Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise. You who dwell in the dust, awake and sing for joy! For your dew is a dew of light, and the earth will give birth to the dead. -- Isaiah 26:19, ESV

In his comparatively short life -- compared to other much older immortals, that is -- Irímé had witnessed many festivals, parties, and other social events that did not go according to plan. This was the first time he had seen one go so horribly, catastrophically wrong. Worse, this was the first time he and his friends could find themselves implicated in the sorry mess.

Mayhem reigned in the minutes after the corpse's departure. People had become separated from their companions and screamed their names at the top of their lungs. A group of palace guards belatedly charged into the palace and attempted to regain order. Some of the party-goers stormed out of the building, looking so furious anyone would have thought the whole fiasco was a personal slight aimed at them.

Abihira was nowhere to be seen. She had vanished somewhere in the midst of the crowd. If she had any sense she would get out of the palace quickly before anyone could think to ask awkward questions.

Irímé looked around frantically for anyone he recognised. His mother had left him over an hour ago to talk to her friends and he hadn't seen her since. Kitri had been somewhere near Abihira a while ago. Where she was now he had no idea. In the direction of the main doors he caught a glimpse of someone who might have been Kiriyuki. Trying to approach her would have meant fighting his way through the crowd. In despair Irímé looked back towards the ballroom, praying he would spot at least one familiar face.

He did. Ilaran was fairly easy to spot in any crowd; he was half a head taller than Abihira, who was herself taller than most people Irímé knew, and he was wearing a very odd, very tall pointed headdress. For the first time Irímé was thankful his co-conspirator had such a fondness for, ahem, eccentric clothes.

Ilaran had apparently decided it wasn't worth battling his way through a host of panicked people. Instead he was standing next to the wall, just outside the ballroom doors and away from the thickest crowds. His grim scowl suggested he had seen everything that happened and knew exactly who to blame for it.

Irímé wound his way towards him, in the process narrowly avoiding a collision with several people who weren't looking where they were going. His earlier murder-related disagreement with Ilaran faded into insignificance in the face of this more immediate problem. What he really needed right now was someone else who knew what was going on and might have some suggestions on what to do.

He was thoroughly out of breath by the time he got with speaking distance. That dratted, absurdly long jórnin[1] had nearly tripped him so many times he'd lost count. His headdress had been knocked askew and was now leaning precariously far over one side of his head. The long hairpins meant to hold it in place now tugged painfully on his hair. The gods alone knew what sort of sorry sight he made when he finally reached Ilaran.

It dawned on Irímé now that he hadn't thought beforehand of what to say. So he said the first thing that came into his head.

"Have you seen Abihira?"

Ilaran nodded. His scowl became even more grim. "She left a while ago. Haliran followed her."

Amidst all the chaos all thought of Haliran and her crimes had been driven out of Irímé's mind. For a few seconds he wondered who that was and why just hearing the name made him shudder. Then he remembered. His eyes widened in horror.

"What?"

Under other circumstances such a loud yell would have drawn the attention of everyone within hearing range. As it was plenty of other people were shouting various things, ranging from the understandable like "Where are you?" to the absurd like "The world is ending!", and no one spared Irímé a second glance.

"Why didn't you stop her?" he demanded in a quieter tone.

"Three reasons. First, her parents went with her. Haliran generally doesn't bother attacking someone who has friends with them to defend them. She's too much of a coward to choose anyone who can fight back as a victim. Second, I've thought about it since I saw them and I still can't see why Haliran would follow Abihira right now. She doesn't know about her hobbies--" Ilaran carefully avoided mentioning necromancy or anything associated with it, "--and she has no grudge against Abihira specifically. There's a chance it was just a coincidence they left so close together. Third, I can't get through this damned crowd!"

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The two of them turned and looked towards the main doors. Dozens of people were frantically trying to push their way through. The palace guards, for reasons unknown to anyone but themselves, were stopping the people who wanted to leave and were searching them for weapons. Apparently they'd got the completely wrong idea about what had happened and thought there had been a violent attack on someone. How they came to that conclusion when there were no injured victims seeking medical attention was a mystery. But then the palace guards had always been hopeless at dealing with non-murder-related crises. Tell them something unusual had happened to anyone loosely connected to the royal family and they'd immediately treat it as an attempted assassination.

"How do we get out of here?" Irímé wondered. "It'd take hours to get past those guards."

Ilaran shrugged. "Are there any windows we can climb out of?"

At first Irímé thought he was joking. Then he saw the look on his face and realised he actually meant it. He pictured what would happen if they were caught climbing out of a window not long after a walking corpse invaded the palace. Everyone would assume they were the culprits making their escape.

"That's the worst idea I've heard in ages."

"Really?" Ilaran asked dryly. "I think your dear fiancée has had a few worse ones."

Unfortunately that was only too true. Their present predicament was all the evidence he needed of it.

Irímé looked around the entrance hall and tried to remember what rooms lay behind those closed doors nearest to them. He had been in this palace only a handful of times over the last few centuries, and no one had ever given him a full tour. There was no need for him to tour the place. The Silver Palace was the main residence of the empress and emperor consort, the Grand Princess[2] and her husband on certain occasions, along with housing foreign dignitaries and meetings of politicians. He would never live here. Upon their marriage Abihira would be given her own palace -- or manor, which was more likely considering how low she was in the line of succession -- and Irímé would live there. Usually he thought that was preferable to the size and grandeur of the Silver Palace. Now he wished he knew more about its layout.

Hazarding a guess, he pointed to the closest closed door and said, "That's probably a sitting room. We could climb out one of its windows without being seen."

Ilaran gave him the sort of look a teacher would give a particularly dim pupil who'd just claimed two plus two made five. "That leads back into the ballroom."

Oops.

"On second thoughts," Ilaran continued thoughtfully, "the ballroom windows open out onto the west garden. We could get out that way. I don't think they've put guards there yet."

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Crypts were always gloomy places. Their very nature made them eerie and unsettling to almost everyone. Going into a crypt at night was a thought that could make the bravest shudder. Going at midnight into a crypt that held a reanimated corpse would send a normal person running for the hills.

It was just as well that Abihira was not even close to being a normal person. Death and corpses had been her near-constant companions since she was less than four hundred.

Her family had just arrived in her father's hometown for the yachinur[3] hunting season. Some strange commotion arose within minutes of them stepping out of the carriage. Abihira and Arafaren climbed onto the driver's seat to get a good view of what was happening. They saw a blood-stained young man being carried on wooden planks out of the fields. His bearers laid him down on the courtyard ground and ran to get a doctor.

"A riding accident," one of them told the children's parents. "Tried to jump that hedge down by the river."

Arafaren shuddered at the sight of the man lying in a pool of his own blood. He climbed down from the seat and ran to his mother. Abihira stayed where she was, unable to look away. She watched as the man's breath grew shallower and shallower until finally it stopped altogether. Later she asked her parents what had happened to him.

"He's gone," her mother said.

"But where?" Abihira wanted to know.

An awkward silence as Hartanna tried to find an explanation that a child would understand. "He left because he was too badly injured."

That had made no sense to her. "Has he gone to find someone who'll make him better?"

In vain her parents attempted to explain the concept of death, and that dead people could not be made better. Back then Abihira had remained stubbornly convinced someone could undo death if they wanted to. She still hadn't changed her mind. Why would she, when recent events had proved her right?

The corpse was waiting for her on the first level of the crypt. She was still dressed in those dreadfully muddy funeral clothes. Abihira looked at the dirty footprints on the stairs and winced. She'd have to clean those before the caretaker came along and asked awkward questions in the morning.

Right now the reanimated corpse didn't look threatening or even particularly intimidating. She stood as still as if she was just a statue decorating one of the tombs. Abihira stared at her thoughtfully. She didn't stare back. It was hard to tell with her veil, but it looked as if she was gazing fixedly at the wall in front of her.

Clearly she wasn't much more intelligent than the skeletons Abihira had already reanimated. Yet she had enough awareness to follow her right into the palace. That suggested she was more than just a mindless zombie. So what was she? Could she actually think?

"What's your name?" Abihira asked.

The corpse stayed silent.

"How did you die?"

Still no answer.

"Raise your hand if you can understand me."

Minutes ticked by. The corpse didn't move. Abihira sighed. It seemed she was just another puppet incapable of thought after all.

I must have done something wrong when I reanimated her, she thought. Maybe I told her to follow me without knowing it. I wonder--

Abruptly all her thoughts stopped. Slowly, hesitantly, the corpse raised her hand.