The Necromancer (23 page)

The Necromancer

a misguided vision. The not-seeing was the worst of it. The impenetrable blackness, the absolute void, the abyss. Did that mean he wouldn’t survive? He didn’t know, but he didn’t like the implication...or the uncertainty. Time was growing short, and now he had to act. Before they reached him. Before they had the chance to stop him. Before they killed him.

*****

accompanied by Roger, Edward, Reverend Parris, and four other men on horseback; the Cranley brothers rode in a wagon drawn by two horses. The back was empty save for several pairs of shackles.

After a day and a half of travel, Edward was baffl ed.

From what Susanna had told him, they should have come across the house by now, but there was no sign of any houses out here. Every time one of the men thought they spotted a house the others would look and fi nd nothing but hills and trees. Corwin and Parris and the others were beginning to wonder if that head injury Edward had sustained was distorting his judgment, and as they continued their search and continued to be misled by their own eyes, they began to wonder about their own judgment as well.

“It must be somewhere around here,” Edward insisted.

“I know this area well, and while I do not remember there ever being any houses out in these woods, I know we should be close. Susanna could not have walked much farther in the condition she was in when I discovered her lying on the side of Sutter’s Road.”

“True,” Corwin agreed. “From what you told us of the girl’s condition, I fi nd it remarkable she walked that far.” He shook his head. “But we have been searching the area for the better part of the day, and still we have found nothing.”

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Hearing this, Roger rode up along side Corwin and placed his hand on his shoulder.

“Please, George,” he said. “We must fi nd her. She is all the family I have now.”

Corwin looked at him grimly.

“We must ride onward,” Edward added emphatically.

“If not for Susanna’s sake, then surely for Salem’s, for there can be little doubt that Blayne is the cause for all this witchery.

If we fi nd them not, he will most assuredly destroy us all.”

Corwin nodded slightly, sullenly, sighing through his nostrils.

“Very well, we shall continue. But, we return to Salem in the morning, with or without them. I cannot allow myself to be further diverted from my duties in town in search of a man who may or may not be a servant of the Devil; who may not even be out in these woods.”

Roger’s face relaxed a little, but he was continuing to grow uncertain. What if they never found her?

*****

room. Ambrose still stood at the window wondering how it could be that they would be coming tonight, the most crucial and effi cacious time to perform the ritual. Surely this was no coincidence. There had to be some other power or intelligence governing these men. There had to be some—dare he think it—divine intervention.

Well, there was no point in dwelling on the situation.

He had done everything he could to prevent being disturbed during the time of the ceremony. He had created diversions for the men who sought him. The house was cloaked in a camoufl age shield with a demon keeping watch at every 211

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quarter. None of them had reported to him yet, and that was good. Perhaps the diversions would keep them occupied chasing shadows until they gave up the search and went back home, but an indescribable feeling of dread, which he had never before experienced, told him otherwise. Perhaps they wouldn’t come for Susanna and him, but he knew they would.

He couldn’t wait any longer. Ideally, the ritual should commence at the strike of midnight, but he knew there wouldn’t be time enough to simply sit around waiting impotently for midnight to come. The ceremony itself would be long and exhausting in order to build up suffi cient energy for the desired result. He had to begin now.

“Damn them,” he muttered, and then he drained

his cup and slammed it down on the windowsill. He turned around. Susanna was still sleeping, covered with quilts in the circle. Jessica sat on the armchair beside the circle, looking up at him meekly. Anster lay curled sullenly at her feet with his head on his paws, his tail beating the fl oor sporadically.

“Get out,” Ambrose said lowly.

Jessica’s eyes widened, but she didn’t move.

“Begone!” he yelled, storming across the room and hauling her out of the chair by her upper arm. “OUT! OUT!

GET OUT, YOU CUNTING WENCH!” he growled.

“Ambrose!” she cried, confused and upset.

He kicked Anster, making the dog whimper and run from the room, then shoved Jessica through the doorway, and slammed the door behind her. His palms remained pressed to the heavy oaken door. He leaned forward, resting his forehead against the wood, and sighed.

He stood like that for several minutes, breathing slowly and deeply to regain some control. When he did, he turned to 212

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Susanna. His outburst hadn’t disturbed her from her slumber.

The unguent had been most effective.

He gazed at her sentimentally. Nothing she could do would ever make him love her any less than he did now. Even though she had fl ed from him, and now regarded him as some kind of monster, he couldn’t help but love her. It made him sad. All his life, happiness seemed fl eeting. The brief love and contentment he had taken for granted when he was so young and Odara was still alive were elements that continued to elude him since her death. He fed his emptiness with anger, but now—even now—that anger ate at his heart and turned it black with rage. He didn’t like using Susanna this way, but he had no other options. This was his last resort.

All he wanted was to love her and be with her. But they weren’t going to allow that. They were coming for him, and when they arrived, they wouldn’t be merciful, nor did he expect them to be. He was never able to let go of the anger, and it was that anger that made him evil. He knew that. He knew that very well, and he exercised that evil on Salem. They could never forgive him for that.

Now there was regret. Now there was sorrow. No

amount of penance could undo the harm he had caused.

If only Odara had never been murdered...all this misery could have been avoided. But those ignorant people in Scotland were too afraid of powers they didn’t understand and couldn’t control. Those damned, ignorant people.

The anger returned.

There was no way to turn back time, and remove the evil that haunted the past, present, and future. He had forged his fate of vengeance many years ago, and he was still bent on avenging the injustice of Odara’s death. He knew who and what he was...and he was proud of it. He would not run.

He would not take Susanna and fl ee like some love-struck 213

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adolescents whose parents didn’t approve of their joining.

There was a higher purpose to his vengeance than the wrath incurred by the loss of a spouse—there was
true
justice.

He would stay and fi ght, but he would make certain he would be with Susanna in the end, even in defeat.

He kindled the incense.

*****

this evening; only dreams of love. Dreams of love with Edward. Hugging. Kissing. Making love in a garden of fragrant fl owers and perfumed dews. Naked. Free.

Gone were troubled thoughts that plagued her

throughout the year, and even the thought that the man she was dreaming of had been killed by the skeleton man who had taken her from her home. There was only bliss, and bliss was all.

She played with Edward’s thick, blond hair as he kissed her deeply and fell to her breasts, devouring her nipples hungrily. He rose up from them and groaned familiarly. She brought her knees up to his waist and wrapped her legs around his hips. He bucked into her rhythmically like waves crashing against a wall of rock. She cooed and moaned, holding onto his strong arms for support.

He slammed inside her, and it hurt. It hurt enough to wake her.

She opened her eyes, then she screamed.

It wasn’t Edward she was making love to, but

Ambrose, and he looked deranged, like a madman. In the dark room, illuminated solely by smoldering embers of incense, his head appeared to be disembodied, but it was only an illusion 214

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caused by the darkness and the robe he wore hiked up around his waist.

She screamed again and tried to claw at his face with her nails and break free, but he had them pinned to the fl oor at the wrists under the bulk of his weight.

He groaned again, and for an instant, she caught a glimpse of that thing that was him beneath the skin, the same thing which had raped her on Walpurgisnacht.

She squirmed, and cried, and thrashed, but she could not move. That dirty thing was inside her like vermin, a poisonous leech that sought to rob her of all her self-respect and sanity. Its fi lth was building up, preparing to explode inside her and pollute her body forever.

All she could do was scream those horrible, gibbering words that had no rational meanings, but which could only be interpreted by the most visceral, instinctual perceptions of man and beast alike.

*****

“What is it?” Roger asked, riding up along side him.

“I thought I—”

He was cut off by another scream, this one louder than the fi rst, and more urgent.

“Dear God!” Parris exclaimed, hearing the tormented cry.

“It came from over that ridge,” Corwin announced, pointing north toward a small hill.

“Susanna!” Roger gasped.

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“Follow me!” Corwin called behind him as he took the lead and the screaming continued.

*****

But Ambrose ignored her. Instead, he continued his violation of her, his moans mutating into grunts, his grunts into swine-like snorts and dog-like growls. His face fl ickered back and forth from human to inhuman to human again; man to beast, beast to man.

Susanna was petrifi ed. She dared not to move or utter another sound; her fear would allow it no longer. Something in her mind snapped. She simply lay there now, a sack of heavy, limp fl esh, her mouth and eyes wide open like a dying fi sh out of water; her breathing: slow, deep, labored.

Jessica pounded on the door, calling to Ambrose to let her in, but he could no longer hear her. He was all beast now, and the beast’s eyes were closed, the furrowed, leathery lids trembling as the eyeballs beneath darted wildly from side to side in their sockets. Its stubby black snout twitched and bristled with short, coarse fur as snot and drool oozed and dripped onto Susanna’s breasts.

It roared out in tongues and began to shudder

savagely.

*****

All the men stopped and looked up in the direction in which Roger pointed.

“I see nothing,” Corwin snapped as he peered with strain into the leave-blown night.

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“Nor do I,” Parris added.

“But I tell you I saw it,” Roger said.

The screaming had stopped and they could no longer determine which direction those screams had come from.

For a moment everything remained silent; only the low howling of the wind could be heard. Then Edward spoke up.

“Wait,” he said. Just now he thought he saw something too, but it vanished almost as soon as it appeared. He removed his spectacles, huffed on them, clouding them with his breath, then wiped them with a handkerchief and slid them back on.

He looked back in the direction he thought he saw it, but nothing was there.

He rode up to the front and passed Corwin, Parris, and the others. He rode up the hill, to where he thought he saw the house, and about half way up he disappeared.

Corwin’s mouth fell open. The men looked at each other with puzzled expressions.

“Roger!” he called from the nowhere behind the

invisible shroud. “Sheriff! I see it! I see—!”

His voice broke off suddenly with a squeak, and a couple seconds later a heavy thud was heard.

“Oh God!” he yelled in a garbled, watery voice. “OH

GOD! SOMEBODY...! SOMEBODY HELP...! SOMEBODY

HELP ME...! GET IT OFF ME! GET IT OFF...!!

SOMEBODY HELP GET IT OFF ME GET IT OFF GET

IT OFF!!!”

Roger kicked his horse and cracked the reigns, and the horse bolted up the hill. Corwin followed, then Parris and the rest of the men.

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Roger dismounted as soon as he passed through the cloak and saw Edward thrashing on the ground being mauled by a winged creature, which looked like a cross between a baboon and a huge bat.

He rushed over to the two struggling fi gures, and pulled his dagger from its scabbard.

“Edward!” he yelled. Edward looked up, his face

covered with blood, his eyes wide with terror. He pushed the demon to arm’s length above himself as it lashed at him with its claws, barking furiously. It sliced into him repeatedly, shredding his clothes and turning them dark with blood.

Roger had his chance and took it. He cocked the

dagger high over his shoulder and swung down with it in a bold arc, putting the whole of his weight behind the blow. The blade plunged into the center of the thing’s back and it howled and howled as a gush of scolding green muck spouted from the wound and cooked Roger’s arm up to the elbow. Roger fell back groaning as the demon released Edward and started to fl y away, but it fell to the ground as soon as it was airborne and fl opped away from the two injured men.

Corwin and his men rode up.