Omg it's *warhammer*

That the dead shall not walk the shores of Ulthuan.

The fifty-fourth of a total of sixty-six oaths was one considered vainglorious by the mages who swore to it on their day of initiation. The ban on necromancy was older than the White Tower of Hoeth in which magic was taught, older than the forests of Chrace and Avelorn, older than the mountains of Caledor, and the dragons that slumbered beneath them. It was said that the ban on death-magic was as old as the original teachings passed down by the Old-ones themselves. With no mages practiced in necromancy, the dead could never walk the shores of Ulthuan.

A small rural village on the coast of Cothique, sheltering a group of warriors returning from the Nagarythe front, was hardly the most likely place where such an oath would be enforced.

“Jaelis, come quickly! A human ship has berthed at the dock!”

Months spent in Nagarythe had sharpened Jaelis’s instincts to the point that by the time Caliel had finished speaking, the mage had grabbed his staff and opened the door.

“What? A human vessel snuck past the patrols? Surely not,” he said to the veteran.

The other elves under Jaelis’s command arrived at the house from other buildings given over to the returning soldiers. Sendai, the youngest of the group of seven, was leading his own, Caliel and Jaelis’s horses.

“Most of the citizen levy has gathered by the dock, they figure the same as you. No fat merchant tub could get past Finubar’s patrols.” Caliel agreed.

The seven elves mounted their steeds quickly. The horses had braved the chill of Nagarythe and the horrors of the Druchii madness without falter, but there was something hesitant in their action tonight. Jaelis tugged at the reins a little harder and waved off the hesitation as being caused by the weeks of mindless travel they had endured on their way back to the Tower.

There was a thick mist rolling in from the sea, obscuring the wide windswept roads of the Cothiquian village as the small party moved toward the dock. It could not have been eerier, save perhaps if the experience was not shared by dozens of the villagers, who were gravitating toward the dock like moths to the flame.

Jaelis leant over the head of Erie, his mare, and grabbed one of the villagers by the shoulder, “what are you doing?”

The elf, a fisherman by the look of his worn clothes turned to the mage, “they say a ship has arrived at port milord, a human ship.”

“Aye, I’ve heard. Humans foolish enough to find our shores should be greeted with stern looks and cold steel, not unprotected crowds. Return to your home,” he raised his voice, “all of you! Return to your homes!”

Jaelis cut an impressive figure atop Erie, but few of the villagers deigned to notice. These were humans, and few villagers would ever have another chance to see one. The veterans picked up their pace so that even if they could not force the villagers to return to their homes, they might gauge the threat, if any, of this vessel before innocents were exposed.

The dock was a simple affair; a few piers crafted with the finesse characteristic to the High Elf race, with a thick windbreak of rocks protruding a few dozen feet out to sea. The longest, widest pier was blocked by a full score of spearmen, while another dozen attempted to keep back the growing crowd. A little over a dozen archers were also positioning themselves with decent sights of the ship’s deck, in case its occupants proved to be hostile.

The sojourners arrived just in time to see the watch commander venture onto the long pier, toward where this mysterious ship was berthed.

“Ho, stand and address yourselves, trespassers!” the commander shouted up at the silent ship as he approached.

“The ship is damaged, probably caught by a bad storm on the way in,” muttered Senlui to Jaelis. The woman wore the concealing dark cloak and rapier of the shadow warriors of Nagarythe, but her bow was shorter than the traditional longbow, and curved like the horn bows of Cathay. Her long blonde hair was swept up in a topknot, to mark her current duties.

“Lucky to make it then,” the mage agreed.

“The damage is older, look at the hull, it’s been patched up enough to float, but could surely have never outpaced the sea patrols.” Caliel said in disagreement. The idea was disconcerting; but then, the whole situation was.

A hunched figure appeared on deck, concealed by the dark hour of the day.

“And there have been no storms of this coast, I asked the levy when we arrived, the damage must be the usual wear of travel. A long journey indeed,” Sendai interjected, unaware, in his naivete, of the connotations of his realisation.

The thin fog grew thicker around them all as the shadowed figure replied to the commander’s challenge, “we are but travellers, in need of a berth as we repair our vessel and go about our search.”

“You will find neither a berth nor anything else you might seek on these sacred shores, vagrant,” shouted the watch commander, “cast-off and begone.”

Bent and gnarled shapes loomed in the twilight behind the hunched speaker. The fog made them harder still to see from the shore. The fog, Jaelis suddenly realised in a moment of intuitive epiphany, that the ship bore with it as a shield from prying eyes.

Before Jaelis could even mouth a warning, Sendai loosed her first arrow. It struck the first of the creatures as it leapt from the ship at the watch commander. Though surprised at the suddenness of the attack, the commander illustrated his prowess by finishing the ghoul with a single riposte. The moment of victory was cut short as the commander was borne from the pier into the water by a pair of the creatures that leapt at him while he dealt with the first.

The elves on the shore shouted in denial as their commander was brought into the water. The archers loosed a volley, only to have it scatter ineffectually in the thick fog and concealing panels of the ship.

Even as more of the ghoul pack leapt onto the pier, a sound far more chilling than their warped feet padding along the refined wood reached Jaelis’s ears. The gentle waves of the Cothiquian beach had ceased to break on the empty shores of Ulthuan. The waves broke instead on shambling, unthinking forms that dragged themselves from the sea’s cold embrace.

Jaelis turned to face the dead without recoil, mouthing the words of a powerful prayer.

Because that was what he had sworn to do.