Fearless (The Blue Fire Saga) (41 page)

“I’m not sure how much help I could be,” Jenna said at last. “The wizards are far more powerful than I am. But I will think on it, and see what ideas I might come up with.”

Leesa nodded. At least Jenna hadn’t refused outright.

“
Thank you,
”
Leesa
said. “And I meant what I said. Even if
all
you do
is
help
me practice
, I’ll be very grateful.”

“
That
I can do,” Jenna promised.
“At the very least.”

“I have
one other tiny favor to ask
. Since you can’t shape-shift right now anyhow, would you let me buy you a cell phone, so I c
an get a hold of you if I need t
o?”

Jenna hesitated, clearly uncomfortable with the idea of having a phone.
Lee
sa was pretty sure she knew why, and it had nothing to do with blocking Jenna’s shape-shifting, which she was unable to do
now anyhow.

‘We’ll get a prepaid one,”
Leesa
said. “I’ll buy it and do the paperwork. I’ll be the only one with the number, so it won’t threaten y
our privacy at all. And I’ll
program
my number into it for you,
in case you need me.
”

Jenna breathed out a deep sigh. “Okay. I guess that would be alright. But when my magic comes back, I won’t be able to carry it with me.
But at least I’ll have it at home.
”

Leesa was thrilled. Finally, someone with magic was going to have a phone.
“Deal,”
she
said.

“Are they expensive?
” Jenna asked. “
Can you afford it?”

Leesa smiled, thinking of
the money
and gold Dominic had given
her before he left.

“Yeah, don’t worry about it.” She got up off the bed. “There’s a place that sells them right her
e
on campus. We can walk over there now. You don’t mind a bit of walking, do you?”

Jenna shook her head.
“Not at all.
Without my wings, I’ve been doing quite a lot of walking lately.”

32
.
DEADLY SUCCESS

A
n ocean away, two of the people Leesa and Jenna had been talking about sat in a horse-drawn carriage outside a tiny Romanian mountain hamlet.
The specially buil
t
coach
had reinforced s
pring
s
, but it still tilted noticeably to the left, courtesy of the Necromancer’s immense bulk. Viktor
and Jordan
sat o
pposite him.
Rafael
was perched on the driver’s seat outside, wrapped in a heavy cloak against the night’s cold, his gloved hands gripping the leather reins
.
The trip here had taken the better part of two hours, but the Necromancer didn’t like practicing h
is
black
arts too close to his castle—unless he was practicing them
inside
th
e castle, safe from prying eyes
. Usually, he would send one or more of his waziri
in his stead
on any mission away from the castle, but tonight’s test was a big one.
To be successful, i
t would need his personal attentio
n and magic
, so he was making one of his rare forays outside his home.

The village was an old one, consisting of about a dozen wooden homes with thatched roofs flanking a packed dirt road. Most of the walls were whitewashed, though a few had been painted a pale rose color. The village was slowly dying, as first one then another of the young men left for the city, seeking work less taxing
and more lucrative
than farming the rugged countryside beyond the homes.
Fewer than twenty-five
people now remained
in the town
, mostly older couples far past child-bearing age.
This late at night, they were all asleep in their beds. Not one light shown from any of the dwellings.

The carriage was parked
on a ridge
about one hundred yards
above the village
, opposite an old
graveyard
. The citizens had been burying t
heir dead in the crude cemetery
for so many centuries that the gravestones outnumbered the living villagers
by
at least ten to one.

The size, isolation and age of the hamlet
had all been
factors in the Necromancer’s choice.

“It is time,” he said.

Viktor and Jordan stepped out of the carriage
on the side of the graveyard
.
Dressed
in
black
, hooded cloaks
, they were almost invisible in the moonless nigh
t. When Rafael saw them exit the coach
, he climbed down from the driver’s seat and joined them. Viktor left the door open, so that his master
could participate from inside—the corpulent Necromancer stood on his feet only when absolutely necessary. Tonight, he could d
o everything he needed from inside the
carriage.

He
opened a
stu
r
dy
wooden chest resting on the seat beside him and withdrew a round, gold-framed mirror twelve inches across. The surface of the mirror was made of the same black material as the
table in his castle. It
served as a portable version of the table,
far
less powerful of course, but
quite
useful nonetheless. He held his palm over the black surface and began to chant in a low voice. A dozen
floating
eyes began to appear inside the mirror, growing steadily brighter with every word he spoke.

When he had activated the magical talisman to full strength, the Necromancer
eased his huge bulk forward until he was sitting on the edge of the seat, his
hairless
head framed in the open doorway.
The cold night air seemed to have
no effect on his exposed face and scalp.

“Let us begin,” he said to his henchmen.

All four of them began to chant
a special summoning spell in low, sing-song voices
. The incantation, strengthened by the power of the waziri imprisoned within the mirror, caused faint, almost invisible beams of dark power to extend from the
mirror’s
black surface. The beams lengthened and spread,
moving in a twisting, wriggling fashion, shooting
slowly into the old cemetery, where each stream of dark magic sought out the ground beneath a gravestone.

The Necromancer and his serva
nts continued to chant
. The black magic steadily weakened
the seal that kept the dead from entering th
e world of the living. Tiny volcanoe
s of dirt began to
sprout
atop the graves. Soon,
fingers and hands
poked up through the ground
as the dead began to slowly claw their way to the surface.

Ten minutes later, more than three score reanimated corpses stood atop their graves. Some were so anc
ient they were little more than skeletons
, and with no tendons, ligaments or skin to hold them together, they quickly collapsed into piles of bones. The Necromancer ignored them—they were of no use
to him
. The rest
of the bodies
were in various stages of decay. The oldest were more bone than anything else, but still possessed enough
of their former shape
s to hold them together. The Necromancer knew from experience that such creatures were
weak and slow
, so he let them collapse as well. He was left with nearly two score suitable zombies, more than enough for his plan.

33
.
A LETTER IN THE MAIL

M
onday afternoon, Leesa received a letter in the mail.
It was handed to her by
Missi
, a sophomore from the second floor who delivered the mail to each room in the dorm. Leesa
looked down at
the envelope
in surprise.
Receiving personal mail was a rare occurrence.
She
didn’t get very much mail to begin with, and what she did
get was mostly junk.
Her whole time here at Weston
,
she could recall
receiving
only one other
letter
.
That one had been sent
by her aunt and uncle soon after she moved in.
She thanked
Missi
and
reached to close
the door.