The undead don’t often move in silence, but tonight they did. Hordes of skeletons, zombies and wights crept through the night, silently moving toward their master's tower.
Skeletons crept in single file, each one pressing a finger to lipless jaws as though they remembered what that gesture meant. Zombies shuffled with exaggerated care, groaning only in muted whispers as they struggled to stay silent, while ghouls skittered on all fours as the pack moved silently, united in purpose. At the head of this procession, a hooded undead figure glided in time with them, showing the masses how to move in utter silence.
It was, after all, a very special night.
Their master, a legendary necromancer that had long been a Night Market presence, was three centuries old today. He had forgotten, of course, as he did with most things these days. But the horde had not, reminded by their hooded friend, and they wanted to surprise their master with a party worthy of three centuries of life.
They gathered at the base of his black tower, a mismatched crowd of bone, putrid flesh and taught sinew. Together, they crept upward. Step by step. Stair by stair. No clatter of bones, no rattle of loose jaws, no stray moans from the zombies at this point. Up and up, until they found the necromancer in his summoning chamber.
There he sat, their aging master, slumped in his high-backed chair, book open across his chest. A snore rattled from deep within his throat, the pages fluttering with each breath.
The horde froze as a loud snore caught and faltered, but resumed after a tense pause, and so did they at the call of their hooded leader.
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The horde resumed creeping in, slowly and silently between snores, until the undead host filled the chambers.
At last, when every one of his undead minions had assembled into the necromancer's room, they let loose their chorus in a cacophony of guttural screams, haunting wails and deafening roars:
“SURPRIIIIIISE!”
He lurched awake, arms waving and sputtering as the book tumbled to the floor. His hands lit up with magic, ready to start slinging spells, confused as to what in the seven hells was going on. He blinked at the crowd of glowing eyes, at the finger-bone candles flickering on a graveyard dirt-cake, at the confetti of grave dust and bone meal raining down on his lap and around the room.
"What... what the hell are you all doing?" He stammered, dropping his hands while staring at the cake. He looked over the rough "300" etched into its center, and noticed the crudely sketched "HAPY BIRFDA" with icing. He shook his head, questioning everything about what was happening, and looked up at the nearest zombie that was literally grinning ear to ear from a hatchet wound.
"It's not even my birthday until next month." He stammered, before continuing, "and I'm not a day over two-seventy! Why.. how... what is all this?"
He rubbed his eyes and pinched his arm, hoping it might shake him from this bizarre fever dream.
The undead horde kept clapping and cheering, oblivious to his protestations, and the aging necromancer reluctantly sighed and accepted the cake with a bewildered smile.
As the crowd chanted for him to make a wish, the hooded figured slipped between the ghouls and ghasts, before finally pausing next to a small obsidian statue, its garnet eyes reflecting the candlelight. The necromancer closed his eyes and leaned forward to blow out the candles, and as the crowd roared with laughter and merriment, the statue discreetly slipped into the rogue's jacket.
None noticed, especially the necromancer, so stunned with this impromptu party of his, and the rogue slipped back into the crowd, unnoticed by all.
It would be days before the necromancer realized what was lost, and he would never realize the how, why or when of the heist.
It never dawned on him that in a room full of undead servants, one was not his own.
