Morning put a hard shine on the frost along the ditch grass. The wind cut through cloak and mail and made their ears ache. Max kept an easy pace on the east road, shield riding his back, hand on the strap so it did not thump. Alina walked beside him, eyes on the hedgerows, bow unstrung on her back.

  Borin and Calder followed, the dwarf’s hammer bumping at his belt and the mage’s staff ticking on stone. Elira ghosted the far side of the lane, hood up, watching every break in the brush. The hours and miles melted away in comfortable silence.

  “If th-this is more than grave robbing,” Max said at last, voice low, “we need to be ready for it. I think it is unlikely the d-dead are walking, but when graves are disturbed and bodies go missing, we should err on the side of caution. Borin takes the lead on this one.” Back home, every rulebook and late-night raid had taught him the same lesson in a hundred different ways. If the dead are on the board, you put the cleric in front. He slowed a step and shifted the line so the dwarf naturally came even with him at the front. Borin glanced over, read the choice for what it was, and gave a single, satisfied nod.

  “Sensible,” Borin said. “If it turns out to be graves and worse, I call it. You set the wall.” Alina studied Max’s face. “But I thought you were in charge.” “I am,” Max said. “B-being in charge means putting the right person up front. If it is bandits, I take p-point. If it is graves and dead things, Borin leads the way. He has more knowledge dealing with such matters than anyone else here. Leading is n-not always about being in charge.”

  Borin’s mouth tugged toward a smile. “He is not giving it up, lass. He is using his head. You'll see it often enough. We pass the reins when the road changes. It's part of the reason we trust each other. We know our strengths and weaknesses, and don't let ego get in the way of doing a good job.” "I see," she responded. Elira nodded at that, and glanced across the road. “Since you are in front for this one, holy man, give us the playbook.”

  Borin nodded. “Most dead are mindless and hungry for life. They go straight for the nearest warm body. That is why we do not chase. Make them cross ground we choose. Keep a line. Shields first. Target their heads and necks if you can reach them, knees if you cannot. If they fall, finish the head. Do not let them bite. If anything breaks skin, you tell me. Elira, take joints and eyes. Alina, shoot skulls if you have them, shoulders if you do not. Calder, make footing bad for them, not for us. Max, you are the bulwark. Focus on defending Calder, Elira, and Alina.” Max answered with a simple, “Got it.”

  They walked on. Stonebridge lay a day east of Brindleford if the road behaved. It did, and the sun was leaning toward the trees when the palisade finally came into view.

  Captain Harlan waited at the gate with two men, a thin-lipped veteran with a scar along the jaw and a way of standing that said soldier before anything else. His eyes went to the Guild badges first, then to their faces. “Must have been a long walk from Brindleford,” he said, steady as a fence post. “You look like it. I am Harlan, Captain of the watch in humble Stonebridge.” He studied Max a heartbeat, took in the others, and did not waste time. “You are the party they sent?” Max nodded and pointed to each person in turn. “Max. Elira. Calder. Borin. Alina. We were told by the Guild there was one grave recently emptied, and two disturbed.” Harlan’s mouth tightened, not with panic but with dislike. “Aye. Elder Rowan and Father Edwin will meet you at the Inn, the Wayhouse. You will hear it straight from them there. The hill can wait till morning. No sense scrambling around in the dark after a days march. You lot must be tired.” He said it matter-of-factly, not inviting any argument, and led them into the village at a pace that matched tired legs, not pride.

  The Wayhouse’s big room was warm with banked coals and crowded with practical things: hooks for cloaks, pegs for spears, benches polished by use. They had bowls and bread in front of them when Elder Rowan and Father Edwin arrived with Harlan. Rowan was a strong looking older woman that had iron hair, a patched cloak, and eyes that missed little. Edwin was thin and careful, with an ink smudge at one nail and hands that had learned to keep accounts and comfort both. They took places at the long table while Harlan claimed the head out of habit. Rowan gave the party the basics. In the past week, one plot was opened and emptied. Two others were pried at the edges and then tamped back down, the soil wrong underfoot for anyone who knew how a grave should settle. Father Edwin added quiet notes in a voice that kept from shaking by will. He told them how the cabinet that held anointing oil was found unlocked one night and latched again by morning with less inside, though he admitted he could not prove it. He added that there was also a smear of wax where no candle ever burned. And lastly, a bitter, lamp-oil-like scent by the window on a windless night. No corpse had been seen walking inside the palisade. Some had heard scraping by the chapel hill and told themselves foxes, because people did not want to think of the other possibilities. Borin listened to their report, and kept it simple. “At first light tomorrow morning, we will investigate the chapel and graveyard ourselves. Tonight, keep a lantern ready at the chapel and tie the bell rope low so anyone can grab it. Post two men within shouting distance of the path, but not on the graves. Keep your folk inside after dark. Ash your sills. Salt your thresholds. The dead, if they do indeed walk here, will go where the living are. Make them go through doors and barricades, not open streets. We will find an answer here, one way or another.” Elder Rowan inclined her head. “Those are sensible precautions. We will see it done.” They talked idly for a short while longer, then retired for the evening. They slept to the creak of timbers and the hiss of banked coals. No bells came in the night.

  Gray light slid into the alleys when Harlan met them at the Wayhouse door and walked with them and Rowan and Edwin up the lane. The chapel was a simple timber-and-clay building with a porch and a bell rope that now had a second loop tied lower where shorter arms could catch it. Frost coated the edges of the earth behind the chapel where the stones stood. They took the graves in order, looking for any clues. One mound had settled too flat. Two others showed a wrong line where tamped dirt attempted to conceal pry marks. Elira crouched and brushed back frost with a gloved hand. “Levered sod,” she said. “Crowbar or a stout pry. Two pairs of boots. One heavy, one lighter. They stepped wide to keep from sinking.” Calder rubbed a thin rind of wax from a stone and sniffed. “Cheap lamp oil,” he murmured. “Bitter. Not tallow.” Borin ran thick fingers along a cut edge and found three neat gouges where iron had bitten too deep. He stood with grit on his thumb. “Whoever did this took time they should not have had.” Max’s eyes measured the space from hill to palisade and looked around carefully, finding a likely spot from the east that would have afforded a silent and unnoticed approach. Their investigation at the chapel complete, they then spent the late morning and midday asking questions of the village folk and listening. A miller admitted to hearing a scraping sound near the hill on a moonless night and confessed that he had called it foxes because the alternative was too frightening. A shepherd claimed he saw a narrow strip of lamplight where no window stood, east of the chapel, and turned his flock quicker than needed without breaking into a run. A woman selling meat pies swore that a bitter oil smell slid past her shutters on a still night and she barred them for the first time in twenty years. Harlan paced the palisade and bridge while the party listened, making sure watch changes happened on time and that the bell rope hung low like Borin had asked. By late afternoon they had a clear sense of when and where the trouble showed itself, a likely approach from the east through a gap in the brush, and a handful of nights it seemed to favor. Not a culprit. Not proof. Enough to set a sensible watch and know where to look first.

  Before the light failed, Max caught Alina in the Wayhouse yard with her new shortsword unbuckled at her hip, testing the balance. The ground was packed hard and rimed at the edges; the fence cut the wind just enough to keep fingers working. Elira leaned on the rail with one boot hooked, smirk warmed into something close to encouragement. Calder settled on an upturned barrel with his hands tucked into his sleeves. Borin, heading out to check in with Harlan, paused within earshot and stayed. “Got a minute?” Max asked. "I can give you a quick lesson on swordplay now if you'd like." "I should probably learn to wield this thing before I am forced to," Alina replied. Max grinned as he stepped forward into the small yard. He wrapped a strip of cloth around the edge of his longsword, then did the same for her blade. “No cuts. We are learning, not limping.” He lifted his sword and tapped the flat against hers. “What you are holding: short, quick, does not need much room. It is quite good in doorways, in hedges, or when someone tries to press you. This”, he said as he raised his much longer blade “is reach and leverage. Out in the open, I touch you and you cannot touch me if you let me. If you allow me to stay at my range, you do not stand a chance against any competent swordsman.”

  He stepped back. “Ready?” Alina set her feet and nodded. Max came in at the edge of his reach, smooth, letting her feel the line where his point owned the space. The wrapped edge of his blade kissed her guard and slid it aside. He reset instead of chasing. “Do you see it? I can touch you. You cannot touch me yet.” She tightened her jaw. “I see it.” “Go again.” He let the shield shoulder drift and cut for her wrist. She blocked late. The thump rattled her forearm. Elira called across the rail, more coach than tease, “If his point’s on you, you are dead.” Max nudged Alina’s blade tip to center. “Keep your point between you and them. Your turn. Try to get in close.” She stepped carefully. Max let the point hang, then snapped it forward so she would have walked onto it if she kept coming. She stopped hard. He eased off. “That right there, is the downside of your weapon. Long steel runs the conversation out here.” She frowned. “So I just lose?” “No.” He closed in three quick steps until their hilts could have bumped. He did not swing. Instead, he crowded her, demonstrating how his wrapped edge tapped his own shield because it had run out of room. “This is the positive. Inside, my reach is trouble for me. My sword turns into stick and handle. Yours meanwhile still works. If you find yourself in a swordfight, you're already in trouble. You are a Ranger, and your main weapon is a bow. If you're forced into a battle with blade, then something has gone wrong. But it doesn't need to be a death sentence. If you can close in, crowd your opponent that holds a longer blade, then you at least have a chance.”

  He backed off and showed the path. “Do not back straight up. Move around, and try to angle to the weapon side.” He tapped his right shoulder. “If you go to my shield, I smother you. Weapon side, I have to turn to find you.” Calder lifted a finger. “And don't forget: watch the ground. No getting clever if your heel finds a rut.” “Right. Small steps. Do not cross your feet. In a battle close in like this, stumbling means death.” He pointed to two scuffs on the ground, about 10 feet apart. “Start here, land there.” They ran it. Alina stepped in and tried to angle. Max’s point tapped her shoulder. She tried quicker and he stung her forearm. She put a shoulder into his shield and he flowed with it and laid the wrapped point to her chest. “Learning feels like losing,” she said, frustration beginning to show. “Learning often does," he replied. "Try this. Show the blade first. Make me blink. Then step.” She feinted with the tip. His point flinched for a heartbeat. She slid a half-step to his weapon side and got her shoulder nearly past. He brought the shield across and bumped her off balance. “See what I did there?” “Smothered me.” “Answer it by going lower. Keep your blade down and in. If you cannot find the head or heart, take thigh or knee. An injured leg means your opponent has less mobility, means they become more desperate. And desperate opponents rush and make mistakes that you can exploit." He paused, then continued, "and if something dead is on you,” he added, voice gone flat, “you do not wrestle for long. Cut a tendon or find an eye.” “Aye,” Borin said from the fence. “And keep your skin out of their mouths.”

  Ten passes became fifteen. Her footwork steadied. She stopped drifting backward. Twice she made him choose between shield and sword and he countered her correctly both times. On the third, the feint was cleaner and the angle tighter. Her blade tapped leather over his thigh. Not a true wound, but a real lesson. Elira’s mouth tugged toward approval. “There it is.” “Two more,” Max said. “Then quit while your head remembers the lesson.” On the last attempt, she tried to bully through his shield and he turned her and set the wrapped point to her throat and held it until she stilled. She blew out a breath and laughed once, annoyed at herself, but less afraid of the blade than she had been ten minutes before. “That is the lesson,” he said. “In a sword fight, do not be where my point owns you. Be at the angle. Go inside, and think smaller cuts that matter. You do not have to hit head or heart to win a fight.” She nodded back at him. "Thank you, Max. I appreciate the help. Will we have more lessons in the future?" He grinned back at her when she asked, and replied "O-of course. One lesson does not a master make." They unwrapped their blades and sheathed the weapons before heading inside for dinner and rest.

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  Night fell quickly. They ate early, checked buckles and strings, and laid their gear where their hands would find it without looking. The room hummed with talk that tried and failed to be casual. The village folk threw them apprehensive glances when they thought they wouldn't notice. Max didn't blame them. Captain Harlan put two men within a shout of the chapel path and hung a lantern on the porch. The bell rope’s lower loop brushed the floorboards. Max sat with the shield leaning against his knee. Elira dozed without committing to it. Alina strung and unstrung her bow to keep fingers warm and sure. Calder walked through the shapes of spells until the rhythm felt right. Borin checked straps once and then folded his hands and let quiet do the rest. No bells came. Dawn slid in, cold and gray.

  They were halfway through breakfast when the first toll from the chapel cut the inn’s low talk. One heavy strike, then another, then a run of wild clanging that turned heads before anyone stood. The sun was only a pale coin behind the treeline and the chill of early morning still lived on the floorboards. Breath steamed when the door opened. Someone screamed out in the lane. The party was on the move before the third toll. Max took the door at a run. Elira knifed past his shoulder. Alina came right behind, with the string on her bow already set. Calder had his staff in hand before the bench finished scraping. Borin rose and headed towards the door, and the innkeeper stepped aside without realizing he had. They rounded a corner and found a young man in a nightshirt stumbling down the lane with a corpse clamped to his shoulder like a stubborn child. Its mouth worried at his throat. His fingers scrabbled at its jaw and could not find purchase. Morning light threw long, thin shadows across the packed dirt. “Max,” Borin said, and the name was a clear instruction. Max charged forward and hit the corpse with his shield in a short shove. Bone cracked, and the thing peeled away and turned slowly towards them, which is exactly when Alina’s arrow took it through the eye and pinned it to the post behind like it had always belonged there. The living man choked and gaped and slid down the wall with blood running bright down his chest. Borin braced him, set a hand on the torn flesh, and said, “Hold.” Warmth rolled from palm to skin. Edges knit. Breath steadied. “Get inside. Bar your door,” Borin told him, and the man ran.

  As they made their way up the hill towards the chapel, lantern light swung on the porch in the thin sun. Father Edwin stood there, white-faced, one hand on the rope and the other pointing where words would not come. Hands pushed up through soil. Faces slick with mud turned toward sound. One grave yawned raw and empty. Two others bulged and tore. Then more behind them, the wrongness spreading like a slow spill. The pry marks they had found had not been the first or the last. “Bless,” Borin said, and the prayer settled like courage tucked into a belt. Max felt his breath steady and his focus sharpen. He drew Battle Focus over the top, narrowing the world to sightlines and angles. Borin stepped into the choke of the path and raised his hammer. "Get inside, Father," said Max curtly, not looking at the terrified man as he advanced towards the graveyard to join Borin at the front. The first corpse lunged. Borin met it with iron and faith. Light crawled along the head of the hammer and the blow cracked sternum and spilled the thing back into dirt. Max slid in beside him, shield forward, sword tucked close, working rim to unbalance and edge to finish, cuts placed where tendon or spine made a difference. Elira’s first bolt took a temple. Her next found a hinge of jaw and turned a head sharply enough to drop it. She moved along the low wall in small steps that never crossed, loading and firing without drama. Alina climbed the chapel rail, planted a foot, and set a rhythm at the door, drawing and loosing in time with Borin’s strikes. Calder lifted his staff and spoke. Frostsheet slicked the path under the first rank. They slipped and took the second with them, a tangle of flailing limbs that bought heartbeats. Their breaths misted white. The light was still so thin it turned the falling frost into sparks at their feet.

  “Do not chase,” Borin said once, and they held where they were. He broke a reaching wrist, stepped, crushed a skull, and moved on with nothing wasted. His breathing had the cadence of a man swinging an axe into firewood. A foolish villager at the fence swung a stool at a corpse that approached him, and almost put his own hand in a dead mouth for the trouble. Max saw it and went, smashing the corpse away with the shield and cutting low where it could not guard, then shoved the man back toward the door. “Inside. Now. Bar the door.” The man ran. He turned back and found the next target. One corpse wore a child’s dress as it advanced toward them. Alina’s arrow hesitated for a heartbeat, then flew, striking the child undead square in the forehead. Borin did not look back. “Good,” he said, and took the next that came with the same measure in his hands. Something heavier hauled itself out near the far stones, chains broken across its chest. Shoulders like a draft horse. The jaw hung on twisted sinew. Elira hissed at the weight and shifted for a cleaner line. “That's a big one.” “I see it,” Max said. Borin set a hand to Max’s shoulder and cool weight settled into bone and shield as Stone Ward spread. “Spend it well.” He brought his own hammer up and whispered, and the metal took on a quiet glow as Hammer of Faith wrapped it in a soft yellow glow.

  The brute crashed into Max and kept coming, the strike rolling off the ward, but the mass still driving him back a step. Rusted chains snagged at the shield rim. The thing shoved, it's jaws working for skin. Max twisted, jammed a boot on a grave edge, and held the line like a hinge. He chopped for the neck and hit meat and old bone. It bit, but not enough. “Left knee,” Borin shouted. Elira’s bolt punched the back of that knee a moment later. The leg buckled. Alina’s arrow hit the other, low and tight. The brute sagged sideways and clawed at the ground. Calder hissed another spell and the earth under the brute flashed with a thin layer of ice that robbed it of purchase. Borin stepped in, swung, and the collarbone cracked but the spine held. The brute raked at Borin’s shield and splintered the edge. Max crowded close the way he had taught Alina, jamming past the line of the longer weapon and drove his sword up under the jaw into the soft palate. The thing thrashed but did not stop. Borin drew breath like a bellows, set his feet in a stance that had been taught to him with both words and pain, and raised his hammer overhead.

  “Judgment,” he said, and the word was not loud, but it was heavy. Divine Judgement came down like a hammer from the heavens. Light came down around Borin's warhammer in a clean pillar, white and gold and edged with something that made hair lift along the forearms. For an instant it was as if the head of the hammer was the head of a falling star. He brought it down on the crown. Bone did not crack so much as come apart under that weight. Fire did not flare so much as decide to exist. The brute’s skull burst and the body sagged, the light gone as quickly as it had come, the air left tasting like sulfur and cold stone after rain. A soft chime echoed in Max's head, and the telltale gently pulsing notification appeared in the corner of his vision.

  From there, it became work done under pressure. They held the path and did not chase. When the last of the fresh dead fell, two long-buried skeletons still dragged themselves with the slow stubbornness of things that had not yet learned they were finished. Elira and Alina put shafts through sockets and joints from a safe line. Calder whispered a soft binding and one of the old bones settled back into its own dirt like sleep had finally found it.

  Silence returned in pieces, as it always did. The soft clink of gear. A distant sob down in the lane. Father Edwin had tears on his face and did not wipe them away. Harlan came fast with two men and stopped when he took in the hill. His jaw set and he let out a breath that did not quite become a word. Borin stood a moment, listening for anything that would tell him the hill had more to give, then turned to Edwin. “Father Edwin, please bring me water, salt, ash, a bowl, and a clean cloth.” Edwin ran and returned with what he had. Borin walked the boundary and drew a line of ash and salt, set four points where the hill’s shape would hold them, and spoke the old words under his breath. No flair. No show. The ground felt steadier after, like a floor braced by strong timber. He blessed each plot by name as Edwin murmured them. He poured water along the threshold and marked the sill with ash. When he finished, he swayed once and caught himself and set his jaw back into place. Captain Harlan stood close without crowding. “What did you do?” Borin wiped his hands. “I consecrated the ground. The ash and salt mark a boundary. The prayers harden it for a time. It will not turn aside a strong, wicked will, but it makes this hill stubborn to take. Fewer will rise here while the line holds. It is a breather, not an ending,” he cautioned. Edwin bowed his head. “You have our thanks. This is a horrible thing. I knew all of these people,” he said, as he indicated the mass of newly dead corpses. Borin nodded. “It is unforgiveable, I agree. I am sorry you had to see this. For the next few weeks, keep a lantern ready at the chapel after dark. Make sure the bell rope hangs where a child could catch it. Put two watchers where they can see the path and hear each other without standing on the graves. Keep people indoors at night, and do not get casual about it. If anything stirs, call the village, not just the brave man nearest the door.” Both Father Edwin and Captain Harlan nodded their agreement.

  Elira crouched by a wrist and eased a thin leather cord up with the tip of her knife. A small bone charm hung from it, carved with lines that could have been decorative to anyone who had not smelled the same bitter oil on it the day before. “Same scent as the cabinet,” she said. Calder ran fingers above a forearm and frowned at a line of pinpricks that did not match embalming or vermin. “Not the work of chance,” he murmured. “Someone’s pattern.” Max nodded. “We carry what we can prove. This was no accident. It was led, intentionally, but we do not know by whom. We cannot speculate. Maybe we will get more answers in Greenglade.” Elira and Calder nodded at that.

  They took stock before daylight thinned the stars away entirely. Elira counted her bolts and hissed quietly. “Seven.” She recovered what she could reach, wiped them, laid them to dry. Alina checked her quiver and set aside cracked shafts. “Nine used.” Calder opened his satchel and made the face of a man counting coins that would not cover all the errands. “Enough for work. Not for comfort.” Borin rolled his shoulders and glanced at the pale sun edging higher. “Mana will settle by mid afternoon.” Calder nodded and said "same here."

  Max walked the hill with Harlan and Elder Rowan and counted with care. “Thirteen,” he said. “We put down thirteen. We will report it to the Guild in Brindleford. Take heed of Borins advice, and if there is another incident, send a runner to the city as fast as you can.” Rowan held a lantern steady in the thin light as she nodded. “You will have bread and smoked fish before you go.” Borin shook his head. “Keep it for winter. We are happy with bread and stew. Put two on the bridge every night for two weeks, lantern lit. If anyone goes missing, send a runner to Brindleford. Salt sills. Ash thresholds. Do not open the hill at night unless you want trouble that chooses you.”

  They ate quickly at the Wayhouse. Elira bartered for a bundle of candles and a stoppered flask of lamp oil. Calder bought salt and twine. Father Edwin pressed two small jars of anointing oil into Borin’s hands without meeting his eyes. Alina restrung her bow and swapped three cracked arrows for three straight. Max tightened his shield straps and checked an edge until it caught a thumbnail and left a thin white line.

  Before they left, Alina touched Max’s sleeve. “Time for a quick lesson?” she asked, chin toward the yard. “Just a few minutes. We should be on the road to Greenglade soon,” he said. They took the same spots. A handful of children clustered at the fence, faces pink from the cold, eyes too wide to blink. Max tapped her blade once. “Point between you and them.” She nodded and moved, the feint cleaner, the angle tighter. She did not beat him. She did not need to. She landed on leather and wood instead of air, and when they stopped the smallest boy let out a sigh like a knot had unpicked itself in his chest. The sheathed their weapons, checked their gear once more, then made their way to the gate. At the gate, Harlan said, “Greenglade is six hours if the track stays dry. Keep to the ridge path. The low stretch by the willows is treacherous footing.” Elira adjusted a strap. “We will make it by midafternoon.” “If the road behaves,” Calder added, half to himself. Borin looked back once at the hill where the ash line lay almost invisible in the weak light, then forward. “Keep your feet,” he said. He began the methodical march toward Greenglade.

  Max fell in beside Alina as they stepped into the pale sun. The hill was quiet behind them. The ridge path ran southeast. Straps were checked, gear set, and there was more work to do. They turned onto the road to Greenglade and went. Max idly wondered how his life had turned out this way. Things he had only done in tabletop RPGs and in video games now were part of his daily life. He shook his head, and his thoughts drifted to Gideon. "I wonder where you are, old friend. I hope you're still doing well." He marched on. He would find Gideon. But first, he had missing corpses to investigate.