Path of the Necromancer - FACTION WARS

Chapter 7.4 - Kristin

Kristin bolted awake, choking on breath as her chest heaved. Her cotton shirt was plastered to her figure by sweat, hair felt heavy with the damp and she could taste salt in her mouth. She'd been crying. Her heart hurt, its hammering beat pounding in her ears and trembled her fingertips.

She made it to the toilet in time to watch her snack-filled stomach chunder itself empty. By the time she was dry heaving, she was quivering on the floor. The chill tiles felt good; it gave her something to ground upon. Whatever premonition she had just witnessed was now claiming its payment. She shuddered at the pictures of the dream replayed in her mind. 'Never' had she seen the past so clear.

The congealed crust that filmed her eyes hurt as she wiped it away. With knees drawn to her chest, and her back against the finishings that entombed the bathtub, Kristin managed to gain a seated position. Her head rushed and her vision darkened at the corners. She gulped air like the drowning gulp water. It filled her and she savoured it. Steadily, time reoriented itself around her. A hand pulled sticky strands of her hair from her forehead.

'Where did that Echo come from?' That was a good thought to start with. Short, simple, and rather to the point. Just one problem, she had no idea where the damn thing had come from. More to her immediate concern, why had 'she' found it. She hadn't gone looking. She wasn't combing the Spirit Realm for it. 'Ah...,' Kristin grimaced. She hadn't gone looking for 'it,' but it found a resonance with 'her.'

The next very important question then arose. What had she seen, reacted to, or done in the Spirit Realm that caused the resonance? This wasn't such an easy question, or so Kristin decided while turning the spray of the shower on. She'd been in the Spirit Realm for hours. She'd sent out dozens of her puppets to all corners to search for all things. Any one of them could have triggered the connection.

The warm water helped. It was a marvelous feeling to be drenched. Eyes shut, a nothingness tune of her own creation playing through her throbbing forehead. Kristin wasn't exactly sure how long she remained like that, it was too long and yet not long enough. She felt irritated within her own skin, wanting to fight, to run to do something and yet lethargic to do more than stand.

It did give her time to think. Try and place what she'd seen with what she knew. A few gaping puzzle pieces flopped about like fish drowning on the fishermans line, but where to put them? What pieces did she now take out to be discarded as fabrication, conjecture or outright lie? It was all very confusing. She had too many parts and not enough hands to hold them with.

'Start from what you know is true, and build from there.' A voice lighter than her own instructed.

'Fuck that,' Another voice scoffed. 'That'll take forever. Just shove it in and see what happens.'

Kristin wondered if it was wise to argue with herself. 'Probably not.' They all concluded at once.

She giggled. It felt good to giggle. That was until she drew in a spray infused breath and started coughing again. Now thoroughly annoyed with the water that dared to do such a thing to her, she snapped the handle to the side with her Will and dried off. It was time to reconsider a few things. And she would start with what she knew of the noble houses.

What was it she'd even seen? Was. Was it a vision? A memory? She'd glimpsed the distant past in a guided tutorial at her father's instruction. Any and everything that history revealed about the worship of Necromancy had some kernel of truth. As the teacher had preached: 'Myths aren't stories that are untrue. They're just the ones that don't fit neatly with the view of what the masses think history should be.'

The mummification and all things death related in Egypt, or the fascination with Hades in the Greek world - from Helonistic all the way back to the Trojan and Mycenaean - were obvious points anyone with a shred of true understanding could put together. That left far more nuanced periods where fingerprints could be traced. Babylonian, Phonecian... Hell even the Bronze Age Collapse bore the hallmarks of a Mage war. Kristin put the puzzle piece of her ancestor's migration away from the world around this point. She never knew the 'why' of the shift of focus, but she lived on an isolated Plane... so that one had to be true. Whatever she'd just seen though, that was 'beyond' any record she had read. She wasn't even sure 'where' the events took place, let alone when. Whatever she'd just seen and whoever those people were, Kristin felt there was more to it than she knew. Whatever 'it' was.

A Necromancer corrupted by the allure of a Warlock. Pure, unfiltered, revulsion. If a word could describe a feeling, encompass it, and impale a persons very 'being,' that would express a modicum of her loathing of that branch of magic. The Mages that consorted with those beasts were scarcely considered human.

Then there was the incy-wincy matter of a fucking Darkness Titan strolling across the field. How in all that was Holy did that happen? If what her father had told her was true, only the most powerful of Necromancers could channel Darkness into the physical realm.

'How the fuck did a Warlock do it?!' She folded one leg over the other and forced the brush through her locks. Laying the silvered object down on the vanity, she felt her mind stabilize after its exalted state. Then another thought had it's jack-in-the-box moment. 'Should I even take what I saw at face value?'

Visions were hazy unfocused things. They were subject to everything from the weather to the alignment of the stars. If she believed in everything a spirit, Ghost or Phantom told her, it was an easy way to invite insanity. Echoes were different though, weren't they? They were momentous events that rippled across time. After all, that's what a spirit was. A representation of a person's soul, imprinted upon time through the fabric of the Spirit Realm. Still, it was something she had to take into account. Spirits couldn't lie, they lacked the mental capacity to do it. However, their memories warped as they faded, as their impressions dissolved back into the void. How much of what she'd just seen was real and how much was the Frankensteinian remains of a vengeful presence remained unknown.

She didn't 'want' to discount it. As little sense as it made, something told her it was important... like it was meant to be seen. Nothing she'd ever experienced was that clear, or that detailed. Further, she didn't know anything about any of the people in the vision, thus her mind 'filling in' the blanks could be ruled out. Oh sure, she was making excuses for her feelings but dammit it felt real! From the way they were talking to one another and the titles they associated with one another, it seemed to her mind the younger man, Neti, hadn't acted as a Warlock would. His mentor was the one to rant about powerful beings held behind a barrier. Kristin felt it wasn't much of a stretch to connect that barrier with the Black Gate.

Her slender eyebrows fell into a frown as she wondered, 'But what were they looking for? What did they want?' The last of the nobility had divided and spread out. She knew they were the target of the attack and it was only reinforced by the words and actions of the traitors. 'What does killing off Necromancer's get a Warlock?' An uneasy feeling settled in the pit of her stomach at those thoughts.

She bit nervously on the edge of her thumb, working along the nail until she was chewing on the skin that housed the hard nub. She stared blankly out the window, the sky a rainbow of dark pastelles.

A blip in the back of her mind captured her unfocused sight. Through the green swirls of particles a minion, or rather, a cluster of them. They were floating around an estate, gazing moorishly with a sway to their stance as the Wards protecting the place kept them at bay. They'd slowly come together after following the breadcrumbs. They'd found Long.

* * * * *

Author Note:
Hello to all, 
Thank you for reading up to this point in my story. This has been a long time coming, and it's now coming to the screen for your viewing pleasure. I really hope you find this to be worht the wait. 

I want to give a special mention to my Patrons on Patreon. They have been incredible throughout all this time, being incredibly patient and supportive as I've struggled to get something worthy on the page. If I didn't have them cheering me on, giving me feedback, or listening to my rambles, I doubt we'd be where we are today. 

If you too would like to have a read of what has been completed up to now (370 pages on a Word Doc), then please join us. 

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCN6f_E0zHmYDbpXObLzTMwQ
Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/playofthenight
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/jcthecontinuer