Carrow tilted his head toward Nezael, eyes wide with delight. “Oh, the first thing I should have told you about skeletons is that your first one is made easier if it’s someone you already love.” He paused, watching Nezael, and all Nezael could do was freeze under his lord’s stare. “Bellamy was like a brother to me. When he fell, it was only natural I raise him as my first because I could not bear to leave him in the dirt.”

“H-He wasn’t dead,” Nezael whispered.

Carrow shrugged. “Humans are incredibly fragile creatures.” His gaze drifted to Yorick’s legs and Nezael couldn’t look. Not again. “Oh, my blossom. My blossom.” He came over and turned Nezael’s chin to face him. His hands were cold and slick with blood. “I thought you’d be happy. Why are you so sad? I found you a skeleton.”

Why was he sad? Yorick was cold. Yorick’s lips were pale. Yorick’s blue eyes were already gone on a tray, blood running down his cheeks from the holes left behind. His once vibrant hair lay slack, crowning his head with dried blood clumped between the strands. He’d never speak with his own voice again. His laugh would change. Every bit of him all but gone except for the skeleton within. A life torn apart and discarded because of Nezael. All because of him.

It made tears fall. Made every part of Nezael numb with horror.

“Come now,” Carrow whispered as he wiped the tears with his thumb. “I’ll help you.” His lips pressed to Nezael’s jaw softly. “I promise.”

Detaching himself from his body didn’t work, but Nezael still felt outside himself as Carrow led him to the other side of the plinth. Every step was real. Right there. But unreal at the same time, like his body couldn’t decide if it was. The first thing he had to do to connect himself to the skeleton—to Yorick—was to connect himself to the heart. The once core of a human from where blood flowed into it and out of it to make the body function. He had to eat it. Let his magic absorb it.

It was soft as Nezael’s teeth pierced it. As what blood remained inside gushed into his mouth and down his chin. The way it ran down between his fingers as he held it there. Each time he swallowed, his lord pressed a lingering kiss to his throat. Nezael didn’t know how long it took or how many times he almost retched it back up only to find Carrow’s hand at his back to coax it back down. Only, it was done. His vision blurred, staring down at Yorick. Feeling his heart in his chest. Whether it was his or not, he didn’t know. Only it was there. Apparent and loud.

Carrow slowly cleaned off Nezael’s fingers, lips cold against each one.

“There,” Carrow murmured. “It wasn’t so hard now, was it?” He angled Nezael’s head toward him, his eyes alight with bright magic that flickered, and he pressed his lips to Nezael’s.

The kiss was nothing soft or comforting. Hunger descended on Nezael’s mouth, holding him so tight in its grip, Nezael couldn’t fight it. All he tasted was blood. All he felt was his lord’s tongue as it tasted all Nezael ever was as though reclaiming him until Nezael was empty. Hollow. When Carrow finally drew away, it was with a self-satisfied smirk with lips smeared in blood.

“Let me show you now how to free his bones from within.”

The skin pulled back beneath Nezael’s fingers with the aid of a tool Nezael didn’t bother to memorize or take note of. Blood ran down the plinth, clumping to the floor where Carrow liberally dropped tissue and muscle he hacked through to get to the bones within. The room smelled so starkly of death, of nothing remotely close to life like nothing had ever been alive there to begin with. The bones were extracted like it was a dream, each one with careful and precise movements to preserve what they were, and cleaned with rosewater and cedar oil. Yorick was beautiful beneath as he was on the outside, but Nezael hated this. Nothing was right. It had to be a nightmare. It had to be.

But then why wasn’t he waking?

He numbly arranged the skeleton as he’d learned to. Carrow helpfully removed what wasn’t needed from his path until it was just Nezael, the plinth, and Yorick’s skeleton atop it. Everything else would be scrubbed away, become part of the tower to augment the magic within. Nezael would never see Yorick’s face again. The man would never smile teasingly or crinkle his nose. His once blue eyes were on a tray only to be part of a potion or worse.

When Carrow finished cleaning what wasn’t needed, he returned to Nezael’s side and gently put his hands at Nezael’s shoulders. “And now,” he whispered into his ear, “he’s all yours, my blossom.” He turned Nezael to look at him. “Do you remember?”

“Yes, my lord,” Nezael whispered, his voice hardly audible.

Carrow’s wicked smile softened into something reminiscent of pride and he pressed a chaste kiss to Nezael’s lips. Quick and soft, nothing like the hunger from before. Then, he withdrew, magic ghosting the tables of organs to follow him out until Nezael was alone in a room where time had stalled.

The warm, golden light was a mockery as it came in from the skylights above and as it haloed the gardens coming alive for spring outside the windows. This flagrant loss of life was drenched in such an ethereal glow, it almost looked as though it should have been a wondrous affair. Not this. Anything but this.

And Nezael cried. The tears began silent, but then he sobbed, unable to hold it in and it only prompted more sobs to work their way out of his chest.

“I’m—I’m so sorry, Yorick—I—I—” He didn’t know how to finish the thought. If Yorick could even hear him in his state. If his soul wasn’t already gone—let go—and left Nezael to fail like he deserved. He wanted to fail, but if Yorick was still there, waiting or trapped, he couldn’t leave his soul suspended there, could he?

“I’m so sorry.”

It was all he could say. Yorick was dead. No words would bring him back the way he was.

There were three life blossoms twinkling on the plinth. The first one, Nezael gently kissed each petal and placed it within Yorick’s mouth, deep in his skull. Another would become the core for his new heart, but the rest, crushed and mixed with Nezael’s and Yorick’s blood. The process made Nezael’s vision sway as he drained his blood into the pestle, as he mixed it with what Carrow had left for him, and then came the crushed petals. Mix until it shimmered. And it did. A somber, golden light twinkling up at him.

With reverence, Nezael took each and every bone and coated them in the life blossom mixture and his magic both with a chant upon his lips to seal it. His voice was a muted echo through the room, oscillating with the latent magic until the very air buzzed. More tears came the closer Nezael came to prepping the core. They slipped from his cheeks to Yorick’s. What Yorick had been. The Yorick stripped of everything beyond what had seeped down into his bones. They were coated and magicked now, the thin, unseen threads of magic pulling this way and that to create the muscles Nezael had once traced. The life blossom was bundled with the herbs he and Yorick had picked before winter drew them closer. It was almost funny; Yorick had chosen his own herbs with as much reverence as Nezael gave to his bones now.

It made him cry once more as he pressed his blood into the petals. He gently left it inside Yorick’s ribs, his new heart suspended there with magic coiling around it.

And there it was: done and with it, the day’s light receded, leaving the room cold and gray, soft subtle blues ate away the gold as glinting magic began to form around Yorick’s prone bones.

Nezael took a moment to recompose himself. Deep breaths as he wiped his tears, locking it all away until he felt absolutely nothing. It had to be this way now.

He needed air most of all. To look away from Yorick. He left the room, but couldn’t go far because his lord was there in the hall. Nezael’s body stiffened seeing him and the curious smile upon lips coated in dried blood.

“I’m finished,” Nezael announced.

Yet he was too weak to resist as Carrow yanked his arm and braced Nezael up against the wall, fingers digging into his face to keep him still, and Nezael held his breath. Carrow’s eyes remained bright with magic, never once dulling, and its power traced up and down his arm until Nezael felt it hold his body like a vice.

“Do you understand?” Carrow asked, anger pushing through each word as his voice dripped with magic. “That you are no one but my necromancer?” He ground Nezael’s head into the wall, his hand shaking from holding his face so tightly.

Nezael shook his head and regretted it as Carrow’s other hand snapped to his throat. “My-My lord!” he choked the words and felt tears slip out of his eyes again. “P-Please.”

Carrow’s fingers tightened, cutting off all other words. “I have no need for apprentices who think they are anything but.” He pressed closer and Nezael could hardly draw in air. “You are mine and mine alone. Your mind, your body, everything you are and more. Do you understand me?”

Nodding was all Nezael could do and he did—anything to breathe again. Carrow released his hold so suddenly, Nezael would have collapsed to the floor if Carrow hadn’t been there. As it was, after a few deep breaths against his lord’s shoulder, Carrow pushed him back and kissed him again, stealing all air away. Magic lingered on Nezael’s lips when he finally withdrew and let him sag against the wall.

“Good,” Carrow whispered it so softly, it was like he’d never been angry, and he gently drew his hand through Nezael’s hair. “Spend the night with what you’ve made and tomorrow morning, he will rise.”

Carrow was barely out of view before Nezael’s legs folded entirely, leaving him on the floor to sob behind the hands covering his mouth. He curled up as tight as he could to be as small as possible, and hide from the whole world. Until it slotted itself back together in something that made sense. Where Yorick was still alive and he’d never tempted fate by leaving the tower.

It never happened and nor was it long before he noticed a shadow next to him and he flinched. But it was only Bellamy. The skeleton knelt beside Nezael.

“Why?” Nezael choked out. “Why, Bellamy?”

“‘Twas not my intent,” he said sadly. He took the necklace from his jacket and let it hang in the space between them. A looking glass. Nezael’s eyes widened as he gasped.

“It was enchanted to see me,” he whispered.

Carrow had seen everything. Every touch. Every kiss. All Yorick had happily done to him and what Nezael had done in return. More tears raced down Nezael’s cheeks and he covered his mouth to smother the scream clawing its way up his throat. Everything was his fault. If he hadn’t left the tower… if he hadn’t fallen for such a kind smile, Yorick would not be in there on the plinth. He’d be alive. Bellamy carefully drew Nezael closer and the smothered scream turned into sobs against his shoulder.

“I should have told you to run away with him,” Bellamy whispered. “But if I lost another apprentice…” He sighed, the sound ghosting itself across Nezael’s hair. “I valued my life more and I regret that I did. I am so, so sorry, my little lord.”

He left Nezael there, but Nezael didn’t have it in him to blame the skeleton. Nezael could have felt the magic upon the necklace all on his own and understood the implications of it around his own neck, but he’d simply been happy with a gift from the lord he trusted so completely. He should have opened his eyes sooner and saw the world for what it was. He watched Bellamy go and the way he still favored one leg as he limped. Not simple exhaustion, but magic deliberately stolen as punishment. Nezael breathed in, gathering a spell on his lips, and exhaled it.

Threads wove across the bones, strengthening them back together, and Bellamy walked straighter. He did not look back. He was Lord Carrow’s skeleton, after all. He would never be Nezael’s no matter how kind Nezael was.

But there was one skeleton primed to be wholly his and though Nezael wanted to run, never return, Yorick was here. Because of him. He couldn’t leave the man he’d loved over the cold winter. Even if Yorick hated him when he awoke. Even if Yorick refused to wake. Whatever happened, happened. In any case, Nezael couldn’t leave. His hands were tainted. He was Lord Carrow’s necromancer.

And that was all he’d ever be, forevermore.

Yorick’s skeleton lay there as still as death in the cold room. The herbs glowed against the magic threads woven around the bones and gave it a pleasant, soothing smell that washed away the stench of death. Almost like cloves and cinnamon. Nezael returned to the plinth, each limb trembling. The magic had created a gossamer shroud around Yorick, making him shimmer. Nezael laid himself inside the shroud and curled up around the skeleton of the man he’d touched so lovingly before.

“Yorick,” he whispered, feeling the shroud shift with his voice. “I’m sorry. It wasn’t supposed to be this way.” He stroked the skull with his knuckles and wasn’t sure why he waited for a response. He gently kissed it on the cheek and laid his head down beside it.

Because it would be a long night.