Necromancer Awakening (8 page)

Mujahid motioned Nicolas into the tunnel.

“I get the feeling they don’t like you,” Nicolas said.

“Their sentence is a long one, and that doesn’t lend itself to happiness.”

“Jail sentence?”

“The estate is ahead.”

Nicolas chuckled. “Undead criminals. Amazing. You guys got zombie chain gangs too?”

“We’re here.”

They were at a dead end.

“There’s nothing here,” Nicolas said.

The nerves in his arms and legs spasmed from top to bottom. He looked up in time to see the glow fade from Mujahid’s eyes.

“You did something to me.”

“Yes. I did.” Mujahid faced the wall.

“You gonna share with the class?”

“I…refreshed your vision. The magic was about to fade.”

“It felt different than last time.”

“You’re an expert on magic now?”

“What’s with the tingling on my head? Every time you use magic it feels like I stuck my head in a mini electrical storm.”

“The
tingling
, as you call it, lets you know that someone is using magic nearby. How near depends on your abilities.”

“But how—”

“What you’re about to see is known to few. I’ll teach you, but you will tell no one.”

Mujahid’s eyes glowed white. He pressed one hand against the stone wall and made a bunch of strange gestures with the other. The wall changed from solid rock to grey cloud, then evaporated into nothing. An archway tall enough for a man to pass through appeared in its place, and a field of pure blackness filled the space between.

“Well ain’t that something,” Nicolas said.

A familiar image drew his attention to the top of the arch. It was the symbol of the floating person with glowing eyes from before.

“That supposed to be a picture of you?” Nicolas said.

“Too much, too soon. You wouldn’t understand.”

Even Nicolas’s enhanced vision wouldn’t penetrate the blackness of the void inside the arch.

Mujahid stepped forward and disappeared into the void. Nicolas took a deep breath and followed the old man into the blackness.

He expected to walk into a pitch-black room, but globes of fiery-orange light, varying in intensity and elevation, floating all around the cavern.

This side of the arch was as pitch black as the last, but the pictograph above it was different. This one was in the image of a mountain with three peaks.

A massive structure filled the cavern. This must be the
estate
Mujahid mentioned.

The building, carved out of the cavern wall itself, was as large as the Texas state capital. The top disappeared into darkness, making it impossible to guess its height, but it was at least two hundred yards wide, and it was surrounded by several tall, narrow spires. Intricate patterns of gold and black scroll work decorated the building around the sides and up a stone staircase, which was as wide as the building itself. The stairs led up to three monolithic doors, each at least fifty feet tall and set back from the top of the stairs.

Statues spanned the top of a facade above the doors. But one statue stood above the others—a statue of death. An obsidian robe shrouded the statue, and it carried an ominous scythe. The entire figure cast a macabre shadow on the steps beneath it.

The whole thing reminded Nicolas of the basilicas he visited with Dad in Italy. The beauty and craftsmanship captivated him at first.

But his admiration turned to disgust.

Here, a short walk from the squalor of Paradise, Mujahid’s palatial estate grew out of the stone floor, trimmed in gold, as if mocking the destitution that surrounded it.

“You live like this,” Nicolas said, “while those people struggle to survive right under your nose?”

“You don’t understand what you see.”

“How’s it feel to walk through that ghetto on the way to your palace? That gold you hand out ease your guilt when you sit on your throne?”

“You understand nothing yet presume to judge?”

“I know—”

“Nothing! Do you know anything about the history of this world, boy?”

Nicolas stared at him in silence.

The man had a point. Nicolas knew nothing about this strange new world, and lashing out at things he didn’t understand wasn’t going to help him see Kaitlyn again. Worse, it might get him killed.

He followed Mujahid up the staircase.

The room they entered destroyed any doubt the estate held religious significance. Twisting marble columns lined the cavernous room, their tops rising higher than the floating light spheres that bathed everything in an orange glow. Two broad transepts opened like great, arched tunnels on either side of a recessed apse at the far end of the room. A golden altar stood at the center of the apse.

Nicolas couldn’t believe he’d stumbled across a baroque cathedral in the middle of an alien world. He wanted to study the place to see how far the similarities went. Why would a civilization build a place like this without any of the religious inspirations and symbolism of his own western civilization?

He wanted to dig. Was there a crypt? Was there an older structure underneath, like at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome? Was this estate part of a larger underground complex or city? What was it about the shape of a cross—formed by transepts, apse and nave—that spanned two worlds?

His questions would have to wait. Mujahid was already leaving through a large golden archway.

They emerged into a room that was smaller, yet vast by any standard.

Golden-framed portraits of men and women wearing long dark-blue robes hung above wooden tables and dainty chairs. The dark-blue scapulars draping their shoulders bore the symbol of the floating person with glowing eyes.

One portrait in particular caught his attention. A bright yellow creature with an enormous head and cavernous mouth sat with webbed hands folded. Chameleon-like eyes the size of basketballs pointed in two different directions. It wore a form-fitting doublet the same color as the robes, and a dark-blue scapular with a black fringe hung to the middle of its chest.

The religious imagery didn’t stop with the architecture, it seemed. Catholic clergy back home wore scapulars as well, depending on their status.

Gold tiles and jewels formed a mosaic on the far wall. Multifaceted stones simulated magical flashes of light. Two tall skeletal warriors on the edges of the mosaic carried blades the length of a man’s arm. They stood beside two men, each wearing the same midnight blue robes as the men in the portraits. One of them looked like Mujahid, but the other was facing away. Each man held a scythe like the one wielded by the statue outside. But the main subject of the mosaic stood at its center. A cyclops, at least four times the height of the men, swung a massive black hammer. Next to it a perfect sphere floated in the air, its shiny surface reflecting the magical flashes in a cascade of gems.

“Is that what I think it is?” Nicolas asked.

“I told you it was hard won.”

“You fought off a cyclops for it?”

“An old, malevolent creature, with a long history of tormenting the people of Erindor. There aren’t many left, Arin be praised.”

“Is that other guy your brother Nuuan?”

“
Lord
Nuuan, postulant. Remember that. His disposition isn’t as friendly as mine.”

“You’re the friendly one?”

Mujahid walked toward a staircase that ran up the side of the hall.

“Your quarters are on the second level. Mine is on the fourth. Training rooms are on the third.”

“Those stairs go down too.”

Mujahid turned on Nicolas. “Under no circumstances will you visit the crypts.”

“I knew this place had crypts! Can’t I just take a look?”

“I don’t care what you see, boy. Explaining the death of my postulant will be very awkward, however.”

Nicolas swallowed.

“There’ll be a penitent outside your room. If you need more food, ask him.”

“You said that before.
Penitent.
I know what it means, but I’ve never heard it used that way.”

“The undead serve a penance for the evil committed during their life. And so we call them penitent.”

A shiver of anxiety ran down Nicolas’s spine. The dead were among his greatest fears, and now he was stuck in a world filled with the undying.

“We’ll speak more about it,” Mujahid said. “In fact, it’s central to what you must learn.”

They reached the second level, and Mujahid led him to a stone door at the end of the hall. A skeleton walked out carrying a tray.

Nicolas jumped.

“You’ll get used to them,” Mujahid said. “Eat. Then get some rest. I’ll send for you in the morning.”

The room was small and spartan. A bed was pushed up against the far wall next to a stone wardrobe. Next to the wardrobe stood a buffet blanketed with food. The centerpiece was a cooked turkey, but it was unlike any turkey he’d ever seen.

Four drumsticks?

His mouth watered, and he tore off a drumstick.

“Amazing,” Nicolas said with his mouth full. “It tastes like turkey.”

“What in the six hells do you expect a turkey to taste like?” Mujahid raised his eyebrow.

“But it has four legs.”

“I know. It’s a turkey.”

“No, you don’t get it. This turkey has four legs!” He pulled off another drumstick and held it up for Mujahid to see.

Mujahid shook his head and left the room, mumbling something as he closed the door behind him.

It didn’t take long for Nicolas to drift off into a turkey-induced coma.

The rotting head dripped with melting skin, and saliva foamed from gaping wounds in the jaw, where missing muscle revealed teeth and sinew. Hair in a patchwork of clumps clung to portions of charred skin that hung from the back of the skull. A jagged, severed spine extended below the head, and blood oozed between the vertebrae.

It pushed itself into the room by coiling and uncoiling its severed spine.

A scream rose in Nicolas’s throat, and he scooted backward on the bed.

The head burst into flames, filling the room with the scent of burning flesh, until nothing was left but a pristine skull.

It rose into the air several feet away.

“No,” he said.

“Nicolas,” the skull whispered.

“No.”

“Nicolas.” The skull raised its voice and drew closer.

“Get away from me!”

The skull rushed through the air, opening its mouth beyond the limits of human anatomy, unhinging its jaws like a ravenous snake as it reached his face.

“Nicolas,” Mujahid said. “Wake up.”

Mujahid shook him.

“What happened?” Nicolas said. His head pounded like he’d been hit by a rodeo belt buckle.

Mujahid’s eyes flashed white, and a wave of energy entered Nicolas’s body. The headache vanished, followed by the anxiety.

“This is far worse than I feared,” Mujahid said. “We can’t delay any longer.”

“Morning already?”

“I left you two hours ago.”

“What’s happening to me?”

“The Hall of Power calls, boy, but your lack of training prevents you from doing anything about it.”

Nicolas leaned back against the wall.

“Did the skull explode with power, crackle with energy, or do anything out of the ordinary…that is, compared with previous dreams?”

“It was all on fire and stuff. I could smell it. Disgusting.”

“This is important. You must follow my every direction.”

Nicolas swallowed.

“Do you remember the sick man?”

“You said he’d failed in the halls, but I don’t know what you meant.”

“Not just any hall. A
Hall of Power
. Halls of Power are places where necromancers go to advance their knowledge. They are…mental constructs. And each Hall of Power is connected to yet another by a doorway.”

“Anyone can do this?”

“Only those who can wield magic…people like us.
Magi
. And only a magus that knows his strength will emerge with his mind intact.”

“So that guy that failed…he wasn’t strong enough?”

“Strong, smart, agile, wise, compassionate, merciful…there’s no way to know to a certainty. His priesthood was his own, and only the gods know the attributes he needed to do their will. Suffice it to say he was tested beyond his measure.”