Necromancer Falling: Book Two of The Mukhtaar Chronicles

by Nat Russo

  “The things I was thinking…they weren’t like me,” Nicolas said. “Whatever that statue is, I don’t think anyone should touch it for now.”

  “It’s in the dirt. Maybe that’s where it should stay.”

  “No. If it has the power to change someone’s personality, I can’t risk some innocent person finding it. Kagan, hand me Robert’s pack.”

  Kagan lowered the wagon, retrieved Robert’s large green rucksack and handed it to Nicolas.

  After some rummaging, Nicolas emptied the contents of a hide satchel into the pack and knelt over the figurine. With great care, he placed the open end of the satchel around the figurine and picked it up, tightening the satchel around it.

  Just like cleaning up after Toby.

  “I think this should do it,” Nicolas said. “If this was imbued, then maybe it doesn’t work unless someone’s touching it.”

  “Let’s hope so,” Aelron said. “You’re the only decent person I know. If you change, I might as well just give up on humankind right now.”

  Nicolas chuckled and started walking toward the gate. Aelron followed.

  “There’s lots of decent people,” Nicolas said. “But decent people aren’t immune to doing bad things from time to time.”

  “You excuse sin with such alacrity?”

  Nicolas shrugged. “My dad taught me that things are different when you make an effort to look through someone else’s eyes.”

  “I didn’t think he had it in him.”

  It took Nicolas a moment to realize what Aelron was saying.

  “Not Kagan,” Nicolas said. “My adoptive father. Back home. I’ll tell you about him some day.”

  “Sounds like a decent man,” Aelron said.

  Nicolas smiled.

  His mood returned to normal after the brief exchange with Aelron. It was strange having a brother. Sure, their relationship had a long way to go, but they’d made a start. There was already an unspoken bond between them. He could feel it.

  Nicolas looked at the gates of Caspardis again.

  What happened to him there no longer mattered. He was the archmage now. If there was anything he could do to help them defend themselves, it was his duty to do so.

  Kaitlyn approached with Toridyn, waving her arms as she spoke.

  “They’re not letting us in,” Kaitlyn said. “Something about a hunt for an escaped prisoner.”

  “They can’t open the gate and watch us enter?” Nicolas asked. “I don’t care if they search us, but we need to get in. Maybe this will help.”

  Nicolas pulled his chain of office out of his robes and made sure it was visible.

  A guard stood inside the portcullis, watching Robert and Philomena like an old man watching teenagers on his front lawn.

  Nicolas marched up to the gate and faced the guard. He was young, not much older than Nicolas.

  “We need to get these people into the city,” Nicolas said. “Quickly.”

  “As I told the lady and the other two, the city’s closed,” the guard said. “Trust me, friend, you don’t want to enter. The Shandarian Rangers lost track of somebody.”

  Aelron turned away from the wall.

  “You’ll be safe if you go around the north side,” the guard said. “Marauders won’t come this close to the city.”

  Nicolas held up his chain. “I really need you to open that gate.”

  The guard glanced at the chain, then back at Nicolas. “That supposed to mean something to me?”

  “Kind of what I was hoping,” Nicolas said.

  “Sorry, mate.”

  “Don’t suppose it would help if I told you I’m the archmage.”

  “Something we seem to agree on.”

  Nicolas stepped a few feet away from the gate, and Kaitlyn and Aelron joined him.

  “Don’t you have other ways of opening that gate?” Aelron asked.

  “I’m trying to save lives, not take them,” Nicolas said.

  Nicolas shook his head. Isn’t that what Mujahid had tried to teach him right from the beginning? That’s why he’d gotten so upset when he’d had to banish his own friend because of Nicolas’s incompetence.

  Wait! That’s it!

  “Kait, that trick you pulled on me after you Awakened…Do you think you could repeat it? If the other guards think one of their own opened the gate for us, it’ll be less likely to turn into a fight.”

  Kaitlyn shrugged. “Maybe. I’m not entirely sure how I did it the first time. It just sort of came to me.”

  “When I use my power,” Nicolas said, “I sometimes have to make images in my mind that represent what I want. Like metaphors, in a way. When I subdue a penitent, I create an image of a dog on a leash, or a prisoner in shackles, and it just…works.”

  “I don’t remember doing anything like that last time. But I suppose I could try.”

  Kaitlyn faced the guard behind the gate and Nicolas did the same.

  The guard shook his head, rubbed his temple, and started pulling on the portcullis like a prisoner rattling a jail cell. There was no sensation of power emanating from Kaitlyn. No indication that she’d done anything at all.

  “What in the six hells are you doing, Thomas?” a guard yelled from the wall. She disappeared for a moment and emerged next to the portcullis. She grabbed Thomas’s arm and started pulling him away from the gate, but he wouldn’t budge.

  “I don’t think that worked,” Kaitlyn said.

  “What image did you create?” Nicolas asked.

  “You’re looking at it.”

  Maybe he’d given her bad advice. Was Kaitlyn’s magic somehow more literal than necromancy?

  Thomas stepped away from the portcullis and disappeared behind the wall. The other guard followed, pulling at his arm. Thomas must have won the struggle, however, because the portcullis creaked then began to rise a moment later.

  There had been no detectable flow of power. Whatever Kaitlyn was doing, it didn’t work like necropotency at all. But he could see the concentration on her face.

  Nicolas hurried the refugees through the gate. He had no idea how long Kaitlyn could maintain her control over Thomas. Or how long it would take the other guard to stop him.

  When the last of the group entered Caspardis, Nicolas followed.

  The city’s west gate opened into a long, bustling plaza with three stone fountains forming a line down its center. It looked identical to the plaza he’d ridden through with the Rangers a year ago, but that plaza was on the other side of the city. Buildings of varying height, each one the same shade of sandstone as the city wall, towered over the fountains. Canvas tents of bright colors circled the center of the plaza, where people browsed merchants’ wares. A cacophony of flutes, each one playing a different tune than the last, echoed through the plaza and grated on Nicolas’s sense of good melody.

  A wide boulevard opened across the plaza. And judging by the ominous circular fortress at the far end, he knew where it led; it was the fortress in which he’d been held prisoner.

  “Hey!” The guard who had been struggling with Thomas ran toward them. “Turn around and walk out the way you came in!”

  Nicolas stepped forward and she stopped, surprised.

  “I’m Archmage Nicolas Murray. I’ll answer any questions you have, but these people are under my protection. Whomever you’re looking for, it’s not them.”

  The guard glanced at Aelron, who turned away.

  When she looked back at Nicolas, her gaze fell on his chain of office with wide eyes. She bowed at the waist and stammered.

  “Archmage,” she said.

  “We can’t leave that gate open for long,” Nicolas whispered to Kaitlyn.

  Kaitlyn nodded. A moment later, Thomas was lowering the portcullis.

  When Thomas approached, Aelron pulled his hood up. Why was he acting so oddly?

  “Who’s in command at the wall?” Nicolas asked.

  “I am, Holy One,” the guard said. She bowed once more.

  “Enough with the Holy…�
�� Nicolas couldn’t finish the sentence. It was no use. He didn’t have time to correct everyone he spoke to. “And who are you?”

  “Corporal Bennet,” she said.

  “You’re in charge? You look my age.”

  And the closer Nicolas looked, the more he wondered if any of these guards were older than he was. He’d learned enough about combat in the past year to know complacency when he saw it. These guards leaned against the crenelations on the wall, speaking casually with one another. Most of them weren’t even looking out at the surrounding countryside.

  If Nicolas was able to breach the city’s defense with nothing more than Kaitlyn playing mind games with a guard, how much easier would the Barathosians have it?

  “Corporal,” Nicolas said, “do you know about the Barathosians? Does that name mean anything to you?”

  “My mother told me they were the reason the archmage Kagan made the Great Barrier in the sky.”

  Her mother spoke the truth, Kagan said.

  Should I ask if her mother knew how many priests you had executed?

  “They’re back,” Nicolas said. “And if Caspardis doesn’t prepare for an attack right now, they’ll appear outside that wall and tear it down.”

  The guard furrowed her brow. “That’s not possible. That wall is solid Religarian sandstone.”

  “They have weapons that make yours look like…”

  This would never work. He could stand here arguing with a low level city guardswoman—only to have to explain himself all over again to someone of higher rank—or he could talk to the one person who ran this city.

  The man he’d hoped never to see again.

  The magistrate who’d had him flogged and executed.

  An idea started to form. Maybe there was a shortcut.

  “Kagan,” Nicolas said. “Does Caspardis know you’re dead yet?”

  Corporal Bennet’s eyes widened.

  “I would expect all of the Shandarian Union and Kingdom of Tildem to know by now,” Kagan said. “It’s possible Dar Rodon knows, though all formal communication was severed the moment I died. Information has flowed in one direction only—from Religar to the Pinnacle.”

  Nicolas swore. He’d hoped if the magistrate recognized Kagan, the man would be more likely to follow orders instead of waste time asking questions.

  So much for that idea.

  “Tor, I need you to do something for me,” Nicolas said. “Stay here at the gate and keep an eye out for the Barathosians. Aelron, you too.”

  Aelron winced and looked around the plaza.

  Why is he acting so jumpy?

  “Where are you going?” Toridyn asked.

  “That fortress beyond the plaza,” Nicolas said. “The guy who runs this city is there. Kait, I’d feel better if you came with me. I don’t like the thought of us getting separated in this place.”

  Kaitlyn shook her head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  Had Nicolas heard her correctly? He thought for certain she’d want to stay close to him.

  “If the Barathosians do show up while you’re away,” Kaitlyn said, “Toridyn and I are the only magic users here. I may be new at this, but I can do more than one of those spear carriers on the wall.”

  As much as he didn’t want to hear it, she was right. Caspardis needed all the help they could get.

  “Keep an eye on him, will you?” Nicolas nodded toward Aelron, who was looking around the plaza like a secret service agent expecting an assassination attempt.

  Kaitlyn grabbed his hand. “Stay safe.”

  “Corporal Bennet,” Nicolas said. “I need you or one of your guards to take me to the magistrate. I’d rather not waste time convincing someone to let me into that fortress.”

  “Yes, Archmage,” Corporal Bennet said. “Thomas! You’re in charge until I get back.”

  Nicolas squeezed Kaitlyn’s hand, then followed Corporal Bennet into the plaza.

  “This isn’t a walk, Corporal,” Nicolas said. He jogged ahead of her. “Let’s go!”

  Nicolas cut a path through the crowd, narrowly avoiding the merchant tents. Corporal Bennet overtook him as they exited the plaza onto the main boulevard.

  The fortress dominated the street beyond a large open courtyard.

  Nicolas remembered that courtyard well.

  More importantly, he remembered the two flogging posts at its center. The posts he’d been tied between and scourged, losing consciousness only to be awoken by buckets of water.

  He pushed the thought out of his mind. There were larger concerns now. He took a quick inventory of his power and realized he had sufficient necropotency to summon a penitent. The knowledge gave him a boost of courage, but he cursed himself for not obtaining a siborum—the small portable sources of power used by cichlos necromancers—before leaving Aquonome.

  Something tugged at the periphery of Nicolas’s consciousness. Someone was watching him. He was certain of it. He wouldn’t have even noticed if he hadn’t focused on his necropotency.

  But whoever or whatever it was, there was little he could do about it now.

  They entered the sandy courtyard beneath the circular fortress, and Nicolas tried—and failed—to avoid looking at the two flogging posts. Each post had a metal hoop at the top, to which a guard would secure a prisoner’s wrist before scourging him. The ground between the posts, though stained red by the blood of countless torture victims, was dry.

  At least there hasn’t been another scourging recently.

  The fortress, with its crenelated parapet, had been falling into disrepair the last time Nicolas had seen it. Sandstone slabs had split and sections of it had been strewn about the courtyard. But now, those sections were either repaired or stood behind scaffolding, where construction workers smoothed grout and shaped stone, replacing the old larger slabs with sandstone bricks.

  “Which way?” Nicolas asked. There was a simple stone door at the base of the fortress, but when the rangers marched him through it a year ago, it led to the dungeons.

  “Here,” Corporal Bennet said. She jogged toward a small stairway that led to a pair of wooden double doors.

  The double doors led to a wide hallway with an arched ceiling. As far as he could tell, there were no guards. It seemed like this was little more than a government building, like every other government building he’d seen. Some facets were different. The walls were sandstone instead of drywall. And the ceilings were high and arched instead of low and flat. Sconces decorated the walls, but natural light flooded through wide doors spaced evenly apart along each side of the hall. Men and women in matching purple robes came and went through the doors, carrying documents and scrolls. Those who weren’t dressed in purple sat on stone benches against the walls.

  If it weren’t for the Renaissance fair clothing and preindustrial architecture, Nicolas would think he was back at the Travis County Tax Assessor’s building in Austin.

  A guard emerged from one of the rooms ahead, and Corporal Bennet picked up her pace.

  “Sergeant!” she called.

  The man faced her and furrowed his brow.

  “Bennet,” he said. “For your sake, you’d better have caught her. That or you’ve come here to tell me I won the general’s lottery.”

  “No sign of the escaped prisoner yet,” Bennet said. “But there’s something you need to hear.”

  “Who is—” the sergeant dropped to his knee. “Archmage.”

  These chains of office come in handy.

  The sergeant glanced at Nicolas without lifting his head.

  Oops!

  “Rise,” Nicolas said.

  The sergeant stood.

  “Can you take me to the magistrate?” Nicolas asked.

  “Court began a few minutes ago,” the sergeant said. “I’m not sure what the protocol is here.”

  “The enemy army my predecessor stopped before they could destroy us is back, and they’re about to invade Caspardis,” Nicolas said.

  “Forget protocol,” the sergea
nt said. “Court room is at the end of the hall.”

  They ran toward a pair of whitewashed wooden doors, ten feet high beneath a sandstone arch.

  Two guards stood post on either side of the door, but they lodged no complaint when the sergeant pushed the doors open by their golden handles and stepped into the courtroom.

  Nicolas couldn’t say the same for the men sitting along a stone table on the other side of the room, however. One of the men, dressed in purple robes trimmed with gold fringes, stood and stared with wide eyes.

  “This is a closed session!” the man said.

  Nicolas had been here before. This was the very room he’d been sentenced to death in.

  And the old man sitting at the center of the table, reading from a large, hidebound book, was the man who did the sentencing.

  The feelings of anger and desire for retribution returned, but Nicolas pushed them aside. It was a good thing Aelron had slapped that figurine out of his hands. There was no telling what he’d have done if he were still under its influence.

  As Nicolas walked down the long, downward-sloped center aisle toward the magistrate, the old man looked up from the book and stared at Nicolas.

  “It can’t be,” he said.

  “Magistrate,” Nicolas said. “Is it safe to assume you recognize me?”

  “But…how?”

  “I’d like to say I don’t hold any grudges, but that would be a lie.”

  “Forgive me, Archmage. I was doing my duty.”

  Nicolas chuckled. “Do you have any idea how much evil in the multiverse has been justified with those very same words?”

  The magistrate blinked rapidly and stood.

  Nicolas waved for him to be seated. “I didn’t come here for your hide. I came here for your help.”

  The magistrate sat with a grunt and gestured toward the hidebound book.

  “I’ll help in any way the Shandarian Justice Protocols allow,” the magistrate said.

  “A very powerful enemy is about to ring your western doorbell,” Nicolas said. “They destroyed Tur and they’re on their way here. They have weapons that can punch through solid stone. They’ll turn your city wall into rubble and march right on in. You’re in charge of this city, right?”

  “To an extent, yes.”

  “A large enough extent to order every guard you have to the walls? Not on the walls, mind you. The walls are as good as gone. In fact, you need to pull the guards off the wall as soon as possible. They need to be prepared for the street fighting that’s going to happen.