by Emma Hamm
Was it magic? Or was she walking into the underbelly of the city and into a situation she was vulnerable in?
“Lyra.”
The voice was one that she easily recognized. Light flared around Wolfgang as he stood at the bottom of the stairs.
She sniffed. “I didn’t expect to see you here. I came here for the Graverobber.”
He bowed and swept his arm out. “And the Graverobber you shall meet.”
“Really.” She cocked a hip sideways to stare at him with an unimpressed expression on her face. “And yet, I do not see the Graverobber here.”
Wolfgang looked up at her. Mismatched eyes captivated her, yet there was still a dull quality to the way she felt. Sirens found everyone attractive. She enjoyed human bodies and really anybody that was around her. But with Wolfgang it felt different in a way that wasn’t strong enough for her to put a finger on. A muffled emotion that had yet to fully emerge from her mind.
“Lyra.” His voice caught her attention once more. “What if I told you that I am the Graverobber?”
“I would say that you were lying.”
She clicked down the rest of the stairs. Sauntering over towards him, she raised a hand to wave through his torso.
He flinched backwards as her hand passed through his shoulder a second time.
“Don’t do that,” he scolded.
“I happen to know for a fact that the Graverobber is a real person.”
“Do you? Does anyone know that?”
Her brows pulled together in a fierce frown. “You are an anomaly I haven’t figured out, Wolfgang. But you are not the Graverobber. Enough games.”
“Games are what make the Graverobber who he is.”
“Then he will have to learn that I always win.”
Unfortunately, she had no way to back up that statement. She wasn’t likely to win when she was alone in this dungeon. The smell of wet earth assaulted her senses and sounds were dulled. This was not her world, yet it vaguely reminded her of being underwater.
In a way, she supposed that being deep within the belly of the earth was similar to being in the abyss of the sea.
Wolfgang appeared conflicted until all expression on his face disappeared. She was struck by how he barely looked like a living thing. Porcelain skin and glass eyes met her gaze until he dissolved entirely.
Deep within the tunnel behind him, she heard the sound of an opening door.
“Really?” she grumbled. “More of this nonsense?”
She stomped in the direction of the noise, all the while grumbling that theatrical men were going to be the death of her. Why was it that men with power always had to make a scene? It was ridiculous. Just meet her at a normal place. Like a hotel or a restaurant.
“No, Lyra. You have to meet people in a graveyard,” she muttered. “Better yet, you have to meet them deep in a crypt where no one will hear you scream.”
She laughed at her own words.
As if she would ever let anyone kill her. Whoever tried would find themselves in the fight of their life with her claws at their throat.
More lights, which led her to a plain door set into the earthen wall, flickered to life. Fisting the knob in her hand, she pushed. The door did not budge.
“Of all the ridiculous—” She huffed and pressed her forehead against the smooth wood. “I’m tired of this. Open the damn door.”
It slowly eased open under her hand.
She grunted as she shoved hard causing a loud bang as the door slammed against the opposite wall and rattled the ceiling above her head. Dirt crumbled and fell in chunks into her hair. For a moment she worried she might have buried herself, but it settled quickly enough.
Her eyes found the figure hunched over an altar at the center of the room. The form was covered by a faded brown cloak. However, she could see how painfully thin the person was.
He was tall. Much taller than her and perhaps equal in height with Jasper. But the bony edges of its shoulders betrayed a fragility she had not expected to see. Lyra could see the heaving breaths that shuddered the ribcage and made the cloak quake.
Suddenly, the entire situation felt real. This was the Graverobber. This was the man whom so many people were afraid of. And he was physically weak.
She cleared her throat.
There was no response from the man before her. So once more, she cleared her throat. This time, she followed the sound with a shuffling of her feet.
“So you have finally come.”
His voice was hardly what she would have expected. With the state of his body, or at least that much she could see of him, Lyra had expected a much older voice. She certainly had not expected a strong voice that rumbled with the power of avalanches and lightning strikes.
That voice made a shiver dance down her spine. Lyra had met many powerful creatures in her life. But none of them, other than the Five, had made the hair on her arms stand up as their strength danced across her skin.
This Graverobber had more substance than anyone gave him credit for.
“Yes,” she squeaked. Was that voice hers? That wouldn’t do at all. “No thanks to your helper. Wolfgang did everything he could to prevent me from seeing you.”
A loud coughing sound made her frown and take a step back from him. It took her a few seconds to realize that he was laughing. His voice was so deep that any sound of mirth was foreign to her ears.
“Yes. Wolfgang.”
She rocked back and forth as she waited for him to continue. Of course, that was all he had to say. “So…”
He was not as talkative as she wanted him to be. She had never been known to be a particularly patient woman.
“Okay, look. I came all the way here to talk. Malachi needs to be stopped, and we think that you are supposed to help us.”
“We?”
She stuttered, “Y-You may be part of a prophecy that could save our world. Malachi wants to cleanse the earth of all humans, which means that magical creatures would also die. If we don’t-”
“We.”
There was nothing more infuriating in this world than being interrupted. Lyra huffed out a breath and rushed to finish the speech. “If we don’t stop him then the entire world will suffer. There, I said what I had to say. Now you’re supposed to come with me.”
“To meet ‘we’,” he repeated in a tone which suggested he was unimpressed.
“What?”
“You keep referring to yourself as multiples. I am certain that there are not many ‘Lyras’, which leads me to believe that you are not speaking for yourself.”
“Well.” She blinked. “Of course I’m not. Did Wolfgang not tell you that I work for the Five?”
“Oh, I know who you are employed with. I want to hear your words. Not theirs.”
She didn’t know how to respond to that. She didn’t know how to respond to any of the things that were happening to her right now. The man had still not managed to turn around and actually look at her.
“I don’t understand.”
“You didn’t come here to tell me what the Five wish me to hear.”
Again, that deep voice made a small shudder travel through her body. “Another asked me to relay a message to you,” she said.
“Pitch has no right to speak to those who are under my protection.”
“What?” She was stunned he knew that Pitch had visited her. But then there was another glaring issue. “I’m under your protection?”
He remained silent.
“Why?” she asked.
Again, he said nothing.
“I need you to turn around.”
“No.”
“I’m not taking no for an answer,” she sternly replied. “Turn around.”
He didn’t have an option in her opinion. He would turn around, or she would walk over and force him to turn around. She would not speak to someone’s back. Rudeness would not be tolerated, no matter how powerful the man was.
He hesitated just long enough to make her blood boil before he
slowly turned towards her.
“And the hood,” she snapped.
The bones in his hands were so prominent that she almost winced. Surely hands that fragile would break if he touched anything. Or perhaps it was the bone white skin tone darkened with lines of blue veins that made her uncomfortable.
Ghostly hands pulled back the hood to reveal a face that made her swallow hard. The hollows of his cheeks were so deep she could see the outline of his teeth. His brow jutted forward nearly as far as the prominent jaw and square chin. The strength the face might have held was diminished by his gaunt form. But even that painful thinness she could have handled in stride.
She was most bothered by the scars.
His skin was pocked with long and thin scars. Some were curved in jagged edges along the high angle of his forehead. A few deepened the cleft in his chin. One traveled down his cheek in a deep gouge. They laced his skin like a patchwork quilt of pain.
The underside of his jaw was entirely black. A tattoo, she realized. A tattoo that covered every inch of his throat in shadows. Even his ears had been blackened. Tendrils of black had been painfully inked into the shell of each ear.
Now she was the one being rude. Lyra was gaping at him as though she had never seen a strange looking man before. He was not shocking compared to the darker creatures whose human bodies were twisted by magic.
Perhaps it was the electric shock that came along with the sight of him. That and the emaciated shoulders that dipped downwards to those hands tipped by ragged nails. Whichever it was, Lyra was made infinitely uncomfortable by the sight of him.
“Oh,” she whispered.
Finally, he raised his gaze to meet hers. Mismatched eyes stared back at her. One black as night and cold as the grave. The other so blue it could rival the sky.
“It’s you. But, there can’t be two of you,” she said in shock.
“I can assure you, there are not two of me.”
Her breath whooshed out of her as her lips parted. “But there are. I know those eyes. I’ve seen those eyes in a very different face.”
Once more, he said nothing. The Graverobber bowed his head until all she could see were the network of scars that prevented hair from growing across one half of his skull.
“No,” she growled. “No you don’t get to brush me aside. You’ve been lying to me.”
“I have not uttered any lies. Not to you.”
“But you have! You are not Wolfgang.”
“I am.”
“You are lying again!”
She couldn’t control her words or her hands from shaking. This was a betrayal she had not expected. Wolfgang had told her he was the Graverobber, but he wasn’t. This man was not the strong, tall, good looking ghost that had kept her attention. This was a monster who lived underneath the ground.
“I needed to get you here,” he argued.
“No, you needed to play your games. Just like every other Lord.”
“It was for you.”
“And you expect me to believe that?” she snorted. “I will not listen to you. I am not interested in any more of your lies. This was a waste of my time and a waste of yours.”
“It is not. We have both come here because fate dictated it.”
She snorted. “Right, fate. Tell me exactly what fate has in store for us, Graverobber. Or is it you who wanted me here?”
“I-I—” he stuttered.
“You what?”
“I had thought-—”
“You thought, of course. That’s all you have to tell me? Spit it out!”
“No one ever speaks to me like this.” His voice grew deeper as something dark shaded his eyes.
“Then you’ve never met anyone like me before. I am not afraid of you. I am not afraid of anyone like you. The Lords long ago lost their power over me, you included.”
“I always knew you would be unlike any person I have ever met.”
She was mildly appeased. The compliment managed to distract her for a few moments before she shook herself back into anger. He shouldn’t be able to get off the hook that easily.
“I’m leaving,” she declared.
“I would prefer it if you didn’t.”
“I don’t care what you prefer.”
Her exit had to be perfect. He had to remember that she was a woman to reckon with and that she had defied everything he wanted. She would only be happy with that.
So she cast him one last disapproving glance before she flicked her ponytail over her shoulder. When she turned, she would make certain that she sashayed her hips. He would be staring at a backside he would never see again. At least he would have something to remember her by.
What she did not expect was to turn and stare directly into the vacant eyes of a skull. Not just any skull but one that was attached to a body, which was standing between her and her escape. Black holes that seemed to bore into her very soul met her gaze. Lyra stared in horror as something in one of the sockets moved. A white maggot crawled into her view and wiggled where the skeleton’s eyeball should be.
She screamed. Long and high pitched, the scream was as hysterical as she had ever heard before.
Her arms pinwheeled as she tripped over one of her heels and fell backwards. She landed hard on her tailbone and twisted her ankle. Pain blossomed in her hands as blood from her hard fall dripped down her fingers. An acidic taste burned her tongue. She had bit it when she fell. No wonder she had stopped screaming.
“Enough!”
The Graverobber’s shout echoed in her ears as she sat stunned on his floor. Along with the voice was a charge of electricity that made the hair on her arms stand up straight. Power arced through the room in tiny lightning bolts that skittered along the ground.
The skeleton had yet to move. Its horrid form lingered in the doorway as it appeared to tilt its head to look at the Graverobber.
She could heard the stomp of booted feet as the Graverobber walked around her. He angrily shoved the skeleton out the door and slammed it closed. More dirt crumbled from the ceiling and caught in the scraggles of his hair.
“What-what—” She couldn’t seem to form more than one word at a time. “Was-is-that—?”
He knelt in front of her. Lyra imagined she could hear the painful creaking as his knees bent. Watching him move was nearly as painful as the dirt digging into her palms.
“I apologize,” he murmured. “I often forget how terrifying Mungus can appear when one is not used to him.”
He leaned forward to pull one of her hands forward. Lyra watched in surprise as he tsked and pulled a small handkerchief out of his pocket. She was presented only with the top of his head as he set to work picking out the grit that was mixed in with her black blood. There was a thin swirl of black tattoo that crawled up from his neck to coil at the top of his head. She found herself staring at it in hopes it might provide answers.
The man had managed to surprise her yet again. She was nearly struck dumb as this powerful man bent onto his knees before her.
“Mungus?” she finally managed to ask.
“His name.”
“The skeleton has a name?”
“Everything has a name.”
“Oh,” she whispered. One particular stone he was working on made her wince. “Did you name him yourself?”
His mismatched eyes held an odd look as he met her gaze. “No.”
“Then how did you know his name is Mungus?”
“It was on the tag attached to his foot when I dug him out of his grave. His name is Charlie, but I call him Mungus.”
“Charlie Mungus,” she repeated. “It’s a good name.”
“He was a good man.”
“How do you know?”
His head tilted as he peered down at her now relatively clean hand. “He had a very nice headstone and many flowers left for him.”
The meaning of the words finally hit her. “Necromancy?”
He made a sound of affirmation before reaching out for her other hand.
&nbs
p; “You can perform Necromancy?”
“Yes.”
“And you can project yourself.”
He shook his head. “No.”
“But Wolfgang is a projection. Wolfgang is not you.”
She nearly winced as his hand convulsed around hers. Slowly, each finger on his hand relaxed. As he took his hand away from hers, she could feel a lingering static upon her skin.
“Wolfgang is my name. I am Wolfgang.”
“But—” She shook her head. “But if it’s not a projection then what is it? You don’t even speak the same way he does.”
She shouldn’t refer to the other version of him as a “he”. She had known Wolfgang to be stronger, handsome, and wickedly tempting. That Wolfgang was not the man in front of her. They certainly didn’t look the same, and this Wolfgang spoke far more eloquently. Not to mention he was more timid.
“It’s the magic.” Wolfgang gestured towards his head. “Too many spells. Too much Latin rattling around.”
“What is that version of you then?”
He shrugged. “A doppelganger.”
“Excuse me?”
“He is me. Or the me I would have been if I hadn’t been so changed.”
“Changed how?”
“Magic has a price,” he murmured. Sadness made his face twist into a horrid expression. A scar nearly bisected his right eye and caused it to appear to droop. “This visage you look upon was willingly created in exchange for power.”
Lyra shook her head. “I don’t understand. What are you?”
“Isn’t it obvious? I’m a Magician.”
She blinked. “That’s not possible.”
“I frequently am considered impossible.”
“No, that’s not what I meant. Magicians don’t exist anymore. When the dimensions merged, every single Magician and Witch were wiped out of existence. There aren’t any more left.”
He shrugged and placed her hand back on her lap. For good measure, he patted it as it rested on her knee. “There are.”
“Of all the—” she grumbled as she rolled onto her knees. “Do you ever speak in anything but riddles?”
“Not often.”
Standing up proved to be more difficult than she had estimated. She had managed to roll her ankle badly. The heels had seemed like a such a good idea when she had walked out of Haven. Now, she realized that looking good probably wasn’t the best option when meeting a man nicknamed “Graverobber”. It was a chore to stand, but she forced herself upright.
