Strange Remains
Part 9
Menzo stared at the Vigil, shock blooming on his face. The older man chuckled.
“I’ve never seen nor heard of cairns moving, if that can make you feel a bit safer. But let this be your first formal lesson; we know ridiculously little, despite what many would tell you.”
Menzo dipped his head and exhaled.
“What worries me,” Yavan continued, “is not the thought of these bones coming to life. Rather, I believe this indicates that the spirit has truly lifted away from the body, despite its obvious strength. If I am not mistaken, spirits like this one need to be quite strong to manage to retain a physical body. What is bothersome is not knowing who interfered.”
“You think someone did this?”
“That is correct. These cairns never build themselves alone.”
Menzo nodded slowly once more and the silence extended awkwardly, Yavan staring at him expectantly. He glanced at the bones, silent and unmoving, then at the woods around him, with the darkness seeming to penetrate deeper than it had before. Or was it just his imagination? ‘It must be’, he decided. He turned back and gave Yavan a tentative smile which the Vigil acknowledged before setting back to his own task.
As he began moving once more, the archer’s senses seemed to pick up on movement in the dark at the far edges of his vision. Yet, whenever he looked up, nothing betrayed any movement. Grunting, he squeezed his eyes shut. ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ he mentally shouted at himself. He gave his head a shake and opened his eyes again; everything was still the same, as he knew it would be. ‘There, you see?’ he thought, ‘nothing there to be seen.’