Umpteen adj. very many: indefinitely numerous
Cheh. Ffp. Cheh. Ffp. Cheh. Ffp.
Yorick planted his shovel in the newly displaced pile of dirt and hefted the corpse into the freshly dug hole. The cold body hit the bottom with dull splash, sinking only the slightest bit into little water that had already accumulated at the bottom of the pit.
The ghoul leaned over, arranging the body as someone, at some point, had taught him to. He could not remember who this was, or if he should be saying something over the body, or feeling anything beside the patter of rain on his back.
It was his seventeen thousand, three hundred and fifty third burial. With all the things he had forgotten over the ages, the number had always been clear in his memory.
"What is your name, friend?" Yorick asked the corpse as he began to replace the earth over the silent body. "Jaelen? A fine name. I will make sure your headstone reflects that."
He continued his work and his conversation. Such professional consultations had made up the bulk of his interactions since he had left the Shadow Isles for the realm of the living. The dead were so much more talkative here, and more friendly. Perhaps it was because their spirits were so much younger and less tired.
One of his ghouls signaled him, its voice reverberating through his being. He threw the final shovelful of dirt onto the fresh grave and pulled, dragging a stone from the ground at its head. A crude grave, but a more fitting passing for the noble carpenter than simply being left on the side of the road.
Sodden footsteps approached. Yorick quieted his ghoul with a thought; the living could do nothing to him now, particularly small, tired ones such as this.
"What are you doing?" The warmskin was thin and frail, looking wan in the light of Yorick's lantern. The thing brandished a pitchfork before him as if it should elicit some reaction. "What have you done with my father?"
"He has accepted death's embrace." Yorick replied, voice growling out of his dry throat. "I merely sent him on his way and memorialized his passing."
The warmskin shook terribly, enough to remind Yorick of the effect of cold, if not the actual sensation. The creature stumbled forward, pitchfork hanging forgotten in his hands, to stand before the grave.
"You…You did this?" the thing asked, voice cracking. It fell to its knees, mumbling something obscured by the rain. Its fingers traced the crude name etched in the rough stone.
Yorick turned to go. Likely he had been taught things to say for such times, but they had long since fled his memory. His ghouls had already located another body a league up the road.
"W-Wait."
When Yorick returned his gaze to the warmskin, it stood once more, though the shaking had not subsided.
It took a shuddering breath. "Thank you. He…he…" The thing stopped again, biting at its fleshy lips with its teeth. "I can't pay you, but is there anything…? Food, or a roof for the night…?"
What did he want? Yorick had not considered such a thing in this context, being asked by a single, fragile warmskin he had simply happened across. He had done nothing but his job.
"The spirit has passed on," Yorick spoke, the unfamiliar words falling practiced from his throat. "I, Yorick Mori, have seen him laid to rest."
He hefted his shovel and lumbered away, leaving the warmskin to the darkness of the realm of the living.