The young Eagle Owl girl wandered through the camp in bare feet, ignoring the stones and flint that bit at her skin. Oblivious to the outside world, she made her meandering way to the Mage's hut and sat by the door, making no attempt to let herself be known.
"Enter, my child," the Mage hissed, sensing the presence of the girl. She crawled into the hut and sat at her Mage's feet.
"I had another vision," the child stated. Her eyes were wide but blank as she recalled the events. "I saw a young boy with a tattoo that I have yet to see; three-clawed markings on the backs of his hand."
"Sea-Eagle," the Mage interrupted.
"I saw him. I saw him die as he fought a lynx. It was savage. I wish to find him. He had no Death Marks. I wish to find him and heal him," she said. The Mage watched her. The Mage had always been intrigued by this girl. So silent and modest, so shut off from others. With her vivid visions and hunger for knowledge, she was a model student at Magecraft. And now, barely ten summers old, she wanted to heal.
"Do you know where he fell?" the Mage asked, shattering the silence. The girl nodded.
"Not a daywalk from here. I could go now."
"Then go, my child. Find this boy and gather his souls, ready for the afterlife."
The body of the boy was crumpled and bloodied, and yet she was not interested in how bad his injuries were. She knew him to be long gone. His souls floated around, and she knew she should gather them, but she was preoccupied.
"Mage, why can't we raise the dead?"
"My child, that would be a terrible thing to do. The dead simply want to be at peace. We should help them achieve this."
"But what if they don't want to be dead? What if they were killed young and want to keep living?"
"That is not their choice. Everything is written in the plans of the World Spirit. It knows what shall become of everyone, and it knows when someone has nothing left to give."
"But what if we argued? Would the dead come back? Is it even possible?"
"Enough with your insolent questions, child! Away with you!"
She reached for her medicine pouch and extracted some earthblood, which she mixed with her spit to form a paste. Wrapping her finger in a blade of grass, she reached for the boy's forehead, with the intention of drawing a circle for the world-soul. She paused. The souls in the air crackled.
Reaching forwards more, she drew clumsily on the pale skin, red-orange a stark contrast to the white-blue. She pulled her hand away and admired her work with a smile.
There, on the boy's head, was the three-pronged fork; the mark of the Soul-Eaters.
Eostra grinned at her creation. How exciting this was, to be so close to the dead! Hastily, she fumbled in her back for a length of rawhide, and scrabbled about the floor for a selection of broken sticks. Binding them together roughly, she held out her fork and swept it through the air. The souls shivered and broke up, then together again, like a flock of starlings at dawn. Eostra laughed, something she hadn't done in all her life. She had argued that she had never found anything that amused her. Well, here it was.
Slowly, unsure, she reached down and cupped the boy's face, whispering a spell beneath her breath. Her bare skin touched his, and she felt a rush of adrenaline. Positioning her fork at his mouth, she finished the spell.
The corpse coughed, his breath rattling in fluid-filled lungs. Froth gathered in his mouth, spilling from the edges. Lovingly, sickeningly, Eostra leant down and kissed his blue, cracked mouth, and then licked up some of the froth. The taste of death lingered in her mouth, and it was a taste that she knew she could grow to love. The boy stirred, opening his milky eyes.
"Welcome back," Eostra crooned, stroking his hair and face. "How do you feel?"
"M... Mistress..." the boy gargled. Eostra laughed again.
"Will you do me one tiny favour?" she asked. The boy looked up in admiration and nodded. She shivered at that look. It filled her with such... pleasure, to have someone see her as such a position of authority.
Eostra thrust a package into his stiff hand. "Poison the Eagle Owl Mage."
So it came to pass that Eostra, the Eater of Souls, became the Eagle Owl Mage. The dead did her bidding, to bring evil upon the living.