Necromancer
**The Man**
Once upon a time, there lived a man. He lived in a small mountain village with his wife, daughter, and the two families’ dogs.
The Villages’ soil was poor, and most just made enough to get by. But not the man’s family. They always had enough to eat and sell. He could always afford new clothes and even toys for his daughter. His family did better than any of the other villagers.
But were they jealous of the man?
No, they were not.
Why?
Because the man could use a bit of healing magic. He could heal minor illnesses and wounds. He ensured that all villagers would survive the winter. Everything was well.
All until the man made another trip to the next city to sell his harvest. Only to be ambushed by Bandits.
But the Bandits failed. Just a single touch and they died, crumbling to ashes. It could have all been over with this, and the man, his family, and the village would have continued to exist with no changes. Sadly, this was not how it all played out.
The man was seen.
His neighbor, whose kids he himself had saved during last winter from a bad fever, had seen the man killing the bandits with a single touch. What he saw reminded him of the tales he heard from the village elders: a necromancer.
Full of fear, the neighbor told what he had seen to the local guards. They laughed in his face but still decided to pay the village a visit. Not, of course, because they believed the man’s neighbor, but because they heard him mention that the man had a beautiful wife and daughter.
The neighbor believed he had convinced the guards and eagerly led them to the man’s home. By the time the neighbor noticed what the guards had intended to do, it was already too late. He alarmed the other villagers, who initially wanted to help. But eventually decided against it once they heard from the neighbor about his suspicions of the man being a necromancer.
By the time the man came back from selling his crops, it was already too late. The village he returned to was quiet. No kids were running around playing, and all the doors were shut. No old farmers grumbling about the good old days. Not even a single farmhand could be seen on the field. If not for the smoke coming out of the chimneys, it looked completely deserted. All was quiet, except the two dogs in his backyard’s kennel who wouldn’t stop barking towards the man’s house.
He found his wife and daughter dead in the living room while the two guards were still having their “fun” with them.
The villagers had barricaded themselves in their own houses and left the man’s wife and daughter to their fate. The man asked himself,
Two guards came to the village, and no one stopped them?
It didn’t make any sense. He couldn’t understand what was happening or what he and his family had done to them to deserve this fate.
The last thing the man remembered was him charging at the two guards before everything went dark. The next thing the necromancer knew, he was again in his living room, embracing the now cold bodies of his wife and daughter. At some point, the necromancer must have released the dogs. The two big mastiffs whimpered and nudged the two corpses.
But no one else could be seen. Every door in the village was now wide open. The necromancer was now the only living person left in the town. Of one hundred villagers, Men, women, and children, only piles of ash remained.
For hours, the necromancer remained in the living room holding his wife and daughter. Until he heard steps. A shady man opened the door. The dogs started to growl, but the man just lifted a finger, and they immediately started to wag their tails as if they had met an old friend.
The man told the necromancer that he was impressed with how he had dealt with the traitorous villagers and that he would help him revive his wife and daughter if he agreed to help him first.
The necromancer wondered if he could trust this man, but he had no choice. If there really was a way to bring back his wife and daughter, he had to know, no matter the price. He was willing to give everything.
The man told him it would take a long time to fulfill his side of the deal and that the necromancer’s family would rot before they could be brought back. So, for the moment, we need two temporary souls to stop the decay.
The necromancer threw a heavy glance towards his dogs, who had been busy eating treats out of the shady man’s hand. And the man’s smile grew wider.