“The rite has been banned for three centuries, and lost for two,” said Drep, the apprentice necromancer. “Are you sure about this?”

Maer’c, the master necromancer, was unmoved. “Those that banned it were fools, and those that followed the ban even more so,” he groused. “It’s an old and powerful magic needed in this world more so than ever.”

Both Drep and Maer’c were standing before an ancient ossuary, one that they had located only through painstaking research and exploration. It was at the depths of Mad Baron Rolac’s labyrinthine tomb, the part that had been successfully provisioned and sealed after he’d decided he wanted to take all his earthly possessions—and servents—with him, but before he had been overthrown and sealed alive in the upper levels. It was not his ossuary—the Baron’s bones had long been plundered, and Mear’c had rudely kicked them aside as they’d walked by—but it was absolutely one of the old madman’s most cherished possessions.

With one last whispered warning from Drep, brushed lightly aside by Mear’c, they began the work of breaking the runes of binding. It was old magic, once strong but worn out by the passage of time, and soon they had desecrated the last rune and watched the magicks dissipate.

The lid shot off the ossuary, and the sides as well, as the bones within began to caper and dance as they reassembled themselves. Calliope music could be heard from some unknown source as it did so, and before long a complete skeleton, magically animated and articulated, was prancing before them with a showman’s flair and an acrobat’s skill.
“Well hey there!” the undead aberration said with a sorcerous voice, jolly and bubbly at the same time. “I’m Callie Vera, and my only desire is to entertain you!”

“At last,” Mear’c cackled, rubbing his hands together. “We have opened way to learning the secrets of the age-old, time-lost art of Funny Bones.”

  • Like what you see? Purchase a print or ebook version!