by Rex Jameson
He tried to stare at the wood and brick homes instead of the streams of common farmers and merchants as they walked between buildings and across the streets. Until he reached the center of town, he hadn’t looked at a single person for nearly fifteen minutes.
When he finally broke from his ruminations, he looked up to find—of all people—the red-haired, familiar, if not friendly face of Princess Cassandra. She was dressed in a non-descript cloak and skirt. Four well-armed knights stood beside her, their hands on their pommels. A timid man in a tan cloak peeked out from behind her. He had the look of a learned man—a scholar. She glared at Ashton, and he saw in her mind the images of the murdered King and dying Queen in the chamber.
“Kill them both,” she commanded.
Two guards split to the left to attack the demon, and the others moved toward Ashton. The world changed. Red lines were everywhere. The Eye was telling him their intentions and slowing things down. He watched a knight lunge at him and how the arcs and reverberations of force changed along the man’s arm. Ashton moved deftly aside of the lunge, and every muscle in the assailant’s face telegraphed surprise.
Ashton chuckled accidentally—not trying to gloat or goad his attackers. He had just never been in a fight this serious before. He’d never had a reason to. He wasn’t particularly quick to anger and always found it easier to apologize than to fight, no matter who was at fault. But the Eye told him that these guys wouldn’t back down without a fight, and he was unusually fine with that. He felt invincible—like this battle-to-the-death was all just a game.
The second knight slashed at him from a high stance. He had been to Ashton’s right, in his periphery, but the Eye had telegraphed the same red lines for the man’s every move. Ashton dodged the blow and pushed one off-balance man into the other, toppling them with their own momentum.
Frederick used very different, less forgiving tactics. One of the guards lay on his side, unresponsive and with blackened marks on his neck and side. The other man chopped at Frederick’s thick plate armor until the demon grabbed the blade in a gauntlet and lifted the man by the throat with the other. Ashton watched in horror as the pale whisp of a soul left the man’s body and absorbed into Frederick.
“Stop!” Ashton commanded the demon.
The demon held the dead man aloft and did not move again. He stared at Ashton. Again the Eye opened a chain of non-verbal communication. There was no emotion this time. Just attentiveness. Readiness to obey.
“Princess,” Ashton said. “We mean you no harm—”
She shook her head in disbelief, and her emotions channeled into him through his sight. She didn’t believe him, and he couldn’t blame her. Not only were her parents dead, but two of her knights were cleaved of their souls too.
“We should flee,” the timid man said from behind her. The Eye registered that the man was giving honest advice. It then began bombarding Ashton with information about the man’s heritage. Lesser noble. Terrible father but loving mother.
Cassandra grimaced and set her brow before shaking her head. She appeared ready to die. She stared down Frederick, daring him to strike her down.
“Princess Cassandra,” Ashton addressed her. “Please listen to me.”
The Eye colored her red. He didn’t need a manual or lesson from a master Eye-smith to know that she meant him fatal harm.
Her two remaining guards recovered from their embarrassment against Ashton and scrambled to defensive stances in front of her. Frederick continued to hold the dead man aloft with no visible shaking or discomfort—perfectly content to wait for orders.
“Are you following me?” she asked.
“Following you?” Ashton asked. The Eye insisted she was being earnest. He saw shades of blue and white in the artificially red hue of her face. She seemed to be pondering him and his intentions. She truly believed he had been tracking her.
“No,” he said, “we’re heading east.”
“Why?” she asked in a commanding tone.
He struggled to think of how to answer her. In truth, he only knew what information Mekadesh had provided him. She told him to travel east until he reached Edinsbro. The princess watched him intently as he processed her changes in emotions—from anger to curiosity to impatience.
“What happened to your eye?” she asked after he didn’t answer. She pointed at his face.
“Oh!” he said, remembering his eyepatch.
He removed it from his head and cupped the Eye with his right hand.
“I’m fine, really,” he said. “It just helps me concentrate, I guess.”
“Concentrate on what?”
“I can see things now with this jewel,” he said. “Truths about the world around me.”
“That jewel belongs to my family,” she announced defiantly.
“Perhaps I’m only wearing it for a short time,” he said, trying to placate her. “Maybe one day it will be yours again. We’ll find out soon, I think. Maybe even at Edinsbro.”
He put the patch over his face again. The Eye revealed her anger subsiding. The red hue was all but gone now.
“You say the jewel changes your vision,” she said. “You keep staring at me. What do you see now?”
He chuckled at her defiance despite her fear—that she would still seek to provoke him and question his sincerity after what he and Freddie had done to her men. There was something about him that had changed since he had worn the Eye—not really a physical alteration but a cerebral one. After watching people lie to his face and being able to see it and know it, he felt a sort of obligation to never put someone else in that same position again. He just wanted to tell the truth, and to have people look at him in an honest, trusting way.
“I see an intelligent woman,” he said, “A future queen of Surdel, perhaps, but a beautiful woman in a lot of pain.”
He felt slightly embarrassed as he watched her expression change, a softening, and then a look of bemusement. He almost removed the eyepatch again to give her some privacy, but he thought better of it. He looked at the laden scholar and the scrolls poking out of his satchel.
“You needed a magic jewel to see that?” she asked with mirth. “It’s a pity the gem has passed to a simpleton.”
He smiled and sent a request to the Eye. He needed something that might impress her. The Eye obeyed with eagerness.
“I see an important person on a quest,” he continued, “searching for truth and answers, just like we are.” The Eye showed a blue line up to the mountains. “You head northeast—toward a very cold place that you’ve never been before.” He looked at the trembling man behind her, connected by a thin filament from the Eye. “But he has. He’s your guide.”
He looked at the two dead men who had been accompanying her and motioned for Frederick to drop the recently deceased guard. The Eye told him that the dead man was of much importance to Cassandra. The demon obeyed and laid the man onto the grass and stones of the road.
“That man has watched over me since birth,” she said, her eyes watering as she tried not to show emotion.
Ashton walked over to the man, but a swirling light distracted him. The light was inside of Frederick, and the Eye told him exactly what it was. The man’s soul was still there, not completely fallen into the Abyss. Salvageable.
“What are you doing?” she asked in alarm.
“Something you will appreciate, I hope,” he muttered. “A peace offering.”
He knelt beside the man and beckoned for the demon to come closer. He looked at the swirl and the dead man’s blackened neck. That strange line of communication opened between the demon and Ashton again. Despite Frederick’s visor being down, Ashton could see the man’s face inside the helmet.
What are you doing? Frederick seemed to ask with his facial expression.
“I’m bringing him back.”
“You’re doing what?” Cassandra asked in alarm.
In the past, he had always looked down on the corpses and asked them to return. He had laid his hands o
n them and maybe closed his eyes and whispered a reason for them to come back. The Eye showed him something very different. Before, he had only blind hope in some latent abilities and miracles that he didn’t understand. Now, without really understanding why, he somehow knew what to do. That wisp inside of Frederick was a soul, attracted to a demon and the darkness that led to the Abyss but still keeping near its host body. Ashton felt the longing, the anger, and the fear within the spirit. He reached out to the soul and it clung to his hand, wrapping itself around his wrist like a snake. It seemed to almost purr in anticipation—like it knew more about what was possible here than even Ashton did. Filaments of white smoke lifted and almost sniffed at the air around it.
As he looked at the wisp, he saw yellow lines moving around his skin. He glowed like a sun. The Eye seemed to ask him a question. Do you want to know?
He didn’t answer, but he didn’t have to. Uncountable images flooded his mind. His father Karl. Another familiar face, his grandfather. His great grandmother. His great-great grandfather. On and on. Years passed by in an instant, and then there was a humongous man with cloth tightly bound around his head, covering his mouth. There was an immense sadness in the man’s eyes. He couldn’t speak or catastrophe might happen. Everything he touched, broke. The guilt of it all made him hide from the world. Then there was a blonde-haired woman glowing in bright light and a forty-foot-tall man with tree-bark for skin. Everywhere he stepped, trees and bushes grew.
“Can you bring him back?” Cassandra asked. “Can you really do it?”
He felt a connection to everything around him. The Eye showed him a false image of the man beneath him. His neck was no longer scorched. He was whole, but he lay in dead grass. The ghostly projection turned toward him and nodded.
With the Eye’s guidance, Ashton brought the coiled spirit to the man’s chest. He lowered his wrist until it touched the plate armor. He felt the wisp leave his hand and sink downward.
He didn’t ask the man to come back. He didn’t need to. Instead, he put his hands around the man’s neck.
“What are you doing to Alfred?” Cassandra asked in agitation. “Please tell me what you’re doing to my guardian! You’re not bringing back another demon are you?”
“No,” Ashton said. “I can see his soul.”
“You can see his soul?”
Ashton didn’t respond. He pressed his hand against the man’s flesh, and then grabbed a clump of grass nearby. He didn’t understand what the Eye was showing him, but he could feel something passing through him and into the man. He watched the skin heal and felt the grass stiffen and wither. The Eye told him a name. Alfred Valens.
“I told you it wasn’t necromancy,” the scholar behind Cassandra said. “I knew it!”
Ashton released his hand, and Alfred’s eyes opened. The reborn guard pushed himself upward onto his elbows and looked back at Cassandra. She began to cry and bent low to embrace him.
Ashton moved to the other man, but his wounds were much worse. The Eye showed Ashton a large chunk of grass off the cobblestone street, and Ashton pulled the knight toward it. Frederick stooped to help, but Ashton instinctively swatted at him. The Eye showed him red lines again and the world slowed as Ashton’s hand descended toward the dark, swirling energy that emanated from his demon companion.
When Ashton’s hand touched Frederick’s, a powerful surge ran up his arm. In an instant, all the hairs on his skin stood on end, and then a jolt coursed through him that was so massive, it flung him backwards ten feet. Frederick somersaulted the other way and with much more force, landing in a noisy heap by the grass.
“Ugh,” Ashton complained, his body aching as if it had been impacted by a boulder.
“Are you OK?” Cassandra asked.
He looked at her and saw genuine concern. The moment warmed him in a profound way. He smiled at her, and she looked away. The Eye showed him her embarrassment and shame—that she was mortified to have felt anything for the man. Images of her parents flowed through her mind and into his.
He lifted himself from the ground and walked back over to the dead man. He waved the scholar over to help him carry the knight. As the scholar grabbed the other side of the knight, Ashton pointed to the clump of grass by the demon who still hadn’t stirred. Frederick was out cold.
The man’s soul escaped from the demon and rolled along the ground like a fog. Ashton knew he could only see this because of the Eye. As the white mist came closer, the Eye revealed another name: Thomas Kirby.
“Yes, Thomas,” Ashton beckoned to the man’s essence. “Come here.”
The wisp obeyed. It tumbled over the grass and into the cracks between the stones in the road, flowing toward him and the man like water. It sat on the knight’s chest and circled around the edges of the breastplate. He wished the others could see it. He found it beautiful and charming.
Ashton pushed it down through the metal with his free hand as he continued to drag the knight across the road. A small crowd gathered as people left their simple homes to see what was going on.
“What’s happening?” someone asked.
“They were fighting,” a man responded gruffly.
The knight began to cough, and Ashton remembered his friend Clayton coming out of the grave—trying to speak through the damage to his jaw. This man’s vocal chords had been crushed and burned by the durun Frederick. Ashton and the scholar pushed the man onward as he struggled and panicked. Ashton reached for the grass and the Eye showed him the energy flowing through his hand and torso and back down his other arm. He closed his palm against the man’s throat.
“He’s been burned,” a woman said.
“Oh, the poor thing!” another reacted.
Ashton watched the scorches heal as he grasped handfuls of green blades of grass that withered to brown and black. The crowd began to mumble and gasp. Dozens of people surrounded him as they had in Perketh and Dona when he had raised the whole towns. He looked up, expecting to see the same expressions as then—appreciation and maybe hope. But that’s not what came back at him through the Eye.
“What kind of darkness is this?” an old man cried. “Are the demons here? Is this the one they call Orcus?”
Fear. Distrust. Jealousy. And lastly, rising anger.
“Let’s go,” Ashton whispered to the healed guard.
He kicked at Frederick’s greaves and the demon groggily responded. Without the skin contact, there was no dangerous repulsive force.
“Let’s go,” Ashton reiterated.
The scholar helped the guard up, and Ashton hurried toward the east, through the market square. Frederick eyed the crowd dangerously through his visor, as did the four guards as they encircled Cassandra. She hurriedly caught up to Ashton as he passed through the main square.
“Who are you really?” she asked.
The images of the man with the cloth around his head flashed through Ashton’s mind. The scholar caught up to them and his eyes were full of questions and guesses. He saw them all before the man could mouth them. Cassandra interrupted the man’s questions and hypotheses, however.
“Where are you going?” Cassandra asked.
“I’ve already told you,” Ashton said. “We’re heading to Edinsbro. The Holy One told us to go there.”
“What’s in Edinsbro?” the scholar asked.
“Answers, I hope,” Ashton said truthfully.
25
The Party Grows
Princess Cassandra walked behind Ashton Jeraldson and the demon, formerly a famous knight of the realm. She thought about the murder of her father and the way her mother slipped out of this world. Then she turned the day’s events over and over in her mind until she couldn’t tell friend from foe.
No one in the party had really spoken since Ashton had raised her knights. No one talked—not even Alfred, her longest serving guard. Usually, in moments of calm like these, he checked on her and talked with her about her condition and feelings. Not today. He stared at the Necromancer—just like every
one else. She couldn’t tell if he was the same person anymore. Perhaps, he was ruined, like the tournament champion had been, by the resurrection process.
A conflict raged inside of her. She knew she hated Frederick Ross, the demon-infused man who had killed her father, but she couldn’t force herself to feel the same way about Ashton. He had been in the room when her father and mother died, and she knew he had raised demons. But he had also raised her friends, and he had tried to comfort her when her mother was dying in her arms. When he spoke, he did so with such sincerity. Even if she wanted to doubt his word, there was something about his voice and patience, even when she was cursing at him or threatening him, that disarmed her.
She caught up with Alfred to try to find some clarity. If not for Ashton’s motives, then at least toward understanding if the person that the Necromancer had raised was her actual friend and not some dark fiend.
“What was it like?” she asked.
The middle-aged man shook his head. “Forgive me, your highness, but I’d rather not talk about it.”
Perhaps he might hold ill will toward Ashton over the way he was killed in the street.
“Were you aware of—?” she asked.
“I remember everything,” he said abruptly.
He picked up his pace until he paralleled Ashton. She heard him say “Thank you” a few times. Her opinion shifted even more towards forgiveness, despite her wish to see someone punished. It would have to be the demon, if it was to be anyone. That much was becoming more obvious. For now.
Ashton awkwardly dismissed Alfred without looking him in the eye. “It was nothing,” he insisted repeatedly. “Not a big deal.”
“I’ll repay you this debt somehow,” Alfred said.
“Just stay alive,” Ashton said. “I don’t want to have to repeat the process.”
Alfred nodded vigorously.
Ashton smiled at the knight, and Cassandra felt even sorrier for Alfred. She had never seen him so frail and confused. He looked like he had aged another ten years.