I yawned and stretched. "You really think a threat like that is gonna sway me?"

"No." she admitted, she pulled back her cowl. Her purple hair was cut short to a few inches, spiked up with some type of gel. Other than the purple hair you would have thought she was any other normal woman. The deities of the undead were all such odd creatures. Abeth (for example) was pretty simple in looks, beautiful sure, but she wasn't stunningly beautiful where anyone would fall over themselves with lust. "It would be nice if you acted a little impressed."

"Shaddup, song sooth. We both know you don't care." She really didn't care about me being in awe of her. "What I would like to know is why you care about being here."

"I was concerned for Ursula's safety. I need my followers to exist." She smiled warmly, and then her true beauty showed. It was still something that was natural and real. It was so stunning that I almost let the lie slide.

"Okay." I said. It wasn't an agreement with her lie. It was simply an acknowledgement that she had spoken.

"You don't think I care about keeping my power?" She tapped her dirt covered finger on Warren One's beak. Little white tentacles started to wriggle from the cracks as she added "I am dependent on their offerings and faith."

Another lie.

The gods didn't need faith to gain or keep power.

They really couldn't care less; Abeth especially. Some of the gods were all hoarding about their followers and not letting them worship others. Mono theology as it is called. The song sooth was not one of those gods.

"Okay." I let the word hang. Why was she so blatantly lying to me?

"I need my faithful to exist."

This was another lie.

If all of her faithful were to vanish tomorrow she would still meander through the carrion pits and mass graves with her haunting little lullaby.

She tutted her tongue and looked through a hole in the castle wall at the black trees outside "I have an errand for you--"

"-I don't do fetch quests." I snapped back. My teeth clicked with agitation.

"What if it brought back Laslilus?" She asked in a carefree tone, staring up at the ceiling with deep curiosity.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

My mouth opened and closed at the offer.

The song sooth kept her focus on the ceiling and more of the snow colored tentacles started to squirm through the cracks of the stone blocks.

She wasn't lying, that was a power she had. Well...She had the power to animate a corpse. Find the soul with her dirge of a lullaby and place that soul back into Laslilus's body.

And with that offer came a question. "Why?"

She turned back to me. "What was that?" she asked it in a distracted manner; as if she hadn't been watching me with her periphery vision.

"Why would you offer me Laslilus?" My voice came out dead, I could feel a quiet danger rolling within my core. "You have had the power to do this the whole time I've been farming. You could have done this at any time. Why now?"

Abeth plucked a feather from Warren One's head right on his eyelid. Boy that bird was gonna be unhappy when the world started moving again. "Because this matters to me. And besides. Death doesn't matter, whether it was five thousand years ago or yesterday. Time doesn't matter with resurrecting someone."

"You don't resurrect." I corrected with the same lack of tone in my voice "You reanimate. There's a difference."

"What's the difference?" She asked as she lazily pulled another feather from the undead avian's eyelid. "Her soul is in her body and it moves under her volition. Wyrm, worm. Same thing. When resurrected she gets what? Twenty more years? The only difference with my gift is that she gets to do it for a long, long time. No aging, no sickness. Just a pleasant existence with her beloved."

I folded my arms "The Supplicant gods would disagree."

"The Supplicant gods are morons!" her voice had changed to less light and more irritated. "When they raise the dead it is a miracle. When their followers die and go to the land beyond it is wonderous that they go to a place where the followers can play musical instruments and sing praises to their gods for eternity! That is freaking slavery! What moron is gonna wanna sit on a stool singing all day long!? My followers get to actually have choices about what they do I don't lord over them how amazing I am and keep them locked in an endless loop of music!"

"HEY!" I snapped "I was a worshipper of the Supplicants in life and I never gave up my vows."

"THEN YOU'RE A MORON TOO!" she shouted this and her voice carried around the castle, still just a normal echo. Nothing magical about it.

"And there we go, I just found your little limit." I said with a slight bit of satisfaction.

She calmed herself. "You're the ultimate skeptic and yet you can't believe that my way is better than the Supplicants?"

"I don't have to explain my faith, that is the whole point of it. It doesn't have to make sense." I wasn't defensive. I had made peace with many things over the decades.

She saw that resolve in my eyes and sighed loudly. "You do this for me and you get back Laslilus. Simple as that, no strings."

My rotting ears perked up at that last statement "No strings?" No strings was an unalterable set of words that carried more weight than most would realize. Especially for the gods. It meant there were no tricks, no word play that would let them wriggle out of the agreement. What they said and the way I interpreted those words were what decided the outcome. Example: a god tells me that if I am a good boy I can have a castle. We agree without saying 'no strings' and the god gives me a sand castle. It is a castle, even though I thought I was getting a big stone castle that could withstand an undead horde it doesn't matter, because the words of the agreement did not specify. No strings however was different.

I met her eyes as I pondered what that would mean. "No strings?"