“As you wish,” Tybalt said quietly. “I’m dragging the rest of the surviving specimens back to the mountain, but the fates of those two are sealed.”

  He made a throat-slitting gesture, and two of the monsters moved to follow suit, blades in hand.

  “Wait, please, Lieutenant!” gasped Specialist Curtis.

  The undead did not slow in their task, but Tybalt allowed himself to turn his head slightly to glance at Mariella’s face. She hadn’t moved. She was staring down at the men about to die with a resolute expression. It wasn’t exactly a smile, but she wasn’t looking away at all either.

  As Specialist Curtis looked up at Mariella, she just gave a sharp little shake of her head. Her eyes were cold.

  Is it wrong that I find her more attractive after seeing that? Tybalt thought. I didn’t think it was even possible…

  The creatures slit the two men’s throats, and blood spilled across the sand.

  Mariella stepped backward, pushing Tybalt lightly back along with her.

  “I don’t want their blood on me.”

  The necromancer obligingly allowed her to maneuver him out of the path of the spray.

  She’s changing more quickly than I realized, he thought. Those days she spent with the beastfolk while I was passed out, plus the fight to protect their village, must have really altered her worldview. She looked at Curtis and Indus so coldly… though part of why I asked her what I should do with them at all was because Curtis is the guy who blamed Mariella for another man attacking her. And Indus was… Indus. I expected her to want them dead. I’d be naive to set that aside.

  He glanced at the fire mage again, but she wore an inscrutable expression. Her face was still fixed forward, eyes on the two soldiers bleeding out.

  As the fire mage watched the last remaining members of their squad die, Tybalt took a moment to review the new monsters. There were a number of zombies, of course—over fifty!—but the creatures he was truly interested in were those that were more unique.

  There were only a handful of new intelligent or semi-intelligent undead, and in response to Tybalt’s unspoken command, they all stepped forward and presented themselves to the necromancer. Baldwin and Hieron, who had remained off to the side during the operation, observing along with Tybalt and Mariella, looked over the new recruits with interest.

  One by one, these new undead knelt, and Tybalt inspected them.

  So as not to waste time, he ordered the other, idle undead to bind the prisoners. When they were done with that, they were to dismantle some of the miners’ beds to construct a litter they could use to carry the necromancer and his lady back up the mountain they had descended.

  The first creature to kneel before the necromancer was a middle-aged miner with a beer belly.

  Good stuff. No special skills, just that Paralyzing Touch common to all ghouls, but nothing to complain about either. I don’t exactly like ghouls, just based on my Tower of Death experience, but realistically, I could use more of them. They seem like they’d be a nightmare to encounter in a group.

  Next came an older man, dignified but slow as he knelt.

  Not exactly physically impressive, but for that, we can get him more levels…

  Tybalt cracked open Unholy Forces and confirmed what a draugr was before he moved on.

  Next came an olive-toned miner who was in significantly better shape than the previous man.

  You had quite a lot of mileage on you from your life before, didn’t you? In addition to looking a bit different from the average miner with his olive-toned skin, Sidon had also been stronger and more agile, with more levels to his name than a normal man would gain in a lifetime. And he’s a variant of draugr, not the normal base version. This guy would probably have stories to tell… if he still had the power of speech.

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  Draugrs ordinarily did not speak.

  That was the key difference between them and the creature on the page before them in Unholy Forces, the revenant. The draugr was intelligent, but it did not retain quite as much of its humanity as a revenant.

  Tybalt already knew what Mist Veil did, since Sidon had used it when they attacked the cabin- it created a veil of magical mist- so he didn’t read the description just then.

  The necromancer waved a hand, and the next in line of his new minions knelt before him.

  “Master,” the young undead said in a calm baritone voice, lowering his head before Tybalt.

  He can speak. That’s neat.

  Huh, he’s another fext? Wait. Is this a second kid? I’ve been consistently telling the undead not to kill children now, but I guess I couldn’t tell my virus… Tybalt looked the young man over carefully, but he certainly didn’t seem as young as Hieron. For magical purposes, would a—seventeen-year-old?—yeah, that’s probably it… would that even be considered a child?

  Certainly, no one had treated Tybalt like he was a child when he was seventeen. And he had enlisted when he was eighteen.

  The necromancer’s eyes darted over to his lover to check her expression, but Mariella didn’t seem to think anything of the young man in particular. She might not have noticed him at all. Her eyes still rested on the dying soldiers as they bled into the sand. It was as though she had willed herself to watch the two men die, all the way to the finish.

  All right. Next!

  The necromancer mentally nudged the underaged undead to not stand so close to him, and the new fext went around to the end of the line of non-zombies kneeling before their new master. Perhaps Tybalt would pair Brunn up with Hieron later and see what the two made of each other.

  Last, but certainly not least, a large, imposing, and familiar figure presented himself before Tybalt and slowly knelt, as if he still had to worry about aging bones.

  Appearances could not deceive the necromancer, though; he could see the monster’s status screen.

  Tybalt only dimly remembered the nachzehrer from Unholy Forces. It was considered a cousin to both vampire and revenant in terms of how it was formed. Like the revenant, it was an intelligent reanimated corpse. Like the vampire, it fed on human life force to survive, although not in the form of blood.

  And the nachzehrer, like the vampire, clearly composed part of the stronger end of this family.

  I’ll have to read the full entry on it later, the necromancer thought. Baldwin’s going to be so jealous when he finds out. Heimar was born as an undead who’s stronger than Baldwin is now. Despite all his efforts. It’s a little sad. But it's certainly convenient that Heimar is as strong as an ox.

  “You could have wiped them all out alone, couldn’t you, Heimar?” Tybalt asked, barely restraining the pleasure in his voice.

  I wonder if I can make more of you…

  “I do only what my master commands,” Heimar replied. Even his voice had a heavy weight to it. Mariella finally shifted her attention from the dying soldiers to the figure in front of her as if she had just realized that there were multiple undead kneeling in front of Tybalt.

  “That’s a humble approach,” Tybalt said.

  Especially since I didn’t give you any directive to restrain yourself. It’s interesting to see how patient this one is. It’s the character of the man rather than what type of undead he is, I’m almost certain of that much.

  “Master, I am most grateful to have retained my sense of self into death,” Heimar said, “as I hope I adequately conveyed before. But, if it’s not too impertinent…?”

  Tybalt nodded. “Go ahead and ask what you want to ask.”

  Heimar returned the nod. “Yes, excellent. I simply wanted to know, will Raybeck recover his sense of self? His identity did not entirely survive the transition, but there are still traces.”

  The necromancer frowned slightly. “Right, I was going to take a closer look at him.”

  He turned, and Raybeck stepped forward from among the other undead and knelt in front of Tybalt unprompted.

  Let’s see what exactly is going on here…

  The only real clue is his race name. What in Abadd is a ‘Semi-Enlightened’ ghoul? I’ve heard of ghouls, and I know what an enlightened monster is, but… well, you don’t get semi-enlightened, do you?

  He turned to Mariella.

  “Hey, gorgeous, this is embarrassing, but I don’t know what’s going on with one of my monsters. Have you ever heard of a creature being semi-enlightened?”

  Her expression went blank, and she shook her head, but out of the corner of his eye, Tybalt saw that Heimar had reacted.

  “That’s what his status says?” the nachzehrer asked.

  Tybalt nodded.

  “When I used to be a seaman, we fought the occasional monster. There were one or two that we killed with names like that modifier, I think… I suspect he might be halfway between two evolutionary stages. It’s strange, though. I haven’t seen Beck go through an evolution.”

  “Well, him being more advanced would be explained by his and your situation with the virus.”

  Heimar nodded with understanding. “Another reason to be grateful to you, master. If I’m correct that he is in between two evolutionary stages… may I have your permission to try and train him up a bit?”

  “Do whatever you think will get him the levels he needs,” Tybalt replied. “My usual restrictions still apply, of course.”

  I’ll be training the undead up myself, but you have more of a sense of urgency about Raybeck than I do, so might as well let you do the heavy lifting, Heimar.

  The nachzehrer bowed his head. “Of course. Thank you.”

  Tybalt nodded, and Heimar and Raybeck stepped away from the others. Apparently, Raybeck had understood some of what the necromancer and the nachzehrer were saying, at least enough that the semi-enlightened ghoul knew he was doing something with Heimar.

  The rest of the monsters gathered in front of Tybalt and Mariella, then, with the lead creatures carrying a mattress that had been secured to a number of wooden posts with clumsy carpentry.

  I guess that was the best they could do, the necromancer thought, wrinkling his brow. I’ll try to teach my creatures more useful things like this later.

  The zombies knelt before the two unbound humans and offered up the soft surface as the litter Tybalt had requested.

  “Ready to go?” he asked, looking at Mariella.

  She looked charmed by the gesture.

  “Yes.”

  The fire mage joined hands with the necromancer, and they were carried off into the night by a half dozen zombies. The others walked behind and to the sides, carrying off the bodies and the bound, surviving prisoners.