Shadowspell Academy: The Culling Trials, Book 3

by Breene, K. F.

  “The same reason Gregory was afraid during his trial, the same reason Pete was afraid in his,” Ethan said. “If she fails her own challenge, her memory will be wiped. She will be cast out of the only world that would have her and her skills.”

  Her face paled. “He’s right. I’m terrified to blow this, not just for me but for all of us. The undead here, they are going to make a push to kill us. I can feel it growing. I don’t know why the necromancer is waiting, but he is.”

  Out in the graveyard the light pulsed and danced, stronger to what I would guess was the north of us. A steady glow of green curled round a bigger clump of stationary zombies.

  I watched that group for a beat, and not one of them took a step in our direction. I pointed. “There. That’s where the necromancer is.”

  Wally nodded. “I know, but what good does it do? The odds of me being able to beat a necromancer of this calibre…well, they’re not good.”

  “At a loss for stats. Finally,” Ethan grumbled.

  I stared out at that green glow and the light that radiated from the individual who had done this to us. “We kill that necromancer, and the dead go back to their graves?”

  “Yes, in theory. But we only really need to knock the necromancer out,” she said.

  Orin had been quiet until that moment. “And just who is going to run the gauntlet and knock him out? If someone can get to him, they’ll still have to fight the zombies around him, no doubt some of the strongest undead.”

  Slowly, they all turned to me.

  I closed my eyes, taking stock of my body. My arm throbbed, aching deep to the bone where the zombie had chewed on me, and my fingers still tingled as though there had been some nerve damage. Other than that, my body wasn’t in bad shape. I wasn’t even exhausted. I just felt like my heart had been ripped out of my chest.

  Just like when Tommy had died.

  It took all my strength to push the grief down, to stuff it to the back of my heart where it wouldn’t interfere with what had to happen. My survival wasn’t the only thing on the line here. The others were depending on me too.

  “Ethan, what kind of range do you have with that wand of yours?” When I opened my eyes, he was looking out over the milling mass. A few of the zombies were climbing on top of each other, trying to get to us. Eventually they would. They’d be just like those red army ants on the bird that should have flown away but couldn’t.

  There would be no waiting this out. “I’m not sure if I can reach the necromancer,” he said.

  “Try,” I said.

  He took a few steps and stood on the edge of the roof, held his wand up and then flicked his hand forward.

  Hope he doesn’t drop his wand, Pete muttered.

  Another time I would have laughed. Another time I would have poked fun at Ethan too. But Wally was right—we needed him, we needed all of us.

  A flare of light shot out from Ethan’s wand, lighting up the sky with a tail like a comet. It fell about three quarters of the way to the necromancer.

  Laughter boomed all around us, the zombies laughing with their master. Pete snarled, and Orin gave a low growl.

  I just nodded. “So we know how far you can help us.”

  “Us?” Ethan raised an eyebrow. “You’re going to leave me here by myself?”

  I shook my head as I ripped a strip of my shirt off and wrapped it around my arm, pulling the ends with my teeth to tie it off. “No. Pete will stay with you. I’ll take Orin and Wally with me, seeing as this is their house and they have the best chance of surviving.”

  Wally stood a little straighter. Orin rolled his eyes. “Vampires are far superior to any necromancer.”

  “Right, fine.” I was going into battle mode. We had little chance of winning this game, but I intended to give us a chance. “Ethan, can you blast a space clear on this side so we can jump over?”

  “Why not ask Wally to do it? Or can’t she control even one zombie?”

  His words seemed to spark something in her. She stepped forward, and I saw in her a tiny spark, a flare of pink light deep in her center.

  “I’ll clear the way, Wild.” She looked down on the zombies at our feet, and I watched with fascination as she reached a hand out over them. The pink light in her bubbled up and trickled down her arm to drip off her fingers. Like rain drops.

  “We need a thunderstorm, not a sprinkler,” I said.

  Her eyes whipped up to mine. “I can’t. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

  You should get Orin to throw you guys down there, see how you like being chucked around, Pete said.

  I glanced down at him and he stared up at me with a wide honey badger grin.

  He wasn’t wrong. There was an opening about twenty feet out from the mausoleum edge.

  “I’m going to regret this,” I muttered. “Orin, can you throw me and Wally out there?”

  Orin grinned. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  He took hold of me by my forearms and spun. Like he was going to throw a hammer in the Olympics. My bitten arm did not like his grip, but there was nothing for it, I had to go through with this.

  Sweet baby Jesus, this was a bad idea.

  I swallowed hard with the first rotation, and then he let me go and I was flying through the air, seeing the dead flash below me, their arms raised like I was at a rave and about to crowd surf. It wasn’t so bad, not really.

  That’s the last thought that rolled through me right before I smashed into a grave stone.

  Head first.

  Chapter 5

  My first thought as I came to was that I didn’t have a dog, so how could a dog be pulling on my leg and my hand at the same time?

  My second thought was that the dog would need to have two mouths.

  My third was much clearer as I remembered my flight via Orin’s throw over the zombies’ heads as they reached for me right before I hit the gravestone. “You did that on purpose, Orin!” I managed to open my eyes just as Wally and Orin landed beside me, her cradled in the curve of one of his arms.

  I was dragged backward, a low growl reaching my ears. Maybe it was a dog. The pounding in my head told me just how hard I’d hit that rock.

  Gravestone. We were in a graveyard with zombies and a necromancer set on killing us.

  “Kill our best chance at survival? I think not,” Orin said. “You are more solid than I realized. I couldn’t throw you as far as I thought. And I carried Wally so as not to break her.”

  I lifted my head to see a hunched-over zombie with my foot and boot in its mouth, its clawed fingers digging into the leather sole. I jerked my knee toward me, yanking the zombie closer, then got my foot free and booted the undead thing in the head. It fell onto its back and let out a low groan that sounded suspiciously like “Shiiiiiiiiiiit.”

  Orin slashed at the zombie attached to my right hand. Its head rolled off, but the hands still reached for us.

  I pushed to my feet, Wally helping to steady me. The second she touched my skin, the zombies lit up like fireflies. A steady pulse of green was all around us, the source drawing closer.

  “Go, go! He’s making his move!” I yelled at Orin.

  He ran ahead of us, and Wally and I followed, her right hand in my left.

  A sharp warning spun me to the left as a zombie launched straight at Wally, teeth first, eyes missing from its skull, long stringy hair in patches, then more solid, the skin healing as I saw the person as they were before they died.

  Even though I saw it differently hanging onto Wally, the thick stench of rotting flesh tickled the back of my throat. Keeping Wally behind me, I gritted my teeth and pinched my lips against the stench, then swung my blade. The knife cut directly across the zombie’s neck, through the soft flesh and partially decomposed bone with an ease that surprised me. The head rolled from the shoulders and plopped to the ground, teeth and jaws still snapping.

  The arms of the zombie reached for me and I shoved it back, knocking it to the ground.

  I pushed another zombie
back. We couldn’t slow down, not if we were going to make it to the necromancer. Not if we were going to take even a portion of the chance Wally’s sight gave us.

  The air around us tingled, the smell of ozone cutting it just before a flash of lightning touched down to our right, sending the zombies back a good forty feet. I glanced back over my shoulder to see Ethan waving that boom stick of his around, lightning snapping down with each wave.

  Another burst of lightning to our left, and one right in front of us, and the path was as clear as we were going to get it. I grabbed Wally and swung her up onto my back. My arm burned where I’d been bitten, and I could feel an infection growing there, spreading up and down in pulses.

  Not good. We had to end this as fast as we could.

  I tucked in close to Orin and let him clear the remaining zombies in front of us.

  “We’re here.” He slowed. “I—” He swallowed hard. “I think it was a bad idea to bring me.”

  Wally let out a low groan. “No, oh no!”

  “Oh no what?” I yelled. “What are you two not telling me?”

  Wally slid from my back as Orin turned to face us. His eyes were still dark, but through my connection to Wally, I could see the green glow blooming in their depths. The other necromancer had him in his grasp. “Oh crap, are you kidding me? Tell me this is a really bad joke!”

  Orin lunged at me and then stopped and shook his head. “I’m trying, I’m trying to fight him.”

  “Wally, you’ve got to push back!” I said as I shoved Orin back. “You’ve got to!”

  “I know,” she said. “But the odds of me being able to beat him—”

  “The odds are bull!” I snapped. “You have to beat him, Wally. No more odds, no more statistics. Embrace what you are, or we are all going to die! You are stronger than you know. You have to believe that!”

  I danced away from Orin, trying to keep the zombies shambling our way in sight at the same time. It struck me, not for the first time, that none of the zombies had been using the abilities they’d had in life.

  Almost on cue, the air echoed with a boom, a rumble of rocks and stone. I whipped around to see the mausoleum going down, magic circling around it that wasn’t Ethan’s.

  “Wally, now!” I put all the command I could into my voice, and she cried out as if I’d hit her.

  Orin jumped on me and we went to the ground. I rolled with him until I was on top, pinning him down, my knees on his arms and my hands free.

  Wally stood in front of the necromancer, her arms spread wide. “I can’t let you hurt my friends.”

  The necromancer let out a long, low laugh, and I couldn’t help but stare. He was wearing a dark gray robe, and his long beard and hair were the same gray. His mouth and eyes had lines that suggested not laughter, but cruelty. There would be no begging or bargaining with this one. He arched both brows at Wally. “You are a child from a blood line that is known for being weak. For letting your heart rule your power. I see it in you, a soft color. Weak. Dilute. You cannot stop me.”

  Orin tried to buck me off, and I punched him in the side of the head, knocking him out. “Sorry.”

  His eyes rolled and I leapt off him, heading for Wally. But my back had been to the zombies, and several of them grabbed me from behind. Before I knew it, my limbs had been stretched out like I was on a drying rack.

  Wally’s head dropped and a soft sob tore out of her that I could just barely hear. This was it, she would either beat him or I’d be torn apart. We’d all die.

  “He’s wrong, Wally! He’s so wrong! I’m here for my family—I’ve only fought like I have because of love! We’re a family now, too, Wally, and you damn well know it! We need you to dig deep like you’ve never dug before.”

  Her shoulders shook and she slowly turned her face to me, tears streaking her cheeks. “I’m so afraid. I don’t want to be like him.”

  The zombies pulled, and the muscles and tendons in my limbs shrieked. I tipped my head back and screamed.

  There was a clatter and the zombies released me as a snarl rent the air. I’d never been so happy to see a honey badger in my life. Pete ripped through the zombies’ legs, sending them flying, and I hit the ground, my joints feeling loose. Wobbly.

  Pete slammed into Wally’s legs. Tell her she can do this, I believe in her!

  “Pete believes in you, Wally. You can do this!”

  Ethan fell next to me, shooting backward. “Wally, even I believe you can do this. Your family isn’t weak, or I wouldn’t have let you stay on this team!”

  Orin groaned. “Me too.”

  Wally lifted her hands, her breath coming in huge gulps, her chest heaving, and I watched as the pink glow suffused her body and jumped from Pete, to me, to Orin, and even Ethan.

  “I won’t let you hurt my friends,” she said. The green energy from the other necromancer pulsed as he laughed.

  “You are untrained. You can’t beat me.”

  “You don’t need training to have heart,” I said. “To have the grit to see this through. You just do it.”

  Nice, now we’re a Nike commercial? Pete said.

  Wally smiled, as if she’d heard him too. “Yeah. I can beat you. For my friends.”

  There was a moment of complete and utter silence and then light erupted from her, blasting into the zombies and knocking the other necromancer off his feet.

  I wasn’t sure what the others saw, but to me, Wally looked like she was on fire, the magic flickering up around her, protecting her as she walked toward the other necromancer. Each zombie she touched sighed and slid down into the ground.

  “Thaaaank youuuuuu.”

  Wally stood over the necromancer. “Nobody hurts my friends. Nobody hurts my family.”

  “This is impossible.” His eyes were wide. “Impossible.”

  I stood and made my way to Wally’s side. “Not a word we know.” With a swift move, I bent and slammed the butt of my knife into his skull.

  His eyes rolled back, and he slumped to the ground.

  The remainder of the zombies sunk back into the earth, one by one.

  I took a few steps back. “Well done, Wally, well done.”

  Her eyes were shining, and a grin trembled on her lips. “I’m not useless.”

  “Nope.” I grinned back, my own eyes stupidly full. “Not for a second did I ever believe that.”

  Knew what you were made of all along, Pete said.

  Wally bent and scooped him into her arms, squeezing him. “Thank you. All of you.”

  Ethan grunted something and stood, holding a hand out to Orin. The vampire blew out a breath as he rose, his eyes his own. He gave a full-body shudder. “That’s not allowed, you know. Necromancers taking over vampires.”

  Wally nodded. “I know. He was not a good necromancer.”

  “What do we do with him?” Ethan asked. “I mean, we can’t kill him.”

  I arched an eyebrow, still breathing hard, my body shaking from the beating it had taken. “What do you think he was going to do to us? Take us out shopping for new clothes and lunch at Mickey D’s?”

  They all looked at me. Of course, they did—I was the killer. And I didn’t particularly feel bad about killing someone who’d been set on us. But he was knocked out.

  “We’re going to see vampires at some point, right?” I let the idea tumble out of my mouth. “What if we hand him over, like an offering of sorts? They’d believe you, Orin, right? If you told them what he’d done?”

  Orin’s face slowly transformed into a wide grin that flashed his fangs. “Oh, they would love that. Yes, let’s take him along.”

  And just like that our five turned into six, although number six was, to be fair, bound and gagged with Ethan’s magic. He kept the necromancer in front of him, kind of a human shield as we made our way out of the graveyard. With the necromancer muzzled, we could see the exit clear as day.

  “He had a spell with him,” Ethan said. “To cloak the exit.”

  Wally shook her head, a frown
creasing her eyebrows. “That means this was more than just a necromancer trying to kill us. Someone from the House of Wonder must have given him that spell.”

  “They weren’t really out to kill us, to be fair,” Orin pointed out. “Just Wild. We were collateral damage.”

  I looked back once we reached the gate. The graves were silent, quiet…and a figure stood among them. My heart picked up speed as I watched Tommy staring at us. His arm was twisted where I’d broken it, but his eyes…his eyes were his own.

  He tipped his head to me, and when he lifted it, he mouthed two words. Keep fighting.

  My heart beat so hard, I thought it would leap out of my chest. I glanced at Wally, to ask her if she was holding him up, and then back to Tommy, only he was gone. Back into the grave he’d been assigned.

  And what about Rory? I knew that he was gone—there was no surviving the way the zombies had taken him down—but there was no sign of a body.

  I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep the sob back. I was not a crier. I usually didn’t give myself over to my emotions, but seeing Tommy and losing Rory…it wasn’t just losing him. It was losing Tommy all over again. Losing my mom.

  Three of the most important people in my life were gone, their lives blown out like candles. I drew a slow breath and nodded. “Let’s go.”

  This trial wasn’t done, and if the first test was any indication, I needed to keep my crap together. When we were out, when I was in the shower washing away the dirt and blood, then I could let the tears fall, then I would sob my heart out. But not before. Not while we still had dangers to face.

  The moment we stepped out of the graveyard, the moon broke through the clouds, illuminating what we faced next.

  I held my arm where the bite throbbed. My head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and a quick glance at the wound told me what I’d already known. Red lines raced across my skin, angry and deep. A serious infection from the zombie bite, one that was growing at a speed that was far from normal.

  “We need to hurry,” I said, and even to my own ears the words were sloppy, as if I’d gotten into Dad’s moonshine.