Page 173 of Alchemised
He wasn’t healing or regenerating; he just wasn’t dying so aggressively. There was still a long journey ahead that relied on his body somehow adapting to the array.
She tried to be gentle, but he shuddered, gripping the back of the chair until his knuckles turned white as she washed and cleaned the wounds. She worked quickly, warning him each time she touched him, explaining each step, trying to help keep the end in sight.
He still flinched every time she touched him.
Every night she came back to the Outpost, following the same routine. Most nights, Kaine didn’t speak to her at all. He was always slightly drunk and somehow seemed annoyed that she kept coming back. After five days, the talisman stopped radiating energy as if it were a leaking battery, and she could feel the aggressive decay from overstrain slowing.
After more than a week of wordless treatment, he spoke abruptly when she was washing her hands. “The High Necromancer wants someone.”
She paused. “Who?”
“A guard from one of the Hevgoss’s prison complexes.”
“Why?”
“I’m still persona non grata, so I don’t know all the details of what’s going on. Apparently at some point, Morrough promised the Hevgotian militocrats the key to immortality. It’s been decades, and he hasn’t produced the version of it that they want. The reason they’re supporting the Guild Assembly is because the High Necromancer somehow convinced them that he can develop it if he can take Paladia. The alliance soured with the latest setback, and now Morrough’s suddenly concerned with getting his hands on this guard without Hevgoss knowing. A few aspirants are going in quietly, trying to track him down. If the Eternal Flame wants more details, they should send someone after them.”
“Why not send the Undying?” she asked.
“It’s more complicated to send us. It takes special preparations, and there’s limits to how long we can go.”
She paused. “Why?”
She could feel his annoyance at the question. “Because we’re bound to Morrough.”
Her hands froze. “Do you mean like”—there was no polite way to phrase it—“are you like—the necrothralls?”
He glared from the corner of his eye.
It was well known that necrothralls could go only so far from their necromancer or else they’d “die” again. Most necromancers could manage a few miles at most. The Undying’s reanimations were particularly powerful; the necrothralls in Paladia moved so freely, no one was sure of their limits, but they were assumed to be somewhere within Paladia’s borders.
That a limitation of distance applied to the Undying indicated parallels between the two.
“Yes,” Kaine said, his tone begrudging.
“But Morrough left, and he didn’t take everyone. You were still here. How did that work?” she asked as she began applying the salve to lacerations that were still fresh and raw.
“We’re not always bound to him exactly.” He sighed. “We’re—he uses his bones, pieces of them, when we’re made. Part of the outer bone of his right arm was used on me. He calls them phylacteries. It’s what creates our physical immutability. A part of that is used to make the talismans.” He gestured at his chest. “He takes the phylacteries out sometimes and either grows a new bone or takes a spare from some necrothrall. That’s what he did when travelling, so he could leave some of us behind during his trip. He doesn’t like to do it often, but if he travelled without leaving the phylacteries, the connection would sever, and we’d—die.”
“His bones?” Helena was stuck on that point.
He nodded. “Yes. He shares a piece of himself with us, and we give all of ourselves to him.”
He was silent, and Helena just kept working, her mind churning, until he spoke again.
“A few tried to run, back when the war started. When they realised it wouldn’t be a tidy little coup to depose the Holdfasts. The High Necromancer had the corpses brought back. He’d made new talismans from each of the phylacteries and put them into the corpses. I believe you call them liches when they’re dead like that. That was when we began to realise what being ‘Undying’ meant.”
“What would happen if you stole your phylactery?”
He laughed under his breath. “You’ve never been anywhere near Morrough if you think that’s doable. He can fill rooms with his resonance. But even if it were possible to steal from him, they start crumbling after a while. That deterioration doesn’t kill the Undying, but—their minds start to go.”
Well, that explained why Ferron needed the Eternal Flame; he was dependent on them defeating Morrough for him.
“I’ll let Crowther know,” she said as she finished.
HELENA PAUSED HALFWAY ACROSS THE bridge to the East Island, looking back towards the dam and mountains. Lumithia was a waning crescent, approaching the summer Abeyance, but still her light gilded everything.
A few more weeks and the summer tides would fully ebb, making passage across the seas possible, and the month-long deluge of trade would pour across the sea, hurrying inland. The Resistance had secured the ports just in time for the annual trade season.
