[Amara]
Rejuvenate deactivated. Connections were made. And my body moved on its own, in the way it was trained to.
A hand latched iron-tight around the undead's neck. I lifted it off the floor and stomped, channeling the momentum to hurl the monster into the wall ahead.
It collided with a thunderous thud and sunk to the floor.
Time, then, seemed to return to normal.
It's true!? It was all true! How could this…
I silenced my thoughts. There was no time for questions. An undead had infiltrated the city. Stood in the same room as my brother.
It needed to be taken care of. Before people were hurt.
Fists clenched and my legs poised before the undead, stirring uselessly on the floor. One strike to the skull would end it. Like those I slew in my last assignment.
"Amara!" Oliver flew in my path just moments before I went in. "Stop it!"
"Wha- What are you doing!?" My resolve cooled like a blade taken from the forge and dunked underwater. "Move! I must slay it!"
"He isn't an it!" Oliver argued. "Skell's my friend, and he's no enemy! He saved my life!"
At that, I could do nothing but stammer.
My brother spoke of an impossibility. Something that could never occur regardless of circumstance. Undead were known for one thing: mindless devastation. I'd witnessed bloody scenes of mutilation by their hands. Fought those that would rend me a mass of unrecognizable meat on the floor had I allowed them. Even vampires - capable of higher thought - could never comprehend empathy.
Yet another impossibility revealed itself. The undead, struggling to merely put arms under itself to rise, looked up at my fearless brother putting his body between us… and dropped a tear.
Oliver extended his arms. "I'm sorry Amara. But I can't let you hurt him!"
I took tentative steps away from the two. Something was terribly wrong. Our Order was acclaimed, no, exalted for its ability to perform this very act. Slaying the undead that terrorized the masses was a good thing. The right thing. It always was. And it had been done thousands upon thousands of times.
It was our duty.
And it was then that I remembered what Warden Slania told me. Of an incident in Belza Hill regarding an anonymous man accused of being a skeleton in disguise.
Completely outlandish. At least, that's what I believed at the time. But then…
That anonymous man - the one who trounced a Knight in combat - and the undead in front of me… could they be one and the same?
Oliver turned his head to the… man. "Skell, are you okay!?"
Speech seemed beyond him. He tried rising to his feet regardless. He failed, slumping back to the floor. The hand against his back made it clear - his spine was shattered.
"Skell!" Oliver hunched over the man.
"He will… he will be fine," I knit my eyes tight. "Allow him a minute."
"What do you mean?" asked Oliver.
"If he truly is undead, his regeneration takes effect as we speak."
"I know. But doesn't light magic muck that up?"
"For a time," I replied. "But Rejuvenate is a meager art, and not meant for offense. Any negative effects Skell experiences are short-lived. Minimal."
"…Doesn't feel minimal," Skell growled.
Oliver rushed to grab his arm and support him. Skell made no shortage of grimaces on the way up.
I crossed my arms. "There is much that needs elaboration."
"You'll hear it…" he leaned against the wall, voice dripping with scorn. "Long as you keep your hands to yourself."
—————————————————————————————————
It all began with the birth of a dead man. Walking without a thought through Sienna Woods.
Then it struck. Understanding. Sentience. The man examined himself and loathed what looked back at him. Confusion and fear and worry and anger all unraveled inside him. He took off, hoping desperately to jog his memories and escape his fate in equal measure.
Instead he ran into my brother.
Oliver stalked a rabbit, bowstring taut. He'd hoped a stew of it would ease Grandfather's pain after a bloody encounter with someone I knew quite well. His prey was however strangely frightened, and flit off unexpectedly. In the opposite direction of an undead in the breezy forest.
The result of their meeting was clear before they spoke it aloud: words were exchanged, and Oliver refused to shoot Skell - despite his skeletal countenance.
Despite knowing what Skell was.
By the time I was able to quiet my thoughts about that, they described the ensuing battle.
Velora returned with a number of thugs and a vengeance. People were hurt. Gravely. Not least of all Oliver, though he noted his shoulder was nearly painless now. Grandfather however, was pushed to his old, injured body's very limit.
Under the table, my fists clenched helplessly onto groaning knees.
So much has happened, and my family went through it all while I was none the wiser! If only I was there…
Somehow, Skell recalled an art that dispersed the thugs and dismembered Velora. I didn't know if I was relieved to hear this or further saddened. After all she'd done, my thoughts of her were a giant, mind-boggling ball of emotions. Same as what I felt for Skell. Once his identity as undead was discovered by the villagers, they forced him to flee. Despite standing in their defense. That… made me think.
Other, lesser matters came up as they recounted events, but as the two came to a close, Oliver grew quieter, and Skell spoke more formally. In hindsight, two very bad omens.
Hindsight was unneeded, however. Even then it crossed my mind:
The hole in the story they neglected to fill.
"How… how fares grandfather?" I asked. "After such a grueling ordeal, he must surely be getting his fair share of bedrest?"
Neither of them spoke. And the subtle discomfort in the room's background was pushed to the forefront.
"H-he's resting, isn't he?" I shook my head. "No, I'm being silly. Grandfather would sooner burn our home to the ground than remain inside it for more than a few hours. We'd need to nail him to the bed, wouldn't we?"
My smile was the only one in the room. And it was becoming harder and harder to maintain.
Skell looked off, sympathy crushing his eyes. I figured he must have been under the effects of a glamour to look as he did. As well, I knew that despite their nature - magical illusions - the emotion they exhibited came from a real place. Which made it all the more terrifying when it was so obvious he wanted to speak. To say something simple, yet shackled with the weight of the world.
Yet he restrained himself. "Not my place," he muttered almost too quietly to hear.
I turned to my brother. His big eyes welled with tears, and he looked so very cold, clutching his arms close. He tried to form words. He couldn't.
So Oliver merely shook his head.
And everything came crashing down.
The man who raised me, taught me to fight, dressed me, fed me, loved me… he was gone. It was no longer a matter of distance between us, but of eternity. When I closed my eyes I could almost hear his voice. Almost see a trace of his smile in the dark. Then they opened and I realized that was all I'd ever have.
That realization stole a piece of what made me whole and never, ever gave it back.
I choked into an instinctive palm, feeling bile pool in my throat and water gather in my trembling eyes. A great dam cracked inside me, threatening to release a deluge of sorrow.
Oliver broke first.
He wept and wept and before I knew it my arms wrapped around him. Tears soaked into my sleeves but I didn't care. I was absent once. Not again.
My own dam had burst as well. Nevertheless I held back the tide. It was the hardest thing I'd ever done. If my grip faltered for but a moment, I'd share my brother's state. That couldn't happen. I needed to be strong. For him. In this world, he was now alone. We had no other family.
Hence by his side I would stand, never again to abandon him to the jaws of peril and loss.
Never again.
—————————————————————————————————-
Midnight must've passed before another word was spoken.
Until then, silence. There was a wealth of information that had yet to be told. What truly occurred in Belza Hill, or the source of Skell's glamour, and several questions I was unsure if even they could answer.
But none of that felt particularly pressing. None so much as walking through life's memories.
Once, I punched grandfather.
Not to be mean, of course. I was simply a little girl and he was the toughest person I'd ever known. So I waited around a corner. And once he came around?
I figured it was a good way to impress him at the time. And he was certainly impressed. After the shock wore off. As always, he liked to play things up. But seeing him, doubled over? I was terrified. How could I have hurt him like that? What was wrong with me?
Yet he just laughed, gently hoisted me off the ground with an arm, and said-
"Amara?" Oliver pulled me back to the present.
He sat beside me on the bed, leaning red-eyed on my shoulder. His body had long cried itself dry, but only now did he speak, voice hoarse.
"We came to tell you about grandpa," Oliver looked up at me. "But that ain't the only reason we're here. Do… do you reckon there's a place we can go to learn about Skell's undeath?"
"What? Why?"
"I want to come back to life," interjected Skell, sitting somber on the opposite bed. "I need to know how."
I squinted. "You want to… excuse me?"
"Is there a place or not?" Skell asked firmly. "Or better yet, is there a way to resurrect the dead?"
…So that explains it. The spiel about being an undead aficionado - this was his aim all along.
My mouth opened, but words came slowly. In truth, I still wasn't entirely sure if mercy was the right decision. Every look at him pumped the warrior blood in my veins. Each glance brought another theory as to his true intentions. He'd proven capable of lying for his benefit once, after all. Thus, assisting him could have untold consequences.
"…I know you don't want to hear this," I watched Skell's frown deepen, "but life and death are not simply levers to be flipped on a whim. The barrier between them is unbreakable. Once one dies, their soul moves on. It is no longer of this world."
"But I've gotta be a special case, right?" his tone bordered on pleading. "I'm a bit of both. I can think. Feel. I even have a few memories back now. If I still have some of my old self left, can't there be a way to regain the rest?"
"I don't have all the answers," I replied. "If there is such a way - and I doubt there is - I've never heard of it."
Skell's fist tightened… then let go and drifted listlessly into his lap. The other delved into his pocket and retrieved a mirror. Wistfully he stared into the item, lacking the energy to let it reflect even sadness.
Equally rational, however, was the idea that his words and emotions were entirely real.
To simplify an old deductive principle: conclusions with the fewest assumptions are most often true. Perhaps Skell was an evil creature that somehow gained a devilish sentience, and spent day and night manipulating my brother to reach me, and gambled on my mercy and gullibility to gain coveted information for diabolical reasons.
Or maybe he spoke the truth. Maybe he truly did just want to live. Be human.
I could not say with certainty. My instincts told me a threat sat across the room.
"But…" I hesitated, "there may be a way to find out."
Yet something deeper wished to be mistaken.
Skell's expression didn't change. He didn't even look at me. "Don't give me false hope."
"This is no con," I assured. "I'm not peddling a miracle solution. I'm offering a chance."
"What kind of chance?" Oliver asked.
"Across Selem, there are many libraries. Diverse catalogues, I hear. Except they all lack a single subject: necromancy. Books to do with it are… sanitized, so to speak, if not taken off shelves entirely. In other words, you won't find anything worth looking into in any such places."
"So I'm screwed?" Skell asked dryly.
"…Not quite," I hid the fierce debate inside my head. "There's one place, in all of Selem, that holds dangerous information civilians aren't allowed access to. Including extensive research on undeath and necromancy."
The undead finally lifted his eyes. "And what is this place, exactly?"
I swallowed. "The Templar Citadel."
That caught his attention. "Y-you're saying the only place that could possibly give me the knowledge I want is the headquarters of the Templars!? They didn't even let us past the front door for a shading visit - no way I'm getting in there."
"That's true," I admitted. "Even with this glamour of yours - which is highly illegal, mind you - entering the Citadel is no easy task. All the more if your identity comes to light."
"There has to be a way," Oliver said. "Any way at all, even if its hard. What if we snuck in?"
"As a Templar," I stated, "I cannot allow anyone to infiltrate the Citadel - it amounts to high treason and a betrayal of my oaths. Further, it would be suicide. Those inside make a career of facing sneaks and subterfuge. No amount of magic and guile will prevent capture and execution."
"Then what can we do?" Oliver jumped off the bed.
"I… apologies," I looked away. "I suppose I gave you false hope after all. I suppose I simply wanted to help, but actually reaching the information you seek? I don't know if its possible. Perhaps if the High Judge herself gifted you her blessing, or if you were a member of the Order, but we'd sooner see a second moon in the sky before the former happened. Same with the latter. Needless to say, you are the polar opposite of a Templar."
A sudden conviction lit in Skell's eyes as he rose. "…Am I really?"
I blinked back, confused. "Well, yes? Undead are the foremost enemy of Templars. Our mortal foes. This is common sense. Those two lines cannot be crossed."
"Like life and death?" questioned the undead. "I'm thinking, and I don't see why not. What stops me from signing up to become a Templar? It's not like they have to know what I am."
I started to get nervous. "I-I'll tell them. You're fortunate I'm speaking to an undead to begin with - I'll never allow one to enter our Order. I'd be plunging a dagger in the back of my own organization."
"Wait," Oliver said, "do you even have to do that? Amara could just bring you the information you need!"
"No," I said firmly, standing up myself. "Our oaths forbid divulging classified information and I will honor those I made until my dying breath. Abyss, those books cannot leave the archives they inhabit in the first place!"
"Fine then!" Skell crossed the room. "How do I become a Templar?"
I met him halfway. "Did you not hear me!? That can never occur! Do you understand what would happen if an undead were found in the Order? It would be a national emergency! Trust in us would-"
"To the Abyss with your trust!" he argued. "That's the thing - I won't get caught! I'm not gonna live this half-life because you're afraid of what if's!"
Disgust came over me. "You're just like the rest. Willing to destroy anything to satisfy yourself."
He jabbed a finger in my face. "You're just like the rest! Self-righteous and stupid! I control myself! Screw Hyland, you - anyone who thinks different!"
"I-"
Oliver bumped between us both. Somehow he found the energy to cry again.
Any anger I held vanished in an instant. Skell's furious eyes were replaced by immediate concern.
"A…Amara… Skell…" Tears rolled down his freckled cheeks, wetting the floor. "Please be… kind to each other… help each other… please…"
Oliver was right. I could say what I wanted, but Skell fought for my brother on multiple occasions. Fought for my village. Fought for no rewards and all the risk. He was different. True, he was an undead. But he was a man, too. And ultimately, that was what I fought for. Not only for my Order and King, but for the little people. The weak, the poor, the disadvantaged and the hopeless. Before I wanted to be a Templar, I wanted to be a woman who made a difference. In any form that could take.
Before me stood the strangest form I could imagine: a man in the body of the enemy. A killer. A monster. That body however, was not the one he wanted. There was a possibility, however small, for me to help change that.
Logically, my answer should have been no. Logically, I should have slain him. But my stupid, stupid heart couldn't do it. Instead my heart brought me to a different decision altogether. One my mind had no choice but to agree to.
"I'll… I'll help you, Skell," I promised. "I'll train you to become a Templar."