The Necromancer

Chapter 7, Part 3

It took three of the towering Golems to restrain Mog. I could only stare up in awe as more of them emerged from the puddles of blood on the ground and formed into rumbling mountains of dirt and stone that slowly took on humanoid form. I vaguely remembered Professor Magdat talking about them in class, but as always, I'd been too distracted to listen very closely. The idea sounded amazing, though: minions that could be summoned anywhere (as opposed to needing a corpse to revive) from just a vial of enchanted blood. I'd never actually seen one in person, and watching them wreck the rest of the Abbey and absorb the ruins into their bodies left me completely dumbstruck.

The Dragonheart in Amcerlizar's hand glowed bright orange, and a flash of light burst forth to fill every crack and crevice of the ruins. It even went around corners and into the deepest holes.

"Oh, hello there," Amcerlizar called out. Even from where I stood, I could see the glowing form of Skip, highlighted by his revealing spell, through the stones that she was hiding behind. "Looks like I've got one more visitor. How about you come on down here, then?"

After a moment of deliberation, Skip stood from her hiding spot on the tower and approached me and Amcerlizar. Her appearance was nearly all back to normal, except her black skin was still spotted with bits of creamy white that were quickly disappearing. She cast a sidelong glance of pity toward Mog, who was being held in a chokehold by a mass of rubble with white chunks of marble for eyes.

"Wow," Amcerlizar commented, looking her up and down. She still wore the skimpy white lingerie that Lamneras had given her. "Quite the welcome. Aren't you just a pretty little thing?" His smarmy grin made my blood absolutely boil. "I take it that you're the one who was impersonating Macera?"

Skip nodded, still defiant as ever. She wasn't even bothering to hide her burning hatred for the man.

"And... who are you?"

"Of course you wouldn't remember," Skip spat out. "You are the reason my husband is dead! Darion, the smith? From Mulgava?" It struck me that I hadn't even known where Skip was really from until this very moment.

"Doesn't ring any bells," Amcerlizar said casually. Skip's whole body shook as she had to hold herself back from leaping forward and trying to strangle him. He cast another spell using the Dragonheart, and a grand throne of rock emerged from the ground. He took a seat and then casually propped his feet up with a sigh. "So... I came all this way for what? Just some pitiful revenge assassination attempt? This was the best you had? A little girl..." he nodded toward Skip. "One rocks-for-brains ogre..." Mog gave a ferocious, bone-rattling roar as he struggled against his captors, but was still unable to move, "And a single pitiful skeleton?" He waved toward Lirk's skeleton, which was still floating nearby.

"I'm sorry, Master," Lirk's skull chimed in. He was now floating only a few feet away.

"You couldn't even come up with a few more skeletons to help you out?" Amcerlizar continued. "And not even one with any flesh left? This is just pathetic. You've always been pathetic, Wilson."

"Winston," I corrected him through clenched teeth. He smirked back, and I realized he was doing it on purpose just to mess with me. He hadn't changed a bit since our years at the Academy. Still a little prick.

"What's this one's name, anyway?" He nodded toward Lirk's arms, which were still trying to stab him.

I remained silent.

"Oh, come now," Amcerlizar said. His calm, condescendingly friendly tone made me far more furious than if he'd simply been angry back at us. He was doing very well at giving off that 'you're so far beneath me that I don't even care that you tried to kill me' aura. "The only way that you survive this little ordeal is to answer all of my questions. I'm not yet convinced that you're not working for the Paladins, and I don't leave Paladin spies alive. Particularly not traitors to their craft like you."

"His name is Lirk," I finally answered.

Amcerlizar scoffed. "So intimidating!" He beckoned one of Lirk's legs closer, and it floated through the air into his hand. "These bones are worn to the marrow. How long have you had this minion anyway?"

"Since our second year at the Academy." I couldn't bear to look at Amcerlizar when I said it. Instead, I focused on Lirk's skull, floating through the air a few feet away. Even in his predicament, it looked like Lirk was smiling. His arm, knife still in hand, kept swinging wildly at Amcerlizar. The same movement hadn't worked the past 100 times, but maybe if he just tried once more, maybe that would do the trick!

Amcerlizar continued studying the bone, then shrugged. He looked me straight in the eyes and said "Must mean a lot to you, then." He opened his mouth wide, and the sparks clinging all over Lirk's body began to stretch until they became thin strands of pure lavender light. And at the very end, seeping out of the invisible pores in the bone, came something shimmering black and gooey, like rock oil.

"Master?" Lirk called. It wasn't the same subservient tone he used when he thanked me for re-summoning him. For the first time, I swear I heard true, heartfelt emotion in his voice: fear. His vacant eye sockets focused on me as little blotches of ooze spread across his skull at the end of the little lavender sparks.

Finally the black droplets came ripping free from the bones with a wet squelching sound. The lavender sparks carried them through the air and zipped straight into Amcerlizar's mouth. He swallowed them all in one gulp and let out a loud belch. "Blech." His face turned sour, and he scraped his tongue against his front teeth. "Even the souls you use are stale."

Lirk's bones fell suddenly out of the air and landed with a clack on the dirt. His rib cage and spine broke apart almost instantly, and his skull smacked against a rough chunk of marble. It rolled down to my feet missing a jagged chunk of the parietal bone. I instinctively reached out with my hand and tried to bring him back, but there was nothing there. It was like trying to summon a pile of dirt. The lingering bits of Lirk's soul were gone; Amcerlizar had eaten him. When the realization struck me, a sob crawled from my clenched throat.

"Well, this has been fun," Amcerlizar said with a sneer as he rose and dropped Lirk's leg into the dust. His throne melted back down into the ground until the dirt beneath his feet was flat, like he'd never been there at all. "But now that I know that you amateurs are not with the Paladins, and are no real threat, I must be off. I've got a whole kingdom to run, you know." I hardly heard a word of his little digs. I knelt down on the grass and held Lirk's skull between my hands. I kept concentrating, channeling the magical energy in my fingertips, hoping that I could bring him back even though I knew that it was completely impossible without a soul. "Best of luck to you all." Amcerlizar strode back to the Summoning Pedestal with his usual confident swagger.

"I swear!" I called after him, clutching Lirk's skull to my chest. "I swear, I'll kill you for this!"

He turned and gave me a dismissive glare. "Yes, you'll probably try again, won't you?" he called out as the runes grew bright blue. "Golems, would you mind cleaning up this mess? Toss their bodies into the sea when you're done, please." With that final command to his minions, his body became hazy and then disappeared as he teleported away.

The mountains of stone and rubble that had been lurking in the shadows behind Amcerlizar suddenly advanced on us. One of the three Golems restraining Mog threw a powerful punch that landed straight on the ogre's belly with a thunderclap of sound.

"What do we do, Winston?" Skip whispered, taking a step back and reaching for the knife that had been in Lirk's hand, now abandoned in the grass. A tiny little knife wouldn't do much against them. "How do we kill these things?"

I had no answer for her. The plan had failed, and I just couldn't bring myself to care anymore. I couldn't speak; everything was all... fuzzy. I just continued kneeling in the midst of the ruins, cradling my fallen minion's skull and dimly wondering what that hot, tingling feeling on my chest was.

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