Michael Scott - The Necromancer

“Do you recognize this armor?” Sophie’s voice echoed slightly inside the helmet, giving it an otherworldly quality. The armor was a perfect copy of the suit Prometheus had worn as a young man.

Prometheus took a step back, his skin now the color of chalk. Aoife reached for her uncle’s hand.

“Do you remember when you made a suit like this for me out of your own aura? To keep me safe, you said.” The smell of vanilla was strong in the air, and then it was touched by another odor: the crisp scent of burning leaves. A slender thread of brown now dappled the silver metal, making it resemble leopard skin.

Shaking his head, Prometheus backed away. Sparks had gathered in his red hair and beard. Shimmering crimson armor started to form over his chest and shoulders. “Who are you?” he asked in the lost language of Danu Talis.

“I am Sophie Newman,” she replied in the same language before slipping back into English. “And I have a message from your sister.”

Prometheus’s aura blazed bloodred, and a suit of armor like the one Sophie wore shaped around his body. The two metal suits-one red, one silver-sparkled, leaking threads of colored aura into the air. “My sister is dead to me,” Prometheus boomed, his voice amplified inside his helm. “She betrayed me… she betrayed all of us.”

Sophie’s armor paled, becoming transparent and crystalline, revealing the girl beneath. Her eyes were solid silver, like mirrors in her face. “She did what was necessary,” she said. Suddenly her aura completely vanished, streaming up and away from her flesh in silver globules, and when she spoke, it was in the cracked and aged voice of the Witch of Endor. “Little Brother, I did what I had to do, and I did it for you. You spent your life protecting me and you paid a terrible price. And yes, I went with Chronos and I sacrificed my eyes to him, but I did it so that I could see the shifting threads of time, and so that I could always watch over you and keep you safe.”

“Zephaniah…,” Prometheus whispered. His auric armor flowed down his body and puddled around his feet before sinking into the ground. Bright green grass speckled with tiny alpine flowers appeared all around him.

Sophie turned to the Elder. “The world will end,” she continued in the Witch’s voice. “This I have seen in every thread of time… all but one. In one there is a chance, a very slender chance, of survival. Do you remember when you and I fought for the newly created humani, Little Brother?”

Speechless with shock, Prometheus could only nod.

“Now it is time for another brother and sister to do the same. And they need your help, Little Brother.”

Prometheus started to shake his head. His green eyes were huge with fiery tears. “Please, do not ask me…”

There was anger in the Witch’s voice. “Your aura sparked the humani to life. You are their father, and like every father, you have a responsibility to your family. If you refuse, then you doom the humani to destruction.” Sophie started to sway on her feet and Josh raced in to grab her. Threads of his gold aura wrapped around her, hissing, crackling and spitting when they touched her flesh. She shuddered, and when she opened her eyes, they were bright blue again. Her lids fluttered, and she blinked hard as she looked from Prometheus to Josh. “Do not disappoint me. I have always been so proud of my Little Brother,” she breathed before she lapsed into unconsciousness.

“I hate leygates!” Virginia Dare screamed as they plunged into the icy water.

“Now you tell me!” Dee shouted.

They fell, down, down, down… and then suddenly there was no water around them, only complete and utter darkness.

“And I particularly hate the falling ones…” Virginia’s voice sounded dull and muted, as if she was talking in a tiny space. “I’m not keen on the jumping ones either.”

Dr. John Dee tried to orient himself, but in the blackness, he was unsure which way was up and which was down.

“What about a light?” Virginia said. “I think a light would be good right now.”

“Has anyone ever told you,” Dee began, “that you talk too much?”

“No.” Virginia sounded genuinely surprised. “Do I? I guess I do.” Her voice changed, turning savage. “But only when I’m plunging through a leygate in the pitch-dark! Then I suppose I might have a few things to say.”

Their ears popped and a series of appalling scents wafted over them, as if they had just fallen through stinking clouds.

Suddenly all sense of movement stopped. They were still in a black void.

“Do you have a match?” Virginia asked.

“A match?” Dee asked, confused.

“I thought you magicians always carried matches with you. To light your candles. Aren’t magicians always lighting candles?”

“I’ve used electric light for the past century,” Dee muttered. “I don’t carry matches.”

“It’s very dark,” Virginia said, stating the obvious. “Scary.”

“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of the dark.”

“Not the dark, Doctor, but what lives in it.”

With a sigh, Dee reached under his coat and pulled out the stone sword. The moment his flesh touched the blade, it started to glow, gray first, then blue, and then blooming bright and white before it suddenly flamed red, filling their surroundings with a cold, stark light. Streamers of fire blazed off the sword, but it was a chilly fire that left speckles of ice spinning in the air.

“Hmm… not much to see,” Dee said, looking around.

Virginia Dare stood beside him, face ghastly in the light of the cold red flames. Then she slowly turned. “I think I preferred it when we could not see.”

A flat barren landscape stretched gray and unbroken in every direction. Beneath their feet, the only marks in the powdery dust were their footprints.

“Where are we?” Virginia asked.

Holding the sword high, Dee turned in a complete circle. “I’ve heard about these… though I’ve never seen one firsthand. It looks like an unmade Shadowrealm.”

“Unmade?”

“Started, but never finished.” He lowered the sword and the shadows clustered closer. “Elders create Shadowrealms using their auras, imaginations and memories. Sometimes a powerful individual can create an entire realm, but often groups will come together to shape their own world.” He gestured with the sword. “This one was never finished.”

“Why?” Dare wondered out loud.

“I have no idea…,” the Magician began, then caught Virginia by the arm, dragging her away. “Run!” he yelled.

She turned and looked up… and saw four cucubuths dropping out of the black sky.

“They must have fallen through before the leygate closed,” Dee said.

The four creatures settled lightly onto the ground, turned, obviously disoriented, then focused on the glowing light from the sword. With triumphant howls, the creatures raced toward Dee and Virginia.

Once they started to run, they changed. The transition from human to beast was instantaneous. One moment they looked like shaven-headed young men; the next they were enormous wolflike creatures with human faces. They ran upright on two feet, but hunched over, their claws sending up whorls of dust.

“Doctor?” Virginia said calmly.

“Send them to sleep,” Dee called out. “Can you play and run at the same time?”

Dare pulled her flute from its leather cover, put it to her lips and blew gently.

And yet no sound came out.

“Oh,” she gasped, “that’s not good.”

The four cucubuths were closer now, their handsome faces marred by the ragged teeth that filled their mouths. Hairless tails thrashed the ground.

There was a flicker of movement in the air behind the cucubuths, and Huginn and Muninn appeared. The huge ravens tumbled from the sky, crashing to the ground in a cloud of dust. They flapped their wings, but only rose a few feet off the ground before they settled down again. Then, spotting the blazing sword, they screamed Dee’s name in unison. The giant birds darted toward the only light in the landscape, moving in a running hop that quickly ate up distance.