Chapter 1: Ashes and Chains
Alice died on a Thursday.
The truck came out of nowhere, headlights white-hot as they pierced the rain. One moment, she was crossing the street on her way home from school—the next, she was weightless, flung through the air like a doll. A scream she didn't remember escaped her lips. Then: cold, wet darkness.
Then... light.
Not warm, not golden. Pale blue. Cold as winter.
She awoke beneath a sky she had never seen before. Twin moons hung overhead, and stars shimmered in unfamiliar constellations. A forest of silver-leaved trees whispered around her, and the earth beneath her was soft and strange.
And then came the pain.
It shot through her chest like lightning, followed by the slow burn of her bones knitting themselves together. She gasped, and a mark burned into her right hand—a black symbol, coiled like a spiral made of thorns.
A voice echoed in her mind.
> "Soul stabilized. New host accepted."
She sat up. The voice was gone. But the mark remained.
She was no longer in her world.
---
Three days later, she was sold.
Her new "father"—a thin, sour man draped in noble crests dulled by dust and age—greeted her not with kindness, but calculation. The moment he realized she was not ordinary, that her arrival came with a mark he couldn't identify, his eyes gleamed.
> "You'll make a fine dowry," he said.
That night, she ran.
And when they came after her—swords drawn and cloaks billowing—Alice did something she didn't understand.
She raised her hand, thought of *death*—and the ground answered.
A skeletal hound burst from the soil, half-shadow and half-bone. It lunged, and the men screamed.
Alice did not stop running.
But the next morning, standing at the gates of the Skyreach Academy, she held out her marked hand and whispered,
> "I want to learn."
And the gates opened.
Chapter 2: Of Names and Eyes
Introductions were awkward.
The academy's marble halls shimmered with arcane light, and whispers followed Alice wherever she went. Most assumed she was a foreign noble, some obscure bloodline from the north. Few believed her story—fewer dared to ask.
She introduced herself plainly: "Alice." No titles. No house. Just a name.
Her summons, however, spoke volumes.
When she demonstrated her magic during orientation—raising a wight clad in rusted armor—one of the instructors nearly fainted. The other, a woman with copper eyes and a frown like a knife's edge, pulled her aside.
> "That... is not listed in our summoning codex."
Alice nodded. "It's mine."
A boy with sharp blue eyes and silver-threaded robes watched the exchange. Later, he introduced himself as Riven Thorne, heir to House Thorne, and the top of the summoning class.
> "You're a curiosity," he said. "Curiosities tend to break."
Alice smiled politely. "Then let's hope I'm sharp."
---
Suspicion grew like ivy.
Whispers of necromancy, of forbidden rites, of dark gods. The instructors scheduled a private interview. The students started watching her practice, their eyes a mixture of awe and fear.
And still, every night, the mark on her hand pulsed with power.
Undead answered her call—not from coffins or graves, but from shadow, from memory, from the dust of forgotten dreams.
And something deep beneath the academy began to stir.
Chapter 3: The Dreaming Grave
It started with a dream.
Alice stood in a field of black roses, each one pulsing with a slow heartbeat. Above her, the sky was a cracked mirror. Below her feet, bones shifted in the soil.
A figure stood at the center of the field—tall, robed in dusk, with a crown of antlers and eyes like dying stars.
> "You are not the first," it said. "But you are the freest."
Alice tried to speak. No sound came.
> "The Gate is open, little queen. Do you dare to walk through?"
She reached out. The figure did the same. Their fingers touched—
And she woke, gasping.
The mark on her hand was glowing.
Chapter 4: Trial by Flame
The first combat trial came too soon.
The class was led to a sandstone arena lined with sigils. Each student had to prove they could summon and command under pressure.
Riven summoned a storm serpent. Another girl conjured a golem of burning crystal.
Alice raised her hand—and the arena went silent.
A cloaked figure crawled out of the ground, wrapped in burial shrouds. It carried a broken blade and moved like drifting smoke.
> "What... is that?" someone whispered.
Alice didn't answer. Her focus was absolute.
The summoned specter clashed with the golem—dodging, striking, melting into the sand before reforming again. It was fast. Clever. Alive in a way undead shouldn't be.
She passed.
Barely.
Chapter 5: Whispers Behind Doors
That night, Alice was summoned to a private meeting with the academy staff.
Five instructors. One headmaster.
They questioned her—gently, then firmly. Where had she learned to summon like this? Who taught her? What gods did she serve?
She answered truthfully. Or tried to.
> "I see the dead," she said. "I call them. I don't bind them. They come because they want to."
That unsettled them more than any lie would have.
The copper-eyed instructor, Professor Rell, studied her in silence. Then spoke.
> "Your magic is... adaptive. Intuitive. You are not summoning corpses. You are inviting spirits."
The headmaster leaned forward.
> "We will allow your continued study. But under supervision."
Chapter 6: Bone and Oath
Alice's first supervised summoning was held in a deep stone chamber lined with glyphs and protective wards.
She stood in a circle of salt and ash, her palm raised. A dozen instructors observed from the perimeter.
She whispered a name.
The chamber grew cold.
A woman in tattered armor emerged—not skeletal, not ghostly. She was whole, with silver hair and eyes like pale fire.
> "You called, summoner?"
Alice bowed her head. "I ask for your strength."
The woman knelt.
> "Then I give it."
A contract formed—woven of memory and soul.
And for the first time, Alice felt like she wasn't alone.
Chapter 7: Class Begins
Alice's days fell into rhythm.
Morning lectures on mana theory. Afternoons in summoning drills. Evenings spent deciphering ancient texts in the academy library.
She learned quickly. Too quickly, some whispered.
Riven watched her from across the training grounds, suspicion deepening into something sharper. Not hatred—fascination.
> "You speak to them like people," he said once.
Alice shrugged. "They are."
But there were other students—some curious, some fearful. A girl with ink-black eyes who asked to spar. A boy who followed her from class to class, hoping to catch her secrets.
And always, the mark on her hand pulsed—guiding her, whispering names only she could hear.