Aregoma left on a hurry, carrying her backpack and staff. Lu followed the old farmer to a stable next to what seemed to be an old run-down tavern. She set up the mules in the pens, packed the blankets and other loose items and was guided to the man inside. The exterior of the building gave the impression that it had not been used in decades, but the interior was certainly better kept, still nothing to write home about but more than serviceable for a free stay for a night. Lu left in the rooms everything but the chest they could not carry and the left to find their companions.

  They found them inside the small church of the town, in one of the back rooms decorated with the imperial flags and plenty other holy imagery like pictures of saints or cardinals. In the room, laying on a makeshift bed that was nothing but a mattress propped over a table was a woman. She looked elven and incredibly thin and sickly, sweating with fever and her pubic regions were covered in both fresh and dry blood. Next to her was a priest, talking with Aregoma while Helvia and three of the townsfolk huddled in a corner of the cramped room. On the other side of the woman was a man with a messy beard and eyes that seem to have not slept in years holding her hand, caressing it softly as he attentively listened to the conversation between the priest and the mage.

  “...And I am afraid there is nothing else I can do other than pray that a bishop arrives in time.” Lu heard the priest say as they walked to the room and stood by the door. They crossed eyes with Helvia, who seemed stoic as ever. “So if there is anything you can do that will give her some time we would be forever grateful to you.” The priest begged.

  “I know mages are not cheap...” The tired man sitting besides the woman said, with a deep raspy voice of someone who needed water five days ago. “...But I give you anything I can, we can save some money and...”

  “Absolutely not.” Interrupted Aregoma. “I will not accept any payment for anything I attempt here.”

  The man opened his mouth to speak but only a soft moan came out.

  “I need some time to consider my options. Please go wait outside.” Reluctantly all of the present left the room and sat down at the chapel, murmuring prayers as they waited with shaking hands. The man was embraced by two of the elder woman, one of them smiled giving him words of reassurance. “Lu, Helvia, I need you here.”

  Both walked back in, closing the door behind. “How can we help?” Helvia asked.

  “Well I just thought this could be a good learning opportunity for our aspiring acolyte.” Aregoma said, pulling out a set of books from her backpack and shuffling through them. “And you are their guarding so I assume you have to keep an eye on them so here you are!” She Pulled a small leather box and opened it, Inside were four wands that seemed to be made strictly out of finger bones glued together with some white substance. She pulled one of them and held it between her fingers. “Also I need someone to carry me if I faint.”

  Deep breath in, deep breath out. She looked at the open pages of one of her books and murmured something to herself. Then turned her attention back to the feverish woman on the bed and began chanting. “Fowogolofo?o fowogolofo?o fowogolofo?o...” As she repeated the words, she slowly moved the wand over the body of the woman without touching it, going from her head to each of her hands, then her chest, legs and finally her pubic regions. Aregoma pulled a face, but her chant was not altered. The whole process took about fifteen minutes, during which Lu could swear there was a glint of blue light coming from the tip of the wand. Aregoma finally stopped and took another deep breath, sitting down heavily on the empty chair next to the bed. “Helvia could you please get me some bread or something else to eat? And some water, thank you.”

  As soon as Helvia left Lu looked at Aregoma, expecting some sort of explanation but she had already pulled one of the books to her lap and was ruffling through its pages while massaging her temples. “So...” Lu said with shy tone. “...What was that? Is that a spell I should learn?”

  “If you are going to become a healer then yes.” Aregoma answered without looking away from the book. “But it is not a good first option, the information you get can be very difficult to interpret... But that is not the point.” She stood up abruptly and dropped the book in one of the side tables. “Lu ask if they have chalk or coal or anything that would stain these floors, please and thank you.”

  Lu walked to the chapel and towards the priest, who was consoling the tired man, and asked him for chalk or coal. He rushed to another side room in the same building and within a minute he came back with some old charcoal sticks. Hopefully they would work. Lu took them and went back in the room at the same time Helvia came in from the outside, flanked by one of the woman from before as well as another dozen of curious townsfolk.

  “First lesson on sigils.” Aregoma said as soon as Lu opened the door. “Copy that on the floor Big enough that I can stand inside. The lines have to be clear.” The elf was pointing at the open pages in her book. It was the drawing of two concentric circles similar in size that created in between them a ring where six symbols where drawn

  Lu knelt on the floor and copied it, taking exceptional care that all the symbols were identical. Lu was not specially good at drawing but they did not struggle as much as they did when they had to understand the symbols. Just remember the shape and repeat it, that was fine.

  Helvia came in and gave Aregoma a jar of water, a glass and some bread and jam. A luxury for sure. “Spells vary in complexity” continued explaining Aregoma. “The most basic ones are called ‘charms’ and they take only between one and five syllables and a quick motion. The more complex the spell the longer the incantation as well as the movements and the setup necessary. The spell I casted before was a spell of grade one. Grade one spells are written with six sigils, six syllables. Grade two takes eighteen syllables, grade three is forty-two, grade four is ninety, grade five is one-hundred eighty six and sixth grade, the highest, is three hundred seventy eight.”

  This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

  At that point Lu had finished the drawing on the floor and stood up to present it to Aregoma. “And why do we have to write this on the floor?”

  “Sigil circles encode the incantation needed for the spell. They are used when you have time to set them up and serve to stabilize and shape the essence of the spell better.” Aregoma walked around the circle, comparing it to the book. “Pretty good for your first time. This is the sigil circle for the spell I just casted, you see one ring, because it is first grade, each of the six sigils is a syllable of the incantation.” She flipped to another page on the same book, now showing two rows of symbols. “Now the next spell I have to cast is of second grade and I am not very experienced with it so I need a sigil circle. Grade two, two rings...” She took one of the charcoal sticks from Lu and made a quick drawing on the wall of three concentric circles, forming two rings, and marked six equidistant points in the inner ring and twelve in the second. “See how it is usually written is in lines, but you have to wrap them around to form circles, the first line here...” She said pointing at a line of six sigils written in the book “is the inner circle, for the second circle you have to write the following sigils in these positions.”

  “So six sigils on the first ring, twelve in the second.” Lu repeated. “the first one goes where? How do I orient it?”

  “You start from the top and write them clockwise, but the ‘top’ or starting position is determined by where you are going to cast the spell towards.” She walked outside the room to the chapel and stood on the central pathway, kicking the carpet away. “This will be the centre and it needs to point in this direction.” She pointed to one of the sides that was occupied with benches and curious townspeople. “Helvia I need you to clear out the room, move all the furniture to the side.” She ordered as she took another bite out off the bread and jam she was holding.

  “Excuse me...” Interrupted the priest. “What is the matter? Has anything happened?”

  “I need you and the husband with me here, and any other close family. I have news.”

  The priest, the tired man as well as two other woman walked in the side room and closed the door behind them. Lu focused on copying the sigils from the book. At some point they smudged one of the symbols from the inner circle while drawing the outer one and had to use a wet rag to clean the section and re-write it. Helvia, with the help of some of the bystanders, cleared the area in no time. The room remained closed for half an hour and the people grew impatient. Eventually the door opened and the priest and one of the women left on a rush, speaking with the other townsfolk who also rushed away looking for something. Something about blankets and wine Lu heard. Helvia was called and she pulled the table and mattress out of the room and placed them in front of the circle Lu had drawn. The husband carried the sick woman to the new resting spot and then he turned towards the other woman who was coming out of the room, tears in his eyes as he embraced her. She was older, late fifties or early sixties and definitely had a grandma look to her. She was also crying, but with a smile.

  Aregoma came out of the room holding her staff and proceeded to stand in the circle Lu had drawn, inspecting it. She gave them an approving smile and gestured them to move away. The townsfolk brought in another table, from the old unused tavern the travellers were going to spend the night in, and a mattress that was little else than hay and old wool wrapped in some blankets. The older woman who was hugging the husband walked to the newly setup bed behind the sigil circle opposite to the one with the sick woman. A couple came rushing from the public, holding a newborn baby. The couple, the husband and the old woman convened together next to the newly setup bed, all of them crying, hugging each other and speaking with thick accent. The husband held the newborn baby the couple had been carrying and kissed them on the forehead. He whispered something to the baby as the old woman sat down on the bed.

  “If I don’t get to talk to her myself, please make sure she does not feel guilty about it.” The old woman said. “This is all a mother could hope for, she will understand at some point. I love you all.”

  The woman lied on the bed atop a pile of old blankets and other rags and took of her trousers and underwear, leaving the lower half of her body exposed. Some men from the town stood around her, gently holding her in place. One of them put a piece of wood wrapped in wine-soaked cloth in her mouth for her to bite. Aregoma walked to the woman and held her had. “No need for goodbyes, you are strong.” She produced from among her pockets a small knife and pierced the woman’s thigh enough to draw blood. She took the crimson liquid and covered the palm of her left hand on it. She then when to the sick elven woman, covering her right hand with the readily available blood from her body. She took a deep breath standing in the middle of the circle, both stained hands firmly wrapped around her staff. She stood in position, sifting her feet ever so slightly looking for the exact angle, knees slightly flexed, her staff raised straight above her. Then she began.

  “migipogofi?o...” As she chanted on a single breath she lowered her staff until it was pointing to the sick woman. The eyes on the skull had a subtle but definitely real amber glow. “...?iwojilowi?iSITOSITOSITO”

  She shouted the last syllables of the incantation while turning around on her feet, pulling her staff over her head and pointing it towards the other woman, as if she had loaded something onto the end of it and was trying to throw it away. There was a moment, no more than a split second that felt like an hour, where the only sound in the chapel was the echo of the chant. Then it came, the sound of flesh being torn apart and the wet splash of blood over blood. Lu turned their face away from the older woman, as did most people, when they saw the flesh of her groin tear itself apart almost from her mons pubis all the way to her lower back, spilling a sea of blood and gore onto the sheets. The came the screams. Muffled by the piece of wood she had in her mouth, but not any less soul freezing. A scream of agony unlike anything Lu had heard before. The men around her made a visible effort to not throw up from the grotesque of the situation and held her in place, preventing her from making the wound worse.

  “It is done, go!” exclaimed Aregoma.

  A group of people that had been patiently waiting with the rest of the observers rushed in, alcohol bandages and stitches in hand, ready to treat now open wound. Aregoma gave a step towards the screaming woman and her legs gave away a little bit, having to stabilize on her staff not to fall. The mage sat down and called for the priest. “The infection...” She told him “Has been passed on as well. Treat her the same as you were doing, now we can only hope that she can handle it better.”

  On the other side of the room, the man and the baby were standing next to the elven woman who now had opened her eyes, confused but awake. The pain and fever had completely left her, no wound, scar or infection. With an cry of happiness she embraced her husband and new-born child. Aregoma stood up, using her staff as a walking stick. “I am tired, can you please show me to my room Lu?”

  Helvia, Lu and Aregoma picked up their stuff and left for the tavern. As they walked there was an equal amount of awe, disgust and terror on the faces of the people who had bore witness to a necromancer using her flesh magic on the living.