— Laoise —

As Cara first introduced herself and then spoke Laoise’s name for the first time the newly named alraune felt excitement bubble up within her so fast she could no longer keep her feet connected to the ground.

In a fraction of a second the remaining roots retracted into the soles of her feet. Almost at the same time as they fully released their hold on the ground, Laoise hopped up in the air. She was excited, but some small part of her mind urged her to be a little restrained. Using only a portion of her strength her quick little hops barely reached half of her standing height.

With each hop she landed somewhat unsteadily and had to get herself balanced again before she could hop again. She wasn’t really affected by the force of her landing but the uneven ground was a different story altogether.

After perhaps a half dozen happy hops, Laoise started getting a bit annoyed at the constant risk of falling over so she switched over to doing the happy steps she remembered Cara doing while Laoise had been planted in the first location.

None of the plants had ever felt inclined to tell her exactly what the dryad had been doing with the rest of her body when the grass showed the locations where her feet had landed. There were some unusually attentive fungi that could detect and interpret emotions that had at least confirmed it was a thing she’d done when she was happy.

With that in mind she let her arms rest at her side as she tried to match the placement of her feet. For the first few steps she tried to watch the reactions of Cara and the other dryad. She quickly realized she could either watch the dryads or stay on her feet, not both.

A bit reluctantly she focused on her steps as she resumed copying the foot placements she remembered. Off to the side she heard the tall warrior dryad chuckling and Cara say something, her tone confused, but Laoise didn’t have the attention to spare to take in the words.

Apparently whatever Cara had said, she wanted an answer or at least the excited alraune’s attention. After perhaps a dozen or two steps she felt a thin surprisingly strong hand on her shoulder.

The metallic pinkie and ring finger were stronger than the other made from the spirit wood flesh and bone, but it would have been easy enough to brush off the hand. Instead Laoise froze mid step and let the hand gently turn her to face Cara.

Apparently her balance was improving at a rapid rate as she spun on one foot, not bothering to return the other to the ground, and was soon looking straight ahead into the curious eyes of Cara. Well, to be exact, she was staring at the mismatched blue and green firefly-like specks that danced in the shadow filled pits where eyes would typically be.

Staring into the face of Cara, Laoise felt the simple bubbling joy washed away by a more complicated, though not entirely unpleasant, tide of emotions. There was concern, relief, guilt, pride, joy, curiosity, and those were just the fraction of the feelings she could readily identify.

Her emotional torrent was somewhat pushed aside when the dryad tilted her head cutely and with amused curiosity clear in her voice said “Might I ask what you are doing? Are you in distress?”

Laoise was obviously confused, why didn’t Cara recognize the happy steps? After a moment of trying to come up with an answer she remembered she could speak to people now and said “I was doing the happy steps you used to do. Am I doing it wrong, it has been a very long time since the grass told me about it.”

If Laoise was expecting immediate understanding to bloom onto Cara’s face, perhaps with some reassurance that she was in fact doing quite well replicating the happy steps, She would have been sorely disappointed. Instead it was even clearer confusion that bloomed on the dryad’s face, complete with a more obvious head tilt.

Before either could speak again, they were interrupted by the sound of laughter from off to the side. Almost as one they both turned to look at the source of the laughter.

Laoise hadn’t really paid much attention to the warrior dryad but now that she did, she realized she had to look up to meet the firefly light filled pits of the woman. Apparently the warrior dryad stood a full head taller than either Cara or Laoise, and for some irrational reason that annoyed Laoise.

Still standing on only one foot, Laoise gracefully rose onto her tiptoes. Apparently that wasn’t quite the impressive or perhaps intimidating gesture she’d hoped as the warrior dryad laughed even harder.

On the plus side it did put them at eye level, or even with Laoise a tiny bit taller. Unfortunately, that was only because the warrior dryad was laughing so hard she bent over a bit.

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Cara let out a huff that Laoise was fairly sure was too cute to accomplish anything and said “Oh, come on Dervla, what is so amusing? If you figured something out, just tell us.”

Laoise ignored the way Cara’s eyes flicked to her standing on the toes of one foot and the slight grin that came with it when she asked what was so funny. It seemed like presenting a unified front might make Dervla take them more seriously. Also commenting on Cara’s apparent amusement at Laoise’s stance or flowing back down to the sole of her foot would be admitting she lost. Lost at what, now that she couldn’t answer.

Apparently one or more of the things Cara and Laoise had done worked as after a few seconds more laughter Dervla looked ever so slightly abashed, though amusement was clear in her voice as she said “I am fairly sure by happy steps, Laoise meant dancing. Remember how much time you used to spend…” As Dervla’s words trailed off the mirth in her voice was replaced with guilty awkwardness and a tinge of something Laoise didn’t know her well enough to identify.

Almost as she recognised the guilt and awkwardness in Dervla’s voice, Laoise felt those feelings well up in her as well. Almost without noticing she was doing it, she lowered herself onto the soles of her feet. Sure she had been looking forward to trying the happy steps, or dancing if that was the right word, but she’d never thought it might be cruel to do it in front of someone that likely stopped doing it because injuries made them unable to do so.

Cara squeezed Laoise’s shoulder comfortingly with her half organic hand even as she reached out and stroked Dervla’s head carefully with her fully metallic hand. Her tone was gentle when she said “Now do not look like that, you two. While my injuries would have prevented me from dancing. Once I got these, I could have started again, though perhaps a bit clumsier.” With that said she turned her focus almost entirely on Laoise and continued “Dancing is an excellent way to show you are happy. You are right that I often danced in the years after planting your seed. Mostly I never took up the habit again after I could, because those dances were not just a way to show happiness. They were also a way to praise a deity I can no longer worship.” After a pause that felt longer than it was she spoke again, her tone more genuinely cheerful and said “If you are interested I would very much enjoy learning new dances with you.”

— Keira —

After returning her awareness to the physical realm Keir spent a few minutes with her eyes closed just letting the voices of the two scholars wash over her.

She wasn’t feeling quite up to joining the conversation yet and it seemed the pair were so wrapped up in the minutia of undeath that they hadn’t noticed she was mentally present yet.

After a few moments of mostly ignoring the conversation going on around her in favor of examining the lingering effects of her communion with Mortis and the trial she’d just faced, something Iida said snagged her attention.

“Oh, certainly, that does seem to be the dichotomy of the undead. On one hand they can seem, and in some ways are, temporally unbound and unchanging. On the other hand they can be uniquely mutable.”

There was the faint sound of a pen scraping on paper indicating one or both the scholars were taking notes before Antheia spoke up, interest filling her voice as she said “I understand the timeless aspect to an extent. Even the simplest undead don’t age or decay. In fact most of my prior knowledge of the undead comes from the archeological and anthropological implications of ancient undead left behind by lost civilizations. The mutable aspect, however, somewhat eludes me. May I ask for some clarification on that point?”

Iida’s voice was filled with that particular excitement of a person who finally had a chance to go into exacting detail about a topic they were passionate about as she said “Well, once again to explain it properly I need to start a bit simple, so bear with me. There are a surprising number of things that can alter an undead on a fundamental level and from a much earlier tier. At their core most of the individual factors are shared by other beings.”

Iida paused for a moment and judging from the rustle of paper and increased pen scratching she seemed to be either checking her own notes or waiting for Antheia to catch up with her own note taking. Regardless it seemed that only a short pause was needed as she continued “Time is perhaps the simplest example as it does tend to be a fairly linear process. Much like dragons and leviathans, instead of weakening them age only makes them more powerful. On the other end of the spectrum elemental affinities are much more complicated. As you know, with the exception of elementals and partially spiritual beings like fey, the first change to their race only comes with embodying one or more of their aspects at tier five. While it is rare even a tier one undead can be drastically altered by their elemental affinities or ambient elemental energy in the area they were raised in. Your friend there is a good example. Abyssal wights are wights infused with elemental aspects of the deep sea and are drastically different than an unaspected wight, and both are drastically different than an ashen wight or a bog wight. The final major malleable factor is simple but incredibly broad. Much like constructs or golems, changes to the physical form of an undead can drastically alter their type.”

Deciding to stop simply eavesdropping Keir said “What sorts of physical changes do you mean?”

Apparently the pair hadn’t realized she was mentally present as her words were met with the clatter of a pen on the table along with a startled squeak and a series of hisses. It was also fairly obvious that simply being startled wasn’t enough to extinguish Iida’s enthusiasm as she suddenly had two people interested in her specialty. There was a hint of the squeak still in her voice but it was overshadowed by the excitement as she said “Well the simplest and most common natural change is a spectral undead binding themselves into a dead body. The next most common alterations are sometimes mixed up with the changes brought about by affinities. For example I recall a study conducted on the environmental effects on zombies. The study wasn’t great because it was carried out over a relatively short time frame. To make up for that they placed one hundred zombies in each terrain so at least a few out of each group were altered. There are more extreme changes that can be caused by altering an undead’s form but they tend to require special processes to keep from destroying the undead in the process. For example flesh could be removed or added to change an undead from a zombie to skeleton or vice versa. Of more interest, one could use the correct rites, incantations, and materials to allow a simple undead to be mummified or even made into a litch.”

With the occasional question from Keir or Antheia to keep her on track Iida spent at least the next half an hour talking about a mixture of theories and studies on the many ways to alter or enhance various types of undead.