Taking their leave from the Mors Ostium they returned to HQ. Rosa thought a wake or reception might follow the follow the funeral, like with normal society, but wasn’t surprised when everyone instantly returned to work, she’d quickly come to realise that’s just the world they lived in. The world she now lived in. No time to celebrate a life while monsters still roamed.

While officers paced back and forth throughout the HQ, transporting documents and catching up with the morning’s work, a small number of familiar hunters congregated in the lobby. Unlike Sam, Rosa had been graced with an abundance of free time and comfortably leaned against a bench, carefully listening in on Louie, Zack, Emma, Seis and Audrey.

“So what’s your plan now?” Audrey asked Seis, “Is a hunt across the world calling your name?”.

“No actually” Seis responded, his tone surprised. “I was thinking of sticking around for a bit. Help out with your vampire lord pest”.

“Good. You can take point with Zack” Louie said.

“What about you?” Zack questioned, his brows creased.

“I’m dealing with a small suspicion” Louie said. Everyone stared, waiting for him to continue but the hunter never did.

“As untrusting as ever” Seis said with an amused grin, like he’d missed his friends antics.

“You’d think we were his enemies” Audrey said shaking her head annoyed. “At least he hugged you lot when you reunited. He pointed a gun at me”.

“Well me and him are meant to be best mates and he barley tolerates me so what do you expect” Zack stated jokingly.

“We believe we’ve zoned in of the vampire’s location” a gruff voice emerged, silencing their teasing. “He’s established himself on the outskirts of Liverpool and following patterns it suggests it will advance inwards soon. When it does we’ll be in range for to launch an ambush”.

The hunters all turned and opened up a gap so commander Ruthor could enter their gathering.

The commander continued his explanation, “We hunt in two days, Halloween night. We’ll attack just as night falls when the vampire exposes itself but won’t expect us. Zack, Louie I want you leading-”.

“Not me” Louie cut off the commander.

“Use me instead” Seis said without a second delay.

The commander gave them a confused and wary stare but quickly snapped back into his usual commanding, demeanour.

“Fine. Zack you take charge, Seis you’re his second. Have your team ready” he ordered and both hunters gave an affirmative nod. The commander turned to Louie.

“Do what you have to” he stated before taking his leave. Emma and Audrey trailed after him and both Zack and Seis went off to scout a team, leaving Louie and Rosa alone.

“Well that’s the vampire sorted. What’s your plan now?” Rosa asked. She turned to Louie to see he’d not been paying attention and instead was lost off in space. Strange, incomprehensible enigmas twirled around behind his arctic eyes.

“Let’s go” he said abruptly and then, without uttering a single sliver of context, darted off towards the exit.

Their destination came to be back home inside Louie’s secret office and working on his classified assignment. Rosa noticed that Louie was working through his notes and research more vigorously than ever, like a dying flame had been reignited within him.

Turning out to be completely useless without her sister there, Rosa watched quietly as Louie worked for hours and until Emma returned home and joined them.

“You should really tell everyone about this” Emma stated scanning through a pile of documents filled with images.

“They wouldn’t like it” Louie stated.

“There’s a reason for that “Emma sighed placing down the pile of papers and jumping off his desk. “I don’t understand the motive behind your actions. You can trust them. My father did”.

“It’s not about trust. If they knew, they’d try and stop me. Say I’m chasing phantoms when there is a real threat in front of us. Nothing would get done”.

“Nothing is getting done” Emma argued. “We’ve been at this for weeks and we’re nowhere closer than when we began. All we’ve done is cut off any possibilities and resultingly created an even more complicated and bizarre problem. Louie, we are chasing phantoms when there is a real threat at our doorstep yet you do nothing. A threat that is after Rosa”.

“Zack and Seis can handle Valdosk” Louie sighed and turned towards her. He froze, catching both Rosa and Emma off-guard.

“Those papers” he said sternly, “bring them to me”.

Despite her confused expression, her sister complied and brought Louie the pile.

“What are they?” Rosa asked curiously.

“Documents of possible red alerts. People and creatures in the country who could be a threat to the hunters and civilians” Emma explained, “But I’ve already checked it five times. That pile holds no one capable of what occurred at our house”.

“This isn’t possible” Louie murmured.

“What isn’t?” Emma asked.

“It says he was spotted entering the country over a month ago”.

“And?”.

“I killed him five years ago” Louie stated coldly.

“You killed him?” Rosa asked, feeling a chill run down her spine. She’d never heard to him mention killing people, the thought had never even crossed her mind.

“Adler Lam a German hunter. Conflicted man but a skilled warrior” Louie said placing down the papers, “but one day, the insanity of the life we live crept inside his soul and like many hunters before, he snapped. Killed eleven hunters and twenty three civilians before I got to him”.

“Then how is it possible he’s here?” Rosa questioned.

“It shouldn’t be” Emma stated scanning over the document. Her face paled slightly. “Yet it is. Hell they’ve even got pictures of him entering the country and the recorded date. Your certain this is the man you killed?”

“No mistake. Spread out all the documents” Louie ordered, “search for anymore dead men walking”.

Although Rosa couldn’t help identifying the dead from the living, she followed her sisters lead spacing the pile of red alerts around the room so they could all be seen. By the time they were finished, papers ran along the floor and up to walls.

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Louie backed up into the centre of the room and his eyes darted around like bullets scanning over every file and document at inhuman speeds.

“Theres more” he commented grimly and then collected five documents. Five more people who’d also been killed by Louie years ago yet had been spotted all over the country during the recent month.

‘Just how many people had Louie hunted?’ Rosa wondered. She’d came to believe that the hunters only hunted monsters but, from Emma’s lack of surprise, it was becoming clear that wasn’t entirely true. Louie carefully scanned over the papers in silence, his eyes ingesting in everything on the pages.

“What are you thinking?” Emma asked, after giving him some time.

“That I’ve finally realised what that scent was?” he growled irritation burning in his throat. “How couldn’t I tell before” he spat.

“Scent?” Rosa asked confused.

“Back when we were investigating the house. Louie kept picking up on a smell” Emma informed. She turned towards him “What is it?”.

“Magic”.

Emma’s face creased, “I know the scent of magic” she said, “We all do, yet none of us there but you could smell anything unusual? Just the scents of the stone”.

“We’re not discussing standard magic” Louie replied, “Unless this magic is fresh, in powerful concentrations or you have previous experience with it, you might as well consider it borderline undetectable”.

“What type of magic are we dealing with? Demonic?” Emma asked carefully, like she didn’t truly wish to know the answer.

Louie shook his head. “A rare, vile magic, coated in the stench of death, long forbidden for over a millennia” Louie said before wandering over to his desk and withdrawing a thick, black leather tome.

“Rosa I know its uncomfortable but I need you to speak of your visions” Louie abruptly stated, “specifically the once right before the attack”.

Rosa stared stunned, she’d never spoken of her visions still terrified and baffled to what they are. She was still half convinced she was going mad, preferring that simplicity over the fact she might possess clairvoyance.

‘How could he know?’ she questioned.

“Visions” Emma questioned, clearly lost. “Rosa what’s he talking about”.

“You talk in your sleep” Louie explained, witnessing Rosa’s baffled expression. His eyes then softened, it was only slightly, barely noticeable but Rosa saw the steel expression crack and tinge with rust. “I was going to wait until you brought it up yourself but time is no longer a luxury I possess”. He walked up to Rosa and bent down to her height. “I need you to push through the pain and terror Rosa. What did you see that night?”.

Rosa looked to her sister but Emma, was stood off to the side speechless. Rosa could see the cogs inside her sister’s mind piecing together the recent events working it together with Rosa’s nightly outbursts the days before their parents passing.

“Why didn’t you say anything?” her sister asked, almost sounding hurt with her sisters secrecy.

“I thought I was going insane” Rosa admitted.

“You technically are” Louie stated bringing her attention back to him. “But we’ll address that another time. Do you think you can do it?”.

The hunter’s determined gaze sparking something hidden within her soul, something primal, powerful. Rosa nodded. With a deep calming breath, she shut her eyes and delved into her mind, reliving the vision. She couldn’t explain how but, on pure instinct and riding that primal spark, she was able to slip back into the fabricated world. It felt like moving a limb or flexing a muscle, unexplainable but natural.

“The shadows” she muttered, not opening her eyes and remaining inside her psyche. “Up the stairs the shadows are … moving, reaching out. Every fibre of my body is warning me to stay away. Even as our house is turned into a massacred bloodbath those shadows are the only thing my body fears. It’s like a living black abyss”. Eventually her mind began to ache and body tremble and soon she was unable to bear the mental strain and was forced to pulled herself back to reality. When Rosa finally opened her eyes again she was greeted with an unpleasant view. All the colour had drained from her sister’s skin although her expression remained fearless as she forced on a brave face. In contrast, a satisfied, psychotic grin spread across Louie’s face. He opened up the black tome he’d pulled out before. She recognised it as the same book Louie had titled ‘Creatures and monsters you should hope to never come across or pray they are already long dead’.

“I believe we’ve found our foe” he stated placing the book down onto his desk, open on a double page spread.

Emma looked at him in disbelief. “You can’t possibly mean-”.

“I’m certain”.

“What?” Rosa asked, worried about her sister’s concern.

“Necromancer” Emma murmured.

‘Necromancers’. During her bouts of curiosity driven research over the last few weeks, like every type of mage Rosa had covered everything she could on them. But then again, there wasn’t much to read in the first place. Following their exile and the ban of their practices nearly all of their records were destroyed to discourage others from following the same footsteps. Only few remaining intact for the use of hunters and others who may have to face their threat. But, despite the lack of information, some things were crystal clear, the necromancers weren’t liked by anyone, so much in fact they were killed on site or if that wasn’t possible a hunt was declared upon them. Their magic and sorcery was considered vile and corrupt, acting too close to the Abyss, granting them domain over both death and the darkness that shrouded this world.

‘Whatever that meant’ Rosa thought. She’d heard that word, ‘Abyss’, used many times now, however, was still without an answer to what it meant. But there was one more text she read that was definitely significant to their situation. In fact it was probably the most important piece of context she’d read for their situation, simultaneously creating the most confusion.

“Aren’t the necromancers all dead?” Rosa asked, reciting what she’d read. It was said they had dominion over death, could they resurrect themselves like they done others? Other did death just not affect them?

“Not all of them” Louie replied sourly, “one still lives”.

“Why have they never been hunted?” Rosa asked. ‘Guess they can die then’.

“The hunters didn’t kill majority of the necromancers” Louie informed. “He did. Drove his entire race to extinction. The last necromancer. Only known by the name Orus”.

“He killed is entire race” Rosa mumbled disgusted. “Why?”.

“For power” Louie answered. “With every kill, the necromancer claimed his fellow mage’s power for his own”.

“Just how powerful is he?”.

“He’s a monster” Emma stated, ending her silence. “An ancient abomination, over a thousand years old. Wielding unfathomable power, it’s the greatest necromancer the worlds ever known and among the deadliest mages ever recorded. Throughout history it has appeared and vanished wreaking havoc as it pleases across the world never giving the hunters time to form an attack force capable of slaying the beast”. Fear began to fester in the corner of Emma’s eyes. “If this monster truly killed my father and is active once again, we must assemble the council and the knights. Pray they can find and kill it before it once again vanishes, or worse slaughters more hunters”.

“There is no need for that” Louie said with composure. “In fact I expect you both to continue keeping our activities secret”.

Emma’s head snapped towards him with dangerous eyes. “You can’t possibly thinking of facing this beast alone. Even if it’s you. This is a threat that requires the power of the knights”.

“That’s exactly what I plan to do” Louie replied, “I’ll end Orus on Halloween night. Both threats to the hunter will be slayed simultaneously”.

“We’re talking about a Millenia old power which was capable of killing my parents without receiving a scratch or cut” Emma snapped, “It’s one of the few remaining mages and said to have killed thousands of us yet you wish to face it alone”.

Louie shrugged unbothered drawing out Emma’s ire and frustration even further.

As Emma continued to argue and Louie continued to pay no attention to her pleas, Rosa wandered over to the tome. It was the one book records on necromancers she’d not witnessed. On the left page there was a series of roughly drawn sketches of a man. Instantly she froze.

‘I know him’ Rosa realised. The sketch was rough and faded with time but she definitely recognised that face and clothing. Just where from? Her mind instantly went blank. Desperate and pushing through the brain ache from relieving the vision, Rosa clamped her eyes shut. Her face creased with concentration as she brute forced her way through her memories, searching for his face.

“What’s wrong Rosa?” Emma asked, breaking away from her conflict with Louie. Rosa never responded, too deep inside her own head to multitask.

‘There!’ Rosa exclaimed within, almost jumping up in excitement. She knew she’d seen him and as it turned out it was more than once, a lot more. For the last month, maybe even longer, she’d passed him the morning on the way to school. He’d never once acknowledged her presence. Not even looked her way. They’d just pass once every morning and carry on with their day, Rosa had just assumed he was a middle aged man on his way to work.

“It’s him” Rosa announced, gesturing to the necromancer sketched into the tome.

“What?” Louie asked with a confused head tilt.

“He’s been on my way to school for the last month maybe longer” Rosa replied.

“You’re sure?”.

Rosa nodded with all the confidence she could muster.

“Its stalking her” Emma gasped horrified.

“Well that officially settles it” Louie said calmly, in contrast to her sister’s terror. “It’s after Rosa. They both are”. He turned to back to Emma. “Are you sure you still want me to wait for reinforcements?” he asked.

Emma’s face creased with conflict, fear and anxiety, producing an expression Rosa had never witnessed. For the first time her sister seemed completely lost.

“Are you confident you can kill it?” she asked softly, attempting to regain composure.

“I’m confident I am our best choice” Louie replied. “If I wait, it has the chance to escape again or worse achieve its goal. I’m not taking that risk. Halloween night, one of us falls”.