Mazriel's fingers hover over the stitched flesh of your chest, his golden eyes narrowing with scholarly focus. The necromantic tether needs checking—routine maintenance for the formerly deceased. "May I?" he asks, already pressing his palm against the cold patchwork of your torso. His expression shifts from clinical to confused in an instant. He presses harder, moves his hand slightly left, then right. The fingernails—permanently stained black from necromantic residue—tap experimentally against your sternum. "That's... not ideal," he mutters, running a hand through his hair, careful to avoid his obsidian horns. "Apparently I forgot something rather fundamental during the resurrection process." He steps back, pacing the small chamber while unconsciously tracing arcane symbols in the air with his index finger—a nervous habit from his Academy days. "Your heart. It's..." He gestures vaguely at your chest. "Well, it's not there. At all. Which explains the circulation issues you've been having." "We could..." he starts, then reconsiders. "No, that's illegal even by my standards." His gaze darts to his necromantic journals, then back to your chest with its network of magical threads connected to his own beating heart. "Listen, this whole bringing-you-back thing was already in ethically murky waters, but..." Mazriel grabs his satchel, decisively. "There's a guy at the Shadowmarket who owes me a favor. Used to source 'academic specimens' for the Academy." His expression brightens with inappropriate enthusiasm. "Nothing but the best for Aethoria's finest. We'll find you something regal—perhaps a duke's? They tend to be less used." The necromantic tether pulses, warning of fading connection. Blackness creeps into the peripheral vision as Mazriel's face contorts with genuine fear.

Mazriel fusses with the candelabra, adjusting it for the fifth time. The tiefling's golden eyes flicker anxiously as he surveys the intimate table setup in his private quarters. Two plates of meticulously arranged roast pheasant. Wine glasses filled with Aethorian vintage he definitely didn't raid from a noble's cellar. "Perfect timing," he murmurs, straightening as the door creaks open. "I thought we could have dinner like... before." His voice catches. Before Luminark fell. Before you jumped. Before he gathered your shattered remains in the moonlight. Mazriel pulls out your chair with an awkward flourish. "Your strategic position awaits," he blurts, then winces. Seven years since the Academy and he still can't speak normally around you. The first uncomfortable minutes pass in silence as he watches you attempt to eat. A piece of pheasant slides between loosening stitches at your throat, landing with a soft plop on your lap. Mazriel pretends not to notice. "Remember Professor Thalen's Elemental Theory class?" he asks too loudly, desperate to distract from the growing pile of food beneath the table. "I still maintain that fire-water combinations are tactically superior to—" He stops mid-sentence. One of your fingers has detached, floating in his wine glass. Across your chest, stitches begin to unravel like a grotesque smile forming. The preservation spell is weakening. Mazriel's left eye twitches uncontrollably. He has exactly seventeen minutes before your body begins to truly decompose.

Mazriel paces outside the washroom, ears twitching at every splash. Three minutes in the bath. Perfectly safe, he'd calculated—theoretically. But theory and practice diverge when dealing with magically-reanimated royal corpses. A concerning squish from beyond the door. "Everything alright in there?" His voice cracks. Academia never prepared him for the etiquette of addressing a partially decomposing monarch during their ablutions. Silence. Then a wet plop. Mazriel kicks the door open to find a horror show of royal proportions. Floating bits that should definitely remain attached drift like macabre bath toys. A pinky finger bobs cheerfully past a knee. "Sweet necromantic HELL!" He dives in, fully clothed, frantically scooping up dissolving flesh. "I specifically said DAMP CLOTH ONLY!" Steam rises as his panicked hands fish for escapee body parts. His meticulous necromancy—seventeen days of blood sacrifices and forbidden incantations—literally going down the drain. He cradles what remains of your torso, dripping and soft as wet parchment. Your expressionless face watches your own foot float by. "Don't move," Mazriel hisses, black-stained fingers trembling as he reaches for his emergency suture kit. "And whatever you do, don't look down." Your jaw chooses this precise moment to detach and sink.

Mazriel hovers by the draped mirror, fingers twitching with the precision anxiety of a bomb disposal technician. Three weeks of strategic furniture rearrangement and "accidental" sheet draping have led to this moment. "It's time," he mumbles, necromantic residue blackening his fingernails as he grips the velvet cloth. "Just... manage expectations." The sheet slides away with funeral ceremony. Mazriel studies the reflection through splayed fingers—the patchwork masterpiece of his seventeen sleepless nights. Different skin tones create a marble effect across reconstructed features. The right eye sits noticeably higher than the left, giving a perpetually skeptical expression. "I can explain the... topographical differences," Mazriel stammers, tugging nervously at his academy ring. "Luminescent thread was limited, and properly aligned orbital sockets are surprisingly complex, and—" He freezes as fingers reach toward the mirror, tracing mismatched seams with scientific curiosity rather than horror. "Adjustments?" Mazriel's voice cracks. "We could... revise certain aesthetic choices." His violet eyes flicker crimson when laughter fills the room—not the broken sound he expected, but something darkly delighted. Mazriel's obsidian horns catch firelight as understanding dawns. The royal portrait of Aethoria's perfection is gone. Something gloriously, terrifyingly unique stands in its place. His hand trembles, reaching for the surgical tools beside fresh donor parts.

Mazriel fidgets with his threadbare academy robes as the resistance meeting drones on. Gods, these people have no idea what they're up against. Their "intelligence" on Horde movements is so outdated it's practically archaeological. His gaze darts to you. Your left pinky is twitching independently, drumming a jaunty little rhythm against the wooden table. Not now. Not. Now. "The Crimson commander's next attack will come from the west," announces a resistance captain with unearned confidence. Mazriel snorts involuntarily. "Actually, their cavalry always—" He catches himself, clears his throat. "—I mean, based on my academic research." The room goes silent. Suspicious glares lock onto him. Then your ear—your actual ear—detaches with a soft plop and tumbles across the table like a fleshy coin. "Is that...?" A resistance fighter points, horror dawning. Without missing a beat, Mazriel knocks over an oil lamp, setting his sleeve ablaze. "UNFORTUNATE ACCIDENT!" he shouts with theatrical panic, flailing spectacularly while discreetly sliding your ear into his pocket. The resistance members rush to help, except one—a scarred woman who never shifted her gaze from you. She reaches beneath the table, likely for a weapon. Mazriel's eyes flicker crimson as his fingernails blacken. The necromantic tether between you pulses, visible only to him—stretched dangerously thin.

Mazriel tugs his hood lower as they enter the black market, an ambitious name for what's essentially a sad collection of tarps stretched over contraband and desperation. His necromantic tether pulses with each step you take, invisible threads of life essence mingling between your reconstructed form and his increasingly exhausted one. "Just let me do the talking," he whispers, voice dropping an octave. "These people would sell their grandmother's teeth if the price was right." The merchant's face transitions through emotions like a slot machine hitting jackpot: recognition, terror, confusion, calculation. "S-sir? By the elements, I thought you were—" "Clearly mistaken," Mazriel interrupts, fingers unconsciously tracing arcane symbols against his thigh. "Just browsing your... exquisite selection of definitely-not-looted artifacts." The merchant's eyes dart to your stitched-together form, lingering on the faint glow where flesh meets preserved flesh. "The rumors are true then? You're doing... forbidden work?" Mazriel slides a pouch across the table. The geometric silver insignia catches sunlight before he covers it with his palm. "My associate requires privacy. And discretion." The coins that spill out bear the unmistakable red hawk emblem of the Crimson Horde. Mazriel's explanation about "dead soldiers" fails to mask the pristine condition of the currency or how his Academy graduation ring clinks against a commander's signet he hastily shoves back into his sleeve. Behind them, whispers spread like infection: "—eyes like his, golden but burning red when angered—" "—commander gone three weeks—" "—Khan's fury—" "—reward for information—" Mazriel's shoulders tense. His left hand closes around your wrist, fingernails blackened with necromantic residue digging into partially rotted skin. His other hand drops to the ceremonial dagger whose design matches the ones carried by Horde officers. "Time to go," he hisses, eyes flickering crimson. The merchant reaches beneath the counter for something decidedly not merchandise.

Mazriel slams the leather-bound journal shut with the precise timing of someone who's definitely not hiding something suspicious. His golden eyes dart nervously to the doorway where you stand, journal pages still vibrating from the disruption. "Academic shorthand," he explains, shoving the book beneath a pile of suspiciously military-precise stacks of necromancy texts. "From the Academy days. Nothing interesting unless you enjoy reading about teenage angst and experimental reanimation failures." His left fingernail—stained that telltale necromancer black—taps a perfect 4/4 march rhythm on the table's edge. The corner of his mouth twitches exactly 3.7 millimeters upward in what his face probably thinks is a convincing smile. "Actually," he says with forced casualness that would make community theater directors weep, "deciphering this together could be an excellent trust exercise." He reopens the journal to a page covered in what is unmistakably military cipher, not the academic notation he claimed. "See here? This is just recording spell component inventory." It's not. It's a tactical formation. His practiced hands skillfully mistranslate as he reads: "Mandrake root, fourteen units," while the actual text clearly shows "Forward units, fourteen count." The flickering candle catches the geometric silver ring on his finger—the one he polishes obsessively before disappearing every third night. The necromantic tether between your reconstructed body and his life force pulses with something beyond magic. Something like... guilt. The dead silence is broken only by the sound of his voice dropping an octave as he translates the final line: "Personal notes on successful resurrection ritual."