The Necromancer

Chapter 7, Part 6

Skip looked at me with her eyes wide. Her lips tried to form words, like a fresh fish pulled from a river, but she couldn't speak. She raised her hands and gently placed them on the sword sticking out of her. Maybe she couldn't quite believe that it was really there until she touched it.

Orange lightning erupted from the Ruby and arced toward the Golem, so bright that it turned night to day for just a moment. The Golem's expressionless face looked back, not caring that it was about to disintegrate. It had done the job that its master had given, which is all a minion can really aspire to. It vanished, sword and all, into a cloud of ash.

Both Mog and I ran forward, but Skip collapsed face-first into the dirt before either of us could catch her. Her entire back was covered in sticky blood, but even that didn't hide the massive hole where the sword had gone through. I tried not to look at it.

"Skip!" I dropped to my knees next to her and gingerly picked her up. Her eyes were wandering, unable to focus. "Skip... are you OK?"

No, she's not ok, you idiot! I berated myself. She just took a sword through the chest! This could be your last moment with her, and that's what you say??

"Winston," she managed to gasp. A slight smile crossed her lips, but she coughed up blood right after. "We gave it a good try, didn't we?" It was amazing that she was even able to speak.

"Yeah, we did," I reassured her. "Our second try will be even better!" I've never hated my father more than I did right at this moment for forcing me into studying Necromancy. If I even knew the most basic healing spells, maybe I could have done something. Anything that would just keep her alive until I found someone who could fix her for good. But the Academy had only taught me death and destruction. I urged the Ruby to do something. To somehow heal her. But I guess it doesn't work that way. It can only enhance what I know. And there was nothing else to be done.

Standing above us, Mog nodded vigorously. "Better!" he agreed. But I could see the pain in his face. The obvious, utter helplessness that I also felt as we watched our friend die right before our eyes. Tears the size of my fist began dripping from his cheeks into the dirt nearby.

She ignored us both. "At least now I'll get to see Darion again." Her voice was a faint whisper on the otherwise silent battlefield. 

"Hey, don't talk like that," I told her. "You... you'll be OK." My voice broke, and the tears began rolling down my cheeks. "We're going to find a Cleric to heal you up, I swear."

She didn't hear me, though. She took her last breath sometime while I was speaking and died with that same serene smile on her face. At least the thought of her husband made her happy in her last moment. I hugged her close, and through the Ruby's energy, I could suddenly feel the presence of her body. She was now a corpse, ready to be resurrected as my minion.

I laid her back down on the ground as gently as I could and closed her eyelids. She was still smiling.

"NO," Mog shouted, looking at her body and then back at me. "FIX!" His own wounds, many still openly bleeding, were completely forgotten. And he was covered in a thin layer of dust and ash, as I probably was.

"I can't, Mog." My voice caught in my throat as I tried to explain.

Mog snatched me up in his gigantic hand and brought me to his eye level, just as he'd done that very first day we met. It seemed like forever ago, when Skip had found me on the Crown Road and brought me back to their camp and saved me from the Paladins. "FIX!" he thundered into my face.

"Mog, she can't be fixed. She's gone."

He dropped me in the dirt like a discarded handkerchief. Sinking to his knees, he cradled her body and let out a low, keening wail that pierced the night air and sent birds into the sky from the distant forest. Tears still flowed down his cheeks and into the dirt, where it mingled with the blood and ash.

"I know," I wrapped my arms around his leg in a hug, doing my best to comfort him. "I know, Mog." I don't remember how long we stayed like this. Could have been minutes, or hours. Just when I thought I'd finally found a purpose in life, Amcerlizar ripped the rug out from under me yet again. Lirk, gone for good. And Skip...

"BACK?" Mog finally asked, holding the body out toward me. Asking me to resurrect her.

I shook my head. "We can't do that to her, Mog." As much as I wanted to. She'd only been gone for a short while, meaning most of her soul would still be in there. Just like that little bird I'd resummoned. She'd still remember who she was, at least for a little bit. But it wouldn't be the same. I don't think I could bear having her call me 'Master,' and thanking me for bringing her back. The real Skip would rather stay dead than face that fate. "It wouldn't really be her. It would look like her, and talk like her, and act like her, but it wouldn't be. She'd be a slave, bound to me. Skip is gone, Mog."

He seemed to accept that (even if he didn't necessarily like the answer) and pulled her body back in for another hug. Her scarlet blood was smeared all across his greyish-green chest and arms. Finally, he pulled a blanket from the wreckage of our supplies and wrapped her body up tight, then placed her carefully on the ground. "WHAT NOW?" he asked.

I sighed. Part of me had been asking myself that same question ever since Amcerlizar was unharmed by the Ruby's first lightning strike. And now, with Skip dead, there was no more plan. Even with the Ruby, I didn't want to go back to my old life. I didn't even want my own castle or my own army of undead minions. I mean, it had been my dream for years now. And with the Ruby under my control, it was finally in my grasp... but I didn't want that anymore. I just wanted Skip back. I wanted to go on more adventures with her and Mog. "I don't know what we do now," I finally admitted.

We sat in silence for a bit longer. Ocean waves crashed against the cliffs, and I watched the stars pass slowly overhead. I still remembered all of the constellations from when I was younger: Douros the Mighty, who had bound the Demon King under his power and become the first Necromancer. Pleos, the great dragon of the sky whose tail always pointed north. Silin the trickster, who had convinced his many enemies to destroy each other and even persuaded the Gods to bring him into the stars. I wondered if some day there would be a legendary story about Amcerlizar, and the very thought of it made my blood absolutely boil. I was not going to let that happen.

I got to my feet. "Come on, Mog. Let's pack what's left of our supplies and get going." I gestured to our camp, some which had been trampled by the Golems. I only had an inkling of a plan, but I knew that we couldn't stay here.

Mog didn't stand, but he looked down at me. The tears had stopped, leaving a slightly cleaner streak down each side of his ash-covered face. "WHERE?" he asked.

I sighed. Using the power of the Ruby, I levitated Skip's body into the air. "We need to find a graveyard."

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