He hated waking up dead. The shock was already strong enough. This feeling, the feeling of thousands of insects burrowing into his flesh, was worse. But the worst thing was the memory loss. There was a period, every time he died, when he didn't know who he was or what killed him. As such, each time was as terrible as the first. He woke gasping, clutching and clawing at his skin in a vain attempt to dislodge the maggots and bites he could almost see writhing beneath the surface. The horrible impression passed momentarily. As the crawlers vanished, he stood still for a moment, trying to understand what had happened. He cried dry, dying tears for the loss of his life. Finally he remembered his name: it was Sacrum. He stopped crying and gnashing and stood up against one of the fiercest winds he could have ever imagined. Holding himself as best he could, he looked out into the bleak, gray world of death. He remembered having died before, and knew that when he woke up it was always worse, knowing nothing but the black truth of accomplished mortality. With the memory of his name came the memory of his geis.# He stood before the great and crackling black house, built high and lonely nearly fifteen leagues from the nearest village. When the door opened, he fell to his knees, like an apprentice, and offered to serve. The wizened, gnarled man in the doorway looked at him as if he were a cow. After several minutes, the man spoke. "You will find saecra for me. Your name is Sacrum now." The thin man let out a short, harsh, barking laugh. Before he could answer, the wizard spoke again, a word Sacrum could neither pronounce nor imagine, and all memories of his old name were b... half the paper... and the secrets were the most important tools that a magician had at his disposal. The Veil of Death was indeed a mighty firmament, but even it could not hide secrets from a wizard for long. Limner was an apprentice and had no totem of his own, so he collected secrets for his master. Secrets had power. Theonides, his teacher, reiterated the axiom until Limner thought it had lost all meaning. Of course, secrets had power; it was such a trivial thing that even the farmers spewed it at each other, always acting as if they were imparting some kind of great wisdom. Limner's master was not a farmer. The petty secrets it hides For those in Limner's trade, dying was something to be avoided whenever possible, even for a wizard. This did not mean, however, that it was much larger than the living world, but everything that had turned to dust resided within its borders..