Diary of the Necromancess

by Sebbaa

Chapter 1: Crashing a Show

You take the book back to a table, hidden in a corner of the library, stacked with scrolls and tomes of your research. You quickly light a candle stuck on a heap of wax on the table, where dozens of candles have lighted your solitary reading before it. You brush away some scrolls to make room for the book and place it on the table.

You look down upon it in awe; to think that such a small, unassuming tome might hold the secrets to bring back the dead. You brush over the black, worn cover with your hoof and shudder. It's not bound in paper, fabric, or bark like any book you know. No, to describe the subtle, yet tough material it is bound in, you have to use a word from the griffon language: Leather, a material made out of a creature's skin.

You have trouble keeping your hoof from shaking, as you open the book and turn to the first page; only to find that it is covered with some unreadable gibberish. But you had anticipated this much. You take a pair of glasses from your bag you have bought for this sole occasion and place them on your nose; looking through the enchanted crystals, the script changes to eligible Equestrian before your eyes.

I was lost, truly and utterly lost. I was once again floating in the endless gray nothingness of the limbo, the realm between worlds. The stomach turning feeling of constantly falling had almost become familiar in the last few days. I would have let out a tired sigh if there had been any air to breath. I had to flee from another world, emergency teleport without destination. With this the rate of hostile, life threatening worlds to actually welcoming ones had become ten to one.

I meditated on the thought for immeasurable moments. Immeasurable, because there was nothing to tell the time in the limbo. With my own home world and the one of eternal night I had only visited two realms that were no dry waste, totalitarian slave states, planes of elemental fire, or deserts of sharp glass splitters. On second thought I had to remove the realm of eternal night from the list of hospitable worlds after all. As much as I had liked it there, there were no plants growing in this world without sunrise, and its inhabitants had to rely on trade with other worlds to feed themselves. That left only my home world on the list.

Dere, the only nice place in a myriad of worlds. I made a mirthless, silent chuckle at that thought. Maybe there was no good in all of creation after all, and the only constant was strife, if I had to consider a war torn battlefield of men-made gods as a nice place.

I shook my head to brush away that thought. This kind of moping would get me nowhere. I had to concentrate on getting out of the limbo again. Luckily the astral energies flow freely between the worlds and I had recovered enough of them to cast a spell. And not too soon, I could already feel the nothingness tugging at my very soul, sapping away my life.

I caught myself sending a silent prayer to anything that might listen, pleading for a at least non hostile world where I could recuperate for a while. I shook my head and thought better of myself. Even if an immortal would be willing to help, their help always came with a price. No, I could only rely on my own strength. I concentrated on the spell, a reversal of the spell that had brought me here. The formula formed in my mind, and my lips silently formed the words. “Reversalis Revidum ilasrevsnarT.”

Bright colorful lights blinded me, and cold air stung in my lunges, as I entered another random world. The constant feeling of falling only lasted one more shocking heartbeat, then I crashed onto something soft that gave a startled “Uff,“ as it broke my fall.

With weight, feeling came back into my body. I groaned; my skin was riddled with small cuts and bruises, I had strained my right arm and, all considered, felt more dead than alive; small curtsy of the last worlds I had visited. I righted myself into a sitting position and blinked a few times to clear my vision.

Eyes, lots of eyes, eyes the size of plums in strange faces of absurdly colorful creatures were looking at me. If I had to guess, their blank stares meant that they were as shocked of my appearance as I was of their presence.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie has summoned a demon from the beyond!” One of them pointed one of its forelimbs at me.

Before I could reply anything to that, and luckily before the crowd could panic, something beneath me stirred. I rolled off whatever I had landed on and stumbled to my feet, noticing that I was standing on some kind of wooden platform. I looked up to see whatever creature's ire I could have provoked, just as it stood up and turned to look at me as well.

Our eyes met, and we stared at each other for long breathless moments. It was one of the most curious creatures I had ever encountered. It was quadrupedal, its body resembling that of a small horse, its shoulders at the height of about my hips and its curiously round head, with a small snout protruding from its face with a wide mouth and distinct nostrils, at the height of my chest; surprisingly expressional eyes mustered me up and down. I figured if it were to stand on its hind legs, it would be as tall as me, maybe a bit taller. It had a coat of light blue color, and long hair of even lighter, almost white blue. A single spiraling horn, the same color as its coat, grew from its forehead. Its appearance made me think of the fabled unicorns. Only that it was not white, and actually didn't look much like a horse; the part about virgins was kind of hard to test at this point.

As it stared at me, I could see its forehead starting to shine with sweat, and its eyelids twitched. I found myself taking a step back, reaching for my dagger involuntarily, moving as slowly as I could not to startle the beast.

“The demon will gobble us all up, whatever shall we do?” A call from the crowd made me stop short and at take another glance at them. All of them still looked at the stage, their mouths wide, their eyes shining. Some of them laughed. I looked back at the blue creature standing with me on the platform in puzzlement. Only now did I notice, that it was wearing some kind of cape, embroidered with gold and silver stars. I took a look around. On the side of the platform opposite from the crowd was a red curtain. It slowly dawned on me, that I had stumbled into some kind of province theater; I relaxed, lowering my hand away from my dagger.

“You know, I'm not actually. . .” But just as I was starting to explain myself, the unicorn thing stopped staring at me, instead it took a wide stance and lowered its horn.

“Yes indeed a demon! Now behold humble spectators, as the Great and Powerful Trixie banishes the neather-creature back into the void!”

I raised an eyebrow at her and placed my left hand on my hip. For a second the creature that called itself The Great and Powerful Trixie dropped her act and looked at me with great and shining puppy eyes.

I sighed, asking myself if I really should play along with this. It would alienate me further from the crowd, and -if I was unlucky- the word would spread that I had been defeated by some lowly actor. Then again I had dropped onto her stage, so it would be polite to salvage her show. And it would make the unicorn indebted to me.

I decided to play along, reached over my shoulder, drew my mage's staff from my back and grasped it firmly with my left hand. I struck the pale, twisted staff onto the wooden stage with a bang and threw myself into a wide -what I hoped was intimidating- pose.

“I am Morcana from Thargunitoth's endless Legions! Cower before my might feeble mortals!” And with that I raised my staff and rotated it high above my head, bellowing the magic formula of “Gardianum!”

A wide, glowing sphere appeared around me. I had given my shield spell as little power as I could. Still, the crowd had fallen utterly silent, and even the Great and Powerful herself shrank back from my improvised charade. When she took more than two heartbeats to collect herself, I winked at her, giving her a brief, reassuring smile.

She straightened herself and cleared her throat. “Never vile enchantress! You will not lay hoof on even one innocent pony while Trixie still draws breath. Have at thee!”

And with that a bright, pinkish light collected at her horn. She closed her eyes, grimacing in concentration, then a hailstorm of colorful wisps shot at me, ripping right through my magic shield.

I yanked my staff in front of myself and shielded my face with my arms, clenching my eyes shut in expectation of pain. But as the the magic missiles showered me, all I felt was a light tingle of astral energy.

I let out the breath I had been holding and stood tall again. As the shower of harmless lights played over my skin, I raised a hand to shield my mouth from view and cackled the most haughty laugh I could fathom.

“Hoa Hoa Hoa! Your pathetic spells may surpass my shield, but they cannot even scratch my immortal body!” I spread my arms wide and pointed the ram's skull at the end of the staff at her. “And now say your final prayer and die, foolish mortal!”

And with that I began casting myself, taking my sweet time and exaggerating the arcane gestures as much as I could. “Come to me you forces of darkness, rain ice and destruction down on my enemies and freeze them all to death!” I tapped my left shoulder with my right hand, then yanked it at Trixie, pointing my index and middle finger at her and shouted the real spell formula: “Frigifaxius!”

Unlike my quadrupedal counterpart, I don't know any flashy spells that aren't meant to harm or kill. So I used my most trusted combat spell and gave it as little power as possible. I was aiming at her hooves, but I didn't want the spell to kill her outright if she was still to slow to avoid the attack. But mainly I wanted to save on my arcane energies.

I was a bit surprised when a two finger thick ice lance shot from my fingers and hit the stage where the unicorn's hooves had been a heartbeat earlier; a head sized block of ice formed on the wood, and hoarfrost spread over it where the spell had hit.

Trixie had jumped back; she swallowed hard when she saw the destruction my magic had done. I averted my face from the audience and gave her a sheepish smile behind my upheld hand.

I have to give her credit for how quickly she recovered and found her act again. She gnarled her teeth and scraped her hoof across the floor. “Then the Great and Powerful Trixie has no choice! She will have to summon the earth shattering magic of her ultimate spell, the one she used to defeat the mighty Ursa Major!”

She closed her eyes and clenched her teeth. A gleaming light began to form at the tip of her horn, showering many-colored sparks everywhere. I responded by raising my staff again and chanted some nonsense that I hoped sounded like foreboding incantations, instead of casting an actual spell. I already felt a headache coming on, signaling the end to my arcane reserves, and I didn't want to chance killing a potential servant just for the show.

The light from her horn swelled to a blinding radiance and I had to avert my eyes. Then she released her spell.

For a second the whole world went white. I heard loud bangs as some kind of alchemics ignited in front of the stage, and I smelled sulfur. While every onlooker was practically blind, and rising clouds of smoke obscured the stage, I made my escape through the curtain. I dropped my staff where I had been standing as a grisly reminder that their “demon” had really been there.

I had just snuck into the shadows behind the stage and realized that it was build in front of some kind of wagon, when clopping of hooves on cobblestone, whistles and cheering roared from the front of the stage. I couldn’t help a satisfied smile sneaking onto my own lips, as I used the opportunity to retreat from the place, the show had been staged, and sought shelter under a tree in between thick bushes.

Now that I was not in the middle of a play, I had finally a moment to assess my situation. The first thing I noticed was the cold. Not the biting cold I knew from the frozen desert of Gor, but that of a northern province winter's day. I wrapped my cloak tighter and it was about bearable, but my feet stung, as the wet snow had soaked through my sandals and foot wraps. I grimaced, took off my backpack and began to search through it for anything I could abuse to keep my feet warm.

I quickly evaluated what I had with me. I had a bit of spare, white clothing I had worn when I was ripped from my world in the desert of Khom, two blankets, a water skin, writing material as well as my diarium, vademecum, and a spell book I had picked up from another mage. All of my coins were gone, spend in the realm of eternal night, but I still had some astonishing trade wares I had brought there. Other than that I only had the clothing I wore and my banishing sword; which is no more than a long, narrow dagger with a silver cross guard in form of a skull with ruby eyes.

I folded my two blankets to a thick pillow, spread it on the snow below me and sat down. I quickly slipped out of my sandals, undid the foot wraps and rubbed my throbbing feet dry with snow. I took my desert clothing and cut it to shreds with my dagger. Then I tried to warm my feet up to the toes by rubbing them with my hands, little good that did, and wrapped them in thick layers of cloth.

With the immediate concerns taken care of, I pushed the bush to the side with my hand and glimpsed out onto the place where the play had been. By now it had finished and the crowd was slowly dissipating. But some still stayed behind to congratulate the actress or whatever, so it would probably still take some time until I could approach her unseen.

I sighed and sat back on the blanket cross legged. I closed my eyes and concentrated on my body and the flow of the astral energies around me. But before I could focus, my stomach growled and reminded me that I had not eaten in three days, not slept in two, not drank for one and was generally cold and miserable. I grimaced, stuffed some snow into my water skin and placed it on my lap under my cloak. That would take care of one problem once my body heat had melted the snow.

I closed my eyes again and focused once more on the astral flow. I could sense that it was strong in this world. Certainly stronger than in my home world of Dere. Judging by the effect my supposedly weak ice lance had had earlier, the astral flow was stronger by far. I wondered what that meant.

I had been to a world with a similar strong flow of energy before. But that had been a barren, empty world where lifeless stone islands floated in black nothingness. The astral flow had been so strong there that stones could fly. But the only life I had found there were a race of bat winged apes made out of rock, who lived and died in a single day. And while my astral reserves recovered immensely fast in that realm, it sapped away at my life like the limbo did. So I had come to the conclusion that no world could be rich in life and magic.

Yet this world was amazingly gifted with magic and there were bushes and trees and warm pastel colored creatures all around me. True enough it was wintery cold, but there would be no trees and little horse things if there were no summers as well. Or at least that's what I hoped. A realm of eternal winter didn't sound very promising.

I decided I had to experiment on this theory. I stood up again and prepared another spell. I closed my eyes and whispered: “Odem Arcanum.”

When I opened them again, I was almost blinded by what I saw. The world around me was alight in red! Every creature, every tree, the air around me and the ground I stood on was glowing red, where my spell revealed the magic within them. There was only little in the air and earth, a little more in the plants, even more in the birds sitting in the tree. The quadrupedal creatures that still lingered on the place were shining bright, but the unicorn standing on the stage was outshining them all, its aura rivaling that of any mage I knew.

I dropped the spell and shook my head. This was a lot to take in. In my world only a few creatures are magical, like dragons, and there is no magic in the air or in the earth. Well, in some places where lay lines meet maybe, but that is stuff of legend. There is certainly no magic in a province village, and most certainly no mage would waste their talent in a theater show.

The edges of my mouth curled up without my initiative. This world promised to be more interesting than I had thought possible. I felt my stomach tingle with the excitement of all the wonders I would find here. Maybe even finally the one I had been looking for since I left my mage's circle in Bosperan behind to go exploring the ancient magic of the Tulamyd lands.

I estimated it took about an hour until every onlooker had left the place and the unicorn began packing up its stage. The sun was nearing the horizon by now, and I decided to wait until nightfall before approaching it, so there was less chance of one of the others seeing me.

When the last glimpse of the sun vanished, I took a deep, relaxed breath. I had always liked the night; for some reason I don't even know myself, my magic is more powerful during nighttime, and ever since that fateful magic accident, direct sunlight makes me uncomfortable. Furthermore, with people going to sleep, it is always nice and quiet; no one to disturb me studying in the library.

I got up, and a spell of dizziness hit me. I leaned onto the tree for support not to fall over. I shook my head and blinked, trying to clear my vision. It took a moment before I had my body back under control. I quickly packed my things, peaked out of my hiding place, then I finally stepped out and approached the actress at her cart.

She didn't notice me until I was but a few steps from her; the fresh snow did wonders muffling my steps. “I didn't get the chance to properly introduce myself before.” She turned form fastening some luggage to her cart; her eyes went wide when she saw me, but only for a heartbeat. “I am Hela Regina Mortium from Bosperan of the world Dere.

“If that means anything to you,” I added under my breath, when she only looked at me confused.

She quickly thought better of herself and cleared her throat. “Ah yes, Trixie has been awaiting you.” She raised her chin and looked at me expectantly.

“Is it normal for your people to speak of themselves in third person or is something wrong with my translation amulet?” I held up the green stone amulet that was hanging from my neck and gave it a curious look. It still boggles my mind to think about how that thing even works. It had been lend to me by the first person I met in the limbo. A curious, old man who had created his own world; a ship in a bottle. Yet something had stolen all of his water and he was grounded in a desert when I came to his world. I don't think he will ever demand its return.

“What? No! The Great and Powerful Trixie is just to important to merely refer to herself as 'I'!”

I raised an eyebrow at that remark. “Hmm. Then enlighten me please, tell me of the great things I should know about Trixie.” She hesitated a moment, then took a deep breath. Before she could drown me with her mindless babbling, I took the amulet off my neck and interrupted its enchantment.

The unicorn went into a lengthy speech, I guess about herself, but in truth I have no idea, because I couldn't understand a single word. I am fluent in Bosperan and Tulamydia, speak Cyclopean and Rssahh and know the secret tongue of demons and wizards as well, as some bits of a half a dozen other languages. Yet the noises coming from the unicorn were an incomprehensible gibberish of whinnies, snorts, and melodic nonsense.

I sighed and put the amulet back on. I had conducted this experiment in every world I had come to, hypothesizing that languages in a world close to mine would at least sound familiar. I almost let my shoulders sink at the thought of being further away from Dere than ever before.

“. . . and after Trixie had vanquished the Ursa Major. . .”

“Ah yes, very impressive. Say do you know where a wary traveler could get something to eat and stay the night? And would you happen to know where the nearest trollpath is?”

She was dumbstruck by me interrupting her monolog for a second. “What is a trollpath? I have never heard of such a thing.” Her eyes gleamed with curiosity; something I can relate to. If I were to meet a strange, world traveling enigma, I would shower her with questions.

I rubbed my face with my hand; I could hear the blood rushing in my ears and my head started swimming. “Its a path between worlds, trodden wide through constant use so it connects these worlds and enables travel between them without the use of magic. I was following a trollpath that I hoped was connected to Dere, before I was forced to retreat to the limbo.”

When I looked at her again, she was staring at me like I just told her the sky is green. “You are telling me there are more worlds, not like lands beyond The realm of Horses, but altogether different worlds? And what is this limbo thing?”

I fought down the urge to roll my eyes and grown. I felt myself swaying on my feet and my vision began to darken at the edges when I replied. “That's kinda hard to explain. Say, do you know someone really knowledgeable in magic, or, stuff. That would be really helpful. . .”

Just great, I thought as I felt my body falling towards the snow. Just like me. Should have asked for a bed instead of babbling on about magic.

Then nothing.