Foretold: Necromancer's Blight: Book 1

by D. L. Harrison

  Given all that information, what I couldn’t figure out was how necromancers used to be good beings. Was there another way to use this power that I hadn’t been told about?

  My roommate was gone, no doubt he was passed out drunk in another room, or out getting lucky.

  I had no idea what I was doing, but I closed my eyes, and tried to picture the dead blonde girl with the gray eyes. I gathered some magic and tried to call her, not sure if a ghost, a wight, or nothing would show up.

  Nothing happened.

  I sighed, was I missing something? Maybe I didn’t have enough information, Carl said necromancers needed enough information on a person to call their spirit to them. I got up out of bed, and opened my laptop as I sat at my desk. I didn’t have much, blonde girl, gray eyes, died at fourteen, around thirty or forty years ago based on her ghostly apparel. The only benefit was how small the town was, a tragedy like that would have been a local story for sure.

  I also remembered thinking she was cute, but I was thirteen at the time. I didn’t think that would help anyway, or at least it wasn’t enough to focus on for the summoning to work.

  Of course, the news story of her death might not have been archived online, and after a few searches the news story angle did seem to be a dead end, but I found the death records for my town and started doing searches using those estimates.

  It was a bit frustrating, the search engine was horrible, which wasn’t really a surprise for a government website. I had to run a lot of searches over the next ninety minutes, but I was pretty sure I found her. Sara Reilly, born July eighth, nineteen sixty-three, and died November second, nineteen seventy-seven. Just fourteen, as I’d guessed back then.

  Turned into a monster in late August of two thousand nine? Only one way to find out.

  Armed not only with her appearance in my mind’s eye, but also with her name, birthdate, and date of death, I tried again. This time my magic responded, and a portion sped away to find and drag her spirit to me.

  It occurred to me then, that maybe intent mattered, what if the old necromancers didn’t summon spirits, but invited them? It wasn’t something I could test now, I was sure Sara would never come of her own volition.

  A moment later I had my answer. She was a monster.

  She was just as I remembered, but also not. Same blonde hair and gray eyes, but there was a hunger to the point of insanity in her eyes, and she was most definitely a wight. Her face was twisted with anger, and fear. How many humans had she drained over the last eight years, how many had she harmed?

  I could also see the fear in her eyes, as she tried to flee and my magic held her there.

  I wasn’t sure what to do, so I did what I always did, I drained the energy from her spirit, almost all of it. I left her just enough to maintain a connection to this world, like a normal ghost. She was no longer a wight.

  The disturbing look of hunger left her face, only to be replaced by horror, guilt, and anguish.

  “Sara.”

  She looked up at me and her fear seemed to override her other emotions.

  I frowned, “I’ll send you on to the afterlife, wherever that is, but I’d like to talk to you first.”

  She said hysterically, “No. Look at what you did to me, what you made me do!”

  I shook my head and said in a hard voice, “Not me Sara. You did it to yourself, when you tried to kill me.”

  She didn’t like that at all, probably because it was true. It was pretty clear she wanted to throw a tantrum, but was too afraid of me to get it out.

  She seemed to collapse in on herself, “What do you want?”

  I said, “Your help.”

  She looked at me incredulously, “I have no choice but to do what you want, don’t play games with me.”

  I nodded, “I could force you. What do you know about the necromancers of old before the taint. How did they do things back then, what caused the taint.”

  She shook her head, “I know nothing about that.”

  “Why do you hate necromancers?”

  She spat, “One of them killed me, or a vampire did.”

  I sighed, “I don’t make vampires, or zombies or wights for that matter, yourself excluded, and that was an accidental side effect of your attempted murder. I’m… different.”

  She still looked scared, but also angry, and remorseful. She was a right mess and if she’d been alive I have no doubt that she’d be crying. Maybe I should just banish her and find another ghost?

  I wasn’t exactly happy either, right then. But there were things I needed to know, and I had no idea how else to get the information.

  She asked warily, “What do you want, will you really release me?”

  “I want to know about the origin of the taint, the necromancers of old. I want to know what happened. I also want to know about the bond I share with one of the Blood, we’re connected somehow. I want to know what it is, and what it’s for.”

  I trusted Christina, but I was starting to wonder if the information was even in their archives. She still hadn’t found anything on it after three weeks.

  She sighed, “I know none of that.”

  I nodded, “That’s why I need your help, and I can’t force you. I want to send you on to the next world, where you can find out the answers to all those questions from those that lived it. I’ll summon you once a week until you can answer those questions, and then I’ll send you back and leave you be. Consider it amends for you trying to murder me.”

  She scowled, “And if I refuse? You’ll have no hold over me once I cross over.”

  “I know. I’m hoping that when you find those answers, you’ll want to help me. This is bigger than your revenge, and I am not the one that killed you. You owe me Sara, I’ve never harmed you. I also freed you from your own mistake, and now I’m offering you what you asked for when we first met, a chance to move on from this world.”

  I sighed and added, “If it makes a difference, I am also part of the blood, a supernatural race that hunts necromancers. If you help me, you will be helping to remove the necromancer threat.”

  She said, “Very well, I’ll do it.”

  I knew she was lying, she had no intention of doing anything for me. I also knew she was probably curious, and may change her mind about telling me once she learns the truth of the past, and what I needed to know. I’d no doubt if it would lead to stopping necromancers, she would tell me.

  I simply nodded, and banished her. I considered going to a cemetery to recruit another, but I’d see what happened in a week.

  I still had a lot of questions as I laid back in bed. About the big picture, and my personal one, and about my power. But sleep finally yielded itself to me, now that I was finally doing something to gain that knowledge…

  Chapter Ten

  Christina had totally called it.

  Fair or not, trained or not, after our Saturday morning run, Timothy had most certainly not been pleased to learn that I’d allowed my knife arm to be pinned against a wall, and almost became vampire food.

  I knew he was only that hard on us because it was his job to keep us alive, but that knowledge didn’t help very much as that whole weekend became a knife fighting boot camp. It was all I did, outside of the shared morning run, my ninety-minute workout, and fast meals on both Saturday and Sunday. I was also only allowed to leave at eight at night, and somehow managed to get my assignments for my college classes done those two evenings.

  The rest of the time, I was learning how to knife fight. Cram session style. I’d still need work, and practice, but I had the basics down pretty cold by Sunday night.

  I’d also learned that in addition to having spells that would dust a corpse in minutes instead of hundreds of years, that the daggers also never needed to be sharpened, and were virtually indestructible for normal use in combat.

  It was Monday morning, business class, and I felt her coming from even further this time, maybe a half a mile. It was hard not to look at the door and meet her eyes as soon as
she walked in, I stayed focused on staring off into space. Yeah, I wasn’t exactly brilliant when it came to dealing with this thing between us.

  The one that was probably all in my mind I mean.

  She sat down next to me.

  “Morning Christina.”

  She replied, “Is everything okay? I feel like you’ve been avoiding me all weekend, and why won’t you look at me?”

  Shit, now I was messing her up with how I was dealing with this thing between us, I needed to man up already and let her know where I stood. It was way passed the silly obsession, or the attraction I had for her stunning looks. I’d gotten to know her rather well these last few weeks. Except of course, if I was already friend zoned in her mind or not, she gave me no signals that way. Vibrant, friendly, smart, loyal, and she had my back, but more than that?

  I turned and looked into her cerulean eyes, and wondered how she could miss what she was becoming to mean to me. Then again, I couldn’t see anything in her either.

  “Grab lunch after? I’ll explain my malfunction.”

  She snickered, “Is there a fix?”

  Damn, there certainly was, but would she be willing?

  “I hope so, I’d hate to stay broken,” I said jokingly.

  She shook her head, “I haven’t found anything out about the bond either.”

  “It’s not about that.”

  She smiled, “Lunch then.”

  My heart sped up at that smile.

  God, she was gorgeous, she was always stunning, but the more I got to know her, the more that beauty stood out. Hopefully her shooting me down, the evil half necromancer at lunchtime, wouldn’t be too awkward. I didn’t want to assume failure but… no signals. Still, at least that way I’d be out of my misery, and could finally move on. Seriously, it was long past time I grew a set. In my defense, I’d always been able to read women and simply avoid being shot down that way, so in a way I was learning a new skill most men had learned in high school.

  I tore my eyes away as the professor came into the classroom…

  We wound up going off campus, and picking up sandwiches at a German deli, and then going to the park down the street. There were people around, but we were far enough away for privacy, sitting on the bench and enjoying lunch.

  “So how was the knife weekend.”

  I grunted, “Hellish, as you alluded to last Friday night. But I learned a lot.”

  She nodded, “So, why have you been avoiding me?”

  I wasn’t sure where to start, so I picked the beginning.

  “The first time I saw you, you had a ghost attached. I didn’t think much of it, I’d banished more than one ghostly leech in my time. Then it happened again and again. I already explained that’s why I followed you that night into the alley, you… intrigued me, and I wanted to understand. I’d never met someone who was different from other humans before then.

  “Not that I was aware of anyway.”

  It’s like ripping a Band-Aid off.

  “I also couldn’t help but notice. No… that’s an evasion. You are one of the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on. Which added another layer to my… interest? So here we are three weeks later, and I find that the more I get to know you, the more that I want to get to know you.”

  I shook my head and looked at her, “Long story short, if it isn’t too late, I’d like to take you out on a date, and see if we can connect in that way. The reason I’ve waited so long is because this is all beyond complicated, and I can’t tell at all how you feel about me, or if you even could… you know.”

  God, that was bloody awkward. I might as well have handed her a note with yes and no check boxes. Women like confidence, which I usually display, this whole bumbling idiot routine I was doing was painful. I was just… a flaming wreck of a disaster.

  Christina asked, “So… you were avoiding me because you like me? I mean, like me like me.”

  Okay, she was acting on a grade school level too, apparently.

  I nodded, “Things were complex enough, I wasn’t sure if it was the best time to get involved, I was also worried not so much about being turned down, but that it would make things awkward between us.”

  She tilted her head, “So you think I’ll say yes then?”

  Crap. I hadn’t meant it that way.

  I shook my head, and then nodded just to confuse things further.

  “No, I meant my concern wasn’t so much for rejection, I can handle that, if you do I mean. It was more about… war, necromancers, Blood, a bond we don’t understand. Then there’s our race’s usual way to get mates, which I find screwed up by the way, so I wasn’t even sure if you did or would date. I guess I was trying to avoid more complications. Obviously, that didn’t work out so well.”

  I needed an off ramp on this crazy road, at least I’d finally shut up, and got it all out. Strangely, I already felt relieved, even if she said no. It would suck if she did, but I’d get over it, and hopefully still have her as a friend. That is, as long as Matt didn’t find out about it and kill me.

  She bit her lip and looked away, and I was pretty sure that was a no.

  “It is complicated, I don’t…” she trailed off in a soft voice.

  I took her hand, “It’s fine, you don’t have to explain.”

  She said, “But I do. I’m not saying no, but I’m not saying yes either.”

  I smiled ruefully, “Okay, I take it back, that statement does require an explanation.”

  She sighed, “That feels good, when we touch.”

  She squeezed my hand, and made no move to let go.

  I got the impression my admitting my feelings was going to make things between us even more convoluted, not less. Which was not the intent at all.

  She said, “It is complicated. My mother never loved my father. Like Matt, my father had been sent here when he was twenty, to team up with my mother. They were close friends, and they did love each other I supposed, but not like lovers do, with passion.

  “You see, she did her duty, the duty to our race. It was a good marriage, just no passion, you know what I mean?”

  When I nodded, she continued.

  “She died a few weeks after I turned fourteen, shifter incident, and I know my mother regretted never having loved passionately, the way I’d seen in other couples. Even then my judgement was particularly strong. I swore to myself then that I would have passion when I married.

  “Of course, I was fourteen and naive.”

  She looked thoughtful for a moment, as if lost in the past.

  “When I turned nineteen, Matt was sent to be my partner, and I knew exactly what that meant. We were to be partners, and not just out in the field. But… there was no spark. He’s a good partner, a good man, and I really tried to fall for him, but it didn’t happen. Still, there is duty. Our race has dwindled over recent years.

  “I like you Tom, you’re a good man, and trust me, you aren’t hard to look at either. But… I need to be sure before we do anything like go out.”

  I frowned in confusion, “So… what exactly does that mean? Isn’t dating how we find that out if the feelings we have for each other will grow and are lasting? That’s what dating is.”

  She shrugged and looked confused for a moment.

  I realized she’d never dated before, she’d been a soldier all her life, and hadn’t gone to school with humans like I had. I found that idea disturbing, but I could also see why it would all be confusing to her.

  “If we were human it would work that way I guess. I do feel something for you, but it’s all mixed up in expectations, both of my race, and of my own wants. If I date you, I’d officially be snubbing Matt, who has always been good to me. Maybe its selfish, but I don’t want to do that unless I’m sure.”

  I thought that through, “So what you’re saying, is if you don’t find the passion you want, you’ll eventually bow to duty and… get with Matt?”

  My stomach twisted just saying it.

  She nodded slowly, “He’s a go
od man. If I can’t find a passionate deeper relationship why would I forsake his loyalty for something else that might fail, or be no better?”

  I could say that was weak, that she should take a risk, or take a chance. But those five people, plus me now, was all the world she knew. She didn’t have a million other fish in the sea, and she’d never gotten to play the field like most woman her age did. It sounded almost absurd, and it was hard for me to understand, but honestly no more so than the rest of the crazy supernatural world.

  “So, if you aren’t saying no, what are you saying?”

  She sighed, “It’s not fair to ask, but I need time to figure out what I feel. I’m not even sure if I would understand passion if it hit me on the head. I do like you Tom, and it may even be more than that. I miss you when you aren’t around, and it hurt when you ignored me this weekend. There’s something there, but I’m not ready to throw away my partner, and my father’s expectations, on something I’m not sure of. It will be hard enough to reject my partner if or when I am sure.”

  “He knows though doesn’t he, he’s been waiting for you to decide?”

  She nodded, “He knows all of this, how I feel. Not about us, but in general. There’s a big difference though, between asking for time, and asking him to let me… what do the humans call it, date other people?”

  I chuckled, “See other people, but yes, close enough.”

  She asked, “So?”

  I teased, “So what?”

  She sighed, “I said it wasn’t fair, I didn’t say I wasn’t asking.”

  I put on a shocked face, and she laughed.

  “Fine, I’ll woo you as a friend, until your overcome with passion and can’t keep your hands to yourself anymore. Or you know, until you say no, or something else changes.”

  This was so bizarre, nothing more so than my agreement. I had it bad. Any other woman came up with that, I’d show her the door, and perhaps contact a psychiatrist on her behalf. But in this case, for her life and the way the Blood worked, it almost made sense. No wonder Matt was so protective and jealous, he really was afraid that I’ll sweep her off her feet.