Slightly subtler Necromancy

A fireball can cook an enemy platoon, polymorph can turn a bishop into a frog. But only a necromancer can rip out your soul and reanimate your husk to hunt down your friends. Necromancy spells in 5th edition D&D are wicked but vulgar. They are spectacular; they are terrifying; and apart from some of the curses* they are hard to disguise.

* curses: such as blindness/deafness, bestow curse, ray of sickness/enfeeblement, or eyebite.

Use necromancy in front of a crowd and you will be feared, then hunted as an abomination. There has to be more to this school than slinging death spells like a culty loon. Why do subtler people get into death magic and what spells do they learn?

The hand? I don't need the hand. This talisman though... (FeliciaAcano / Deviantart)

I may be trying to inject too much realism into a fantasy game, but if your magic isn't of much mundane use** and cannot be used openly, why study it at all? A necromancer should be subtle if they want to survive. Their spells should make that possible, and better: they should be worth learning even with the taboo on necromancy.  Here are low-key spells*** for the hidden death wizard.

** you can question the daily usability of other arcane schools. Abjuration - how many demons are running around anyway? Evocation - I know that there's a war on, but do we need artillery on daily standby? And so on. At least an evoker can help out by protecting a village from bandits and a diviner can find smugglers for the lord. There's little use for a witch who can raise undead at a whim.

*** consider this post an homage to Goodberry Monthly's excellent post of necromancy spells.

WHAT NECROMANCY CAN BE ABOUT

Death; souls; life force; memories. Necromancy is concerned with what is in the blood or in the bones. Visceral stuff, more than superficial enchantment or transmutation.

A necromancer learns to find the memories locked in the lower soul, the soul that stays with a body. They learn from the dead, call up spirits to advise them, let themselves be partially possessed, splice a foreign soul onto their own to power a graft.

Fine, sometimes a huge zombie is exactly what you need. (Dresden Files / Dead Beat. Awesome.) - DSillustration / Deviantart

JUST GIMME THE SPELLS I NEED THE SPELLS

My Father’s Axe

1st level Necromancy (wizard/warlock)

1 minute to cast, range: touch, components: VSM (the item)

Concentration up to 1 round / level

Binds the spirit of a dead owner to an heirloom tool - an axe, scythe, pen , etc. For the duration, you have proficiency in using the tool or weapon, or advantage if already proficient.

Relaxing your concentration on this spell voluntarily lulls the animating spirit to sleep, recasting wakes it again. Breaking concentration because of damage or a distraction risks the spirit running wild; Wisdom save versus the spell DC, or act without proficiency (or with disadvantage if you didn't have proficiency to begin with). In this case, can only put down the item on a successful save; it stays wild and uncontrolled until the maximum duration lapses.

At higher level: level 2 - duration 1 minute per caster level, level 3 - the item will work for another than yourself, level 4 - duration 10 minutes per caster level, level 5 - duration 1 hour per level and no more concentration required (or chance of the spirit breaking its binding). 

For when you don't dare to bind a spirit to its own corpse or allow yourself to be ridden by it. A utility spell to get temporary proficiency in a tool or weapon. Limited in that you need to find an actual heirloom, useful because it lets you function as a Jack of All Trades, using thieves' tools, a poisoner's kit, a sword and so on. Can double as a curse if you break concentration while someone else is using the item. I'd allow this spell to automatically decypher a code or disable a trap if they had a tool from the creator.

Now you know why necromancers steal grave goods. That cup's owner used to mix some brilliant poisons. Found here.

Bone Memory

2nd level Necromancy (wizard/warlock)

10 minutes to cast, range: self/touch, components: VSM (remains and 50 gp scrimshawed bone piercing)

Concentration up to 10 min / level

Bones remember how they moved in life. You bind someone's lower soul to a piece of their scrimshawed bone and wear it as a piercing. (Actually it just needs to taste your blood once and stay in skin contact.) For the duration of the spell, you can use one Str/Dex/Con skill the deceased knew in life. (Athletics, Acrobatics, Sleight of Hand, Stealth).

At higher level: level 3 - can grant this spell to a willing target (who you need to pierce), level 4 - also gain proficiency in a physical saving throw the deceased had (may be for another ability than the skill is associated with).

Generally useful to have a piece of bone of a famous thief, acrobat or strongman. More specifically, if you have a bone of someone who knew the traps in a hallway, I'd allow this spell to show which trapped tiles and locks to avoid. Good way for the DM to feed information to a party. "The bone anklet sucks in another drop of your blood and nudges you to a painting. Behind it, you find a hidden alcove."

A scrimshaw magnifying glass - smear blood on it and you'll be amazed at what it shows you. From.

Crow's Brew

2nd level Necromancy (wizard/warlock)

1 round to cast, range: touch, components: VSM (a dead person's eye)

Concentration up to 1 round / level

Pluck a corpse's eye and drink it. You can mash and mix the eye with ale or spirits if you like, but you need to consume it entirely. The spell lets you see what the deceased saw right before they died: starting at the moment of death, each round you maintain this spell shows you what happened one round earlier.

At higher level: level 4 - duration becomes 1 minute per caster level, level 5 - 1 hour per level

A lesser version of Speak with Dead - you gain more limited information but without having to haggle with some obnoxious spirit. This is visual only, so try and pick up lip reading.

From

Little Messenger

2nd level Necromancy (wizard/warlock)

10 rounds to cast, range: touch, components: VSM (a tiny dead animal)

1 hour / level

Reanimates a small animal (cat-sized or smaller) as a messenger. Anoint a mostly intact animal corpse with a salve of cow fat and boiled frog meat. The little monstrosity that claws itself back to animation will carry a package up to one inventory slot (a longsword, a couple of potions) to a location or direction you command. Once it reaches its destination or when the spell runs out, the thing escapes your binding and runs amock for 1d10 rounds, then collapses. 

Ok, not subtle but definitely creepy fun. A necromancer's version of Animal Messenger. Frenzied ghoul rabbits in your enemy's bed aside, this allows you to deliver messages and light weight packages. Lasts shorter than Animal Messenger, and doesn't convey your voice, but on the plus side you can have the beastie carry anything up to the weight limit.

Dead mice in your bed? You wish it were mice.

Essential Saltes

3rd level Necromancy (wizard/warlock)

13 hours and 3 rounds to cast, range: touch, components: VSM (a body and 150 gp in lab supplies)

Indefinite duration

“The essential Saltes of Animals may be so prepared and preserved, that an ingenious Man may have the whole Ark of Noah in his own Studie, and raise the fine Shape of an Animal out of its Ashes at his Pleasure; and by the lyke Method from the essential Saltes of humane Dust, a Philosopher may, without any criminal Necromancy, call up the Shape of any dead Ancestour from the Dust whereinto his Bodie has been incinerated.”

–H.P. Lovecraft, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward

You reduce a corpse to its essential saltes to revive them later. The alchemical preparations take 13 hours and 150 gp of supplies (doubled per larger size category) from a well-stocked lab worth 1000 gp (tomes, retorts, foci, astrolabes etc). With this urn of fine blue-grey powder, you can recall the creature to life and return it to dust at any time. The corpse must be whole for the rendering to work (dessicated mummy or skeleton is ok, but a lone skull is not) and can belong to an animal or sentient creature.

Label your urns carefully, because this spell gives no direct control over the reconstituted creature. A magic circle in binding configuration may be used to hedge in the summoned creature and negotiate terms of service. Cthulhufiles has inspiration for set dressing.

As the warning goes:

"I say to you againe, doe not call up Any that you cannot put downe; by the Which I mean, Any that can in Turne call up somewhat against you, whereby your Powerfullest Devices may not be of use. Ask of the Lesser, lest the Greater shall not wish to answer, and shall commande more than you."

Abilities: 

• The creature remembers all that it knew in life but remembers the time since its death only as a vague nightmare. 
• The creature has all statistics and abilities it had in life, but none of its belongings. Any missing body parts or broken bones are reflected as permanent injuries.
• The creature knows spells prepared at the time of death but reconstitutes with all spells slots expended.

Weaknesses:

• The creature reconstitutes suffering from 4 levels of exhaustion, which can only be cured by feeding it blood from a living victim of its own species. Every day of drinking blood cures one level of exhaustion. (Exhaustion level 1: Disadvantage on ability checks - 2: Speed halved - 3: Disability on saves and attacks - 4: hit points halved). Happens even if the creature is normally immune to exhaustion.
• While in sunlight, the creature has disadvantage on Attack rolls and Ability Checks. 
• Is, and can be turned as, an undead. Vulnerable to radiant damage. Has its bodily functions restored: can be poisoned or diseased, needs food and drink. Gods save you if it procreates. 
• Casting the spell's formula in reverse causes the creature horrific pain (half speed and disadvantage on all rolls) and can be used to unbind the magic. Full unbinding costs three rounds; every round, the creature loses 1/3 of its maximum hit points. It dissolves into its essential saltes at the end of the third round of chanting.

The classic, lifted directly from Lovecraft's Case of Charles Dexter Ward. Both more powerful and way more dangerous than Animate Dead. This spell returns a creature to life with its mind intact*. Can be used to interrogate dead sages or to call up some monster and set it loose.

*What went wrong with this resurrection? (d12)

1. Resents you for bringing it back to blood-dependent unlife.
2. Turned sociopathic (chaotic evil) by the trauma.
3. Wants to evade your control over it.
4. Seeks to find and awaken a hidden monstrosity.
5. Inhabited by strange and malevolent spirit, d6+2 HD.
6. Lost its mind. Animalistic, shuns light, hunts victims for blood and sport.
7. Lost many memories.
8. Murderous. Convinced it can reclaim its life by condemning others to the pit.
9. Convinced it is still in hell.
10. Wants to use this second chance at life to save its soul and enter heaven.
11. Obsessed with finding its descendants and rightful belongings.
12. Seems perfectly rational and sane.

Label these. You wouldn't want to mix up the sage and the axe murderer. (etsy)

Untiring Flesh / Awakened Spirit

3rd level Necromancy (wizard/warlock)

1 round to cast, range: self or touch, components: VSM (a talisman crafted from a corpse)

Concentration up to 1 hour

You or the target will need to wear a mummified body part for this spell to work. A Hand of Glory or a minor relic will both work - the latter being infinitely easier to explain away to curious priests. Each talisman corresponds to one ability that can be boosted. Talismans need to be harvested from someone famous for the ability to be boosted (a strongman, a wisewoman, a silvertongued rogue, a sage).

Targets have the boosted ability raised to 18 and make all checks with this ability with advantage. Also:

• Strength - encumbrance 36, triple jump distance
• Dexterity - speed +10, can run across water as long as you start and end your turn on land
• Constitution - +2d6 temporary hit points, and tireless: immune to exhaustion
• Intelligence - hypercognition*: can ask the DM one answer and receive a short but truthful answer (as Divination).
• Wisdom - mindreader*: can cast detect thoughts or tongues
• Charisma - silvertongued*: can cast suggestion

* Using this ability ends the spell for you.

At higher level: add one target OR one hour of duration per spell level over 3rd. New targets will also need to have a dedicated talisman.

A boosted version of Enhance Ability. The spellcasting ability for mental abilities may be a bit powerful. On the other hand, this encourages social interaction rather than hacking, so I'll keep it.

Sure, you could go for one of the classics...

...or make one item with all the bone fetishes you might need.

Skullsight

3rd level Necromancy (wizard/warlock) (edit: originally 4th level, felt like too high)

10 minutes to cast, components: VSM (the skull and 100 gp powdered opal in milk)

Concentration up to 1 min / level, range: prepared skull on this plane

You can see out of the eye sockets of a skull that you personally prepared by casting this spell over it (which expends the 100 gp in powdered opal). Your vision works as if you were present, including factors such as darkness or mist or coverings. The skull can be anywhere on the same plane as you when you cast this spell. While you maintain this spell, your own senses are dulled to the point of uselessness.

At higher level: level 4 - duration becomes 10 min / level, level 5 - can access up to 5 skulls at a time, level 6 - duration becomes 1 hour / level and you can also hear sounds near a skull.

Somewhere between level 3 Clairvoyance (strictly close range) and level 5 Scrying (for which you only need to know your target, or have something that belonged to them).

Yes, very dread. But did you check who sourced all the skulls for your fortress? (From)