Code of the Necromancer

by Deck Davis

  “What was his name?”

  “Studs…erm…”

  “Attention to detail, lad. What have I drummed into your skull again and again? I want you to do well in the guardship, Heath, but you’ve got to work.”

  Heath chewed his lip and a pained expression crossed his face, as though the mere act of thinking hurt his brain. “Godwin! Studs Godwin was his name.”

  It didn’t take Lloyd long to pluck the name from his own memory. “Studs Godwin. We tried to recruit him when he left the inquisitors, didn’t we?”

  “Before my time, sir.”

  “What did he have to say?”

  Heath looked tense now, as though he were bursting to let his excitement out.

  “Spit it out, Heath. And relax a little; this isn’t a barracks.”

  Heath approach the desk and leaned on it. “He says he saw the pickpocket and the Black Cleric walking together last night. The boy looked scared. He saw them walk down Old Rope street.”

  “Old Rope? That leads toward the railway.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Was this it? Lloyd could hardly believe it, but was this what he needed to not only stop using the cleric’s services without harming his own reputation, but to put the man in a cell of his own?

  Then again, it would hardly look great for people to know that Lloyd had used a potential murderer to solve murders. And that he used this killer to solve one of his own crimes…

  Then the idea hit him.

  A bargain. If the Cleric wanted to avoid time in Old Spinners, the worst prison in the Dispolis jurisdiction, then maybe a deal could be made. One that involved the cleric admitting publicly that his own involvement in the homicide detection success rate was minute, and that the glory belong to Captain Lloyd Blackrum.

  “What do you want us to do?” asked Heath.

  “Bring the Cleric in. Do we know where he is?”

  Heath smiled with pride. “I already asked your boys, sir. They saw him and another fella using one of the Rats’ Palace manholes.”

  Your boys. The nickname made Lloyd want to laugh every time he heard it. Early on in his captaincy, he’d started paying the network of urchins and pickpockets in Dispolis to be his informants. He’d give them a list of people he was interested in, and they’d tell him what they knew.

  It was funny the things that urchins could see; people hardly ever noticed they were there. They were so low on the ladder of society that people pretended not to notice them, or thought them so devoid of interest that they didn’t need to pay attention to them.

  The dead pickpocket, though, was the only one who’d refused Lloyd’s offer. He told Lloyd that it was against his principles; society wouldn’t help him by giving him a job, but the same society slapped his hand when he stole to feed himself. So, he wouldn’t become an informant on principle.

  As much as it annoyed Lloyd, he respected it.

  He stood up. “I want ten guards to go into the Rats’ Palace. Tell them to use whichever entry point the cleric went down. Bring him in. Use force - use a lot of force - but for god’s sake, no accidents. I don’t want him dead.”

  “Sir, most of the guards are on the streets for the parade the Queen’s uncle organized. If we take guards away and something happens…”

  “Then he’ll shit a dozen bricks, and he’ll tell his niece to cut our funding. Still, the cleric is a dangerous man, and the streets will be safer without him.”

  “Dangerous? He’s always helped us, sir. Is this about him, or is it about…”

  “Heath, what did we discuss about loyalty?”

  “The most important thing about loyalty is a closed mouth.”

  “So close yours, and only open it when you find ten guards and pull them off the streets. I’ll give you an order with my seal on it, in case they start giving you any shit.”

  When Heath left the room, Lloyd got up and put on his coat. It was thick, and it had the emblem of the queen on his right breast, and his Queen’s pin on the other; this was a decoration she’d given him to commemorate solving his fiftieth murder case.

  While Heath rounded up guards and sent them into the Rat’s Palace, Lloyd would go and see Dellis Logworth, the chief crime correspondent for the Dispolis Tribune.

  It seemed like a good idea to him that when they arrested the Cleric and dragged him out of the sewer, one of the most connected reporters in Dispolis was there to see it.

  46

  Jakub reached the end of the hall, where the altar waited. White light seeped through the giant arched windows were behind it, almost blinding, but when Jakub looked at them and realized he couldn’t see anything outside.

  It made sense; the hall didn’t exist physically; it was a spiritual home for the Three, for the mages who had birthed necromancy so many centuries ago.

  He sensed them waiting behind him now, eager for him to make his decision. They depended on novices choosing to adopt their shades; they existed on the essence they drew each time a necromancer of their shade used their spells.

  Having finally met them, Jakub didn’t really want to ally with any, but there was no choice. This was it; he was a journeyman, about to take a leap in power.

  “The question is, which to choose?” he said.

  “Might I say…” said Crotalus.

  “No, you may not. Leave me to think.”

  This was the biggest decision a necromancer could make. He thought he’d made his mind up years ago, but all his recent troubles and his expulsion from the academy, had changed it.

  “The Tapper is the most honorable shade a necromancer can choose.”

  That was what Kortho would say, because it was the one he’d chosen. The Tapper could use death as a force for good; he could use it to heal wounds. In that way it was linked to his existing Health Harvest spell, except being a Tapper made spells like that so much more powerful.

  It was the shade Jakub had decided on when he was just twelve, when he’d first learned about the choice. Back then, Kortho was still around, and Jakub had the Queen’s academy behind him.

  But now…

  Now my only ally is Witas, and there are some pretty nasty people who seem to have it out for me.

  And if not me, then other students, the poor bastards who they might catch unaware.

  He needed to be able to fight.

  Death Draw would give him that power. It was the opposite of the Tapper; you drew essence from death in the same way, but wielded it destructively.

  And in turn, it slowly destroyed you. A man couldn’t spend his life wielding the destruction of the dead for himself, and not expect the pain and corruption that went with it.

  Jakub didn’t want to see himself thirty years from now, just not even fifty years old but looking eighty, full of pain, with bones withered from too much corruption, his mind dirtied by the force of death.

  “That leaves the Raiser,” he said under his breath, testing his potential choice and the way it sounded.

  In a way, Mancerno was right; the Raiser shade was true necromancy, in that it encompassed what the art was about – raising things from the dead.

  It would mean he could raise long-dead things and have them serve him. He wouldn’t depend on finding a corpse within its resurrection window.

  There was a drawback, though. A hell of one.

  The academy always said that a necromancer was free to choose his own shade. That said, a journeyman who chose the Raiser would be expelled, because it was a dark form of the art.

  It wasn’t just in the academy that it was seen that way; a necromancer turning up at a city with five skeletons in tow would see the city gates closed on him. People would flee from him, and others would attack out of fear or spite.

  But the power…the ability to create a personal army, given enough experience and practice and essence.

  Screw what the academy thought. They’d abandoned him after just a single mistake.

  Screw what other people thought, too. When he’d been living with his ca
nnibalistic family, who had helped him?

  Nobody.

  “Just you, Kortho.”

  If Kortho found out that Jakub had chosen the Raiser, he’d be hurt. He’d feel it deep.

  But Kortho was gone now. Kortho wasn’t here to protect him, so he needed to protect himself.

  And with that, Jakub approached the altar and he made his choice.

  He placed his hands on it, and he faced the hall, faced the Three, and spoke.

  “I choose the shade of the Raiser.”

  Shade Chosen: The Raiser

  As a journeyman, you have taken an important step closer to mastery of your art. With your new shade, comes new powers.

  Skill increased: Minor Creature Resurrection upgraded to Major Creature Resurrection [Resurrection Glyphline]

  You can now raise creatures of any size from the dead.

  Skill increased: Death Puppet increased to [2] [Resurrection Glyphline]

  You can now use Death Puppet on those who are on the edges of death; not just those who have already died.

  Skill Learned: Re-Animate [1][Resurrection Glyphline]

  A perk of the Raiser shade, you can give life to creatures and people who are long-dead. This life is limited; they will be mindless, able to do your bidding but not to think for themselves.

  47

  The Three wittered amongst each other from beyond the altar, but Jakub could hardly hear what they were saying over the pounding of his own pulse.

  He read the text that accompanied his shade and felt adrenaline course through him.

  This was it; the culmination of years of study. Years of classrooms, of poking cadavers, of reading until dawn.

  If graduating as a novice had been his first major accomplishment on his necromancy path, then this was his second, and it was a giant stride toward that thing in the distance, that thing that had seemed so unobtainable – mastery.

  If the upgrade from Minor Creature Resurrection to Major and the change in his Death Puppet spell had been the extent of it, he’d still have felt a glow of happiness.

  But Re-Animate was a spell of true power. It made his existing catalogue of spells look weak as hell in comparison.

  He could raise an army now. Well, perhaps not an army – he was still limited by the amount of essence he could hold at any one time. He had the female necromancer’s soul necklace, but the necklace would adapt to him, and would only hold enough essence according to his own rank.

  That meant he wouldn’t suddenly be able to visit a graveyard and create a legion of the dead. Four or five at a time was his guess, and then more as he grew in power.

  There was no going back now. If getting admitted to the academy had been a dim possibility, it was gone now.

  So too was any idea of a normal life; he wouldn’t get entry to many cities if he had a party of undead with him.

  Screw them all.

  He’d face that when he came to it. If he needed to go somewhere, maybe he’d banish whatever he’d summoned. The scrimper part of him grimaced at the idea of wasting essence, but he’d adapt, because this meant he didn’t have to worry.

  He could travel the roads that people said were dangerous. If bandits attacked, so what? His undead companions would drive away the cowards and kill those who chose to fight.

  And more importantly, when the murderous bastards who were hunting academy students came for him, he’d be ready.

  48

  It took just a command in his own mind to leave the hall of the Three. When the grand hall disappeared and he was back in the sewers, he found that Witas was gone.

  There were dead rats all around him, and his dead gator ally was laying on the ground. Nearby there was the woman.

  Could this be a time to test his new shade?

  Focusing on her, he spoke the spellword of Reanimate, and he let essence flow out of his soul necklace.

  The mist dispersed when it hit her body, and she didn’t move.

  There are limits to our shade, said a voice in his head.

  “What?”

  It was the voice of Mancerno, the red mist, the necromancer who had created the Raiser shade.

  A Raiser cannot raise a fellow necromancer to their ranks. It was a fail-safe I built into the essence of my shade. Necromancers cannot use their art on their fellows, except for the good.

  “How are you speaking to me?”

  Shade-brothers are bonded for life. Surely you were taught that?

  He had been taught that. He guessed he was just caught up in it all.

  “You’re not going to stay in my head the whole time, are you?”

  Don’t flatter yourself. One, I have learned better than to spend too long in the mind of any person under thirty years old. Two, you aren’t the only Raiser in our shade. You have other shade brothers.

  “Like who?”

  Many, some whom rarely cast their spells anymore. Others who cast them too freely, and paid the price. Others still who prefer to stay out of the eye of the queendom. You might meet them someday. Ryden Renault, for example, is-

  “Ryden Renault?”

  You know of him?

  Jakub felt a shiver creep through him. Ryden Renault was the reason he’d failed his first assignment. He was a necromancer who had been banished for practicing the darker side of necromancy – the side Jakub had chosen, too.

  Now they were shade brothers? He didn’t want any kind of link with Ryden. It made him sick to think he’d once let Ryden leave and flee punishment of his crimes, just to save Kortho’s life.

  “Don’t breathe a word of this to Ryden. Don’t let him know what I chose.”

  A sore spot, shade brother?

  “You need me to use my shade so you get essence, right?”

  It is our pact.

  “Then unless you want me to starve you, don’t breathe a word to him. If you do, I’ll become a hermit like the others you mentioned. I won’t reanimate so much as a fly.”

  I can read your thoughts, brother. I know you are bluffing.

  Damn it. He should have closed his mind, he should have used the techniques instructor Irvine had taught him.

  We will keep our confidences for now, said Mancerno. Best not to start a friendship on melting ice, no? Feed me, brother.

  “Feed you?”

  Use your shade, so I may dine on the essence.

  “Fine.”

  He focused on the woman again, and he spoke his reanimate spellword. Again, nothing happened.

  Did I not tell you that it is impossible? Top marks for ingenuity, brother, but you cannot use the gift of our shade on a compatriot.

  “I’ve seen a necromancer resurrect another necromancer. That was how Kortho came back,” said Jakub. “Plenty of academy necromancers have been resurrected over the years.

  A full resurrection is different from Reanimate. A full resurrection means giving the gift of life back; Reanimating gives no such thing. A reanimated being is just flesh, bone, matter. Nothing of the stuff that is real life – a person’s thoughts. A body is nothing without its mind.

  Damn it, he knew that. The excitement was catching up to him. He needed to think straight. Find Witas, get out of the Rats’ Palace.

  The key. He needed to find the mana-box that the necromancer’s key opened, and see if it gave a clue to who she was, and who she was working with.

  Perhaps try a rat? said Mancerno.

  “I need to save my essence for later.”

  Later? Not many of our kind choose to be raisers. Most necromancers come from the academy, and we know how they feel about us. You don’t have many shade-brothers, journeyman, and that means I have not fed much lately. I am hungry.

  “You want me to raise a rat just so you can feed from the shade?”

  It is our pact. Your powers do not come for free.

  “If I do that, you’ll leave me alone?”

  You’ll never be alone now. That is the beauty of a shade.

  “I don’t want you bursting into my head whenever y
ou feel like it.”

  Then help me, and I will treat you with respect.

  Jakub walked around the pool and stood over a dead rat. Seeing it, he was struck by a thought; he already had the Minor Creature Resurrection spell. How was that any different to Reanimate?

  It is quite different, said Mancerno.

  “Remember that thing about respect?”

  There are dead vermin in the pool that have not already been resurrected. I can sense them. Try your old powers, and your new.

  “That’s a waste of essence.”

  New knowledge is never a waste. Try it. You will find plenty of corpses in this foul pit to replenish your necklace.

  Jakub looked at the pool of water and spoke his Major Creature Resurrection spellword.

  Soon, something disturbed the waters, and a rat breached the surface. It climbed onto the edge of the pool and then skittered around, sniffing the corpses around it.

  Next, he looked at the dead rat by his feet, one who the necromancer had brought back, and Jakub’s gator had killed.

  He spoke the Reanimate spellword, and the rat stirred to life.

  But instead of walking around, it stayed still.

  Take a step, said Mancerno.

  Jakub moved, and his new rat moved in time with him.

  Tell it to walk to the chamber entrance.

  “Go…err…go over there.”

  You only need think it.

  The rat walked over to the chamber on his command and stopped at the entrance.

  As you can see, reanimation is not true life. The things you bring back are just shells, and will act only by your wishes. It is a mighty shade, the mightiest if I may say so, but you are not giving these things their life back.

  “So why not just use my resurrect spell? What’s reanimate giving me?”

  How much did it cost you to use resurrect versus reanimate?

  Woah – he was right. It had cost a tenth of the essence to reanimate one rat, as opposed to fully resurrecting another.

  Now you see, don’t you? You see why this shade is frowned upon. Left unchecked, a man could build an army.

  “Left unchecked? Who’s doing the checking?”