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Thanks for the view! This time I'm writing once more of the Undead of the Second Age, but in this entry we'll be seeing them from the perspective of an outsider, someone who hasn't been exposed to the true world of the Undead and still thinks of them in a traditional stereotypical sense. The man is Feren Oakroot, a Wood Elf, who happens to be heading home from a tavern quite late at night when he learns that a rumor he thought was just an urban legend was, in fact, quite true. He finds that the Undead known as Death Knights, skeletal horsemen atop equally skeletal steeds DO exist. The reader may consider this harsh revelation a severe lesson about why he should keep his promises to his wife.




Feren Oakroot left the smoky air of the Clover Keg and made his way into the night air. It was a cool night, cloudless, revealing a starry sky. As he made his way onto the dirt road Feren heard only the sound of crickets. He knew this calm wouldn't last, as he was meant to be home hours earlier and his wife was sure to be worried.
'Let her worry,' thought Feren, 'I'm damn well entitled to have all the fun I want.' He kicked a pebble down the street and laughed to himself, still a bit tipsy from the drinks. Once the laughter faded, Feren began to hum to himself as he casually strolled home, unconcerned with his wife's worrying. He would think up some excuse for the delay by the time he'd reached home. After all, he had quite a stretch of road to travel yet. Suddenly, his elven ears picked up something strange. The crickets had stopped chirping. As Feren glanced around he couldn't help but take note of a few birds hastily leaving the nearby trees.

He came then to a crossroads, the same he'd passed many times before, and then he heard it. From down the path heading in from the long farmlands of Palt came the cries of an ungodly beast, an echoing neigh that lingered in the air long after it was uttered. Feren's eyes went wide and his hands began to shake as the sounds of bony hooves approached at a speed no normal horse could travel. Off in the distance he could see what looked like two small lights next to one another approaching rapidly. Feren began to panic. He had heard the rumors before, horrible stories of skeletal riders patrolling the farmlands, of beheaded soldiers found on the roads by morning and of the dead speeding along the highways at night. His heart began to beat rapidly in his chest, and he could no longer distinguish between it and the sounds of the approaching steed. His mind told him to run, but his body was firmly frozen in place. Before long, the rider came into view. He, like his steed, was completely skeletal! He wore old platemail with a horned helm, a long saber in one hand. The lights Feren had seen down the road were the eyes of the rider, two small ghostly yellow flames that seemed to act as pupils. As the rider approached, the flames moved inside the bony sockets to spot Feren. The horse slowed as it approached the crossroads, and, once it had strode over to Feren himself, it came to a complete stop. The rider leaned down and brought his face a mere two feet away from Feren's.
"Cothos..." was all the rider said, his voice sounding like a raspy echo from inside the skull. The rider seemed to be smiling, almost as though he were pleased by the reaction he was getting. Feren raised one shaky hand and pointed down the path that led to the town of Cothos, his eyes wide and unblinking and his mouth quivering and silent. The rider's grin seemed to widen. He nodded once and flicked something small at Feren. He flinched, not knowing what the rider had tossed at him. The rider then sped off down the road toward Cothos for whatever business he had there. After staring after the rider for what seemed to be an eternity, Feren finally looked down at the object lying on the ground. It was a gold piece, payment from the rider for Feren's help. Feren left the piece where it was, not certain it wasn't cursed, and ran screaming toward his home, to his wife. Feren knew he would never again be doing any late-night partying.




This concludes the second snippet of what I hope will be many more. I hope you enjoyed it, I enjoyed writing it! For those wondering, no, the piece was not cursed. As I write it, Undead are misunderstood creatures who are not much different than any other race. In my last chapter I showed some examples of this, and I most likely will show more over time. The rider, in this case, was merely being gracious. As for the 'beheaded soldiers', there WERE a few cases of such things, but they were not unprovoked. The Undead, like elves, humans or anyone else, send patrols to ensure the security of their lands and people, and they will act with force if they deem it necessary. Please leave any comments or questions in the comments section here, on my profile or over PM! Thanks again, everyone!