The Necromancer's Gambit
Nicolas Wilson
The Necromancer's Gambit
One of the little indulgences I allow myself is getting my hair cut in Hazel Dell. It’s a little shop, just off 99th. The owner is a gentle, old woman who decorated the place like it was her parlor: balls of yarn, old portraiture, and a pink, flowery wall paper that all give it a 1950s feel.
It seems like each time I go, she’s decides I look like a different celebrity from the 30s or 40s, and insists on cutting my hair that way. Right now I’m Gary Cooper, apparently. But I go there anyway, because she’s the only one who doesn’t disturb my cowlicks, and make me look like Alfalfa.
It’s raining, but this is Portland, so that’s redundant. Rook’s late. That’s not a good sign.
I’m huddled under an awning to stay out of the worst of it. Some poor bastard in a beat-up pick-up left his lights on. If it was warmer, or drier, maybe I’d leave it alone- and I should. Never draw attention to yourself. It was the closest thing to a maxim my mother ever had. But the idea of someone having to walk home in this downpour, fuck- being stuck in this city’s lousy enough.
I walk slowly over to the truck, hoping a driver careless enough to leave his lights on maybe didn’t lock the doors. But that would be simple, and the driver’s apparently a very practical moron.
Simplest unlocking spell I know is sympathetic magic. You spit in the keyhole, make the lock a part of you. Then you use an incantation to convince it that you both want the lock open; my favorite I learned from an Irish klepto who might have stolen my heart if she hadn’t made off with my wallet.
Sympathizing a lock open always reminds me of that scene from Empire, where Luke can’t get his rocks up- because it only kind of works. Sometimes, you just look at the lock sideways, and it’s done. Other times, you can work a lock for hours, and nothing.
The Toyota’s lock has seen better days, and its owner isn’t gentle about shoving his key inside, so it gives quickly. I glance around. There are enough people on the sidewalk that I’ve definitely been seen, but nobody’s paying enough attention to care. I open up the door, and feel around for a second, just long enough to find the lightswitch and push it in.
“The fuck are you doing in my truck?” He’s drunk; I’m not sure if the smell or the slur hits me first. I feel a hand on my shoulder, that works its way to the collar of my leather jacket. I turn around.
“Just turning off your lights,” I say, earnest.
“You were busting into my car.” I can’t be sure if he shoves me against his truck, or nearly passes out, and uses me and it to stay on his feet. Either way, it’s all I can do not to punch him right in the face. I take a breath.
“You left your lights on and your door unlocked. I just wanted to help.” I put up my hands, in surrender. He knows he’s ploughed, so he stops to think about it; he can’t decide if I’m telling the truth, so he lets go of my collar.
Without my collar to steady him, he falls most of the way into his cab. He’s drunker than I thought. And even if I call the cops, they’d arrive just fast enough to be worthless. I grab hold of his shoulders, to steady him, “You don’t look so good. Maybe you should sleep it off.”
He grunts, and I know I’m not so lucky. I don’t quite remember which Greek or Latin root I need to finish off a drowsiness spell. I don’t dare guess, lest I Sleeping Beauty him- because I really don’t want to have to deep tongue kiss a man tonight.
I slam him hard against the steering wheel. “Whoa,” I yell, for the sake of a homeless man, half-asleep in a doorway with a clear line of sight. “You okay, buddy?”
He’s got a small cut in his forehead, and it’s drooling blood around his brow. “Maybe, I, maybe I should sleep it off.” He’s not unconscious, but he’s almost passed out from the drink. I fold his legs into the cab and shut the door.
“Got plans?” Female voice. Haughty. Not authoritative enough to be a cop- but it’s nobody I recognize.
“Excuse me?” I ask as I turn around.
“You know, if you’ve got a long night of date-rape planned, I can always come back in the morning. I’d hate to intrude on your evening.”
“You’re late.”
“You must be Knight; Sister Magdalene said you were grumpy. I’m-” I grab her wrist and squeeze. If she isn’t who I think she is, this is the point I get maced, or maybe a fireball cast in my underpants.
“Don’t.” I give her a second to react, and when she doesn’t I let her go. “Never use your name with anyone if you can avoid it. Names have power.” Magic draws on connection. A name is giving someone a piece of you, and a stronger connection, one they can use to burn you from a distance. “Besides which, when the Salem Circle finally sets up its government, you’re going to be their castle, so you’ve already got a title. You’re Rook.”
“But don’t titles also have power?”
“Some. But less – for the same reason that saying goddamn the President isn’t nearly as effective as casting a diarrhea spell on Barrack Obama. Specificity is your friend- and your enemy.” I’m still awkwardly holding a coffee cup, and push it out to her. “It’s cold.”
“As in ice, or you didn’t grab one of those sleeve things?”
“As in whichever extreme I ordered it at wasn’t enough to overcome your extreme tardiness.”
“I’d retort with a witticism about your tardedness if I‘d had my coffee already.” She grabs the cup and drinks it like a shot. There’s a sigil on the bottom of it. Not a spell in its own right, just an activator; the sugar in her coffee is transubstantiated. The spell turns it back into an artificial sweetener, one that in significant quantities acts as a laxative. She doesn’t notice the mark- didn’t even check for one- which almost makes me want to activate the spell.
But I don’t. Because I’m trying to be diplomatic. “I’m still not 100% on why you’re riding along with me. Our Castle is friendly enough, loves to talk tradecraft, and actually has experience relevant to your new responsibilities.”
“I’m supposed to be Rook eventually. But right now I’m just another sister. Magdalene asked me to come and learn what I could about your Gambit, so we could design our equivalent from a position of knowledge.”
“Magdalene? What is she, a first century prostitute?”
Her eyes flash with a memory, and I realize she knows Magdalene’s real name and wants to tell it to me, then she says “Names have power.” I know it, too; Magdalene and I have a history, but Rook doesn’t need to know that. History has power, too.
She takes another sip from her coffee, then asks, “So is this what a magical dick does? Sit around drinking old coffee? And why couldn’t you just wait for me to get here, then let me order for myself?”
“One, because this is the only block in Portland without a Starbucks on the corner, and two, because we have a case.”
“So that’s why you had me meet you outside the Cauldron. You didn’t strike me as a dance club kind of guy.”
“Am I that obvious?” I kneel in front of my homeless witness from before. It takes a moment for him to recognize me, and he worries for an instant that I mean to shut him up, until he sees the green of a bill in my hand. “Guy in the truck hit his head pretty hard. You want to keep an eye on him, for me?” He mumbles something that sounds like ‘sure’ and palms the twenty; we both wish it was more.