Necromancer Awakening

by Nat Russo

  Lamil looked Nicolas up and down. “When you find your cet, you will find your direction. You cannot have one without the other.”

  Nicolas rolled his eyes.

  “Do not take these words lightly, for I do not offer them lightly. I can teach you more about necromancy than you have imagined possible. But I cannot teach you anything if you are unwilling to learn.”

  “I want nothing more than—”

  “Your impatience is a form of unwillingness. To be impatient, by definition, is to be unwilling to suffer delay. But wisdom requires delay, for wisdom is a thing that takes time to acquire. And knowledge in the absence of wisdom is dangerous.”

  That last sentence was almost verbatim what Mujahid had said. He looked away, thinking about the first day he had spent in Paradise, and wondered if he would ever be powerful enough to get back home.

  Lamil chuckled and said “Too much too soon is not a good thing.”

  Nicolas’s head snapped back toward Lamil, and his heart raced. This was more than a coincidence.

  “Of course it is no coincidence,” Lamil said.

  So that was his trick. Lamil was using the strands of energy to read his thoughts.

  “The Mukhtaar Lords were among my finest students.”

  “You’re more powerful than they are?”

  Lamil harrumphed. “Your question betrays your ignorance. I do not offer power…not in the way you expect. I offer a journey towards wisdom.”

  Lamil raised his hands and spread his webbed fingers in front of Nicolas’s face. “Now, in order to reach a destination, one must first know one’s starting point. I am going to delve into your mind to see how much of the art you possess, and how much you are capable of possessing.”

  Nicolas’s neck shook with an involuntary spasm as the probing energy dove deeper into his mind. Strands of energy intertwined themselves around his symbols of power and probed the depth of his energy well.

  “You have a basic understanding of the source of your power, but not its purpose,” Lamil said.

  The energy strands grew tighter and dissolved into the symbols of power, and images ran through Nicolas’s mind. They resolved into a single image, repeated over and over—the entrance to his hall of power.

  A strand of energy touched the white door, entered it and recoiled away from it. When it entered the black door an image of Kaitlyn appeared, and Lamil inhaled.

  He tilted his head. “You have come into the second tier of your power.” Lamil tilted his head to the opposite side. “Now…let’s have a look at what you may be capable of.”

  The strands reached deeper, opening door after door in the hall of power. Every time a new door opened Kaitlyn appeared for just a moment before dissolving into mist. Deeper and deeper the energy probed, and Lamil’s hand trembled, yet the energy delved deeper still, racing through rooms too quickly for Nicolas to keep track. Again he heard Lamil inhale.

  “Potential runs deep. You have as many halls as a Mukhtaar—wait…there is another.”

  The probing strands reached a large, circular room in Nicolas’s mind. Multiple black doors dotted the room…too many to count. This was something different, and, judging by Lamil’s reaction, unexpected.

  The room was a hollow, tubular column climbing to a height beyond the limits of his vision, ringed with black doors stacked one on top of the other that reached up into a black, starless sky.

  There was a presence in the room he hadn’t noticed before, and he spun around to see what it was.

  Kaitlyn stood no more than two feet away, holding a rose and smiling her infectious smile. He reached out to touch her, but she dissolved into wispy strands of cloud that rose up through the hollow column and became one with the starless sky.

  Lamil pulled his hand away and he circled Nicolas, as if wanting to see him from every angle.

  He might not be able to read the expression on Lamil’s face, but he could see the siek was shaken. And the siek wasn’t the only one. What in blazes was Kaitlyn doing there?

  Lamil completed the full circle and stopped.

  “I need time to meditate on what I have just seen,” Lamil said. “There are things I do not understand about your pathways…and that is saying something. I will seek the High Priest’s council. Let us continue your studies tomorrow. You will train with me. The formations are for cichlos, not human.”

  Nicolas looked down.

  “Learn to develop your patience. We have a long journey ahead of us.” Lamil nodded to a nearby student. “Take Nicolas to the sleeping dome.”

  The student bowed and led Nicolas from the dome.

  Nicolas couldn’t help wondering what Kaitlyn had to do with his hall of power.

  “Learn anything useful, human sab?”

  The voice surprised Nicolas as he left the dome. He was expecting to find Jurn waiting for him, but instead he saw a red-skinned cichlos wearing the white cowl of a student, leaning against the archway that led into the dome. The cichlos was standing in such a way that the left side of his face was hidden from view. His right eye, however, was staring straight at Nicolas.

  “Nicolas. The name’s Nicolas. Not human, or sab, or…whatever the hell the cichlos equivalent of dumbass is. Got it? Nic…o…las.”

  The cichlos made an unfamiliar noise and turned away from the arch. When the left side of his face came into view, Nicolas took a step back. The fish man’s left eye was completely black, as if the pupil had dilated and remained that way. It was hard to tell with the cichlos, but the skin surrounding the black eye looked burned, as if the entire side of his face had been engulfed in flame at some point. Nicolas couldn’t stop staring at the scars.

  The cichlos’s right eye crossed to the left, as if trying to see what Nicolas was staring at.

  Nicolas realized what he was doing and looked down.

  “You don’t look so pretty to us either, you know,” the cichlos said.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

  “Personally, I find it hard to believe you’re the one he’s been waiting for. You’re not even one of us.”

  This was getting old. “We now continue with the verbal abuse portion of the program, I see. It doesn’t have quite the effect you’re going for when you do it all the time, you know. Someone should teach you people about that.”

  “Toridyn,” the cichlos said.

  Nicolas laughed. “And there it is. The cichlos word for dumbass. I knew we’d get there eventually.”

  “Toridyn is the cichlos word for my name, human…I mean…Nicolas.”

  Ahh hell. I am a dumbass.

  “You haven’t been treated well by us,” Toridyn said. “I understand. But we’re not all like Jurn. Few of us are.” He paused when Nicolas didn’t react. “It was a training accident.”

  “Jurn was an accident? That explains some things.”

  Toridyn made a noise like a chuckle. “Not Jurn. My face. You were curious. About a year ago, I conjured an energy sphere and something went wrong. It blew up, I cried like a hatchling, and now I have this to remind me.” He pointed to his left eye.

  “I didn’t mean to pry.”

  “Why wouldn’t you be curious? Even my own people stare at me from time to time.”

  “Well, they don’t seem like the most sensitive bunch.”

  “And the best part is I’m not even supposed to be here.”

  “I know the feeling. So how’d you get trapped here?”

  “It’s a sad story.”

  “Well the universe seems to think I’ve been too happy lately. I could use a little more depression in my life.”

  Toridyn looked away as if considering something, and then he took a step toward Nicolas.

  “I wanted to work with the chimeramancers, and then the stupid skull dreams started,” Toridyn said. He spoke with animated gestures, and his voice grew excited.

  “Excuse me…the whatmancers now?”

  “The grey cowls…never mind that. My point is once the skull dreams start, it
’s all over. No one cares what you want anymore. It’s all sab this and priestly caste that. And don’t even get me started on the prophecies. ‘You are destined for greatness, Toridyn, but your ignorance blinds you.’” He spoke the last in a fake, deep voice that sounded remarkably similar to Lamil’s.

  Nicolas let a small laugh escape before he realized it. This was incredible. Toridyn was just like him.

  A snapping noise caught their attention, and Nicolas turned to see one of the instructors giving Toridyn a strange look.

  “Come on,” Toridyn said. “There’ll be time for talking later. I’m supposed to show you to the sleeping dome. There isn’t really a place for you, so you’re going to have to bunk with me.”

  “Works for me.”

  Nicolas followed Toridyn toward another archway leading out of the temple dome.

  “Can I ask you a question?” Nicolas said.

  “Sure.”

  “Just what the hell is a cet, anyway?”

  Toridyn chuckled and led him into the dormitory.

  Nicolas lost track of the days after eight weeks of training, and every morning was the same—a breakfast of raw fish and water, an hour of meditation, and several hours training with the siek. Meal times were difficult for him, but hanging out with Toridyn helped.

  The cichlos students lived in pods, small rooms made from barrier material that were large enough for five or six students, and these pods were stacked from floor to ceiling around the dome, leaving a large common area in the center. Ladders hung from pod entrances and small platforms. In a way, it reminded Nicolas of Montezuma’s Castle in Arizona. He’d gone there with Dr. Murray on their Rocky Mountain trip.

  There was something disturbing about Aquonome, however. Just like in Paradise and Caspardis, there were no children here…or hatchlings, as the Cichlos called them.

  He got up earlier than usual to watch an orb ritual in the temple. Cichlos would bring small objects to a temple priest, who would walk behind the orb for a few moments, then bring the object back. Nicolas was just as confused as the first time he’d seen it. After a few minutes staring at the murals on the dome ceiling and the strange sparkles on the floor, he headed back to his dorm to eat.

  He sat on a bench, which Toridyn had fashioned for him out of barrier magic, and stared at his breakfast plate, wishing he had some tartar sauce. He took a bite of the disgusting fish. They didn’t even clean it for him. They just tossed it on a table, fresh from the lake, and expected him to dig in, fins and all. The one time he asked to cook it they looked at him like he’d farted in church.

  He heard a noise at the entrance to the room they shared and assumed his friend had come to join him as usual.

  “Hey Tor,” Nicolas said without looking up.

  “Siek Lamil wishes to see you now,” Jurn said.

  “Tell him I’m on my way.”

  Jurn turned Nicolas’s plate over and the fish, guts and all, landed in Nicolas’s lap.

  Nicolas tried to stand but ropes of energy bound him to his seat.

  “Be thankful the siek warned me not to harm you.”

  Jurn left, and as he disappeared into the temple the ropes of energy dissolved and Nicolas was free again.

  Nicolas picked pieces of fish off his robes, telling himself Jurn wouldn’t be so lucky next time. He took one of the less disgusting pieces and swallowed it. He’d need more fuel for two extra hours of training today.

  Toridyn’s head peeked around the corner into the room. “Cheerful make a special trip to lighten your mood?” Toridyn said.

  Nicolas had taken to calling Jurn “Cheerful” in the preceding weeks, and Toridyn was making a habit out of copying his speech patterns.

  “Yeah, right,” Nicolas said. “I better not keep the siek waiting.”

  Toridyn grabbed a towel from beside his bed and began brushing Nicolas off.

  “This should mask some of the smell,” Toridyn said. “Just remember Cheerful’s still out there somewhere. Try not to piss on him.”

  Nicolas was shocked for a moment until he realized what Toridyn was trying to say.

  “Piss him off, Tor. Try not to piss him off.”

  Toridyn made a strange face. “But that makes no sense.”

  Nicolas smiled as he stood up and made his way out across the temple and into the training dome.

  The familiar tendrils of energy entered his mind when he stepped into the training dome. He looked around for Siek Lamil and saw him standing at the front of the room, waving him over.

  Nicolas had learned to see subtle differences in cichlos facial expressions. But, as always, Siek Lamil was inscrutable.

  “Another day passes, and yet you remain ignorant,” Lamil said.

  “I’m sorry,” Nicolas said. “I’m trying—”

  Lamil lifted his hand. “I accuse you of nothing. Once more you see blame where it does not exist. A necromancer must learn the proper purpose of blame, for blame can be a destructive force as much as a positive one.”

  “But our job is judging people, ain’t it? How can we do that if we can’t blame them for the things they’ve done?”

  Lamil rotated his eyes independently of one another in a gesture Nicolas had learned to interpret as deep consideration. After a brief pause, his eyes came back to rest on Nicolas.

  “What is the Prime Duty of a necromancer?” Lamil said.

  “Not this again.”

  “What is the Prime Duty of a necromancer?”

  Nicolas knew the siek wouldn’t stop until he received an answer.

  “The Prime Duty of a necromancer,” Nicolas said, “is to raise the dead and help them achieve purification.”

  “Correct,” Lamil said. “Tell me where the Prime Duty instructs us to place blame on our penitents.”

  Nicolas squinted. He was sure the siek was leading him into another verbal trap. “Nowhere?”

  “Is that a question or a statement?”

  “Statement.”

  “Correct again,” Lamil said. He paced for a moment, keeping one eye on Nicolas and another on one of the training formations. “Blame should never be wielded by a necromancer in the course of purification. It does no good to place blame on someone for the evil they commit.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. We’re supposed to make them understand the consequences of the bad things they did when they were alive, right? Don’t we have to hold them responsible?”

  “What is the Prime Duty of a necromancer?”

  “Oh my god! What…the frick…was wrong with my question?”

  “What is the Prime Duty of a necromancer?” The siek never raised his voice or sounded flustered.

  Nicolas took a moment to control his frustration. He’d get nowhere fighting Siek Lamil’s process. “The Prime Duty of a necromancer is to raise the dead and help them achieve purification.”

  “Correct. Now tell me where in the Prime Duty it instructs us to place blame.”

  “Nowhere, Siek.”

  “Correct again. When one person blames another, the accused raises a wall around their mind, rendering it impossible for them to be objective. They cannot step outside of themselves and gain a different perspective, because they have walled themselves up within their own justifications. To be purified the dead must accuse themselves. The necromancer is their guide, not their judge. We lead the dead on a journey through their own lives until they judge themselves. It is the only path to true purification.”

  He’d heard this before, in different words, but something struck a chord this time. Whenever it happened to him, because of an overdue assignment, or forgetting something Kait had told him, he’d usually spend more time trying to explain himself than understanding what he did wrong.

  “Now,” Lamil said. “Tell me the First Law of Necromancy.”

  Nicolas tried to recall the words Lamil taught him a few days earlier.

  “Death is a…wait,” Nicolas said, bringing his fist up to his forehead. When the words came to him he snapped his finge
r. “Death is an extension of life.”

  “Correct,” Lamil said. “The First Law is why I brought you here early.” Lamil reached into his voluminous shirt and took out a sphere that looked like a smaller version of an orb of power. When he placed it on the ground between them Nicolas felt a trickle of necropotency.

  “Touch the power within the siborum,” Lamil said. “Draw it in.”

  These siborum things must be the cause of the power surge he felt every time he got close to a cichlos necromancer.

  He reached out with his mind and sensed a small source of power. It was faint, but he knew he could touch it. He focused and allowed the power to fill his energy well.

  “Very good,” Lamil said. “You have transferred power from the siborum to your mind. Intuitively, I might add. Now, release the power and repeat.”

  Again Nicolas reached out and touched the small power source. It was easier this time.

  “Continue,” Lamil said. “But this time, I want you to turn away from the siborum.”

  Nicolas turned and drew the power in once more. If the siek was expecting it to be more difficult because he was facing away from it, he must be surprised.

  “Continue,” Lamil said.

  Nicolas repeated the process several more times, and each time it took less effort. Confident in his newfound ability, he emptied himself of power and reached out to touch the siborum one last time.

  Nothing happened.

  He must be getting overconfident. He calmed himself and reached out once more, prepared to feel the flow of power enter his well.

  Nothing happened again.

  “Turn around,” Lamil said.

  Nicolas turned and saw Lamil holding the siborum in his hands. Goose bumps prickled at Nicolas’s mind, telling him the siek was manipulating necropotency. The siborum started glowing, and after a moment it popped and separated into two hemispheres.

  “What is the First Law of Necromancy?” Lamil asked.

  “Death is an extension of Life.”

  “Correct,” Lamil said. “Behold Life.” He took the top half of the siborum away and showed Nicolas the bottom.

  Resting within the hemisphere was a small flower, dried and shriveled, as if it had been dead for some time.