The Necromancer (17 page)

Susanna stopped to catch her breath and get her

bearings. She couldn’t afford to be without her wits. She needed to be cautious. She needed to be alert. But more urgently, she needed to know what was happening and why.

She had never seen nor heard of anything like this before, and if what lay in wait for her on the other side of that hill was anything the equal of this phenomenon, she may be in the direst of jeopardies.

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She knelt down and closed her eyes for a moment to compose herself. Her breathing was more laborious than she had fi rst realized. She huffed slowly and deeply in an effort to regulate it, but it was diffi cult. Had she really run so far so fast that she should be exhausted already? She didn’t think so. In fact, she knew that couldn’t be the case since she was very fi t and knew it. No. It was more than the running that had her breathing so heavily. It was her state of mind. Her anxiety was causing her body to rebel against her, and the more she tried to fi ght it and move on, the worse her condition became.

She began to hyperventilate, and her anxiety doubled as a result. She had seen this happen to someone before, to Peter Willard when they brought him to the dungeon where she had been imprisoned. Two guards dragged him kicking and wailing in shackles past her cell when his body suddenly fell limp. He began coughing violently and gasping faster and more desperately.

“Help him!” she had yelled. “In the name of God, will you help him!”

But the Cranley brothers didn’t know what to do, and it wasn’t long before Willard’s face turned a bluish-gray color and his eyes bulged frog-like in their sockets.

“Help him!”

But Nyle and William simply stood by and watched the small frail body before them as it heaved, twitched, vomited, and died. That memory haunted her. She would never be able to forget that poor, wretched fi gure curled up like a dead rat on the dingy dungeon fl oor.

But was the same fate about to befall her? As she remembered Mr. Willard’s death and its similarity to her present condition, she grew even more distressed. Her breathing continued to worsen. No matter how much air fi lled her lungs it didn’t seem suffi cient. She felt dizzy and nauseated.

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Calm
, she thought—willed
. I must be calm. I must be calm
again
.

But her efforts to sooth herself failed. Her eyes rolled back inside her head, and she collapsed onto the dewy grass.

When she awoke, it was still night. She couldn’t have slept long, she knew, since she could hear the murmuring droning on as it had before. She raised her head and looked to the hill. The glow was still there in the trees, waiting for her to discover its source.

Susanna checked her breathing, and after a moment sighed with relief. She didn’t know what had caused the attack which led to her unconsciousness, but she was glad it was over.

Now she could concentrate on satisfying her curiosity.

She stood up and advanced toward the hill ahead. The murmuring grew much louder than she expected it would, although she did expect it to be loud since it had traveled such a considerable distance through the woods.

The base of the hill was before her now. It was steep and would be a tough climb for her, but she couldn’t allow herself to be defeated, having come this far. Determined, she leaned forward and proceeded with her ascent.

The hill proved to be an admirable challenge for her, but she endeavored to be every bit the equal of it. She clambered up the hillside, seizing weeds, roots, shrubs, whatever she could fi nd to lug her weary body upward as her feet probed for purchase on some rock in the earth.

Her breathing quickened, and for a moment she feared she would faint again and go tumbling down the hill. She looked down over her shoulder at the ground below. She had already climbed high enough for a fall to be crippling or fatal, and the thought further robbed her of breath. She turned back to the wall of dirt and rock, clung to it and closed her eyes.

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Calm
, she thought,
Calm.

This time she didn’t faint. Her breathing slowed and she continued upward.

She was almost at the top now and received a whiff of gritty fetor which awakened a profound loathing in her.

It smelled like earthy rot, a foul stench of decay which made the air thick and heavy. A lump swelled in her throat as if the rancid air were clotting in her windpipe, but it didn’t hinder her breathing, and she was able to stave off the nausea the lump sought to provoke.

Her limbs were tired and wobbly, but she managed to inch her way to the top of the hill high enough to peer over the peak. At once, all her senses were assaulted. Stenches choked her, rupturing blood vessels, making her eyes burn and tear, causing ample amounts of mucous and blood to run from her nostrils. Her skin grew cold and clammy with a sickening grime.

The droning was deafening, reverberating throughout her trembling body, but the most abhorrent offense was to her eyes and what they now beheld. Susanna turned away, retching and heaving, covering her mouth with her hand.

The scene which caused her illness did so

with revelation and horrid remembrance as well as the incomprehensible conglomeration of malformed anatomy to which she was now made witness.

Ambrose was in a fi relight congress with a creature so vile and ugly that the very sight of it threatened to unhinge the doors of her mind and pitch her headlong into madness.

Somehow she held on. Even in the presence of that thing—with its writhing tendrils, multiple mouthed breasts, and exposed and translucent innards which displayed the course 152

The Summoning

of its fl owing parasite ridden excrement—she held on to her sanity.

It took all the strength she could summon to keep from crying out or losing consciousness.

The creature’s ribs were cracked and broken and jutted out jaggedly from its back in a tangle of splintered bone and oozing marrow. Ragged fl aps of colorless fl esh cleaved to the luminous red eye which was its head and blazed brighter when it spoke. Broad plates of iron, which clanged together when it moved, festooned its densely muscled fl anks, making up the whole of its exoskeleton.

It was obviously a creature of some intelligence, since Ambrose seemed to be conversing with it, but Susanna couldn’t understand its or Ambrose’s part of the dialogue.

They appeared to be speaking in tongues or some foreign language she had never heard before.

She realized she never knew Ambrose, and never

loved him. Seeing him interrogate the beast like this yanked her memories of Walpurgisnacht from the trauma and enchantment induced abyss which he had created, and panic swept through her. The horror of her brutal defl owering fl ooded her mind in a torrent, and before she could get her bearings and stop herself, she screamed.

She screamed like she never screamed before in her life.

Ambrose and the creature turned toward her. Her eyes widened. She knew her error in giving voice to her terror and felt exposed and naked. Her mouth fell open and she raised her hands to it briefl y, forgetting her precarious position on the hill, and slipped.

She rolled down the slope in choppy thumps,

bouncing and crashing into what felt like every rock and thorny 153

The Necromancer

shrub on the hillside. Her mind a blank, and her vision a blur of earth, stones, sky, and vegetation as she plummeted. As she tumbled, she caught a few glimpses of Ambrose’s silhouette at the top of the hill, forecasting the muddy glow of the creature behind him.

“Susanna!” he cried out, but gravity was still taking her away from him.

But death didn’t come. She hit the bottom with

an uneventful thud and stopped. When she fi nally dared movement, pains jabbed at her from every side. She had taken quite a beating, but she had to move. She had to get away as fast as she could. She looked up the hill. It was dark there now.

She tried to rise to her feet, but a sharp pain notifi ed her that she must have twisted her left ankle during the fall and another pain told her that her right shoulder was dislocated.

She let out a small whimpering cry, more in fear of what her injuries meant in terms of her ability to escape than from the injuries themselves.

But injuries or no, she had to try. She stood up and began hobbling, holding her bad arm with her good one. Far away she could hear him calling her name: “Susanna!”

She fi gured he must be coming down the far side of the hill. That was good. That gave her a better chance of getting away. She continued deep into the woods, the deeper the better. If she couldn’t get away, at least she could hide.

“Susanna!” he called again more urgently.

Susanna limped faster through the woods. The moon, the fullness and brightness of which she had been so glad to take advantage of earlier, now seemed like a curse and a traitor, allowing Ambrose easier access to her.

As she fl ed deeper into the woods, the trees appeared to grow larger and closer together, giving Susanna the added 154

The Summoning

coverage she needed to elude her pursuer should he get this far.

It was strangely comforting to be this deep in the mysterious glory of the forest, amongst the pleasurable sounds and scents of nature, but Ambrose’s voice was getting louder, and she didn’t know how much longer she could keep up her present pace. She continued to run blindly away from his ever more urgent calls. Her lungs burned. Her body ached. A stitch stabbed her sharply on one side of her chest just beneath her ribcage.

Susanna stopped. She was exhausted and didn’t want to risk fainting again. She took refuge in a small alcove of brambles and tangled weeds. It concealed her body quite well, she thought, despite the white nightgown which acted as a beacon in the moonlight.

She squatted there quietly, trying to regulate her breathing in short measured huffs so as not to alert Ambrose of her whereabouts. She could see him now through the twigs and prickly leaves. At that moment, the pounding in her head, which denoted the regularity of her pulse, stopped, snatched a breath, then continued. She was certain her heart had skipped a beat. She didn’t know much about warlocks or magicians, but she had a terrible thought that maybe he had the power to fi nd her through magical means. Her fear waxed. She cupped a hand over her mouth to stifl e the scream hammering madly against the back of her throat for release.

Wide-eyed and blinkless, she glared at Ambrose

standing in a clearing just yards away, turning to every quarter in search of her. His gaze fell in her direction. He seemed to be looking directly at her. She was paralyzed.

He took one step toward her, then another. As he advanced slowly, methodically, all she could do was hope he was merciful and killed her for discovering what she already 155

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knew. But she didn’t believe he intended to kill her under any circumstances. His intentions were far more diabolical than that.

What if he takes my memory from me as he must have done
before?
She thought
. What if he takes my memory from me with
enchantments and makes me do things?

Susanna squeezed her eyes shut and prayed inwardly.

She could hear Ambrose’s footsteps getting louder and closer.

But he walked and walked and kept walking. As the sound of his footsteps faded away, Susanna opened her eyes and looked around. She couldn’t see him anywhere. It was as if one moment he was there and the next he simply vanished.

She stayed crouched there for a long time, almost comatose with terror. It was diffi cult to believe she had been fortunate enough to be overlooked. She was certain he would fi nd her and do unmentionable things to her.

A vagrant wisp of wind howled and blew her hair across her face and forehead. It cooled her fl esh and released her from her stupor. The stars and moon didn’t look so sharp in the sky now. Dawn was coming, gray and sleepy.

She rose to her feet. Her injuries hurt even more now as she regained the circulation in her legs and they awakened with the painful tingling sensation of countless needles sticking all over.

She was still wary of moving from her sanctuary, but she couldn’t stay there forever, so she left.

She hobbled through the woods, hoping to come to a familiar road once she was outside the perimeter of the forest.

She knew from the direction of the lighter sky where the sun was rising, so she proceeded southward.

The fi rst pangs of hunger crept inside her belly as she walked like a wounded soldier toward the babbling brook up 156

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ahead. It had been a long night, and she was hungry and thirsty and tired. She didn’t want to think of the long journey home, a journey she was sure she would have to walk the full extent of on a bad foot and an empty stomach, but it was a journey that had to be made.

She didn’t know when she would fi nd the next body of fresh drinking water, so she would have to stop a while and slake her thirst, and perhaps drink a bit more than she needed in preparation for the long walk awaiting her. The lining of her mouth felt like cotton. Rest and refreshment were very welcoming.

She clambered down the bank to the water, crouched down on her haunches, and dipped her hands in. It was icy and bracing. She never thought anything so cold could feel so good against her skin. She cupped her hands together and greedily scooped the water into her mouth, slurping it savagely.

She drank for a long time until she was full and a little bloated. Twilight spread across the countryside, giving everything a bluish hue. She decided to drink a little more, just to be sure. As she bent over to bring her hands to her mouth again, she saw the faint image of a man rippling in the water and looked up.

She gasped.

It was the charred and partially skinned and eaten corpse of Phillip Hawks, staring at her with its scolded, black eyes.