"We lost too many," Soterius sighed, looking over the bloody snow.
"They fought well against the regular soldiers," Mikhail observed. "But what came out of that wagon-we didn't train for that."
"What were they?" Soterius did not expect an answer.
"Ashtenerath." It was Tadrie who spoke, from where he sat huddled in the back of the wagon-box, as Pell did his best to dress the farmer's wounds. Soterius frowned, recognizing the term from old tales.
"Awakened dead?" Soterius replied, meeting Mikhail's gaze. "Those are just stories told to scare children."
"Not necessarily," Mikhail said quietly.
"That man… was my brother-in-law," Tadrie said haltingly, shivering with the cold. Andras stripped cloaks from the dead soldiers and distributed them among the wounded and survivors. "He was taken by Margolan troops six months ago. We thought he was dead. Better for him if he had been," Tadrie said, still obviously shaken by the encounter. "The Lady forgive me. I had no choice but to kill him, although I don't know how to tell my wife." He shook his head. "Then again, that… thing… wasn't really him, at least, not in his right mind."
"What do you mean, 'not necessarily?'" Soterius looked from Tadrie to Mikhail. Pell finished binding up Tadrie's wounds and stepped back, closing up the wagon doors for the slow trip back to the refugee camp. Soterius and Mikhail, two of the least wounded, led the group. Andras guided the horses with Tabb as guard, and Sahila and Pell brought up the rear.
"During the Mage War, the Obsidian King was able to reanimate corpses on the battlefield," Mikhail said as they walked. "I didn't see it myself, thank Istra, but I knew men who saw it first-hand. Such fighters were of little use other than to terrify their comrades."
"So such a thing is possible?" Soterius remembered the story Carroway had told him, about the vengeful woman's ghost who had tried to possess Carina as Tris and the others were fleeing toward Principality. And while Soterius knew that Carroway was often given to exaggeration to make a tale better, the bard had sworn to him that in this case, the truth needed no embellishment. In Carroway's recounting, Tris had fought the dead woman's ghost for control of Carina's body. In throwing clear the vengeful spirit, he had accidentally cast it back into the woman's corpse, momentarily reanimating her until Vahanian struck her down with a sword.
Mikhail nodded. "But I don't think that's what we fought tonight. The man I captured was alive. Although… there was something that didn't feel right. I suspect that we're dealing with blood magic."
