Mitch the liches magical yuletide slay ride (Christmas special)

Mitch and his skeletal squads were about halfway to their goal when a massive blizzard forced them back. They sat trying to wait it out, but Mitch was far too impatient. They needed a way to keep the cold from their old bones (joint pain was no joke when you got to Mitches age... and were largely skeletal. Musco-skeletal pain had long since devolved to skeletal-skeletal pain. Some kind of disguises wouldn’t go amiss either; he had come to that realisation after the third traveller had screamed, wet themselves, and dove for cover. He quickly sent a message over the network asking for help, and one of the many constructs stepped up to help; a unit with the designation 0-0-0 had used their share of the earnings so far towards their dream of becoming a simple tailor.

They hadn’t had much practice so far clothing the human body, so this was a perfect opportunity for them to gain a large number of practice models who were the right shape and were in no position to complain, given that they would get what they needed for the journey for absolutely free.

Of course, that solved, there was still the issue of transportation; Mitch would seriously slow them down these days; one day's travel would have him in bits. But his skeletons didn’t wish to abandon him, and he wasn’t ready to separate from them either, and with the sudden blizzard, even if they had the equipment and time to make a carriage, it would end up going off the road on the slushy snow.

That and he didn’t feel comfortable asking his skeletons to pull; The Princess had been right on that front; his skeletons deserved more respect than that. This problem, however, was solved the next day, as several of his skeletons, the next day dragged in a number of freshly frozen corpses. Some kind of carnivorous deer. Who upon raising were more than happy to pull in exchange for meat, though once this was over, they would need convincing to take a proper maceration before they started to stink (and just like with teenagers with a bath or shower, Mitch knew they would sulk and ignore the stink for about a week after or until they developed their first mystery fungus, whichever came first.)

The transport itself took longer; they took all the spare bones they had lying around (one thing they had plenty of) and started to cobble together a transport option suitable for the task. They needed the spare bones anyway, as skeletons did not come with any kind of warranty (any human over 30 can attest to that after the third time something they needed went twang, and believe me post, mortem isn’t any better on that front.) If they ever needed spares, it was very much a bring your own job, and this was their solution. Piece by piece, a sled of bones was cobbled together, like the worlds most morbid jigsaw puzzle, with skull lanterns at the front and back, a comfy spot in the middle for Mitch to sit (after all, if you’re a skeleton, you really don’t want the only one with necromantic powers too knackered to help if anything goes wrong.) Some kind of carefully woven halter and extremely long woven reins, so the zombie deer didn’t vanish without a trace. Somebody had even managed to cobble together some kind of improvised bells out of the scraps of metal salvaged from the tomb so they didn’t accidentally hit anybody. That struck everybody as a bad idea.

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Turns out almost all the fabric 0-0-0 had was lincoln green, but as the old expression goes, “beggars can’t be choosers”, and it turned out they were really good at tailoring once they were away from the areas of the valley likely to cause fabric to combust. She’d even managed to cobble together some kind of hats for everybody in a rather chic pointy style. (Mitch had no idea about fashion; you miss a few hundred years of catching up on the local trends, you’ll end up failing to be trendy even more than a parent trying to dress cool. Being dead a few centuries put a real kink in such endeavours, but in the end, who cares about something like that?) They had even managed to cobble together some fake facial hair because nothing hides a bare skull better than a big bushy beard, and a hat meant nobody noticing your bare skull. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a start.

Somewhere down the line, one of his crew had remembered their skill in carpentry and drafted a bunch of fellow former elves (smaller hands) to help craft some kind of thank you gifts for their new hosts. Showing up empty-handed had felt kind of wrong to everybody, and they had transportation. That and spares could be used to bribe passers-by to prevent the whole screaming and running malarkey that always followed running into them.

Hopefully, that would prevent any torch and pitchfork related incidents (the most common cause of undead workplace injury by far) long enough for them to make it to their new home.

Next came clothes for Mitch himself; having used up the last of the green on the batallion of undead, all that was left was a roll of red fabric. But by now, 0-0-0 had got the sewing of this kit down to a fine art, so long as she followed the same pattern, it would be pulled together in a matter of minutes, and she was particularly proud of the large and bushy fake beard.

It didn’t take long after that to throw some still bloody meat in the deer’s feedbags, and then they were off.

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Mike, the hiker, was in shock. He had been out for a weekly stroll, not too long, only twenty or thirty miles, but while he was out, a massive blizzard had hit. Now here he was freezing his brass monkeys off by a roadside (silly hiker shorts seem really silly when it’s too cold to pretend it isn’t) and was struggling to stay awake when he heard the sound of bells; who the hell would be out in this weather?

The answer came soon enough, as a horde of skeletons in green clothes sprinted past, accompanying a sleigh that was more like a slay. Cobbled together out of what looked to be the leftovers from a cannibal buffet. Pulled by a group of zombie deer.

While he tried to deal with whatever the hell he was seeing by making himself as small as possible, he was knocked on his arse by a nice warm looking cloth sack, which would have hurt less without the wooden prize inside. But still, it was warm enough to sleep in till things settled down. Once the runnered horror had passed, he burrowed into a snowbank and started a fire. He’d take it.

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They were almost to their destination when Mitch remembered he had one more present to give. This one he had made himself. He handed the present over. “Merry Solstice 0-0-0,” he said as he realised how much fun his trip had been. Maybe he should do this again next year.