Necromancy Page 5

  “Bugs have their own language?”

  Ewan sighed. “I haven’t a clue.”

  As they approached the door to the containment room, Lizzie steeled herself to enter. She prepared herself to see the Lycan, and even though she knew he was recovered, images of his burning flesh and the stink of charred hair assailed her.

  Ewan opened the door to reveal a wolf with intact flesh and fur and a mad look in his eye. It was that look that made Lizzie thankful for the chains wrapped securely around him. “Why haven’t you drugged him again?”

  “Frank tried. The drugs didn’t work a second time. We’ll just have to restrain him. He doesn’t feel pain in the same way a fully alive creature does. He reacts to it, but he doesn’t experience it beyond the immediate moment.”

  That might be true, but it didn’t help.

  “All right. Let’s get this started. Standing around watching him cut himself on the chains isn’t going to make me feel any better about this,” Lizzie said. “We know fire won’t harm him. Bullets and physical trauma are equally ineffective. What’s left?”

  Ewan blinked. “I thought we’d start with a sensing ward.”

  Oh. And now she felt like a complete monster. Non-invasive measures were definitely the place to start.

  She went through the steps of gathering her magic, formulating her intent, then applying will. Unlike during her rocky beginnings with magic, she flowed through steps in seconds these days.

  She cast a sparkly net of finely woven magic and let it settle on the wolf. He shouldn’t have felt a thing. Sensing wards were quiet magic, even subtle when more sophisticated casters employed them. (Lizzie was rarely subtle.) But even the loudest, brightest, flashiest of sensing wards weren’t typically detectable by the subject. They certainly didn’t harm the subject.

  The shriek of an injured animal pierced her ears, and as quickly as she’d cast the ward, she dissolved it.

  “What. The. Fuck.” Tavish’s statement hung in the now-silent air.

  Lizzie had no answer. Sensing wards didn’t harm, and they didn’t cause pain. That was pretty basic, magic 101 or 102 stuff.

  She circled the wolf and examined him—without the aid of magic.

  He’d ceased struggling against the chains. His breath came in short, sharp, panting breaths, and his head hung low.

  He looked exhausted. Worn out from his struggles and the pain.

  “Thoughts?” Ewan asked, drilling her with a probing look.

  “That shouldn’t have happened.” She replayed in her mind’s eye the brief moment between casting and dissolving the ward. There’d been something. She’d barely glimpsed it, but only because she’d been focused on ending the wolf’s pain. Her ward had picked up magic that had flared strong and bright.

  “Do it again.” Ewan must have seen her discomfort, because he reminded her, “It has no memory, and I know you detected something.”

  He was right, and so she cast again. This time, she was ready. She didn’t take time to settle in to the feel of her magic as it worked. She cast, and then reeled in the data. Her focus narrowed to the sliver of magic that was other, and she took a snapshot—the look, the feel, the taste of it—then shut down the ward.

  “You found something,” Ewan said, but she needed a moment to think.

  She held up her hand, asking him silently to give her some space. Closing her eyes, she took out the memory she’d created and turned it around in her head. Something about it felt familiar. It was on the tip of her tongue, the edge of her mind. So close…

  “Oh, shit.” Lizzie looked at the two men as she pulled out her phone. As she waited for Harrington to answer, she said, “Elin. You need to find Elin.”

  7

  Elin was nowhere to be found.

  Lizzie sat across from Harrington in his office and listened as Ewan and Tavish reported on their search of the house. When they finished, she stifled her fifth or sixth yawn.

  “If she’s in the wind,” Lizzie said, “then maybe we’re in the clear.”

  “She’s not in the wind. She’s simply yet to be discovered,” Harrington clarified. “I suspect she’s still on the property.”

  “Agreed.” Ewan stood at attention, looking especially stern and forbidding. Failure didn’t agree with him. “She did this for a reason, and until her motivation is uncovered, we can only assume her plan is as yet incomplete.”

  “Tell me again what you saw, Lizzie.” Harrington poured himself a whiskey without offering the others a glass.

  “It was brief, but I’m certain the magic I felt was Elin’s, and I’m almost as certain she didn’t fuel the Lycan’s reanimation. Her magic acted as a shield and masked any other traces of magic.”

  “Your men are working on a deeper look at Elin’s background?” Harrington asked Ewan, who nodded in reply.

  A knock at the door was followed by Matylda’s entrance. Another of Ewan’s staff escorted her through the door, then disappeared after Ewan dismissed him.

  Harrington studied Matylda with a grim look. “I understand you want to have a look at the Lycan.”

  That was news to Lizzie.

  “No. I requested an opportunity to observe Lizzie cast her sensing ward so I might evaluate the results myself.”

  Also news to Lizzie, but she had one obvious objection. “My ward actually hurt him. It interacted with Elin’s shield in a way I don’t understand, but it definitely causes him pain.”

  Matylda’s eyes narrowed. “If I’m correct, it is not a shield that surrounds this Lycan. I need to observe the effects of the ward before I can say with certainty, but I believe I know who is behind the misuse of the necromancy book.”

  “But we know who it is,” Lizzie said. “We can’t find her, but her identity is no secret.”

  “You don’t know, child. You don’t have the slightest inkling.” Matylda’s gaze softened, and Lizzie suspected she saw a hint of pity there.

  Her aunt’s pronouncement was vague enough to spark Lizzie’s curiosity. But Harrington, being the suspicious sort, asked, “Why should I trust you, when you refuse to disclose relevant information?”

  “Because I’m the only one who knows what we’re dealing with,” Matylda replied evenly.

  “What we’re dealing with?” Ewan asked. “You’re saying that the sixteen-year old Norwegian intern that we background checked isn’t a spell caster?”

  “A spell caster, a witch, Lycan. If she’s who I suspect, then she is all of these and none.”

  “I trust her,” Lizzie said. “And didn’t you tell me, Ewan, that the Lycan retains no memory of any pain he suffers?” Not that the wolf’s failure to recall made inflicting pain less morally questionable, but Lizzie trusted her gut, and her gut told her to trust Matylda. “Come on. Let’s do this.”

  Except when Lizzie got up and headed to the door, no one followed her, not even Matylda.

  A few erratic heartbeats passed before Harrington relented and agreed…and then everyone filed out.

  Four minutes later, they had their answer.

  Piled into the room with the chained Lycan, Lizzie cast her ward. She’d warned Matylda to be fast, and the agreed-upon signal (a tap to the shoulder) was almost instantaneous. Lizzie untangled the ward she’d cast, and then waited for the verdict.

  “It’s her.” Matylda cast a pitying look on the wolf and then left the room. Ewan and Tavish were right behind, since her minder had left earlier.

  Harrington didn’t say a word as he held the door for Lizzie.

  She figured they would tramp back up to Harrington’s office, but Matylda made a beeline for the library, also located in the basement.

  When Lizzie and Harrington entered the room, she already had a book pulled from the shelf. She pointed at it and said, “Nymphs.”

  “A nymph?” If Ewan had ears, they’d be perking up. “Are you sure?”

  Matylda nodded and pointed at the book. Lizzie took the hint and cast a ward. She found her magic, formed the question—which was
simple, since Matylda hadn’t give her any information—and applied will.

  The result was…unexpected.

  Words poured from the book. Lizzie had never encountered a warded book so eager to let loose its secrets. She had to concentrate to slow the stream, but when she did, the words became sentences, and then they became a story.

  The first story was heartbreaking, the second no better, and the third made her eyes well. By the fourth, she’d become so entangled that it took her several seconds to realize that Harrington was shaking her arm.

  She stepped away from the book, as if physical distance would limit the pull of the words. She took a deep breath. “Okay, I got a glimpse into the lives of four young girls.” She took another breath. “Four teenage girls who were possessed, their lives stolen, their power appropriated and used for foul purposes, and then their physical bodies discarded. I don’t know what happened to their non-physical selves.”

  “Their souls,” Matylda said. “I’ll spare you the knowledge, but know that nothing good comes when a nymph possesses a body.”

  “I thought they’d been eradicated.” Ewan looked at Tavish for confirmation, and he nodded his agreement.

  “Apparently not,” Matylda said.

  “This one certainly isn’t quiet.” Harrington paused then swore. “Ewan, you need to have your staff check on Emme, Elin’s aunt. She unexpectedly claimed a few weeks of comp time just as Elin was beginning her internship.”

  Matylda shook her head. “You should check, but almost certainly she’s been eliminated. Anyone who would spot the sudden change in her personality would be. Memories are not a problem. When a nymph possesses a body, she assumes the memories and powers of the host, but personality is another matter.”

  “How do we kill a nymph?” Lizzie asked.

  Matylda turned to Ewan. “Dragon? How does one kill a nymph?”

  “Fire, water,” he replied. “Earth to contain.”

  “We drown or burn her? Or bury her and hope no one digs her up?” Lizzie’s eyes burned. Too soon didn’t begin to describe her feelings on dealing with fire of any kind, let alone cremating a person. Even if the person in question was an evil nymph bent on reanimating all of the corpses in Prague. Which raised the question: “Why? Why is Elin, or whatever her name really is, doing this?”

  “Power,” Ewan and Matylda said, one on top of the other.

  Matylda inclined her head, indicating that Ewan should explain.

  “Nymphs have always been seekers of power,” he said. “Human history paints them as carefree, playful women. Always beautiful and tied to nature in some way. While their origin is unknown, they did at one point prey upon women who collected water from community springs, which could explain their historic tie to nature. But they were never benign. History has bathed them in an unearned positive light.”

  “They hunted much as a lion lying in wait for a parched water buffalo would,” Matylda added. “They are most certainly not benign.”

  At this point, Harrington’s silence ended and he began to drill Matylda. Much more his style than watching from the sidelines. “Why here and now? How did she learn of the necromancy book? What advantage is there to her in reanimating these corpses? How is she powering the reanimations? And what magic has she used on the Lycan?”

  And then he waited. Lizzie knew he expected answers to these questions, quite possibly in the order he’d asked them. They weren’t rhetorical or a way to organize his thoughts. His thoughts were perfectly organized at all times—so far as she could tell.

  “The ward Lizzie triggered wasn’t protection,” Matylda said. “It’s an insidious combination of ward, spell, and the subject’s magic. It grows stronger the longer it remains active, pulling increasing amounts of energy from the subject.”

  “And the purpose?” Harrington asked.

  “Control over the subject. She makes them her puppets.” Matylda straightened her spine and lifted her chin. “As to why now, I can only assume she plans to use the book to create her own army of soldiers for some unsavory, objectionable purpose.”

  Mind control scared the snot out of Lizzie. Losing control of her own body… She shivered. “Why aren’t you affected?”

  “The soulless are the easiest targets. It requires less effort on her part to cast, weave, and bind this hybrid magic of hers to an empty shell.”

  Lizzie nodded. “If she’s trying to control potentially hundreds, she’d pick the easiest.”

  “I’ve heard of nymphs stealing bodies and their magic,” Ewan said. “But not retaining magic from one body to the next. And combining magic? That’s a precursor to Big Magic. Should we be concerned that she’s employing Big Magic?”

  The look on Harrington and Tavish’s faces when Ewan mentioned Big Magic would have been comical if they were anyone else. But seeing two men as powerful as them flinch at the mere mention of it wigged Lizzie out.

  She was familiar with the concept. When the sum was greater than the parts contributed, that was Big Magic. The name came from the exponentially greater amount of magical power generated. It was scary stuff, the magical equivalent of going nuclear.

  Lizzie swallowed a yawn, then cleared her throat. “So no Big Magic? Just to clarify.”

  “No,” Harrington said. “I don’t see how she could mask that. But if it’s not Big Magic, what’s powering the re-animations? We’re not picking up traces of death magic either.”

  “That is the question.” Grimly, Ewan said, “If we find Elin, I’ll be sure to ask.”

  “And we’re sure she’s still here?” Lizzie couldn’t help wonder if Elin had detected which way the wind was blowing. Matylda’s reanimation hadn’t gone to plan. She was an old soul with a great deal of knowledge. If Elin knew much about Matylda, she might be worried that Matylda’s newly corporeal—and vocal—existence would be a problem for her. Then her attempt to control Matylda had failed. “Maybe she’s running? Giving up on a failing plan?”

  No one replied, but one look around the room told Lizzie all she needed to know. She was alone in her hope.

  Unfortunately, she had a bit of a problem. Stress, adrenaline, and caffeine weren’t doing their part to keep Lizzie awake. Her jaw cracked with the yawn she couldn’t hold back.

  Harrington glanced at his watch. Yes, the man still wore a watch. “Why don’t you head to bed, Lizzie? Get some sleep, and we’ll reconvene in the morning. In the interim, Ewan and his men will keep looking for Elin and digging in her background.”

  Lizzie scrubbed a hand across her face. She could barely string her thoughts together, so Harrington was right. She needed some rest before she’d be up to challenging the likes of a nymph-possessed spell caster with the face of an innocent girl.

  And sometimes, all a problem needed was a good night’s sleep. Fingers crossed that was true in this case.

  8

  Sleep didn’t solve any of Lizzie’s problems other than providing her with a clearer head. But something exciting happened while she slept: other people kept working, plugging away at the two crises that had consumed Lizzie’s every waking moment for two days, and they came up with some pivotal information.

  The dragons (long as they’d lived) and Harrington (with as many contacts as he had) had failed to acquire a very specific nugget of knowledge.

  Magic communities tended to favor their own and distrust outsiders. They also held their knowledge close. So it wasn’t unheard of for each group to have secrets that weren’t shared between magic-user types. Lizzie knew very little about dragons, for example.

  Witches were an extreme example. They not only believed themselves a class above other magic-users, but there were special groups within their society—like the Coven of Light—that focused on acquiring and securing knowledge.

  In the Coven of Light’s case, the pursuit of knowledge trumped other, smaller considerations, like the well-being of humans, free will (witch and human), and life in general. They had no problem murdering left and right to achieve thei
r goals. The Coven of Light made most cults sound like a walk in the park.

  But they were exceptional at gathering information.

  “Explain to me again what Kenna found.” Lizzie sat across the dining table from Harrington. He’d insisted she eat as he updated her on the latest.

  “In that book you’ve both been digging through. You know the one?” He buttered his toast with enviable precision as he waited for Lizzie to confirm.

  “The witch’s diary?”

  He confirmed, but she knew it had to be. She’d had a feeling about that book. The thing had practically tapped her on the shoulder, begging to be read, every time she’d come within spitting distance of it.

  “Wellsprings. Naturally occurring magic that gathers and forms a reservoir of magical energy.”

  Her fork clattered on her plate. “Holy crap. You think that’s it. You think there’s one here.” She retrieved the abandoned utensil and scooped a forkful of fluffy eggs into her mouth. “Wait. Wouldn’t Matylda know if her house sat atop the magical equivalent of an untapped oil well?”

  Harrington eyed her askance until she closed her mouth, chewed, and swallowed. “I’ve asked her, and if there is one here, she’s unaware of its existence. But she’s not the builder of the house.”

  “Hm. I don’t know. The secret chamber where the taboo books were hidden—”

  “Matylda’s resting place.”

  “Yes,” Lizzie said. “There’s no outside access, and to fade into the room, you have to already know the location. The secret was passed down through the family. I can’t imagine the builders of the house passed down the secret room’s location and not the existence of a magic wellspring.”

  If Kenna hadn’t left town to prep for her mother’s recovery mission, Lizzie would have hit her up to pull more information from the witch’s diary. Unlike most magic books, the record keeper who’d recorded the witch’s diary had made it impossible for another record keeper to single-handedly retrieve information from the book. The combined efforts of both a witch and a spell caster were required.