Still

Often, I'm reminded of laying there, on the battlefield.

I was face down at the time, the slick mixture of dirt and cold blood pressing wetly against my cheek. I'd chosen the spot too hastily, I quickly came to realize. I'd reacted too strongly to the sharp clanging of swords, surrounded as I was by the furious battle cries and wailing death knells. Really, I should have held things together longer, looked for a better spot... but in my panic I'd simply found the nearest clump of fallen soldiers, read aloud the small scrap of parchment the magic users had given me. I drank the bitter, dark-green potion I'd been keeping safe, draining the phial in a single gulp.

And then I fell face down in the mud, and I died.

Mostly, anyways.

Being face down was important because of the likelihood of carrion crows, and not allowing my eyes to be pecked out of their sockets seemed like a good idea. Still, I found myself cursing my lack of foresight, for soon I didn't even have the persistent thrumming my own heartbeat to distract me. My entire world became the sensation of cold, clammy muck seeping into my mouth and nose, trickling slowly down my throat.

I only had to put up with it for a while, I told myself... a few hours at most. A carnage-strewn battlefield like this was where most of the Lich fe'shala – The Withered Hand – did their “recruiting”, replenishing their forces with the casualties of our own, the blackest of magics enabling them to use our own dead against us. Each battle we fought yielded a fresh crop of potential soldiers for them, dozens of vacant-eyed and lifeless bodies, ripe for the taking. It was the reason humans had been losing this war.

It was the reason I was there in the first place.

The mud was trivial enough, actually, considering all the other things I'd been prepared for. The sensations of body death, paralysis, the rites and rituals used by the undead, the process of reanimation... all were things I'd had to frantically commit to memory in just a few short days. It was a hasty, reckless plan... but feasible enough that several important-looking cowled figures had somehow managed to find time away from the front lines just so they could drill the precautions and information I'd need into my head, making sure that no matter what happened I was more or less prepared.

When the tumultuous noises of battle had receded and the first sounds of corpse looting could be heard, I began to wish I'd been better prepared for the undead's morbid sense of humor.

“That's not a hat, Makhara.” I heard one say.

“What's not a hat?” an amused, gravelly voice asked innocently.

“Geeze, if you're gonna keep wearing that thing, I think I'll go stand by the wagon.”

“Bah. You're no fun.” gravel-throat sniffed. A sodden “plop” was heard a moment later.

“Oi!” I heard a different rusty voice yell some distance away. “I wonder what this one died from, hey?”

There was a chorus of crude chuckles. A moment later, I heard the faintest jingling of chain mail, followed by the sound of a throat clearing.

“Oh, hello! This is my first battle!” a raspy falsetto mocked, “Am I doing well? Is it over? I can't see too well, on account of my head's wayyy over there, and over there, and-”

Howls of coarse laughter filled the air.

“Enough o' that!” a nearby voice growled. “That one's useless, obviously, so stop playing with it and keep looking.”

“Aye, sir! No more playing, sir!” the voice said, followed by a quick, ringing jingle and a succession of sickly thuds. There was renewed laughter, and scattered cheers in addition to some appreciative clapping.