Short Story: Reanimation Rites?

Jori squints his eyes in pleasure at the warmth of the sun kissing his cheeks, spreading his arms wide to embrace the soft breeze. After a moment of basking in the beauty of nature, he breaks into a jog and runs across the field to where a group of children around his age awaits.

"Hey! Sorry I'm late! What're we gonna do today?" Jori squeezes into the small herd, panting like a dog from the exertion. Immediately, he notices the unusual quietness and heavy air around them, and his laugh trails off into silence.

He looks around his group of friends in confusion, before his gaze falls on the trembling frame of a tiny girl among them, wiping her tearstained face.

Taking a step backwards, he tugs on the sleeve of a particularly close friend and lowers his voice to a whisper. "Huh? What happened? Why's Yenna crying?"

His friend replies at a barely audible volume. "You remember her dog? The pup she saved from drowning in the river a few years back? He died last night. Got attacked in the woods by some wild animal. We've been trying to get her to stop crying for ages."

Jori's eyes widen in surprise, and the image of the fluffy, energetic dog tackling him in greeting flashes across his mind.

"Oh. That's..." For once, even Jori is at a lack for words. His ever-present smile fades, his shoulders slumping in sorrow.

"Alright! Yenna, stop crying, okay? Would it help to see Silver one last time?" Finally, a tall, lanky boy speaks up, his voice slightly impatient. Yenna's sob catches in her throat, and she peers up at him with hope. "Can I? Really?"

The boy, whom Jori now remembers as having the name of Vemik, grins with confidence. "'Course. Look, this was s'pposed to be a secret, but since you're so upset..."

Satisfied at the reaction he's elicited from the group, Vemik continues in a mysterious voice. "I have affinity for death magic. My pa's gonna bring me to the Capital soon to take some sort of test."

A collective gasp runs through the group, exploding into excited chatter. Questions begin firing from every direction.

"Magic? Really? How did you find out?" "What's it like? What can you do? Can you raise the dead?" "The Capital? Whoa, that's so far away! When are you going?" "What test is it? Does that mean you're a mage now?" "Show us your magic! Come on, show us!"

Vemik flashes a cocky grin. "Like I said, it's s'pposed to be a secret. For now at least. But y'know the Reanimating Rites? I can do that."

Every pair of eyes grow to the size of saucers, and then exclamations of admiration and excitement break out. With tears still in her eyes, Yenna grabs Vemik's arm and asks tentatively. "Can you bring Silver back? Even just for a bit?"

Vemik puffs out his chest in pride. "'Course! In fact, you can all watch! Just give me a bit to prepare what's needed for the ritual, kay?"

Jori cocks his head at the sight of his buzzing friends, scrambling to help Vemik find the items he claims to be necessary for the rites to summon Silver's spirit. He makes a move to join in, but his friend grabs him by the arm to stop his motions.

"You believe that crap? You really think he's a death mage?"

"I dunno." Jori shrugs and then smiles with innocent excitement. "But I hope he's right. Golly gallops, it'd be awesome if he really is a death mage!"

His friend scoffs. "Guess we'll find out. I'd like to see what kind of show he thinks we'll be dumb enough to fall for."

An hour later, the children are gathered in a half-circle in a small clearing within the forest — not the dangerous one that Silver had been attacked in, but close enough. According to Vemik, it's best to choose a setting that's similar to Silver's last surroundings. 

The audience sitting on the grass has grown bigger than before, with other children from nearby villages catching wind of the news and being called over to bear witness to this incredible event.

Vemik stands in the front proudly, donning a strange attire of black and purple that looks pieced together from several rags. Before him is an oddly shaped symbol, scratched into the ground with charcoal. And in its center is a piece of raw, fresh chicken meat — Silver’s favorite, according to Yenna.

Vemik clears his throat, and the children immediately quieten as they stare up at him in eagerness.

“Kay. Everything should be good. Let’s begin.”

His eyes flutter shut, and he begins mumbling something under his breath, holding his hand out towards the symbol. His muttering drags on and on — until he suddenly ends it with a loud shout, startling a small child into a loud-pitched squeak of surprise.

“Come back, Silver! I say, come back!”

The children wait with bated breath.

Nothing happens.

Just as their anticipation starts to give way to doubt and disappointment, an eerie gust of wind, far too chilling for summer, hits them.

Jori lets out a gasp, jumping to his feet and looking around wildly for a glimpse of the dog’s spirit, while some other children grab at each other in fear.

“I-is that…” Yenna whispers.

“Silver? Come back, I say. Yenna is waiting for you! Silver! Can you hear me?” Vemik yells loudly into the woods. For a moment, there’s no reply, not even an echo of his own voice.

And then a strange howl cuts through the silence.

Earsplitting screams from the children.

“What are you doing?” Yenna hisses as she runs over and smacks the boy responsible for the mocking howl on the arm.

The boy doubles over in laughter, barely able to squeeze out coherent words in his amusement. “You should have seen the look on your faces! C’mon, do you guys really believe in this whole death mage crap? You think anyone can be a death mage?”

Vemik’s face grows red — whether with anger or embarrassment, Jori can’t tell. As Jori racks his brain for a well-timed pun to try and lighten the mood and break up the pending fight, a ghostly, faint howl — as if answering the boy’s call — drifts to their ears from within the depths of the forest.

The boy’s laughter dies.

“It’s working! It really is Silver! Vemik did it!” At this point, Yenna is beside herself with elation.

But the exhilaration is short-lived. The group of children’s enthusiasm is transformed into growing panic as the ghostly howl is joined in by another — then another, and another.

“Wh-what’s happening?” Jori’s friend grabs at him, his grip painfully tight as his eyes dart around in fear.

“M-maybe it’s Silver? He made some new dog friends in the uh, afterlife?”

“...That happen to sound like a pack of wolves?”

Jori gives a weak chuckle, desperate to keep the infectious fear at bay with his best attempts at humor. “Wolves are just bigger dogs! Who knows what a dog’s afterlife is like, right?”

“Look! Look! Everything is fine! This is normal, kay? Silver is on his way! I promise!” Vemik tries again, but fails, to regain control of the situation.

“The meat! It’s gone!” Amidst the chaos, a child points at the sigil on the ground and the meal that was prepared for Silver. Her shrill voice rises above the rest, causing the group’s frenzy to escalate.

“Is it Silver? Where is he? I can’t see him!”

“Damn it, run!”

Nobody knows who yelled that command, but it was the final straw that broke the camel’s back. As if they were all waiting for someone to make the first move, the group scatters and starts sprinting out of the woods towards where the nearest village is.

One of the children trips over the root of a tree, going down hard with a pained screech. This only serves to increase the panic of those who only heard the reaction but didn’t see him trip. In their haste, another child slips on the mud and slides right into the flowing stream, getting drenched from head to toe.

Jori’s friend makes a mad dash for some distance before realizing he’s making the escape alone. He turns around to see Jori watching the unfolding mess around them in fascination, and he hollers with impatience at his friend. “Jo, what are you doing?! Get your butt over here! Let’s get out of this cursed place!”

“Wait, but I want to see Silver!” Jori shouts back in response. “You can go on first without me! Golly gallops, this is wild!”

“Are you insane? Even Yenna’s started running!” His friend starts running back and grabs him by the arm, starting to drag him away from the scene. “I’m not explaining to your ma that you got eaten by a bunch of ghost wolves!”

“But what if it is Silver?” Jori twists his head around to look behind them into the forest, straining for any sight of the familiar dog. He seems to catch a flash of grey in the distance, but it’s gone before he can even tell if it’s only a trick his mind is playing on him.

“Jo! We’re not sticking around to find out!”

As they run by Vemik, they can hear Vemik shouting away in futility until he, too, gives up on his last struggles and joins in the frantic escape. “Wait! C’mon! Come back! By the Twelve, that wasn’t what the book said! It was s’pposed to work! I know I did everything right!”

In the end, as far as Jori knows, everyone that was present in the forest that day made it out alive, with only a few scratches and minor injuries from their reckless running. Nobody saw any sign of Silver or wolves, ghostly or not, in spite of the same howls they all heard.

It turns out Vemik did have some affinity for death magic after all, but after a test at the Capital, it was deemed too weak to manifest into a strong enough capability to perform magic. And so Vemik returned to the village, to relentless teasing from his peers who never let him live down the terrible incident in the woods.

Though Jori has always wondered — if the reanimation rites wasn’t successful, as Vemik isn’t actually capable of casting such a spell… Then what happened to the meat they had prepared for Silver that disappeared right under their noses?

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This story is kind of different from the usual, I guess, since it's not strictly a character's backstory. But if you remember, Jori had made a comment in Chapter 1 about Vemik's disastrous reanimation rites from his childhood, and I thought this would make an interesting tale. Thoughts on what actually happened during the event and if Silver's spirit actually got summoned? Hahah 

I hope you guys enjoyed it! Again, really sorry about the delay on this short story (it's supposed to be the short story reward for July). I'll have the next short story for this month up by the end of the month for sure! 

Thank you so much for the support and your patience!