A/N: Thanks for the new follows, favorites, and reviews!


Recollection

That night Ichabod didn't get any rest. His mind was on Abbie, his conscience more bothered with Katrina… The safe homecoming of the two boys had not put his mind entirely at ease. They hadn't claimed the sword…. It was still hidden in the cave. Even without the threat of the Hessian soldiers, it still haunted him that he had failed the mission…

For whatever would come next, Katrina wouldn't be of any aid…

Meanwhile Abbie was having a very vivid dream, far too vivid. Katrina had captured her and was about to set her alight… She was about to undergo the punishment of witches throughout time…

"You are a disgraced witch…. Wicked and untrustworthy!" she spat. "You deserve death…. Purified by fire…"

Abbie would far rather not be purified at all…

When she finally woke up, startled, her bedding scattered on the floor, she heard a sound. A soft whisper outside of the bedroom window…

She quickly grabbed her gun and tiptoed to the open window. It was hard to discern anything in the dark yard.

"Quiet, I tell you…. Don't disturb the spirits…" Abbie peered and peered. Something, or someone, was hunched over in her garden! Burying something…? Or retrieving? And talking to a black cat it would seem…

Abbie couldn't see clearly. She hesitated. Should she interfere…or wait and see? A few moments later, the person—it was a person—stood up in its full length. It was a tall man with long filthy hair and a croaky voice. "Don't disturb the bones… Azraël… they're not food…." The caped man turned and walked away.

At the garden gate, he looked upwards and glanced up at the window. Abbie saw his eyes…. They were flaming red….and they had spotted her. He took his cat in one arm and took of his top-hat with the other. An elegant bow in her direction…. The moment his hat touched his head again, he went up in smoke…

Abbie jumped back. What the hell? She quickly put on some sports shoes and walked out into her garden in her pajamas…

A hole had been dug in the ground and inside were a bunch of bones…. They didn't even seem to belong together… What was the meaning of this?

As she called Ichabod awake on her cell phone, she didn't notice the bones slowly glowing red…


The shrill sound of the phone startled Ichabod. Would he never have a moment's peace?

"Crane…" Abbie's voice sounded loudly. "The strangest thing just happened…"

As she told the story, Ichabod's eyes widened. This sounded remarkable like a ghost story Katrina had once related to him. She'd been laughing as she described the horrible details, and he had briefly wondered at the hidden, perhaps darker, depths of his newly wedded wife. He had dismissed his distrustful attitude at once. His wife was a Friend, a nurse…. Surely he should not begrudge her the joy of telling a horror story?

"Are the bones becoming luminous?" he inquired.

Abbie turned around to have a look. "Yes," she whispered, "a sort of reddish glimmer…"

"You better leave at once…" Ichabod advised her. "It won't be easily defeated…"

"What won't?" Abbie asked.

"The bones of old…." He sighed deeply. "Cursed beings…. Skeletons, one might say… Strong and unforgiving, always ready to strike, never tiring…. I'll tell you the story once you'll get here. Bring Jenny as well…"

A little while later, the three of them were gathered in Ichabod's motel room. Ichabod had just started to relate Katrina's ghostly story…

"The Phoenician wizard…."

"What, like a Phoenix?" Jenny interrupted, addressing Abbie as well: "You said he went up in flames, didn't you..?"

"Like the people… the Canaanites… not the magical bird…" Ichabod responded somewhat sharply.

"Sorry…" Jenny muttered under her breath. "It's remarkable enough though…"

"Perhaps…" he granted, "though mixing religions and cultures all the same to get the desired result…"

"Just tell the story, will you!" Abbie said.

An old Phoenician wizard had an uncanny interest in the human flesh, or rather, the bones underneath… Obsessed with anatomy, he had built a theory of resurrection based on the shape and color of said bones. The wizard found and categorized different shades of white, as well as, various indentations in the bones. As a result, he had done some great discoveries…. The very bones with potential for revitalization had a distinct off-white color and what appeared to be carvings in the lower tibia and fibula. Filling large books with his new-found knowledge his life ended rather abruptly in an unfortunate fire; his findings and his remains gone for good….

Or had they?

About a century later he returned… and made a name for himself. Both feared and admired, his influence grew at a steady pace. He experimented with the bones… bringing them back to life. However, they did not resemble the persons they had once been… rather they listened to his will, obedient to his commands…

"Great… A skeleton army…" Jenny groaned. "Just when things had calmed down…"

"Let's hope he won't be able to gather an army this time around…" Ichabod mumbled. "The sooner he is stopped, the better… Fortunately not many bones are eligible…"

"That's encouraging at least…" Abbie said.

"Yes, every one in thousand or so…" he recalled.

Jenny's eyes widened. "So in a town like ours…."

"It could still amount to a formidable militia…."