'Ink On His Hands' Part 1: The Dockworker
6395 AC
Heartfaire, Kingdom of Aiova
The Docks
Torzek Heimyar could think of at least ten other things he’d rather be doing than standing on Heartfaire’s dock, watching as city guards pulled the body of a dockworker out of the bay.
Torzek was the current High Priest of Death in the city, and the guardsmen often called upon him to help with bodies when foul play was suspected.
It was the job of the priests of Nillioth, God of Death, to prepare the bodies of the dead for cremation and perform the proper rites so the soul would be able to pass on.
In cases where one had been dead for longer than a day, it was important for Torzek to be involved to make sure the soul had passed on. He possessed a gift from Nillioth himself, the ability to just vaguely see the spirits of the dead. In rare instances, he’d even been able to have limited communication with them for a brief moment.
He’d been preparing for tomorrow’s rituals when the guardsmen had come knocking on the temple doors.
“A body in the water,” they’d told him. While that was true, he hadn’t really been expecting this.
The man had already been identified as an elven dock worker named Vossler Culut. He’d gone missing about a week previous, reported missing by his employer, a company whose sole purpose was to trade with the Kingdom of Wirrowwir.
Beside him, Ruven gagged as the body was laid before them.
Ruven Clifflower was a nice kid, if not a tad excitable. He was a young but dedicated priest. He was a natural at consoling the grieving families and friends of the deceased that passed through the temple each day.
The boy had just been leaving for the night when the guards had knocked and promptly insisted on joining them.
The stench of the rotting, waterlogged body the city guards had just pulled from the shallows of Hearfair’s port was enough to make Torzek himself gag.
He crouched down to look at the bloated face. The eyes were gone, no doubt eaten by fish, and he shuddered.
A sickly purple wisp floated through the air and Torzek only realized what that meant as the body sat straight up and a horrid, gurgled scream ripped out of the body.
It lasted only a few seconds before the body went limp and the wisp floated back out of the body.
Torzek tried to calm his racing heart and looked at Ruven. He’d been so startled by the scream that he’d fallen back onto the dock. The boy was shaking, his eyes fixed on the dead body.
“Torzek,” the boy’s voice was quiet. “What was that?”
The priest shook himself. ‘Necromancy,’ his mind supplied.
“I’m not sure,” he responded.
One of the guards had rushed over. “What was that?”
Torzek stood and looked to the faint purple wisp sitting beside the body, no longer moving. “Just something that can happen to a body this bloated, no need for alarm.”
The guard raised an eyebrow at him but said nothing. Then he glanced at the body and seemed to struggle for a moment before he averted his eyes.
Torzek offered a hand to Ruven, which the boy took gratefully.
“Let’s get this body on the cart and back to the temple.” He tried to keep his tone even. Something was wrong, very wrong.
Ruven nodded and called over a few more guards to help transfer the body onto the cart.
Torzek couldn’t keep his eyes from straying to the purple wisp as they worked. Normally after death, the souls passed to the afterlife quickly. In the few cases, if the soul was not willing to pass on, a caeles of Death was sent to assist. The body had been in the water for days; the soul should’ve passed on.
Just before the cart was about to leave, he went and crouched in front of the wisp.
“Vossler, if you follow me, I can make sure you pass on,” he said quietly.
The wisp shuddered in the air but didn’t move toward him.
He nodded his head. “Okay, I’ll send her to you instead.”
“Torzek!” Ruven called, “Ready to go?”
Torzek stood. “I’m coming. We need to get back quickly.”
Ruven nodded and the two climbed onto the front of the cart. Ruven directed the camels to start moving back toward the temple.
Torzek glanced back to the purple wisp. It seemed to be struggling, straining to move toward him. He urged Ruven to move faster.
~
Torzek hopped off the cart upon reaching the temple and directed Ruven to get the body ready for cremation.
The boy nodded sharply and directed the camels to move down the large alley to the stable and the mortuary.
Torzek raced through the temple and up the stairs until he reached the chamber where the caeles assigned to this temple lived.
He rapped on the door, and after a moment, it opened with a creak.
The caeles in charge of this temple, Shael, was by far the kindest servant of a God Torzek had ever met. Not that he’d interacted with many, but the ones he did were often distant and cold. Shael was the opposite, constantly invested in the day-to-day goings-on of the temple and the mortals that passed through it.
“Apologies for disturbing you,” Torzek said. “There’s a soul down on the docks that won’t leave. I tried to get it to follow me here, but it didn’t move.”
Shael’s expression grew worried. “I’ll go and help.”
“Thank you. One other thing, I think someone used necromancy on the body. The soul wasn’t there when I first arrived. Then the soul showed up and went into the body. He started screaming before abruptly stopping.”
Shael’s face darkened more. “That is concerning. Thank you for letting me know.”
There was a brief second, and then she was gone, a slight breeze left in her wake.
He closed her door and made his way back downstairs to start preparing the temple for tomorrow.
A loud, dull thud resonated through the temple and Torzek froze.
He moved toward the closed temple doors where the noise had originated.
Opening the door, he looked outside to see the street empty.
His brow furrowed, and he turned to go inside when he caught sight of the outside of the door.
Nailed to the wood was an ink drawing of him and Ruven crouched over the body from earlier.
Ice flooded his veins as he slowly took the parchment from the door. The details were exact, as if someone had drawn this during their inspection of the body.
He touched the parchment gently and the ink smudged just a little; it was still fresh and not blotted.
A rustle of paper had Torzek’s eyes darting to the alleyway between the temples of Death and Fate.
He went to head toward the alleyway, another rustle calling to him, when Shael’s voice called out from inside the temple, “The soul was gone.”
Torzek turned to face her, drawing still clutched in his hand.
Her face was drawn, a deep frown etched into her normally cheerful face.
“What do you mean the soul was gone? It wouldn’t move when I tried to call it.”
“It just wasn’t there.” She looked at the parchment in his hand. “What is that?”
Torzek handed the parchment over and tried to rub the small smear of ink off his finger. It faded to a dull grey streak.
“Where did you get this?”
“It was nailed to the temple door,” Torzek replied. He glanced once more to the alley before closing the door and turning back to Shael.
Shael studied the drawing for a moment before suddenly dropping it as if it had burned her.
It fluttered to the stone floor of the temple.
“Are you okay?” Torzek asked and then picked up the paper.
Black covered his hands as he flipped it over.
Fresh, wet ink seemed to bleed from the parchment:
'THE FIRST SPILLING OF DAMNED BLOOD BUT NOT THE LAST'
