I want to meet whoever thought it was a smart design decision for our ceremonial swords to feature a working gear train, and kiss them on the mouth. Providing, of course, their mouth has the old-fashioned fleshy bits still attached, and isn’t rapidly decaying into skeletal undeath.

I’ll admit, I didn’t think so fondly of that unknown smith during training, my sword heavy against my shoulder as we drilled and marched and practised.

I might’ve gone so far as to stab them through the heart - providing the gearing didn’t jam against their ribcage - when the war began, and me and my sisters fought and died against unimaginable foes.

But when the necromancers rose, heralding the return of the armies we’d already sundered, pale in skeletal glory, we learned to appreciate our unusual weapons.

For though naked bone may deflect steel, they came to fear the bite of our gears.