The Vulcans are prototypical soldiers, noble of mind and heart; ready to protect at a moment’s notice. -Bianca Rosamund’s Sagistry Compendium, Ch. 2.

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“Ben?”

“Yeah?”

“You ever wish the dead would just leave us be? I think I’d prefer it.”

“We’d be out of a job, Abe. Dealing with the dead is half of what we do. I think it’s the preferable half, honestly.”

“More than fighting beasts? Really?”

“Really. Least you can help a ghost pass without fighting it. Don’t have to kill. It’s already dead.”

“Fair enough. I just can’t stand the tinglies.”

“The resonance?”

“Aye. The tinglies. Don’t get those from wolves, nor from harpies. No possession. No deteriorating state of mind. Just you and nature, battling it out with fire and claw.”

“Fair enough, though I would argue that the dead are just as natural as the living.”

A chill ran through Ben as they walked, though that was just the wind. They listened to the babbling of water flowing over stone as they followed a wide creek. Hardwood trees towered over them, leaves and branches entwining to create sporadic patches of sunlight and shade, hiding most of the sky and the Massifian Wall from the Clerics. Tree limbs rustled as the winds passed through. Leaves of blue and red fell, dead and changed by the coming of autumn. The leaf-littered grass before them rolled and rose alongside the creek, making for uneven traversal as the boys looked for tracks and hints.

Abe, despite the peaceful quiet of the woods, decided to elaborate. “You can eat the beasts after. Sell ‘em. Don’t have folks trying to break a contract due to a lack of proof. I think that’s a point in my favor.”

“Yeah. Smoked harpy leg is a point in your favor,” Ben replied.

“Rich traders don’t know it’s shite. Won’t admit it once they do, either, since it’s exotic. Makes them seem refined.”

“Until they learn that harpies are the result of horrific splice testing by Soventrists who were way too far out of their league.”

“You telling them?”

“I am not.”

“A point in my favor then.”

Other than clues, they knew not what they looked for. Of late, animals avoided this stretch of the woods and the miles of land around it. Folks who came this way disappeared, not a trace of them to be found. Lord Heret’s constables had not taken long to come to the Clerics’ Office once they’d been made aware. If humans were behind the disappearances, Ben and Abe could leave the issue to the police. Better to send in a cleric first than a constable. A cleric could get away from human assailants. Magistrates were not trained to survive encounters with the dead or horrific beasts.

“Look,” Abe said as they made it to the top of a hill. “A house.”

House was putting it lightly. This was a lodge, and a massive one at that. The wooden home sat two stories high, the roof rising above the hill it was built into. While it may have been a great show of craftsmanship back in its day, the building was now a shell of its former self. It sagged to the left a bit, a sign of what was to come should it not be fixed. The white wood was beginning to deteriorate around the structure, some planks throughout having already rotted through. Even from the top of the hill Ben could note clumps of some bugs, either termites or carpenter ants, who had made the dying home their own. A lookout sat next to the house, a wooden platform built into some trees. No railing or armholds or anything of the sort. Just two stools and a ladder. Nothing and nobody were up there. That was not the oddest part to Ben.

“No guards,” Ben whispered. “No windows on the building either. Just the door.”

“Aye,” Abe replied, equally quiet. “Only one way in. Looks haunted, eh?” he asked as he nudged Ben’s shoulder, pushing Ben over a bit. He had to catch his balance. Abe was a head taller and half a person wider. “Sorry,” he said. Ben chuckled.

“I agree. I’d bet Da’s bottom Nicky there’s a spirit here.”

“Just need to find out if it’s our culprit.”

They began to slowly walk down the hill. They could not rule out the potential presence of people, though Ben heavily doubted it.

Surely a criminal who was, at the very least, abducting people would have some way to keep watch? A friend? An accomplice? A grunt?

Ben Infused his senses with Kova. The simple sounds of rustling plantlife and running water exploded in his ears for a moment, the sounds of so many things both living and not competing for his attention. The chill of the wind was amplified, the brightness of the little sunlight that snuck through the canopy, the smells of the woods.

The smell of death forced him to stop in place.

He controlled the Infusion, bringing his senses down to manageable levels so that he could filter through whatever stimuli were important and whichever were not.

“You smell that, Abe?” Ben whispered, looking toward his friend. He spoke quietly as the Infusion allowed them to easily hear one another. Abe’s nose was scrunched, tears conjured by the awful scent forcing his eyes shut.

“Yeah. Don’t like it one bit.”

They had smelled death. Decay. The pungent odor of decomposition, of a life taken or ended, of maggots and rotten meat and voided bowels. Ben put most of his Kova into his eyes, taking in every detail he could, watching for a surprise, a bandit, a beast. They continued walking on toward the lodge, its wooden door slightly ajar. As they approached, the scent became invasive. They easily would have caught it even without Infusion. He heard nothing new, no one, no movement or voices. All signs were leading toward a spirit of some sort.

They walked in, the hinges making no noise as they carefully opened and shut the door. Darkness enveloped the home. Ben could only make out a few feet of a red carpet before them. The Infusion only made the dark seem more… dark. Some said you could hallucinate if you Infused your eyes in the darkness for long enough. Ben had never cared to try, and now would not be the first time.

“You got this?” he whispered to Abe.

Abe nodded, putting his fist up to his chest and sticking his pointer finger out. Wisps of light floated above his fingertip, rotating for a moment before coalescing into a small orb of incredibly bright flame. Ben could now see they were in a hallway.

The hall was wooden, bare save for a red carpet that ran down its length. Small entrances into separate rooms lined the walls. Dust filled the voids between wood. Webs infested the ceiling as well as the corners where it met the wall. The scent did not come from the surrounding rooms. The clerics continued on their way. As they passed, Ben made note of what seemed to be beds, toys, and dishes. All were beyond disrepair. The blankets on the beds seemed to be recently rustled, the fabric not having settled from disuse. Likely rats or other small creatures.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

But there are no animals around. None at all.

Ben stopped, pointed to a bedroom, and walked in. Abe followed.

He approached the bed. No wooden frame, mattress torn with flattened cotton spilling out. Someone had been putting it back in. He focused on his smell. Under the stench of death was sweat, body odor, spittle from a mouth with rotten teeth. Ben Infused his hand, coating it in forest-green Aether, his palm glowing with a soft light. He met no resistance. No Nether. No spirits.

“People,” he whispered, allowing the Aether to dissipate. Abe nodded, allowing the orb of fire to float a few feet in front of him, concealing the boys in darkness while still helping them see ahead. They turned and walked toward the rot, following the fire.

They explored the remaining rooms and the rest of the lower level. The stink was strongest near a latched door which led downstairs. Before heading down, they decided to clear out the upper level of the home. Ben had decided this was a home, or a commune, of a sort. Every room upstairs also hosted multiple beds and messes, though the folks whom they belonged to were nowhere to be seen. Multiple hallways, plenty of rooms, and each opening led to empty bedrooms. Satisfied they would not be ambushed from someone on the upper level, they went back down to the latched door in the ground.

Ben bent down to undo the latch. His hand began to glow with green Aether. As he grabbed the latch, the Aether slowly began to diffuse from his hand into the mechanism. Infusing the latch allowed it to work beyond its peak efficiency, as though it were new, making it much less likely to creak. He unlatched the trap door, pulling it up a tad and signalling for Abe to hold onto it. As the Aether faded from the latch, Ben moved to the other side of the door and began to Infuse the hinges. Abe lifted the door without a sound, revealing a steep staircase. Warmth rushed through the opening. Torches, held by brackets, lined the walls along the stairs.

Morwood torches. Explains why there’s no smoke. Is there a God’s Grove nearby?

They began to descend, small creaks and thuds coming through with every step. Try as they might, neither Ben nor Abe could Infuse an entire staircase and still have enough energy to flee. There was no point anyway. Even the best stairs made noise when used. Ben had hoped for stone steps, but that would have been too good to be true. The boys now had to hope they could make minimal noise or that they were mistaken for one of the commune’s own.

Pain ignited in Ben’s head, goosebumps popping up all around his skin as a true chill ran through him. He stumbled for a moment, grabbing on to the railing so he would not fall. Spirits. In the ground. In the home. In the walls. Weak, though, and non-malevolent so far as he could tell. It was easy to feel the disposition of a spirit based on their netheric resonance, the energy left behind when they made contact with the physical world, and the ones here seemed more frightened than vindictive.

Abe looked to Ben, worry showing in his arched eyebrows. Abe was not as sensitive to the dead as Ben was.

“The dead are here. They do not rest.” Whatever was here scared the ghosts, likely made them ghosts in the first place.

The stench worsened as they reached the bottom of the stairs.

“If we see anyone,” Ben whispered, “we leave. Get the constables.”

“Depends,” Abe whispered back.

“On?”

“What they’ve done.”

“We’re clerics. We don’t kill-”

“I’m not saying we kill.”

Ben nodded. Clerics would not kill humans outside of self defence situations, but instigating violence against them was not against their code.

“If we can run, we run. Got it?”

“Who put you in charge?”

“You. You did.”

“Right.”

The boys unbuttoned their black, woolen long coats, dropping them onto the wooden stairs. Abe wore the same outfit, the garb of their order. Gray buttoned vest over a white dress shirt, gray trousers, gray tie, black belt, and black boots. All flecked with dirt, mud, and tears, of course, as they’d spent the last couple of days sleeping in trees and roaming woodlands. Very rarely was an active cleric’s garb kept clean.

Ben felt at his belt, unlatching the hammer he kept at his side, holding the familiar weight of his chosen weapon. A black, morwood hilt rose into a brick of smooth, white sagestone. The weapon ran longer than his forearm, giving a solid reach alongside the force it could produce. Ben preferred to use this over the long sosin knife and kovlock pistols all clerics were outfitted with. His blade sat in its leather scabbard, his pistol in its leather holster, both on his belt. Abe’s blade was out, the flames of the torch and Abe’s orb glinting off the well oiled steel. His wooden wand was still latched.

Torches lit the hall as they did the stairs. The walls and floor were of dirt rather than wood. No bedroom entrances could be made out. The boys continued, the dirt softly crunching under their boots as they went. They stepped slowly, carefully, placing their feet in tracks left by those who lived here. They kept their eyes Infused, looking for any potential traps, any change in the area. Dread crept into Ben’s mind, his heartbeat quickening, driblets of sweat forming on his forehead. The heat was worse in the hall than anywhere else in the house. Despite dropping their coats, Ben was uncomfortably warm.

A cacophonous hum of voices met them as they neared the corner. People were here. He inhaled, smelling nothing but death and body odor and…

Is that blood?

They quickened their pace, turning the corner and coming upon a massive chamber.

Four pillars of white sagestone sat in the middle of the room, reaching from the dirt floor to the wooden ceiling. Four sets of stairs led up to a square platform between the pillars, a perfect spot for a speaker to stand, preach, educate. A man stood there now. Tall, robed, and taking no note of the boys as they entered. He focused on the attendants before him, all sat in rows of pews built in the fashion of most churches.

A cult?

It must have been. He’d read of some, such as Ronny Knoxes and his Massifian Reforgers. They’d all ingested nightshade believing the Allsmith had been captured, that dying with the intent of saving him would inevitably lead their spirits toward his prison. Not a sinister group, just misguided, easily fooled, and unfortunate. Scholars agreed that membership had been voluntary, and only adults were welcomed to join their ranks.

This felt sinister.

Ben and Abe watched as the man atop the platform prepared to preach. As he organized some texts and candles on a flat stone podium, two robed figures, with a child in hand, walked up the front-facing set of stairs. Stairs stained black with old blood, previous attempts to clean it having been obviously unsuccessful.

Ben could not tell, but the child seemed to be a young girl. Shaved head, clothed in a black dress, irrevocably dirty. Solrusian too, for her skin was as dark as the void. She was gagged, the cloth stained with salt and tears and snot and spit. She groaned, though the tensing of her neck led Ben to believe she was trying to scream. The preacher held a knife to her neck, long and of impeccable quality. The child had not noticed them either. Ben and Abe had already started creeping forward, crouched a tad, weapons in hand.

“Solrusian, young, of a moldable soul. These qualities are best beloved by Soventre, the master we serve, the master for whom we must find a home!

“For eons, throughout the turning of eras, our Lord has been besmirched by the Sagistry, partially blamed for the Darkness over Commonwealth, his name muttered as a curse instead of a blessing.

“He must come home. Come home to us. Those we have eaten for sustenance will have died for nothing should we fail, we-,” he paused as he slit the girl’s throat, smiling as the blood flowed down her dress, “-cannot displease him.”

A crack. All looked back as air ignited into flame. A thin, blazing line of green sagefire erupted from Abe’s wand, traversing the room and drilling through the preacher’s forehead; his rapturous smile fading as the spell exploded from the back of his head. Clumps of hair and chunks of skin disintegrating before hitting the ground, sagefire making ash of all it touched. Ben screamed, for the girl, for the preacher, his voice melding with those of the cultists.

The cultists, their leader dead, all stood as they yelled. They held knives, mallets, hammers; small weapons for small people. There were twenty-two in total, all armed, none confident in their abilities. The kinds of folks who were fine with the abuse and death of a child because that was the only power they would ever hold over another person.

Ben, anger surging, stepped forward, hammer in hand. The screams faded though the cultists’ mouths stayed open. Ben’s temples thundered, blood pumping to the rhythm of his furious heart. The hammer head began to glow forest green as Ben Infused it. Abe’s sosin knife gleamed as he Infused it with sagefire, giving the blade properties of flame. Frustration and despair made Ben’s mind run hot. He would deal with Abe’s actions later.

Ben would not kill, but he would not let these crimes go unpunished.

The clerics of Aegimar and the cultists ran at one another, battlecries erupting from their throats save for Ben. Ben reached for the Inner Eye, the emotional state where feelings would not overrule his sense of logic. He thought of Da, getting home to him safely, leaving him without a son. He thought of these cultists who had been misguided, who had been led to commit such horrid crimes. Their choices were their own, but weaklings were oft at the mercy of those who were strong. They might have turned out differently if the preacher had not led them unto barbarism.

He thought of Raina, the girl who might be out of a job should they die. He thought of the families of these cultists, children and wives and husbands who had no say over the actions of their loved one, whose lives would be upended due to their weakness. He had to see both sides, those who were hurt most, those who had no power over the situation.

Those who were forgotten.

I have a home to return to. Someone might be waiting for them too.

His goosebumps abated alongside the thumping in his chest. His breathing stabilized, the adrenaline shakes subsided. The Inner Eye came over him, shielding his mind from thoughts of fury and sadness. He moved, hammer in hand, ready to subdue rather than kill.

Too bad it’s not ghosts, Ben thought as his hammer shattered the teeth and jaw of some young man who did not know better.