Ethereal Fate

Damien opened his eyes, and the dead filled the streets.

Drifting aimlessly, most act as though they don’t see the living. Other spirits moan for help or follow those they loved and lost. Damien had the unique privilege of being able to shift his gaze in and out of the Ethereal. The realm between. On this particular evening, he was looking for someone.

Damien looked out from the half-built apartment complex down to the hundreds, possibly thousands of spirits that drifted this way and that. The street below was lit by dull floating globes of light bobbing slowly up and down each sidewalk. Each spirit was marked by the cause of their death and wore the clothes or lack of clothes they died in. This caused a smattering of apparel from all periods of Fenwrath’s history. Soldiers who had stormed the capital during the First Era wore thick leathers with black fletched arrows sticking from their backs as they tried to flee. Men, women, and children forever burned denoted the Third Era when Devils and Demons set the city ablaze.

A luminous indigo light flared from down the street where Damien watched a car glide through the street of dead. Propelled by a liquified form of blue void rock the car floated about a foot off the ground as it sailed by. The people in the car, of course, could not see what they coasted through. Damien could see the driver visibly shudder as they passed through one of the spirits.

“That alley across the street is where you saw it?” Damien said.

“Yes,” came a timid response. Damien pulled his attention from the lifeless below. Fred’s towering frame was kneeling, holding the hand of a mousey Halfling. She had deep slashes down her left cheek and across her throat. Ethereal blue blood perpetually dripped to the floor where it faded to nothingness. Fred looked toward Damien with a solemn expression.

“Winnow is terrified of these beasts, Damien.” Fred said, turning his attention back to the Halfling. “Don’t worry. You got the best in the business. We are going to make sure that the creatures can’t hurt anyone else. You have my word.”

Winnow smiled half-heartedly. Even while kneeling Fred was close to a head taller than the girl. His massive hand dwarfed hers as he held it. Damien turned his attention back down to the street below. Most of the spirits wandered without direction. Numb and without purpose. They seemed to sail with no knowledge of where they were. Some like Fred and Winnow had acknowledged their death and without a push could interact with the living.

Fred drifted up to where Damien watched. Fred was a walking oddball. He was Elvish and close to seven feet tall. A lot of the height was from the chunky boots and six-inch mohawk atop his head. When he had passed, he was dressed in a black leather jacket with spikes and studs all over it. He wore a shirt that depicted THE DEMENTED PIXIES. A band that was terrible 40 years ago when it was popular. Fred lifted an ethereal cigarette to his lips with his left hand and took a long drag. With his right hand he gently flicked a lighter open and closed. Damien couldn’t help but stare at the cuts dripping blood from both of Fred’s wrists. Over the last year, he had never asked why Fred had died. It seemed too painful a detail to bring up.

Fred gestured with the cigarette across the street toward the alley, “We got company.”

Damien snapped his eyes in the direction Fred pointed and could make out two ghosts both human men dressed in similar clothing, a heavy leather coat that draped down to their knees. Embroidered on the back was a serpent head with fangs bared over crossed bones, the symbol of their former gang, The Immortals. They were a cult, worshipping Golyat the Leviathan, a demon from the Seven Hells. Neither of them had any visible wounds that Damien could make out from this distance. They were probably sacrifices sworn to a vengeance pact to a rival gang and poisoned. If done right they would die and become immortal, able to drift between the worlds, invisible to common folk.

One of the spirits, a man with hair down to his mid back, shoved one of the Wanderers, making them stumble to the ground. The Wanderer stood slowly and continued into the crowd on the street. The men then greeted each other, and the long-haired man pulled a glistening locket on a golden chain from his pocket. The second ghost, a man with a shaved head and tattoos mimicking the Goliath culture up the back of his neck and head, laughed loud enough for Damien to hear from his post in the apartment. It was strange to see something so bright surrounded by such a faded landscape within the Ethereal. It was an object of the living stolen by the dead. From what Winnow had described to Fred it was an amulet of protection, gifted to her from her grandmother. A true protection amulet would have prevented these two thugs from getting anywhere close to Winnow. In Damien’s opinion the grifters who sold such fakes were among some of the worst people in the city. The light form of magic within the amulet was enough to draw attention, but not enough to stop an assault.

Damien could see Fred tense as the locket sparkled in the bobbing globes of light that passed. “Two weeks we’ve been looking for this guy. Seems like your location glyphs could use a little bit of work.”

“Fred, stay with her. I will be back in a moment.” Damien summoned energy up from his feet and felt the familiar intoxication of power pulse through his body. He twisted his hands into an intricate glyph pattern with swirling lines. This particular glyph was for fluidity and movement. With the final lines in place, he forced the magic out and with a dull pop his body buzzed. Damien then leapt from the window, his dark hair whipping around his face. He was propelled by the magic 20 or so feet and landed with a crisp thump directly in front of the cultists. Purple necromantic force erupted outward in all directions cracking the pavement where Damien landed and sent the two ghostly thugs sprawling to the ground.

“THAT DOESN’T BELONG TO YOU,” Damien let the energy pulse through his voice. Though he spoke lowly, the power caused the ground to shake. The long-haired man snapped upright in an instant. It was nearly too fast to see, just a blur in the night air. Damien flicked his right hand to the side closing it in a fist. The man was grabbed by a telekinetic force locking his body in place. With his left hand, Damien deftly drew a glyph in the air. This one summoned the purple light of his magic but was sharp and angular. A glyph of exorcism. The ghost with the shaved head flickered up to a standing position and began to fly down the alley away from the necromancer. Unfortunately for him, Damien was faster. With a snap of his fingers to close the glyph, Damien sent a surge of necromantic energy chasing the ghost. The wave of violet crushed the ghost like a boulder dissipating him and leaving behind a puddle of black, briny ectoplasm with a splat on the ground.

Damien turned his attention to the long-haired man still locked in his telekinetic hold. The same violet energy dripped from Damien’s eyes as he stepped up to the cultist. Damien saw fear growing in the thug’s eyes. True fear. This made Damien smile. There was nothing more dangerous to a ghost than a proficient necromancer and this man knew that. Damien pulled free the locket still clutched in the cultist’s hand, pocketing it for now. The locket buzzed with just enough abjuration to be noticeable but without the final enchantments to make it functional. Damien gripped his right fist tighter and brought it forward and down, forcing the spirit to its knees.

Damien drew the same angular exorcism glyph pattern with his left hand. Purple light illuminated the long-haired man’s face. The ghost opened his mouth as if to beg and Damien snapped his fingers once more leaving the ghost in a pile of ectoplasm on the ground. Both pools of ectoplasm steamed for a moment before dissolving into nothingness.

Damien breathed in deeply before pushing the energy out of his body with his exhale. The power was invigorating. Literal control over life and death. It was no wonder so many novice sorcerers and wizards chased immortality through necromancy. Damien walked back to the half-finished apartment building. He opened the door to the apartment where Fred and Winnow waited.

“Those two aren’t going to hurt anyone else,” Damien said. Winnow looked visibly relieved. He walked over to where she waited and knelt. He removed the locket from his pocket and held it out to her. Winnow looked to the locket and smiled.

“I don’t imagine I can take that with me,” she said.

“No,” Fred replied, “Unfortunately not. It was taken from your body before your passing and is not of our world.”

“We can take it to someone close to you,” Damien said, “If you want.”

Winnow looked at the locket again before she replied, “Take it to my daughter. Let her have a memory of me and help my husband understand that I am okay,” she glanced past Damien to something he couldn’t see, “Nuria awaits me. Please tell them a warm hearth will be waiting when it is their time to join me.”

Damien nodded, a tear welling up in his eye. This was the hardest part. Winnow smiled at Fred and squeezed his cheek. A faint glow flared in the apartment and when it subsided Winnow was gone. Damien wiped his eyes and stood determined.

Fred let out a sigh, “They never tell us where to find their relatives.”

“I know where they are,” Damien said turning and leaving the apartment.