The Enterprise of Death - Jesse Bullington [27]
“None of that, now,” said the necromancer, and with a murmur Omorose sat back up. “Bring Awa in and lay her by the fire, then bring me Halim. She’ll need his shoulders and ankles by the look of it, and probably more beside. You’ll be at the mortar and pestle all night; much as I hate to waste good bones she’ll be useless without them. We’ll do a soup with the powder, I think.”
The snow settled on Awa’s cheeks, on the salty brooks both clear and red that trickled down them, and then Omorose’s corpse picked her up and carried her in. When she tried to refuse the food in the coming days the necromancer merely had to threaten Omorose’s mortal remains and Awa would do as she was told. Eventually she was able to speak without crying.
“I’ll do anything you want, and not run, nor disobey,” said Awa, unable to keep her eyes off the corpse of Omorose standing behind the necromancer as they sat at the table, the bone broth steaming between them. “But you let her go.”
“Where to?” His bemused smile sickened her.
“To wherever the dead go when sorcerers don’t enslave them,” said Awa, her voice unwavering. “You let me bury her, and you never touch her again, or let your servants touch her, or eat her, or anything else. You let her sleep, and if you do then I will be as good an apprentice as you could hope for.”
“Alright,” said the necromancer, and with a wave of his hand Omorose’s corpse collapsed in a pile on the floor. “Now eat your supper, it’s getting cold.”
Refusing the help of the bonemen, Awa found the mountainside less than accommodating to an amateur gravedigger. She eventually settled on the far side of the glacier where the rock shelf reemerged from under the ice just before the cliff fell away. On the narrow outcrop of stone she built a cairn over her mistress, and the spirits of the glacier promised to keep Omorose cool lest the summer sun ripen her into something delectable to scavengers. Awa stacked the rocks high, her fresh wounds nothing more than fresher scars and minor aches after only a few days of taking the necromancer’s cure.
That first winter alone with the necromancer was the worst, with him jumping the bones of his beloved restless dead on an almost nightly basis. Between his romps she discovered where he actually slept, and how. In the mornings when he sent her out to spar with the bandit chief he animated the bear corpse, which would rear up on its hind legs while the necromancer unlatched a catch in its fur, making its whole chest swing open on a hinge. Then he would step inside, careful not to snag himself on its ribs, and pull the furry door shut behind him. The undead bear watched Awa intently whenever she came in to bind a wound or start cooking their dinner but only growled if she approached it. Knowing she would have to learn all his secrets to avenge her mistress, Awa became the model pupil and asked him about his sleeping habits one midwinter day when they were snowed in.
“If you mean to ask why I sleep inside a giant, monstrous beast instructed to rend apart anyone who might disturb my rest I would ask what happened to your previously acceptable wits.” The necromancer’s concubine tittered from atop the bear’s back —it was still on all fours after the previous night’s activities.
“I think there’s more to it,” said Awa. “You don’t always sleep, and when you do it’s always during the day, when I’m out.”
“Any old sod can see when the sun is up, but by keeping a nocturnal regimen I train my eyes to see better than an owl in the dark.” With his long nose and fat, round eyes he did look something like an emaciated owl, although Awa, never having seen such a bird, did not realize it.
“There’s more,” said Awa.
“More?”
“More.” Awa nodded. “You don’t want me to see you sleep, and not just because we’re all vulnerable when we sleep. You’ve your bear, after all, and I couldn’t hurt you if I tried. So why do you hide?”
“She’s calling you afraid!” said the concubine.
“Not afraid,” said the necromancer, but his left eye twitched as he spoke, and he