The Necromancer's Betrayal

by Mimi Sebastian

  “But I didn’t, and I entered a record and escaped body and mind intact.”

  He tilted his head to one side, curiosity replacing his anger. “How did you escape the record?”

  I shrugged and gave him a quick rundown of the cemetery scene, how I barely made it past the gate to emerge back in the market square where Gus waited with Kara. “Can you explain how I escaped?”

  “Death aided you. Simply put, your demon side and your necromancer power worked together to shift you out of the record into a different reality, allowing you to escape.”

  “That explains everything.” I tried to tone down the sarcasm, but it still bit the air around us.

  Malthus’s response was to smile, which made me squirm in my seat. “The Greek seer Tiresias was blind, yet he could see into the heart and mind of the universe and make predictions.” He swept his arm around the room. “External reality did not clutter his mind. I know it sounds very new age, but this is how our power works. We use it to perceive the environment with a similar inner eye.”

  I listened to him with my mouth open. I never took Malthus for a new age guru.

  “Don’t give me that look. You allow external reality and your own preconceived notions to clutter what you see. You look at a rose, see the color, maybe even look further to examine the petals, but your mind has already decided it’s a rose. You don’t bother to look closer and determine if it really is a rose or maybe something else entirely.”

  “So I was seeing my inner zombies?”

  “Not exactly, but you did look inward and perceived reality in a different manner, as shaped by your necromancer power, and manipulated it to serve your needs.”

  “Why a cemetery? Zombies? Why not Disneyland?” I’d much rather fight off ornery tourists, but instead of Disney, I got The Amityville Horror.

  “Because your demon power is driven by your necromancer power, by death . . .” He paused on the word death and his eyes seemed to focus inward. Then he blinked and they flickered back to me. “As you practice this skill, you won’t need to delve too deeply into past memories or projections like the cemetery. You’ll learn to control how you manipulate your reality. That’s not to say you still won’t have some surprises along the way.” He leaned forward in his chair. “I wish you’d let me help you, accept me in your life.”

  “If you’re looking for some after-school special reconciliation, it’s not going to happen.” My voice shook with the words. I hadn’t meant to let my emotions take over, but after zombies, demon battles, and gooey dessert, I was employing every fiber of will to keep it together.

  He gave me a confused look, obviously never having suffered through an after-school special, and I swallowed a chuckle. Since Malthus had admitted he was my grandfather, he’d allowed bits of downright human emotion to seep through his stoic exterior. It was interesting but disconcerting. I almost preferred the impassive demon I’d met just a few weeks ago.

  He straightened and recast his face into the demon-in-charge mold. That’s more like it.

  “Very well. You may not view me as your grandfather, but you must accept my authority as magistrate. Your identity as part-demon and the events with Cael have left you vulnerable. It’s important you accept my guidance and protection. Some will attempt to hurt you—the attack as you approached the portal is evidence of that,” he said, his tone deceivingly bland, and I almost thought his concern stemmed more from duty than actual emotional attachment. Regardless of the reasons, I shrugged off his warning. Misplaced confidence? I just didn’t care.

  “Everybody keeps saying others will come after me, but no one will explain why I’m suddenly public enemy number one. Why haven’t the demons sent out the troops to track down the Big Bad? Find out who killed my grandmother? I came to the demon realm to find answers because no one will explain anything about the deaths, about myself. I know, somehow, the events and killings are tied to the genocide, which you won’t explain to me.”

  “I will, but not now. Trust me.”

  Really? Was he delusional? “You have yet to convince me I can trust you.”

  A pained look flickered across his face, one he quickly replaced with a forced hardness. He remained quiet. I detected a small, almost undecipherable twitch in his right eyelid before he blinked it away. “You are unique. I was mistaken to push you too soon after your grandmother’s death. You had no time to ease into your power.”

  I gave a small, mirthless laugh. “I haven’t eased into anything in my life so far. It’s all been shock treatment. Throw me in the ice water. I understand you want to help, but I need space right now.”

  “Ewan can . . .”

  “Don’t.” I thrust my palm up and looked away. “You cannot talk to me about Ewan.”

  “I would change that situation if I could. I called upon the death pact to spare him.”

  I pictured him again in the record, standing over Ewan. “I don’t think he wanted anyone to spare him. Did it ever occur to you that you might have inflicted a worse punishment on him?”

  “He is too valuable to our race to let die. Sometimes we have to make decisions that seem wrong, but are necessary.”

  I pressed on my forehead and stood, intending to make an exit, but remembered the room had no door. I sighed audibly. “Look, I’m tired. Can you alternate reality me home?”

  He frowned and said quietly, “The time has come to face the council.”

  My stomach lurched with dread. I knew this was coming. But now? Now? This venture into Wonderland had fried my brains, and I couldn’t fathom facing a room full of presumptuous demons. They’d wanted Cael alive, not out of some sense of demon clemency, but to interrogate him, and after, I have complete confidence they would have executed him. Demon justice never ended well as Ewan’s situation proved. I ran my hand through my hair, sticky from sweat and possibly something else I refused to ponder. “Can we reschedule?” I asked, fatigue slowing my words.

  He quirked an eyebrow and maybe smiled. “‘Reschedule’ does not translate into our language. We’re waiting for them to summon us.” He ran his gaze over my clothes and frowned. “But first we must do something about your attire. Really, you must take more care with your appearance.”

  I bit back a defense of my torn and stained clothes. Even if I hadn’t just escaped a horde of zombies in a cemetery, I never managed to match the demon talent for always looking tidy and gorgeous. I was hoping my demon side would assert itself in the fashion department, but with my luck, the genes I’d inherited most likely consisted of the throwaway ones. If demons got acne, or baldness, those were certainly the ones passed on to me.

  “What do you suggest? A trip to the demon day spa?” I asked.

  “Nothing so plebian, my dear.”

  As if on cue, a female demon popped into the room, indigo fabric draped over her outstretched arms. Malthus turned his back to me, and I took the dress and changed. The material felt so soft, like a baby’s cheek. It was a vast improvement over my discarded clothes, still reeking of battle and blood. I half expected a Renaissance fair type dress, but was surprised at the sophisticated cut and way the fabric folded around my chest and waist. The female clucked, lifted the other piece of fabric looped around her arm, and wrapped it around my head in the style of a West African headdress. She exited, and I chanced a glance in a mirror, pleasantly surprised at the way the wrap secured my tangled locks.

  “Ready?” Malthus asked. At my yes, he turned and observed me with a small frown. “You’ve lost weight. You need to eat more.”

  I sighed and bit back a more sarcastic reply, but couldn’t help giving him a simple understatement. “I’ve been a little stressed lately.” I’d noticed my clothes hanging more loosely off my body, but food had turned into more of a necessity than something I gave much thought to these days.

  The air rippled, and I waited for the next
transformation. An almost transparent demon materialized, and Malthus angled his head for me to follow. We left the room—or more like it left us—and emerged in a long passageway of a grandiose building, topped by a ceiling almost too high to perceive. The passage ended at a pyramidal tower with terraces winding around the outside, similar to Sumerian ziggurats. We headed in the opposite direction from the tower, passed long passages lined with thick pillars, seemingly inspired by ancient Babylonian and Greek architecture, or more likely, the other way around.

  We stopped at an arched entry guarded by burly demons who wore only loose-fitting pants. Black tattoos spiraled out from the delicate skin around their black eyes to cover their faces and bald heads. The intricate lines swirled over their shoulders and stopped at mid-chest. They stood at stoic attention, not the least distracted by my gawking.

  Malthus urged me past the guards into a rotunda where one female and four male demons milled about. Above us, space images—a night sky, blue sky with clouds, people and places that didn’t exist in my time or consciousness—appeared and disappeared, melded into each other in some artistic planetarium display. Each image projected a sensation—a cool breeze, or brief shadow, as clouds crossed a pink-blue sky then changed to darkness.

  I recognized the sex demon, Julian, from the day Malthus had asked me to raise Adam. His robe, open at the chest, shone in a resplendent silver, and his black, slicked-back hair gleamed. He and Ewan practically snarled at each other when in close proximity. Julian loved to remind Ewan, via nasty teases, of the debt pact’s restraints. Yet, while Julian emanated a treacherous veneer, it was the woman standing next to him that commanded my attention. She sparkled from silver baubles and gems piercing her arms, chin, mouth, toes, any patch of exposed skin, which is saying a lot since her red robe didn’t cover much. Her black hair, flowing past her ass, shone in that unnatural demon sheen. I silently thanked Malthus for the gown and headdress.

  Malthus led me to a throne-like chair carved from a huge slab of granite. When I sat, Malthus placed his hand over mine, resting on the chair’s arm. He didn’t speak, but held my gaze, and a calming sensation blanketed me. I couldn’t quite decipher his expression—regret, maybe? Did Malthus ever regret anything? He removed his hand and made his way to the other end of the circle formed by the chairs, greeting all the demons on the way. He stopped in front of a demon whose hairless skin glowed with a bluish tinge, similar to the icy glaciers in the Antarctic. I caught my breath and tightened my grip on the armrest. He was the demon without eyebrows in Damon’s record, the one who’d joined his hand with Malthus’s on top of Ewan’s head. I wanted to jump up and talk to him, to Malthus, but then he turned his icy gaze to me, and I slumped back against the stone.

  A ghostly body approached and regarded me with the most startling eyes I’d ever seen. Gobs of cloud-like forms drifted across its irises in a constant flow.

  “Don’t recognize me?” the demon asked.

  Even his voice seemed to reach me from afar, but not so distant as to be unrecognizable. Xavier. Holy shit. Art connoisseur, and death demon, his power rivaled Malthus. Yet unlike Malthus, he’d adopted a low profile, managing two successful art galleries, but still interfered in supernatural affairs when it pleased him. While neither Malthus nor Ewan fully trusted him, I’d come to value his insights into my power. He took my hand and kissed it in a gesture I found oddly comforting given the ghostly shadows traveling across his eyeballs.

  The chamber quieted. I looked past Xavier and watched Ewan stride into the room, wrapped in bronze robes, as if he’d just stepped out of that painting. Even the demon council seemed awed by his grace and the sheer power flexing off his muscled body. His flowing robes and shimmering skin camouflaged him when he moved, giving him a stealth-like quality that must have served him well on the battlefield. He caught my gaze with one quick glance, but the female pincushion motioned to him, and he moved to stand next to her. She glided a finger down his cheek, her look smoldering. Ewan turned to her and gave her a small smile.

  My stomach roiled, a vertiginous churn that shot hot bile into my throat. I scanned the faces of the five demons, now all seated, with the ice demon at the apex of the circle. I knew so little about this world that colored my veins. Nothing made sense, especially my reasons for being here. I felt like the awkward high school kid who showed up at the prom to everyone’s surprise.

  After torturing myself a few moments longer at the sight of Ewan and the female, I tore my eyes away to find a different Chronicler seated just outside the circle, an open book propped by an easel in front of his seat. His broad strokes and occasional shading motions made me think he was drawing instead of writing. He was so intent on his task, he didn’t even register the creature that passed his seat. I, however, wanted to run from the room at the sight of the spiderlike thing, its translucent, thin frame carried aloft by eight thin legs. I couldn’t tell which part of my body shivered the most.

  It pranced to the center of the room. Its leg bristles rubbed against each other with a shush, shush—a cushioned rasp—the same sound made when you shaved bristly leg hair through a thick layer of cream, except shaving my legs never made me sick with fear. The worst though, the part that had me pressing hard against the back of my seat, was the multiple pinkish eyes that seemed to simultaneously glance in all directions. When it turned its twenty or so eyes on me, sweat trickled down my back. Up to this point, none of the demon creatures I’d encountered, even the frerac, seemed out of place. But this thing was beyond weird even for the demon realm. It was an aberrant concoction posing as something graceful, something angelic, and the eyes, those sick pink eyes, resembling the moldy pink that grows around tub drains, told of something sinister and gross.

  Xavier, who’d claimed the seat next to me, leaned over and spoke in a hushed tone. “That is Naala. Do you remember the statue at my gallery?”

  I gaped at Naala again. Crap. He was right. I’d seen its statue in the courtyard. “What is it?”

  “She’s a remnant of our ancient history,” he said, eyeing the creature. It was difficult to tell with his floaty eyes, but I might have caught a glimmer of cautious respect cross his face, or was it fear?

  “Why is she . . .?”

  “Ruby Montagne.”

  I turned to the glacier demon who’d halted me in mid-question, surprised at the strength of his voice at odds with his frail body. He raised a bony finger and pointed at me, regarding me with a cold severity that bordered on savagery. A light flashed behind my eyes, and the events of my final confrontation with Cael played out in my mind, not from my own memory of the event, but as if some documentary filmmaker had set up shop in my head and was filming his movie based on some poorly written, biased book. Not biased in my favor, of course.

  “Why did you kill Cael?” he asked coldly once the scene had played out. The council regarded me as one. Even Naala trained her eyes on me in an unholy synchronicity. The wicked sharp pincers circling her mouth clicked furiously.

  “I don’t know who you are and why you feel you’re in a position to interrogate me,” I said, trying hard to keep my voice even.

  Xavier smiled, but the rest of the demons didn’t alter their impassive expressions. The blue demon regarded me, flicked his eyes to Malthus then turned them back to me. “I am Ivo, the demon council leader, and I hold more than enough authority to interrogate you. You are part demon and must defend your decision to kill the necromancer, Cael.”

  I’d spent a good week or two replaying the moment when I’d killed Cael, and each time the memory grew more blurred. My power had prodded me, convinced me that Cael had to die. Despite my own misgivings, in a twisted way, it had known Cael had twined his essence with too many zombies. I had to kill the zombies to save us and in doing so, sealed Cael’s fate. I clung desperately to that conclusion, especially since it allowed me to put away the Xanax. I refused to let my mind wander into darker theori
es regarding my power and Cael’s death. I faced Ivo, who waited impatiently for my response. “I killed Cael to protect myself, the witch Adam, and the werewolf Brandon.”

  “The revenants are of no consequence,” he said dismissively.

  I tightened my hand on the stone and tempered my anger. I didn’t expect the demons to care about Adam or Brandon, but they didn’t need to belittle their sacrifices.

  “You engaged a power sphere and wielded enough arcane power to subdue Cael without killing him.” He leaned forward, and I swore I felt a wave of frigid air hit me. “The act of generating the sphere in itself was . . . reckless.”

  Who was he to pass judgment? Making the power sphere had been risky, but I’d managed it without any major repercussions, as far as I knew. I met Malthus’s gaze, and he nodded.

  “I stand by my actions. I had no choice,” I answered.

  “We all have a choice. You had a choice in preserving Cael, yet you chose not to. I wonder why?” Ivo arched the skin above his eye, where his eyebrow would have been if he’d had one, giving him a disconcerting Voldemort appearance. Thankfully, he had a nose.

  “I suppose life or death was a choice,” I said, letting the sarcasm soak my tone. “But you’re just as complicit in Cael’s death,” I continued, ignoring Naala’s clicks and pink eyes that seemed to bulge at my impertinence. “You knew a demon guided Cael, yet you did nothing.”

  “We have no evidence a demon was responsible for Cael. From what we can gather, you and Cael are fully responsible for the supernatural deaths.” He tapped his finger on the side of his chair. “The two necromancers, one of whom is part demon.” His last words rang ominously in the quiet chamber.

  Whoa. Wait just a goddamn minute. I looked at Malthus. He’d also suspected another, more powerful demon had masterminded the deaths, Cael, all of it. Why the backslide? What kind of judicial schadenfreude were they pulling? Malthus had molded his expression to match the cool granite of his seat. No surprise. No assurance. Nothing. What was going on?