The Necromancer by Kevin Page B

magician—and if discovered as such would surely be put to death. Of course, being a reverend of some infl uence would help allay such suspicions, but there were no guarantees. He was having too much diffi culty foreseeing the future to tell if there was any way he might possibly be captured and executed.
    Nonetheless, he was forced to act now...and act fast.
    When he reached the prison, he tethered his horse to a hitch and went inside. He proceeded downstairs to the dungeon.
    At the bottom of the stairs, to the left of them, was an antechamber to another section of the dungeon. The door to the antechamber and the door beyond the antechamber were 84
    Escape
    both open. Men and women, tied to whipping-posts, endured endless fl oggings here; others hung upside-down by their ankles from shackles mounted on the cobblestone walls, their necks bound to the walls similarly, to keep them from sitting up. The guards were at them, insisting upon confessions. An imprisoned woman kept shaking her head, saliva running from her mouth down the side of her purple face into her eye. She coughed, then a gush of blood sprang up out of her nose and mouth.
    Ambrose smiled, then turned to the guard who
    unlocked the door to the prison cells and let him in.
    All the cells were occupied by men and women in
    various states of foulness. The dungeon stank strongly of excrement, urine, vomit, and body odor. The conditions had grown much worse since he’d been here last.
    He walked to Susanna’s cell, ignoring the desperate cries of the prisoners he passed on the way.
    When he came to the cell, he stopped and peered in through the bars. Susanna sat sullenly in a corner of the cell, sulking and staring blankly at the fl oor near the cell door. Her face was oily and streaked with dust and tears.
    It had been over a month since her sister died, but her father couldn’t bring himself to tell her until last night when he visited her. The news seemed even more devastating to her than it had been to him, and he didn’t tell her that her mother had contracted the disease as well. That, he thought—after just learning about Phoebe—would probably kill her, and she needed to be in the best of spirits now. She needed to be strong.
    “Susanna, my dear child,” Roger had said to her. “I must tell you of something most dire.”
    “Yes, father?”
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    “It concerns your sister.” He stopped, looking into her eyes. They were troubled, as if she knew about Phoebe’s death already. She didn’t have to be psychically gifted to predict that. Phoebe had been very ill when Susanna was arrested, and considering the fact that her health had been steadily declining for some time now, the dire information which Roger was about to tell her concerning Phoebe could only be one thing.
    Roger wasn’t sure he should go on, but he felt she had a right to know, and he had kept this news from her for much too long already.
    “Your sister passed away from us last month. I am sorry I have not told you before now. I had not the courage or the strength to do so. I know you were most fond of her.”
    “Phoebe...” Susanna said, “...dead.” That last word was barely audible, little more than a whisper. Susanna had suspected Phoebe had died, but hearing it and knowing it was true made it real for her.
    “Oh, Father!” she cried, then broke down completely, clasping the bars with her hands and sliding her head and body along them until her knees hit the fl oor.
    “Phoebe!” she sobbed.
    Roger knelt down and placed his hands on hers as she wept. He felt terrible and guilty. I shouldn’t have told her, he thought. It didn’t help for her to know now. It simply could not help.
    He hated to think about it, but it was a very real possibility that she would never have had to know. If the magistrate chose to see her executed, what good would it do to make the last days of her life more miserable than they already were. He resolved not to tell her of her