryn enthuses, not noticing Jaimin’s reaction. “My mother died when I was a little boy.”

Aw. “You come too,” I say impulsively. “She’s not very maternal, but she’ll like you.”

That puts a happy grin on his face, and he leads the way to the officers’ dining room, where Peiris is slouched comfortably in a chair and Arimen is practically bouncing off the walls.

“Well?” he demands. “What did you find out?”

I keep silent while I settle into a chair and pull Jaimin down to sit beside me, keeping hold of his hand, and then I sigh.

“I talked to my father,” I begin, and give them a rundown of that conversation. Jaimin’s hold on my hand tightens to a squeeze. “Master Samoine has been searching the archives since late this morning,” I conclude. “He has the class rosters from myuncle’s time at the academy and is working on a list of who else he might have spent significant time with.”

“Does it need to have been a significant amount of time?” Peiris asks, and I shrug.

“Probably not, but would you approach someone you barely knew thirty-five years ago to bring them in on a plan like this? There has to have been enough contact between them for some trust… or maybe blackmail.”

“How long was your uncle at the academy?” Arimen asks. “Why would he want to blackmail someone? Or would they be blackmailing him?”

I shrug. “With Uncle Domys, it could go either way. He’s a nasty man who does nasty things, and he’s not above adding blackmail to the list. He was only at the academy for a year, though. He left as soon as he passed his first-year exams and proved he wasn’t a danger to the world.” I pause. “In hindsight, they may have been assessing for the wrong things.”

Arimen frowns. “But blackmail is bad. Why?—”

“He’s a bad person, Arimen,” Jaimin explains gently. “That’s why he’s involved in this.”

“Talon said he’s not smart, so I thought maybe he didn’t understand what he was doing. But if he’s a blackmailer too…” He shakes his head. “I guess he’s doing this on purpose.”

Oh holy steaming gods’ turds. I stare at my naïve young friend and wonder why I had to be here for the destruction of his innocence. What am I supposed to say now?

Coryn rescues me. “He probably is doing this on purpose, but remember that there are a lot more people working on purpose to stop him. The truly bad people will always be outnumbered by the ones who want good, even if sometimes the bad ones seem like the loudest.”

Arimen firms his shoulders and nods. Jaimin squeezes my hand again, and Peiris looks at Coryn like he hung the stars.Fuck. Did something happen between them while I was gone? It hasn’t even been two full days!

I meet Jaimin’s gaze and tilt my head meaningfully toward Peiris, a question in my eyes. His mouth twitches into a rueful half-smile, and he gives a tiny shrug.

Great. Just great. I add “diplomatic negotiations” to my to-do list and hope that Peiris’s imperial parents are the doting kind.

“Let me tell you what else I’ve learned,” I suggest. The budding relationship can wait, and Arimen could probably use a distraction right now. “I was able to access Wasianth’s knowledge of zombies.”

Eager faces turn to me, the previous subject put aside. “Do you know how to get rid of them?” Coryn asks. “Can I help?”

“Yes, and… maybe. I haven’t worked out the details yet. The key is with the necromancers. They use pieces of their souls to raise the zombies and animate them. If the necromancer dies, the energy from those soul shards is absorbed back into the world, and the zombies return to being corpses.”

Peiris is already shaking their head. “The imperial histories mention slaying necromancers by the score. Some few died, but most didn’t—the act of raising zombies turns them into some kind of undead themselves. It was only the intervention of the gods that saved us last time.”

They’ve said that before, and it caused me a lot of anxiety. Not this time, though. I understand now. “They’re not undead; not even close. Some necromancers use a spell of transference—” I stop. What I’m about to describe is going to distress all of them alot. “Maybe you should just trust me on this. We need to kill the necromancers, but I—Wasianth—need to do something first to make sure they die.”

“Just tell us,” Arimen says, his world-weary tone at odds with his youthful face. “We already know it’s going to be bad.”

I glance at Jaimin, who nods, so I take a deep breath and continue. “The spell of transference removes their soul from their own body and puts it somewhere safe. The nature of the spell means that they’re still connected to their soul, thus retaining their humanity, and can also draw on it to raise more zombies.” I brace myself. “But, and this is the worst part, in order to keep their soul energy from being used up by all the zombies they’re raising, they do another spell. It's… a bad one. It draws soul energy and assimilates it.”

Jaimin gasps, understanding, but Coryn frowns. “Huh? I don’t understand?”

“The necromancers transfer their souls into another living being, like a pet or a person, and then make it so their soul energy is shared.”

He’s still frowning, but then his eyes go wide. “They steal other people’s souls?!”

I nod. “Essentially, yes. The spell, which is so vile it’s nameless, lets the necromancer merge the two soul essences and control the resultant power. They can then raise zombies that they’ll be able to control without using their own soul energy.”

Peiris swallows hard. “What happens when the stolen soul is used up?”

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