Dirge for a Necromancer - By Ash Stinson Page 0,128

before I did though. How’re you feeling?”

“Tired, but okay,” said Maeleht He sat up slowly. Ebha objected meekly, but he silenced her with a gesture. “I think I’m getting better.”

“Oh?” Raettonus forced himself to smile; it felt uncomfortably like lying. “That’s good to hear.” He unslung his bag and opened it. “I have something for you and your brother.”

“Really?” asked Maeleht. He leaned forward slightly, and his long, orange hair fell across his eyes. He brushed it back behind a slightly pointed ear. “What is it?”

Raettonus held up a pair of books. “This one’s for Dohrleht,” he said. “A friend of a friend wrote it. It’s about magic, and until he finds a new teacher it should help him become better.” He set it on the bedside table. “This one’s for you. It’s a guide for learning Zykyna.”

Maeleht raised his eyebrows. “Zykyna?” he asked. “Where’d you get something like that?”

“I wrote it,” he said. “It’s not finished, but you’re a smart kid. I’m sure you’ll be able to fill in the gaps I couldn’t.”

The young centaur took the book with wide eyes. “Thank you, Raettonus,” he said in a tiny voice as he ran his fingers over the cover.

“Don’t mention it,” said Raettonus, standing. “It’s the least I can do, leaving so abruptly.”

“Thank you though,” said Maeleht, looking up at him with a smile. “For everything. You…you were a good teacher. I’m glad to have been able to meet you.”

Raettonus cleared his throat and turned away. “Well,” he said, starting for the door. “I need to be going. Take care of yourself, Maeleht.”

Before the centaur could answer, Raettonus was out the door. He met up with Brecan just outside the grand double doors of the citadel’s front entrance and mounted up. “You sure you have everything?” asked Brecan.

“Yes, I’m sure,” Raettonus snapped. “What are you, my mother? Just fly.”

“Right,” said Brecan. With a running leap off the mountainside, he took to the air. Raettonus watched the fortress recede as they spiraled upwards. The ocean grew larger and larger, and the coastline longer. And then the citadel was no more than a tiny speck.

Raettonus entwined his fingers in Brecan’s mane and leaned against his neck. The smell of horseflesh suddenly brought him back into a memory—something buried so far back in his mind that it seemed like forever since he’d thought about it.

In his memory, skeletal fingers with strips of rotting flesh still clinging to them trembled up out of the soil all across a muddy field as the rain pounded down on the knight sitting behind him on the saddle. Raettonus trembled as the man urged his horse on down the path toward a bleak, abandoned castle, breathing in the stench of rotting flesh and looking with horror as bodies pulled themselves from the ground. He was no older than four years—a tiny, malnourished wisp of a child with wide, green eyes flecked with brown, and gently pointed ears. He shook and sobbed and would’ve fallen down under the hooves of the horse, but the knight held tight to him and kept him on the saddle as all around them the unmarked graves stirred.

“Shush, child,” the knight said in a quiet voice to Raettonus as his black destrier splashed through a puddle. “They won’t hurt you. No one’s going to hurt you.” But the boy continued to cry and the rain continued to fall and the corpses continued to drag themselves out of the ground.

It seemed like an eternity before they reached the stark, gray castle that loomed above them on a slight rise. Rain pattered against the hard edges of the structure, and the chains on the portcullis rattled terribly as it lifted. The knight urged his destrier gently under the gate, and it lowered behind them. He dismounted in the yard and lifted Raettonus easily from the horse before leading both the boy and the steed to the stable. As the knight turned his attention to unbridling and removing the horse’s saddle, Raettonus watched him with wide-eyed terror from a corner.

“You have nothing to be afraid of here,” said the knight as he worked. “My name’s Sir Slade the Gryphon, of the house Black and Red. What’s your name?”

“R-raettonus the Phoenix, house Red and White,” muttered Raettonus in a quivering voice.

“Raettonus, eh?” said Slade, as he brushed out his horse’s mane. “That’s a strange name. But a handsome name too, I’d say. Tell me, Raettonus—why are you afraid of me?”

The little child squared his slight shoulders. “I’m not,” he answered. “You’re a demon, b-but I’m not afraid.”

Slade looked out of the corner of his eye at Raettonus and gave him an amused smile. He turned and knelt in the straw beside the boy. “Well, that’s good,” he said. “There’s too much fear in this world, Raettonus, and it turns far too easily into hate. I never, ever want you to be afraid of me, okay?”

Raettonus felt he was supposed to answer somehow, so he nodded.

“I want you to know,” Slade went on, as he stood and ran one large hand through Raettonus’ hair, “so long as I’m alive, I’m not going to let anything bad happen to you. We’re going to be happy, you and I.”

On Brecan’s back, Raettonus thought about the way Slade had smiled then. He wondered if it had felt to Slade like a lie.

~ End ~

~ About the Author ~

Ash Stinson was born in the outskirts of a small, rural town in California, called Hilmar, where she spent the first eighteen years of her life. As a child, Ash was a voracious reader, and was encouraged by her parents and grandparents to read anything she could get her hands on. Her especial favorite reading material soon proved to be fantasy books, and she decided when she was ten-years-old that she wanted to write a fantasy novel, too. Ash spent the next ten years learning how to write a story. She now lives one town north of her hometown, in Turlock, California, where she is studying Psychology at CSU Stanislaus.

Find out more about Ash Stinson here:

http://ashstinson.livejournal.com/

http://facebook.com/AshAStinson

Table of Contents

Title Page

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

About The Author