Page 69 of Courting the Dragon King

“What’s it like, the afterlife?” Konrad asked.

“I don’t know actually.”

“But you said you stepped through the—what did you call it? Bone Door.”

“Only the dead can see beyond. To me it is all shadows and fog. I can’t see what it is actually like. But Umbra has told me it is peaceful. She says there are lots of treats and everyone gives her pats.”

Konrad chuckled. “It sounds very pleasant.”

“She says the people there are happy,” Wraith said.

The cries and wailing of the funeral procession grew quieter.

“Where do you think they are heading?” Konrad asked.

“To the cemetery. There is one a short distance that way.” Wraith pointed. “I saw it when we flew overhead.”

“Really? I didn’t see anything.”

Wraith hesitated. He still did not feel entirely comfortable sharing information about necromancy. Mainly because Konrad hated it. He knew the shadow king and queen would not want him to share as much as he had with Konrad and Elias and the others, but this was his family now and their kingdoms were at peace.

“I could see the cemetery because I can sense where the bodies have been buried,” Wraith said. “It’s a necromancer thing.”

“I see,” Konrad said.

Wraith studied his face, but he was unable to read the blank expression.

“During the war, I fought against the reanimated.” Konrad stared straight ahead. “From the time I was old enough to fight, I was sent to battle against Necros. I remember the first time I fought the necromancers. We had won and were victorious. Then our own dead soldiers rose and turned on us.”

Konrad’s jaw clenched. “Anton, my friend, he—” He closed his eyes. “He came back. I had to kill him. But he wouldn’t die,” he said, voice strained. “I had to hack him to pieces to stop him attacking me.”

“I’m sorry. That must have been horrible.” Wraith hesitated. “But you know it wasn’t him, right?”

“What do you mean?”

“With the reanimated, their soul is not there. His spirit would not have been connected to his body. He would have been … elsewhere”—he waved to the ether—“when you hacked him to pieces.” Anton might have lingered after death or moved on straight away. Wraith did not know. But he would not have been in his body when he attacked Konrad.

“I am glad to hear that at least.” Then Konrad grimaced. “Still, it was not right.”

“I suppose putting a sword into the body of a person you once knew is difficult, even if the spirit is not there.” Although, honestly, Wraith had never considered what that would feel like.

“You think?” Konrad said, and Wraith could hear the fury in the words. But also the pain.

Wraith looked at the spot where Mary had sat in the middle of the dirt road. “I have never felt the connection others do to the bodies of the dead. How can I? They are husks.”

Konrad exhaled sharply.

But Wraith kept talking; he wanted Konrad to understand. “When death comes the spirit usually leaves the body within minutes, unless you bind a soul to the corpse, of course. So the body has no real significance.”

“How would you feel if your own corpse came back and was controlled by your enemies?” Konrad’s green eyes flashed.

Wraith almost wanted to step back in the face of Konrad’s anger.

He will not hurt me. He is just upset and hurting. But he will not harm me.

And Wraith knew that to be true. He knew Konrad might be angry, but he’d learnt that Konrad wouldn’t actually hurt Wraith.

“I do not see how I would feel anything,” Wraith said. “I’d be gone. What happens to my body after my death has nothing to do with me.”