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living who fall are added to their number. I have seen…” His voice faltered. “I have seen my own people among the dead, folk that lived when I lived, and I think that they were destroyed when I lost control, but I do not know. I cannot know.”
    “I am sorry,” Elyana told him, and she was, though it seemed trite to tell him so.
    “Now I wish only for release,” the ghost continued. “For myself and for my land. But I cannot make it so. If I venture from the tower, I feel my mind fading, for the pull of the pendant I fashioned is too great. Yet I fear that if I return to it, it will consume me entirely, and perhaps extend the curse even farther.”
    “Now we come to it,” Arcil said quietly, but Elyana ignored him. Sometimes his superior air was too much, even for her.
    “Can you help me?” The ghost stepped forward, hands outstretched.
    “How?” Elyana asked.
    “It is the pendant that powers the sorcery. And I think it is the pendant that keeps me here. If it can be destroyed, then the dead will fall, forever. And I will finally be at peace.”
    Elyana ignored Arcil’s knowing look and kept her eyes fixed on the ghost. “Where is the thing, and how can it be destroyed?”
    The spirit turned from her and drifted over to the rim of the balcony, where it pointed back the way they had come.
    “I can still sense it,” he said in his cold, lonely voice. “You, wizard, might be able to feel its power if you extended yourself. It must lie where my body lies. Only a magical weapon can destroy the pendant, for I shielded the thing against harm.”
    Arcil glanced over to Elyana before speaking. “It does not seem… especially feasible, then, to seek the pendant now. Your dead will rip us limb from limb, and then we’d be keeping the valley safe with the rest of your… comrades.”
    The ghost nodded. “I think I may be able to offer you some small protections along the way.
    “You say that Arcil will be able to sense it,” Elyana said. “How?”
    The ghost looked surprised. “In my day, any wizard would have such spells at his disposal. I have witnessed your friend’s magics—he should feel the pendant’s pull, though I suppose some might be more sensitive to it than others.”
    Elyana looked to Arcil for confirmation.
    “There was a strange, unwelcome attraction to a certain area we passed through the ruins,” he admitted. “But I was not inclined to investigate. To be honest, I was otherwise occupied.”
    “An ‘unwelcome attraction,’” Elyana repeated. “And you say, Lord Dolandryn, that some might be more sensitive to its power than others. A necromancer, perhaps?”
    “Almost certainly.”
    Elyana frowned, and the moment she looked at Arcil she knew he was having the same thought. She saw his eyes narrow.
    “We’re done for now,” Arcil said.
    “We can’t let the Galtans have that thing,” Elyana said. “Do you know what they would do with its power?”
    “How do you know their wizard is even alive?” Arcil asked.
    “He’s a necromancer,” Elyana said. “And a powerful one. We saw his work. If we made it to safety, I’m sure he did. And if he finds the pendant, it’s only a matter of time before he figures out its use.”
    Arcil sighed deeply. “Well-reasoned, unfortunately. I suppose we’ll have to find it before he does.”
    “It seems we need each other, Prince,” Elyana agreed. “What assistance can you give?”
    The ghost drifted back to them, considered them for just a moment, and began to speak.

Chapter Four: The Pendant
    Prince Dolandryn explained that in life he’d known only a handful of spells, for he had bent his concentration upon necromantic studies to the exclusion of almost all other magics. Yet he had learned one or two useful tricks, and upon Elyana and Arcil he placed a dweomer that hid their pulse and gave them a semblance of… Elyana was not sure how to describe it, for she saw nothing different in Arcil’s appearance once the spell had been