The Necrosopher’s Apprentice

by Lilith Hope Milam

  The Necrosopher’s Apprentice

  Book One of the Blackweed Almanac

  Lilith Hope Milam

  For Rejoyce.

  Thank you for your patience and support.

  Always & Forever.

  “Let's suppose that you were able every night to dream any dream that you wanted to dream. And that you could, for example, have the power within one night to dream 75 years of time. Or any length of time you wanted to have. And you would, naturally as you began on this adventure of dreams, you would fulfill all your wishes. You would have every kind of pleasure you could conceive. And after several nights of 75 years of total pleasure each, you would say "Well, that was pretty great." But now let's have a surprise. Let's have a dream which isn't under control. Where something is gonna happen to me that I don't know what it's going to be. And you would dig that and come out of that and say "Wow, that was a close shave, wasn't it?" And then you would get more and more adventurous, and you would make further and further out gambles as to what you would dream. And finally, you would dream ... where you are now. You would dream the dream of living the life that you are actually living today.”

  Alan Watts - The Nature of Consciousness

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  1

  Gansel smiled with cold cheeks and crinkling eyes that peered through her father’s old spyglass across Port Myskatol’s ice-bound harbor. The tip of her nose felt numb from the wind and wet from her condensing breath. Taking the spyglass away from her eye for a moment, she rubbed at her nose with a thick glove then returned to observing the sailors out on the ice.

  She loved watching how the sailors went about their chores. It was as if she were right next to them, looking over their shoulders. Like the eye of a distant god looking down on the world.

  It was only a few days until Winterdark and the snows had engulfed the seaside city in an ice blue blanket. Wind with teeth sharp enough to bite through heavy cloaks ran through the streets like errant children as the port denizens frantically prepared for the coming of Winterdark. Soon the sun would disappear and darkness would fall on the world for two weeks.

  Gansel sat wrapped in her woolen shawl, short, stocking clad legs crossed beneath her under her family's fern-green, saffron, and crimson colors waiting for a fish to bite on her line. She stared across the bay and could feel the chill of the rocks creep up into her thighs as she watched the navy sailors crawl over their warships like ants on a piece of ripe fruit. They were working hard to keep the harbor ice from engulfing the royal fleet in case the island clans of Saagardell attacked.

  In the distance, she could see icebreaker crews walking along the edge of the harbor, hammering away at the edge of the ice shelf. They drove spikes into the ice, breaking off huge chunks that would float away into the seas around the island nation of Eldervost.

  There was a thundering crack that echoed across the harbor and suddenly the sailors were running as fast as they could from the ice's edge. A massive shard rose up out of the water, larger than any of the icebound ships. It crested and toppled, revealing greenish blue ice underneath that glinted in the gray sunlight.

  She gasped and looked away. The sound of creaking of ice and shouting sailors swept across the frozen bay. There was a boom that thundered through her chest and then a moment of silence. Cracking an eye open, she saw the sailors getting to their feet, cursing and laughing.

  On the far shore of the harbor, where the warships were moored to the massive stone docks, she saw more sailors gathering along the ship railings to watch their comrades stumble and slide on the ice. Gansel wondered, would they have gone after them if their friends had fallen through the ice? Regardless, they were now yelling insults and laughing at them. Gansel shook her head and smiled at the absurdity of the spectacle.

  A bell jingled down at the water’s edge.

  “A fish!” she squeaked and scrambled down the jetty rocks to where her fishing board lay on the ice.

  She slid across the ice on her soft black boots to the hole she had knocked out earlier.

  Her hand shot out and grabbed the bell. Jerking the string up, she felt the hook take! Wrapping the line around the board, she reeled it in and the fish popped out and flopped on the ice. She thought its red and purple scales glinted like fancy jewels under the gray clouds.

  Holding the fish down on the ice, she brought the board down on its head, stunning it so she could bring it back to her catch-line hidden between the rocks. After she slid the line through the fish’s mouth and placed the lot in her satchel, she climbed back up the jetty.

  "You get another Ganny?” she heard a raspy voice croak out. Looking towards the wharf, she saw a young goblin with a large wicker basket waving a webbed hand while leaping from rock to rock. Gansel readjusted her satchel on her shoulder and waved back at her friend Tar’dur.

  Behind the small froglike child, a dwarf girl puffed red curly hair out of her face. She threw a leg over a slick boulder and misjudged her footing, falling between the rocks, "Wait up, I'm stuck!"

  The little goblin spun around on one foot and made a chirping sound when he saw his friend. "I got you Tymuld!"

  In a flash, he hopped over to the dwarf and grabbed her by the back of the tunic. After a few tugs, the dwarf was free. Gansel reached her friends, nowhere near as nimbly as the goblin. Tymuld didn't look up as she approached, too occupied with scanning the boulders, "My barnacles!"

  The dwarf girl pointed back at the crack she'd been extracted from and Gansel stuck her hand between the rocks, fishing out a cold, soggy burlap bag. It was heavy and something squirmed inside. Tymuld thanked Gansel as she opened the bag to inspect her catch.

  "Looks like you two were lucky today," Gansel said. "Ready to trade?"

  Tymuld nodded, put on a pair of heavy leather gloves, and reached into her wet bag. With a tug, she pulled out a nodule of five barnacles, each the size of her fist and residing in a conical shell. Smiling, she reached into her belt pouch, pulled out an old ship’s biscuit and held it out in front of one of the shells.

  With a wet spurt and a quick snap, the crustacean grabbed hold of the crusty bread with its blue and white teardrop shaped head and refused to let go. Tymuld pulled hard to draw the creature out of its shell. It was the length of Gansel's arm! Tymuld beamed at her catch. "What do you think?"

  Tar'dur clicked his mouth and shrugged. "Kinda small don't you think?"

  Tymuld gave a sharp look at the goblin. "You try prying these off their perches! You'd more likely be feeding them your fingers!"

  Tar'dur held his green webbed hands out apologetically, fingers spread to show the flaps of skin between them. "Okay! Right! Right! I'm only foolin'! You made a good catch there! I'll trade you a pound of seaweed for a chunk of them!"

  Tymuld nodded in appreciation at the offer. "Sounds good."

  Looking at her human friend, she asked, "What you got today Ganny?"

  Gansel pulled a fish out of her satchel, "I caught five bay trout! I'll trade you each one for what you got."

  The friends made their daily exchange and wandered the icy streets catching up with each othe
r. Even though Tymuld and Tar’dur were from Frogtown, the slums outside the east gates, Gansel liked being around them. They were fun and made her laugh. She had to be careful and not be seen with them though. That happened once, with the Underkeepers. They had to run for blocks to escape! It wouldn’t be good if the Warden knew she had subhuman friends.

  Gansel felt guilty even calling them that in her mind. Her mother tolerated the fact that she played with them. There weren’t too many merchants’ kids that would’ve played with a wash woman’s girl. So, she let her daughter play with who she could as long as she didn’t get caught by anyone from the Assembly.

  Her mind wandering, she didn’t hear what Tymuld had asked.

  “What?” she was paying attention now.

  “Oy! Girl! I wish you’d listen! I said you think you’ll go into service next year? Don’t all human girls do something like that when they get old enough?”

  She shrugged and looked away. She didn’t want to look at her friends in the eye while talking about this subject. Thinking about the future made her uncomfortable. She didn’t want to wind up like her mom and wash rich people’s underwear day in and day out. She straightened her satchel’s shoulder strap, pretending to focus on it and ignoring her friend’s curiosity.

  Looking back up, she saw that Tymuld hadn’t looked away, so she deflected the question with one of her own, “I dunno. What are you doing when you get older? There aren’t many dwarves around here.”

  Tymuld smiled wide. “Ah, I’m not quite sure either. My pa told me once that his ma and my ma both were wedded by the time they were twenty. So, I’m past due. I think we’re gonna go back to the mountains on the mainland someday. Pa was captain of the guard there once! But, he says that we can’t go back to Krichshear Halls though, so maybe we’ll go to Opdonderje if we could only save up the coin.”

  Gansel blinked in surprise and caught herself before she could react. She never got used to the age difference. Her mind always thought that Tymuld was younger than her, maybe thirteen or fourteen tops. But Tymuld was twenty-two and already of age, for a dwarf girl.

  Remembering the day that she learned her friends’ real ages was always embarrassing. She must have seemed like such a bumpkin.

  Now, as she listened as Tar’dur explain how he planned on helping out on his uncle’s boat next spring and thought, ‘I wonder where I’ll be when they’ve left?’

  Gansel put her hand in Tymuld's and gave it a comforting, familiar squeeze. They walked like that for a while as Tymuld told stories of the dwarven kingdoms. She could feel her dwarf friend's warmth even through the gloves. The winter never seemed to bother a dwarf as it did her.

  A harsh, guttural voice cut through the air, scaring Gansel, “What in darkness is going on here?!”

  The three of them stopped in their tracks. Gansel turned around and saw two human men standing over them, dressed in the black leather uniform of the Assembly’s Underkeepers. Human men tasked by the Temple to patrol the city and maintain the virtue of the Pure Human Spirit.

  The taller of the two men reached down and yanked Gansel up on her toes by her collar. She screamed and dropped her bag.

  The shorter Underkeeper squinted at Gansel from under his wide-brimmed hat. Her eyes immediately went to his lower lip. It bulged out, stuffed full of something brown and wet that clung to edge of his mouth like black marsh water. Her skin crawled at the sight. She couldn’t stand seeing people chewing blackweed.

  His little black eyes shifted from her face to her friends. "What's a human girl doing with Frogtown gutter-trash like this?"

  Tar'dur puffed out his chest and spoke up, "Put her down! She hasn't done anything!"

  The taller man’s long arm shot out and cracked the tiny goblin's jaw. "Shut your big mouth, you froggy boonga!"

  Gansel heard bones snap as Tar'dur's legs buckled.

  She gasped as her friend fell into the snow. Tymuld dropped down beside the unconscious goblin and Gansel could hear her whimpering as she held his head.

  Gansel tried to move away, but the tall Underseeker still held her fast. "No you don't, what you doing with them anyway? You a frog lover? This one your boyfriend?"

  Gansel looked away, what did they want? Had she finally gotten her friends in real trouble? She should have never pressed her luck like this. Would they have ignored them if she hadn't been there?

  The shorter human said, "Nah, Pyotr, the boongas don't swing that way! They ain't got the tackle for a human."

  The other man's face wrinkled at the thought. "Disgusting things, unnatural. An abomination to the Spirit!”

  He gave the young goblin a swift kick in the groin. Tar’dur groaned weakly while Tymuld held him tight and whimpered.

  "You sure they ain't' got the parts, Gordin? The rock-midge here seems sweet on this one!” Pyotr asked.

  Gansel begged, "Please, leave them alone."

  The men fell silent and stared at her. The shorter one, Gordin, got in Gansel's face, "Did we ask you anything frog-lover?"

  "N-no sir," she stammered, "but please, I was only buying some food for my family from them. I..."

  She paused, hesitant and unsure of what to say.

  “I’d never be friends with non-humans! I don’t even know them!”

  She could feel Tymuld’s eyes burning into her. Glancing briefly towards her, Gansel saw her friend’s face flush with anger and betrayal.

  “Sub-humans,” Pyotr corrected and Gansel swallowed her shame as she nodded her head.

  Gordin spit out a gritty gob of blackweed juice and squinted at her, "Hey, don’t I know you?"

  He put his finger under her chin and raised her face up. "Yeah, you're the wash-a-woman's girl!"

  He looked over at Tymuld and Tar'dur, then back at her. "What are you doing this close to Frogtown? The market’s closer where you live."

  "The f-fishing's good over here, sir," she answered, trying to keep her breath from hitching in her chest.

  He took his hand away from her chin and motioned for his partner to let her go, "You best get back home girl and I don't want to see you running around with this gutter-trash again!"

  Gansel's heart froze, she couldn't leave her friends like this!

  "P-please, don't hurt them!” she begged.

  The short Underseeker looked down at her friends and shook his head, “Don’t worry. They’re not worth the effort, not that you should care.”

  He took a deep snort and hawked out a glob of black phlegm onto Tar'dur then leered at Tymuld, "You get your boonga back to Frogtown, you hear me rock-midge?"

  Tymuld nodded vigorously, then squat down to pick up the goblin. Gansel was surprised how easy it was for the dwarf to pick him up. She watched her carry him away until she had disappeared around the corner.

  The short guard poked Gansel in her shoulder with his gloved finger. "You get home and stay away from Frogtown! Didn't your mother have enough sense to teach you to keep away from those creatures?"

  Gansel looked away and stayed quiet. He shook his head and made a sound of disgust, "Get."

  Picking up her bag, she fled down the icy roads toward home as fast as she could.

  Across the icy bridge and through Gigger’s Gate, back into the city, she ran, crying. Her heart and eyes burned with rage and fear. She was angry with herself and sure that this had been her fault. The guards would have likely overlooked her friends if she hadn’t been there.

  Her legs ached as her boots continued to pound down the street. Safe and inside her house, that's what she wanted. She saw her alley ahead and slowed down enough to duck down it. She stumbled her way between the buildings and hit a patch of black ice, falling on her hands and knees. Her bag hit the ground beside her, a bit of seaweed sticking out from the flap.

  Wincing, she sat up on her haunches and looked at her hands, red and raw. Sand and grit spread out in an attempt to stop people from slipping on the ice had worked their way into her scraped skin. She spat on them and tried to get them as clean as
she could, but her hands were too shaky. Her heart felt as raw as her bleeding palms. Her knees threatened to buckle as she stood to trudge the rest of the way home.

  The alley opened up onto a small courtyard walled in by shops facing away to the surrounding streets. A small hut hemmed in by a barren garden stood in the corner of the yard, a mud brick wall ran around the edge of the garden. Gansel could hear Mama, out of sight, humming to herself. She guessed that she was getting things ready for spring.

  She looked over the wall and saw her mother kneeling in the muddy garden as she scraped away the latest snow with a small garden spade. Seeing her made her feel so much better. Knowing that she was home opened a warm spot in her heart.

  Mama stuck a pointed wooden rod into the hard, wet earth once she cleared the snow. It slid back out, leaving a small hole in its place. Then she took a small bulb from out the front of her apron and dropped it into the hole. Mud onions. The bulbs could survive Winterdark and would come up in the Thawn. They grew fast, but couldn't survive the warmer weather that came with spring. They were always the first vegetables of the year they'd eat. Usually mixed in with an omelet or layered inside butter-bread.

  Strands of her mother's hair fell from her bonnet and into her face. She muttered to herself and stopped digging to push the errant locks back behind her ear, trying to not smudge her face. She wasn't successful and wound up with a dark smear across her cheek. Gansel smiled despite her dark mood.

  Her mother turned and gasped in surprise, "Ganny! You scared me!"

  She looked at her daughter, dubious about her presence. "Back so soon? Did you catch enough?"

  Gansel reached into her bag and pulled out the three remaining fish. Her mother gave her a sour look. "That it?"

  "I also got some seaweed and barnacles off of Tymuld and Tar'dur." She put the fish back and pulled out some of the kelp. Her mother gave a sound of disgust at the mention of her friends and guilt welled up in her heart. Why did she lie about her friends to the Underkeepers? She hated that she had been too afraid to tell the truth.