The girl was dead. Her blood pooling on the hardwood floor made that obvious, even if her spirit hadn't been standing there, horrified, staring at the corpse.
I gently took her hand as she continued to stare. We are the oldest magi, the power over death being the first and most vital for humanity. Followed closely by the wizards and their elemental affinity, but we were first. Necromancers have stood at the Gate for most of history and held the world's hand as they passed through.
“Who did this?”
She looks at me. At our hands. At her body on the floor.
“A man. He has a knife. He told me that it wouldn't hurt.”
“Did he tell you his name, little one?” Death is traumatic and we try to comfort when we can.
“No. He said his friend wanted to meet me. His friend had a weird name. It was long with lots of consonants.”
“Did you say you would meet this friend?” I thought I knew the answer but wanted to make sure.
She nodded.
“It will be alright little one. Now it's time to go to the Gate. Can you see it?”
She looked around until her eyes caught on something in the distance. I looked where she looked and saw what she saw: a massive Gate made of shining metal. It stood in shadow as it shone, offering a passage through the Darkness.
I looked around the back room for just a moment. The police had not found this place. The only reason I knew the body was there was the spirit’s crying. I reached into the Dark and pulled a little sliver into the Light. The body began to decompose like a high-speed film. The blood seemed to evaporate off the floor and the walls, leaving the room a wreck, but no longer a murder scene. I knew any cop would have a coronary at this kind of destruction of evidence, but there was no way they could deal with this problem anyway.
As the body was taking care of itself, I took one more sweep of the room. The stench of demon was strong. I could not-quite-see the trail of magic the warlock had left as he moved around the room and out the door. Taking my umbrella from the corner I stepped back into the alley and the rain.
Time to hunt.
I tracked him halfway across the city in the rain. Every mage can sense magic in our own way. Other necromancers have told me they see trails of light, or “vibrations” in the air. Magic always seems like a smelly cloud to me. Admittedly some kinds smell better than others. Healing almost always smells pleasant. Fire usually smells like fire, just different ingredients depending on the wizard. Water magic smells like the sea, or a river, or a bog, again depending on the wizard.
I’ve never had the chance to ask another mage what my magic smells like.
The trail of demon stink finally led to a run-down hotel. As I continued to follow the cloud its odor had started to get more subtle. I still smelled the sulfur and shit that all demons smelled of, but I had also begun to detect hints of old paper, cedar, and something dark. Not evil, just ‘dark’ smelling.
The windows of the hotel lobby had long been boarded up, and several of the doors were missing from the rooms. I saw, however, a suspiciously shiny door handle on the backdoor of the lobby building, as if someone had replaced it in the last month or so.
It was oh so tempting to just barge inside in a blaze of glory, but I had not gotten to my venerable age by doing an excess of stupid things.
I tested the door to see if it would creak as I swung it open. A good way to tell if the person you’re after is a real criminal: rusty hinges make excellent alarms. These hinges were not rusty. I moved through the open space that used to be a kitchen slowly. Watching and listening for the warlock. And keeping my nose open for any additional hint of the demon. If the smell had been ‘real’ it would have knocked me over by now with its strength. Sometimes magic sucks. I could have gotten used to a real chemical in the air, magical perceptions can keep ramping up the unpleasantness forever.
As I moved along the wall I started to hear faint arguing. Which is unusual for a warlock. Either he had a partner or his demon was unhappy. Both circumstances made my job easier. Both circumstances were odd enough that it made me wonder what the hell was going on.
I moved closer to the voices and realized that they were coming from the broken and doorless walk-in refrigerator. Comfortingly stupid on the warlock’s part since there could only be one exit.
“I do not want this,” a deep voice said. The spike of demon smell let me know what the speaker was, even though I was out of sight.
“I don't give a shit what you want! You're mine! You signed the contract! I am your master!” The other voice was male but pitched higher than an adult. This must be a new warlock just trying out his demon. It was disturbing that he turned to murder so quickly.
“You made me sign!” the demon shouted. Which made no sense. The whole of a warlock's power was seduction. They sweet talk demons, people, anything with a mind, into doing what they want. Why would one of them ‘make’ a demon do anything?
I risked a peek around the corner. There was the warlock. Short black hair with blond roots showing. Metal in his face. Neck tattoo. Classic goth poser look.
There was another girl on a stretcher in the broken fridge. Naked and strapped down. I didn't see a spirit, so she must be just unconscious. She looked a lot like the previous victim, so this guy had a type.
There was a sacrificial circle on the metal floor surrounding the stretcher. The runes indicated feeding physical strength to the demon with little of anything else.
The demon was standing across the body from the boy. Big, slabbed-on muscles, ram's horns on top that almost brushed the metal ceiling. Exactly what I would expect the circle on the floor to produce.
The weird thing was that I knew the demon. He had been in contract with a warlock I had known in the early nineties. The warlock had sacrificed books instead of souls because Lbrt'Arctn was a bibliophile. They had been together for years before Clarence had died. Burt had almost no interest in human sacrifice. He was the most squeamish demon I had ever encountered.
This was getting a little too weird for me.
I called a little of the Dark I to my hands, ready to attack or defend. With a carefully calculated swagger, I stepped into the cooler doorway.
“Hello, boys. Looks like someone has been naughty.”
The demon and the warlock both started for just a second. It was funny in a way. Then the screaming started.
“Kill him!” the boy yelled. Almost screamed really. His voice got really high when he was stressed evidently.
Burt took a fast step toward me, really all he had room for between his size and the smallness of the cooler. I shaped the Dark into manacles and threw them toward him. The Dark was where the demons were from. It could contain them better than any other thing in reality. Our power over it was one of the reasons we kept watch for rogue warlocks.
The manacles wrapped around his wrists and kept flying toward the wall, taking the big demon with them.
The boy was fast. He charged me when he saw the demon fly toward the wall, sacrificial knife leading the way. He must be brand new, he would have to sanctify a new blade if he cut me in anything but ritual sacrifice. I wondered how he had gotten this far on his own.
I reached out right-handed and grabbed the boy’s wrist, guiding the knife past me. Strong elbow into the diaphragm knocked the wind out of him. Not as much as expected, he was wearing lots of layers it felt like. Still holding the knife. Keep my hand on his wrist. Push him back into the wall. Knife hand against the metal. Keep the pressure up. Forearm across the neck.
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Now we could talk.
“So,” I let the syllable hang in the air for a moment. “I’m with the official Mage Community Welcome Committee. We wanted to let you know that there are some ground rules for living and working in and around the Metro Area. The first being that you are not allowed to kill anyone.” I realized that sarcasm may not have been the best choice in this particular instance, but I was stressed and that tends to make me mouth off.
“You have two options in this situation,” I said. I was getting my mouth back under control at this point. “You can keep struggling and I’m going to end up killing you mostly on accident. I will do my damndest to deliver you to the Council alive, but no guarantees. Or you can surrender and you will definitely get there alive.” The kid was sort of listening at this point, I think I had choked most of the fight out of him.
“What’s it gonna be?” I stared him down as I demanded.
He dropped the knife in response.
“Good, now sit there and be quiet.” I pulled out some zip ties that I habitually kept in my pocket and bound his wrists. He could run, but I could chase him down with his hands tied. I picked up the knife and moved toward the girl on the stretcher. Pulse, check, good. I pulled back her eyelids to check her pupils. Wide as the fucking sea. She must have been drugged out of her mind. I took a quick glance at her through the Dark. Her spirit was still strong and strongly tied to the body. She would be fine once the drugs wore off.
I glanced at the demon still pinned to the wall. He was struggling to get to me still, which made sense after the last command.
“Call him off,” I said to the boy. “I want to say hi.”
“Enough,” said the kid. “You have no instructions for now.” The phrasing of the order was odd. Most warlocks kept a congenial tone with their demons. They wanted them happy in case there was a loophole in the contract, or if they were summoned again. This kid acted like he was ordering around a robot.
As the boy spoke Burt’s struggling stopped. He hung imply on the manacles that were still stuck to the wall. I stayed where I was for the moment, well out of reach of both of them.
“How have you been Burt? I thought you swore off warlocks after Clarence died.” Clarence had been a writer I had known in years past. An Afrofuturist before that had been a thing to be. The only sacrifice I had ever heard Burt demand was that Clarence’s books be dedicated to him.
“Hello Asa,” Burt rasped. His voice had never sounded like that before. “This is the first trip since Clarence.” He glared daggers at the kid in the corner. “She had my name. I had to come see who had found it after all this time.” I wondered who ‘she’ was, but let it go for now.
Burt’s eyes flicked down to the knife in my hand. “Once I was here that thing made me obey.” His eyes were still on the blade. “I signed away my will, Asa. She made me! Make her give it back!” I could see the pain on Burt’s face, and the hungering rage that demons were so famous for. I had never seen that on Burt’s face when I knew him through Clarence. This kid had really messed him up.
I still held the blade in my left hand. With my right, I pulled a little of the Dark into a necklace with a flick of my fingers. I tossed the charm over Burt’s head. It settled there, doing the opposite of glowing that necromancer charms always do. “This is just a truth spell.” I looked Burt right in the eye. “We had a mutual friend once, but that’s been a while ago. You’ll be fine.” The demon nodded.
“Tell me what happened.”
“I was summoned by my true name, pronounced correctly by a warlock. I came out of the Dark into the circle. Once I was here she drew blood with the dagger.” His eyes flicked down again. “I could not refuse after that. She had a contract prepared that gave her full control. I’ve been here two weeks and haven’t been able to make a single decision since then! You have to believe that I did not want this! This is not the kind of sacrifice I want!” Burt was getting increasingly agitated as he spoke.
“What do you need to go home?” Some contracts had clauses that prevented a demon’s return to the Dark.
“Nothing. She’s keeping me here by order alone. Destroy the dagger and I’m out. Never coming back again!”
“Who is ‘she’ that you keep talking about?” I wanted to get this sorted before I sent him home.
His eyes flicked to the wall where the kid slumped on the floor. Well shit, I guess he’s trans I thought. Demons had trouble with non-binary genders. It had been a problem for a while, but no one could figure out why they did it or how to stop it.
“Alright then, are you ready to go home?” Burt nodded vigorously.
I looked at the dagger. It was a simple design. Leather-wrapped handle, no guard, swept blade, gut hook on the back. Excellent for slicing and opening a carcass or corpse. It looked like an ornate hunting knife, made by someone who read too many fantasy novels.
I checked the kid in the corner to make sure she, no he damn it, was still sitting quiet. Check. I blinked and looked at the knife through the Dark.
I almost had to shield my eyes. It glowed with maleficence. This thing was evil in a way that only the worst humans, mages or not, could be. The mage who made it must have been a warlock because I could see a soul, black like a demon, bound into the steel. It raged against the imprisonment and powered the enchantments with its struggle. And the enchantments were many. They hovered around the thing like a cloud. Swirling and reaching out, to me, to Burt, to the kid. This thing was bad in a way that I had never dreamed.
And it was the most impressive thing I had ever seen. No one had ever been able to keep an object enchanted. The fact that the cost was so high and so monstrous made it clear why not.
I studied for a minute or so, trying to see how the thing worked so I could break it.
Ah ha.
“Watch the kid,” I said to Burt. “Yell if he does anything you think is dangerous.”
I nicked the edge of my palm. The thing needed blood to bond and it wouldn’t obey me until I bound it. As soon as my blood touched the blade I felt it trying to control me. It wanted to be used, wanted to kill, wanted to summon more and more demons. It wanted chaos and destruction.
Very human altogether.
I resisted the whispering and drew the Dark into the dagger. I fed more and more power into the thing, putting pressure on the cracks between the enchantments, stressing the steel, squeezing the carbon bonds from the inside out. Just before it blew apart I encased it in a ball of oblivion that would contain the explosion.
A soft WHUMP is not very satisfying after all the work I had put in.
Burt was already fading back into the Dark when I looked back at him. His glance behind me, though, made me turn back to the kid.
Except he wasn’t on the floor anymore. He was standing next to the girl on the stretcher with another fucking knife pressed to her throat. How many knives did this kid have?
“Time to talk,” the warlock said.
Should have frisked them before I looked away I thought as I watched the knife. This one was a plain military surplus K-bar bayonet. I risked a peek through the Dark. Entirely mundane.
“What would you like to talk about?” I was moving as I spoke. An eye on the knife and an eye on the floor. I was still between them and the door and I stepped out into the derelict kitchen. Maybe I could draw him away from the girl.
The kitchen was still shrouded in darkness. Tiny windows and an open door did not let in much light. For a little added flair I called a little Darkness into the corners and edges of the room. It would make him a little more nervous and help me see all the better.
“I know that you’re new to this. Maybe we can work something out with the Council.”
The kid peeked around the doorway, trying to find me in the shadowlight. I thought about taking him then. That would have made things a lot easier honestly, but I might have hurt him in the process. I always tried to avoid that if possible.
He made a show of stepping into the empty kitchen, head up and pretending to be relaxed. I was still moving around in the dark, using skill rather than magic to stay unnoticed.
“Who gave you the knife?” I asked, speaking to the corner to confuse my position. “The one that I broke.” Making sure we stayed on topic.
“I found it,” the kid said. He kept turning from corner to corner trying to figure out where I was.
“Bullshit. It was one of a kind and as purely evil as anything I have ever seen. People don’t just leave nuclear missiles or plagues lying around either.” He was moving out into the middle of the room, finally.
He was moving side-long toward the door as if I wouldn’t notice he was trying to run. At least he was that smart. “My dad flips houses. He lets me sort through the crap they find in attics and basements. I found the book and the knife in a basement.” Okay, maybe he had found it, especially if the warlock had died.
“Is your dad a warlock or your mom?” Magic almost always ran in families. There hadn’t been an outcropping of talent in decades.
“I’m adopted.” There was a lot of bitterness sunk into those two words. This was getting a lot clearer by the minute.
“Look, kid, I know that you're new to this. Had you summoned a demon before Burt?”
He was still inching toward the door but shook his head. “No. He was the first name I found.”
“This is a shitty start, but let me take you to the Council and find you an apprenticeship. You can learn how to be a real warlock instead of a murderer.” I was slowly moving toward his back, speaking softly so it wasn’t clear that I was approaching.
I took the last step and put my hand on his shoulder. I felt him tense for just a moment.
The turn was fast and the swipe with the knife had all the speed a teenager could muster, but I could feel the motion through his shoulder. And I had a lot more experience.
As soon as he tensed I was pushing him away to make some distance between us. The knife flashed in the moonlight from the door, cutting nothing but the shadows. I took another step back, pulling the dark and the Dark around me.
“You really are stupid, boy. A warlock should never face another mage without a demon, especially a necromancer.” I took two diagonal steps toward him, moving fast and taking long strides but maintaining separation. Just as I’d hoped he swung at me again. This time the fist came before the knife, again a good deviation from earlier, but not nearly enough. I stepped to his left and into him as he jabbed with that fist. Let his follow-up with the knife come straight for me, and then moved with it. Circle into his body. Tuck his knife arm under my elbow. Control the wrist with my left hand. Keep turning. One more hard step and he went stumbling away with the knife in my hand.
I gestured with the blade. “Stand down.” I was trying to be authoritative and gentle all at once, neither are my strong suit.
He didn’t even seem to hear me. As soon as he was up he was charging at me like a boxer going for a clinch. I faded back as he came on, but he kept following me, until my back was against the metal wall of the cooler where the girl was.
I took two punches to the gut because I was trying to keep the knife away from him. Then I felt him draw back his leg to knee me. Instinctively I brought both hands to his shoulders to push him away, but he saw the knife and tried to wrestle it from me. A few desperate seconds later he stopped struggling.
I don’t even know how it happened, but the knife ended up between his ribs. Shit. I felt the blood run over my hand as his heart rate picked up with the pain. Shit fuck shit goddamn. I pulled the blade out of his chest and threw it into the corner of the kitchen. Do not die, kid, I thought as forcefully as I could. Gently, but quickly, I eased him down to the dirty floor. I reached into the Dark and pulled power into the wound through my hand on his chest, wrapped it around the heart to keep it beating. I felt the whistling through the magic where the lung was nicked, patching that up too. Necromancy can’t heal wounds, but we keep the body and soul together until they heal on their own; or until we can get to a real doctor whether magic or mundane.
“Hold on you stupid little shit,” I muttered as I worked. “Did you stab yourself? Did I slip? How did this even happen?” I was hoping for a response, but he was just lying there. I kept glancing into the Dark to check on how alive he was.
“Fuck you old man.” I could barely hear the whisper over my own breathing and heartbeat.
“You’re going to be fine, kid. Just stay with me till I get you stuck back together.” I was still busy knitting the Dark into his organs to keep them working.
“Why should I?” he whispered again. “I’m circling the drain in more ways than one.” His breathing was getting more ragged despite my efforts. “I can see the Gate, I know what it means.” A long pause. “I’ll see you on the other side.”
And then he died.
His soul just walked out of his body and toward the Gate. I almost grabbed him, but I had never stopped anyone from dying because they wanted to, and I couldn’t do that to him then.
I was still sitting there, holding the dead but still breathing body, when I heard rustling from the cooler.
“What the hell is going on!?”