The Necromancer's Seduction

by Mimi Sebastian

  His anger seared me, but it wasn’t anger at Sybil. It was anger at his own lack of power, his inability to right a wrong. I still didn’t understand the depth of his despair, but I felt it, pure and raw, tearing at my insides. No wonder he’d been angry at being awakened from death. Does he feel this every day?

  “Fuck you,” he said. Then he doubled over, his pain pummeling me through the bond. “She’s trying to bind me,” he said, words forced through clenched teeth.

  Her spell reached out to me, wrapping me inside and out. Adam pulled at our bond, seeking more power to fight her. I channeled power to him, squeezing it out. I grabbed the stair rail, guiding myself to the floor where I curled around my stomach. He’d sucked so much power that I felt as if my body had imploded. It was almost too much.

  I slapped my cheeks to keep from fainting, using the pain to dispel the onset of panic. My body shook, a crazy shake that rattled my eyeballs. Adam’s shout was followed by a crash.

  “Sorry. Are you okay?” Adam crouched beside me. He held a miniature surfboard carved from wood and painted in red and black stripes. His charm?

  I gasped as if I’d been holding my breath underwater for way too long. “What was that?”

  “I used a deflection spell, and she knocked over my table. Made a mess, but at least she’s gone.”

  I laughed and couldn’t stop, didn’t want to stop, letting the laughter loosen my tight nerves.

  “What?” he asked.

  I waved my hand at his messy apartment. “She made a mess? Really?”

  After a few more breaths, some of my strength returned. “What’s Sybil’s obsession with you?”

  “She wants some of my spells.”

  “The mind control ones?”

  “Kara told you?”

  I nodded and opened my mouth to ask him about Jenna when he cut me off. “I don’t want to talk about it. Just leave it alone.” He tightened his grip on the surfboard.

  “Was Sybil waiting for you?”

  “She arrived just as I was leaving the apartment. Apparently, after I died and the coven had my body, she’d cast a homing device on me. When she showed up, I realized what she’d done and removed it with a spell.”

  “All this time she’s been tracking you? At my house?” Anger heated my face at the thought of her spying on Adam and me.

  “It doesn’t work quite like that. The homing spell requires a specific purpose. She probably programmed it to tell her when I showed up in the vicinity of my apartment.”

  “We have to tell Kara about this later.”

  He pinched his lips. “Fine.”

  We left his apartment on high alert in case Sybil had decided for another go around, only relaxing after traversing the couple of blocks to catch the train bound for the Tenderloin. After the ten-minute ride, we climbed out of the BART station. I cringed each time my shoes made that schlip, schlip sound as they lifted off the grime that coated the stairs.

  At the next block, we swerved around a bag lady hunched over a shopping cart. A trembling Chihuahua yipped at us from inside the cart, probably to guard their spot in line for the soup kitchen. Despite the unsavory street corner deals and side-glances thrown our way, I enjoyed the raw humanity on display. We turned down another street and were greeted by an array of art galleries displaying the latest fringe art, seedy strip clubs, and liquor stores advertising deals in English, Spanish, Vietnamese, and Chinese on their smudged windows.

  “Are you the resident expert necro?” Adam asked.

  “Hardly. You’re my first.” I smiled at my own joke, but it only fetched an eye roll from Adam. “It’s been a while since I used my powers.”

  “We talking a year?”

  “Longer.”

  “Great. I get the amateur. Figures.”

  “I raised you. My grandmother used to tell me I had natural talent for necromancy.”

  “Did she mentor you?”

  “More like a professor. She’d even quiz me. She was very enthusiastic.”

  Before I’d disavowed my necromancy, she’d tossed book after book at me, lecturing that knowledge was the necromancer’s most powerful resource. A few times, she took me with her to reanimate corpses. We always laid them back down to rest after getting what information we needed. Her enthusiasm was palpable, even for the smallest of tasks. So was mine. When I helped her with raisings, it was easy, practically effortless, and very exciting. The high from wielding power over death invigorated us both.

  “What happened?” asked Adam.

  “Shit happened.”

  We reached my destination a block farther, a Vietnamese grocery store next to a banh mi eatery. I directed Adam into the grocery store, my senses immediately assaulted by the briny smell of sea animals and the bright greens and reds of the stacked Japanese soda cans. We weaved through the cramped aisles, arriving at the frozen section where I found my sticky buns.

  Adam was eyeing a bag of frozen squid, disgust crunching his nose. “Even when I ate, I never liked gooey animals.”

  “You, a surfer, not liking seafood?” The lines of his face tightened. Oops. He didn’t know I had rifled through his things. I gave him a side-glance.

  “So what else did Kara tell you about me?”

  I closed the freezer’s door and turned to him. I wasn’t going to lie, not when I needed his trust. “She didn’t tell me about the surfing. I saw a picture at your place of you on the beach. We were looking for your spell book. Sorry.”

  His face darkened, and his anger threaded through my muscles, tightening them, especially the ones around my throat.

  “I stopped surfing a long time ago.” He spun on his heel and headed for the exit. I clasped my hand around my throat and coughed. Shit. He had almost choked me through the bond. Did he even know what he’d done, or was it some deadly reflex? I paid for my food, went outside, and found him a block away, facing the entrance to an alley blocked off by boards of splintered wood. He kicked in one of the boards, and it cracked in half with a loud crunch. I darted my head around. “Jesus, what are you doing?”

  He stepped into the alley, and I followed him, clutching his arm when he failed to respond. He swung around and slammed me against the brick wall, pinning me with a hand on my chest. His breaths came hard, and his eyes widened and glazed over in a frightening ecstasy. “Death. Blood. It’s here, and I need it.”

  Oh shit. What do I do? Give him your blood. The thought surged quickly, and I shoved it aside. I reached out to him through the bond, but his hunger blocked me. “Stop. You can fight this,” I said. My head hurt where it had banged against the wall, and he pressed harder on my chest, stifling my breathing. He snarled and looked at me with contempt.

  “It’s either you or the corpse,” he said, his voice so cruel, so distant from the breezy California beach boy. My monster that I can’t contain. And what have I become?

  I grasped his wrist and tried to wrench it off me. “Go,” I said.

  He let go and stalked into the shadows, and I half ran, half walked out of the alley and leaned against the wall of the neighboring single room occupancy hotel, hugging myself. The body in the alley was already dead. I knew it, could sense it, but it didn’t make the whole scene any less repulsive. My breath shuddered out of my aching chest.

  Adam emerged, passed me, and headed for the BART. I trailed after him. When we approached the entrance, I noticed a young guy staring at us, mid-twenties, his clothes a throwback to early eighties goth. His mouth twisted into a sneer, but it was his eyes, feverish against his sepulchral face, that made my skin crawl. I bumped Adam with my elbow and motioned toward the guy with a nod. Adam’s expression didn’t change, but he took my elbow and propelled me down the stairs.

  “Adam?”

  “Just keep moving.” His grip was firm, but not alarming, and I nudged the bond and found it calm. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t escaping one monster only to wind up in the hands of another. We reached the second flight of stairs when the sound of sticky steps behind us
sent a burst of nervous adrenaline through my body. Adam pushed me forward, increasing our pace.

  I didn’t dare look back to see our pursuer. I didn’t need the visual. My mind did a fine job by itself, conjuring a grotesque zombie or ferocious demon tailing us with rabid intent. And these days, reality had exceeded any terror I could imagine.

  We entered the main lobby, and I noticed the BART was mysteriously devoid of travelers in cliché horror movie fashion. Somehow the deserted polished floors and glare of florescent lights gave a post-apocalyptic sheen to the metro, more eerie than the dark, grimy subways of places like New York City.

  Tickets in hand, we squeezed through the turnstile, footsteps still echoing behind us. We sprinted down another flight of stairs to the train platform. We heard the creak of the turnstile flaps opening and closing behind us. My ears suddenly felt bionic, attuned to every whisper, shuffle, snarl, and other microscopic sound. I could have predicted no train upon reaching the platform, but at least a couple of people loitered in wait with us. I braved a glance down the platform corridor and exhaled my relief to find it empty. I peeked down the tunnel and saw the distant headlights of an approaching train. Adam continued to survey the platform for signs of our supposed pursuer, his mouth drawn in a straight line. Did we imagine him? We never actually saw him chasing us. Have I become that paranoid?

  The train stopped in front of us, and we both moved toward the doors before they even opened. When we sat down in the train, I scanned the car and had finally leaned against the seat back when my blood froze. On the platform, visible through the smudged windows of the train, was Goth Boy staring at us with lunatic eyes, licking his fingers with his lips. The train lurched forward and left him smiling at us.

  “I remember him,” Adam said. “He was present when I was killed.”

  I swallowed hard. “Do you remember anything else?”

  “No, but the body in the alley—” He paused and looked out at the dark tunnel rushing by in a turbid blur. “That dude left the body. He’s a revenant.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  It took me a good portion of our ride to dispel the shock of his revelation. It’s one thing to deal with zombies, but this rogue necromancer had created a revenant, confirming he wielded a respectable level of power. Fuck me.

  The train sped up, causing me to bump Adam’s shoulder. I flinched involuntarily.

  “Don’t worry. I didn’t feed off his scraps,” Adam said. “Even I have my standards.”

  “Are you . . .?” I paused. How do I ask if he needs to feed on flesh? He seemed to understand, thankfully.

  “The craving has passed,” he said.

  When I arrived home, I placed a three-way to Kara and Ewan to tell them what had happened. Adam returned to the Tenderloin to see if he could locate our newly discovered revenant. I also suspect he wanted to avoid conversation with both Kara and me.

  I tossed the vegetables in my wok and spoke with my cell lodged between my cheek and shoulder. “No, I don’t need protection,” I said to Ewan for the third time, although I almost agreed on his second try. The knowledge that another necromancer is out there with the ability to make revenants had us all on edge.

  “So you’re sure he’s not supernatural?” I asked.

  “Based on the description you gave us, he’s not anyone I know,” Ewan answered, followed by an affirmative grunt from Kara.

  “Uh, there’s something else,” I said.

  The line went quiet, then Kara’s voice cracked. “After near death in the demon realm and an encounter with a revenant, there’s something else? Man, you’ve gone from cloistered professor to danger girl. I’m jealous.”

  “Be happy to switch places.” I told them about Sybil.

  “That bitch,” Kara said. “I’ll tell Matilda.”

  “Will she do something?”

  “I don’t know. Sybil has supporters in the circle. Her family has influence. I think Matilda wants to wait for the right moment to take her down, and I’m not sure this is it.”

  “Maybe Malthus can throw his demon weight around the circle?” I asked.

  “The witches don’t give a shit about his weight, but, maybe. Ewan?”

  “Malthus needs to know about this, but you’re right. I don’t think he’ll get involved,” he said.

  “She can’t get away with this,” I said.

  “The coven is not going to want to stir the cauldron over this. No one was hurt. Everyone wants to end this business with the murders and revenants without creating a bigger mess.”

  “It’s not fair to Adam.”

  “Adam made his bed, rumpled it, then stained the mattress,” Kara said.

  I’d decided not to fill them in on the incident with Adam and the body. Both Kara and Ewan had full control over their power, and I didn’t want to appear the nutty necro who couldn’t handle hers.

  “Ruby, you’re too quiet,” Kara said.

  “We need to find this killer,” I said.

  “Let me send someone to watch the outside of your house,” Ewan said, his tone more insistent. I visualized the stubborn purse to his lips.

  “Fine,” I relented, spilling noodles onto the stove with my furious sautéing.

  When we hung up, I sat at the kitchen island and dug into the Pad Thai. Too much lemon grass. I sighed, put down my chopsticks and had just rested my head on my hand when a knock sounded at the door. I stared at my half eaten meal. That was fast.

  I opened the door, and Ewan strode through and loomed above me in the hallway.

  “You said you were sending someone,” I said.

  He crossed his hands in front of his chest, as if bracing for a fight. “I decided I should come over and see to your well-being personally.”

  I laughed a short, clipped laugh.

  He smiled, with his mouth only. His eyes . . . yikes. The lust emanating from them made my knees weak.

  “I bet,” I said under my breath, well aware he could hear me. I wheeled about and returned to the kitchen.

  He retreated to the study while I finished my dinner. I took my time eating, delaying the inevitable private time with Ewan. When I was done, I tossed my chopsticks in the bowl, my jumpy stomach no longer able to digest the food.

  I found him scanning the books. “Quite an interesting collection,” he said.

  The shelves were filled with books about necromancy, Greek mythology, demon compendiums, witch dictionaries, and fairy tales, both fake and real. Most had belonged to Cora, and she could have easily opened her own occult bookstore. At one time, I’d pored through the books, some worn, others new with crisp pages. Now they sat, neglected spines glaring at me. Neglected until now.

  I studied his profile and watched his strong hands bump across the spines.

  He pulled on a paperback and read the cover, raising his eyebrow. “Demons are Forever?”

  My whole face flushed. Great. “That was my grandmother’s.”

  He looked unconvinced. He flipped the book and read the back cover. “She ached for his touch, but would his sins and her distrust keep them apart forever?”

  I cursed my grandmother and swore tomorrow, first thing, I would scour every shelf and purge the study of any book back containing the words ache, touch, love, passion, tortured. If it has so much as the word like, it’s thrift store fodder.

  He turned to me, caressing me with his gaze. I blinked slowly and felt the space between us shrink. My breath grew uneven.

  “I’m going to get a glass of wine.” I turned toward the kitchen, stumbling. My knee felt much better, but the occasional twinge shot up from my kneecap.

  He followed me. “Why don’t you sit down? I can get the wine.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Have anything stronger than wine?”

  “No, I’m not a heavyweight like you demons.”

  “You know alcohol doesn’t make us drunk.”

  “Then why do you drink it?”

  He didn’t answer, just leaned against the doorfram
e, a small smile playing on his lips.

  “Anyway, no whiskey. Wine then?” I asked.

  He nodded. I scanned my impressive collection of two wine bottles and picked the Malbec. I pierced the cork with a corkscrew and twisted, driving the sharp edge into the cork. Ewan moved next to me, close enough for him to heat the air between us. My hand twisted to the right and split the cork in two.

  “Shit,” I said.

  Ewan chuckled and wrapped his hand around the bottle. The cork pieces vibrated until they popped out of the bottle, landing on the floor.

  “You’re full of little magic tricks,” I said.

  “Would you like to see more of my tricks?” he asked, his voice a deep whisper.

  I grabbed the bottle out of his hand and filled a couple of wine glasses. I was pretty sure he wasn’t talking about rabbits or top hats. “Ah, so want to go sit in the front room?”

  He didn’t answer but moved his body to let me pass.

  I plopped down on one side of the leather couch, tucking a leg underneath me, allowing the leg with my bruised knee to hang off the edge. Ewan sat on the opposite end from me, and I shifted to put more space between us. A moist breeze flowed in from the open window and brushed against my cheeks. I looked at Ewan, finding his eyes boring into mine. He fingered the top of his glass with his thumb.

  “What do you feel when we’re together, when I touch you?” His voice grew husky at the word touch. He wasn’t wasting any time. I licked my dry lips, then gulped down some wine and tried to reconnect my scattered mind.

  “Confused . . . surprised. It’s like my reaction to all of this—my involvement with the supe community. I thought I’d be uncomfortable with everything, with my powers, but it feels . . . natural, exciting even.”

  “And?” His voice was barely above a whisper, but its tone was firm, demanding.

  “So I feel the same sense of excitement and confusion when I’m with you.” I sipped on the wine, keeping the glass to my lips. “But . . .”

  “I’m a demon.”

  I blinked a few times. Before this whole mess started, that certainly would have been the major sticking point. Now? Ewan’s demon identity mattered less and less. I was interested in discovering more about the man or whatever lay beneath all the heavy layers of demon.