The rest of the day passed in a blur of paperwork. Jameson’s death merited a pile of it that took up most of my day. I considered it penance for not being able to save him, and for raising him. The bright spot in my day was seeing neither hide nor hair of Floyd.

  Back at home, bills, mail, and Monique’s legacy awaited me. I’d only just walked inside when Bubble swam over to the side of the tank closest to me and swished its tail.

  I went over to the tank. “Lonely day?”

  The cold knot of power relaxed inside me, and I touched my finger to the glass. Flakes of necromancy magic drifted into the water. Bubble swished its tail again before chasing after a bit of magic.

  Not comfortable putting it off any longer, I retrieved the box and letter Monique had left me. Maybe there was some hint of how to get rid of this power.

  The letter opened easily; age hadn’t been kind to the adhesive. Inside, I found a single folded sheet of paper and a brass key. My hands shook as I unfolded it.

  Kelsey,

  In the event that I cannot be with you to guide you into adulthood, I hope these things will help you.

  Mom

  That was it? That was all she could think to write in case necromancy caused her death? Even after she all but doomed me to the same fate?

  I let the letter fall to the floor. If she’d really loved me, she wouldn’t have risked her life or mine.

  Hopefully the box would be more helpful. It took some doing, but I wiggled it out of the cardboard. Taking a deep breath, I inserted the key and turned it. The lock clicked.

  If there were any spells, I couldn’t see or feel them. The outside of the box didn’t have any visible hinge, so I grabbed it from both sides and lifted. It slid off, revealing a cloth-lined interior, black (of course, what other color would a family of necromancers use?), and a leather-bound book. Embossed in gold was a single rune: Deyr.

  Death.

  I studied the book, the way flecks of gold had worn off the embossing, cracks in the leather, and little lines of wear around the spine for what seemed like hours. As disappointing as Monique’s letter had been, I had a feeling this would have answers, just not the ones I wanted.

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  The book came out of the box easily enough. The leather was cool to the touch. Inside me, the cold magic of necromancy curled up toward my finger. I choked it out before it could escape my skin. It settled down, but I could feel it lurking.

  Pointedly ignoring my necromancy, I flipped open the book. Any hope I’d had for a more personal letter from Monique was dashed by a title page written in an elegant script.

  Deyr: The study and secrets of the dying, death, and undeath

  By Kelsey Nekro

  A cold shiver crept down my spine. That was my name. My first name listed with a clan name that had died with its members hundreds of years ago. Or so I’d been taught. Every one of them executed for necromancy.

  A group of witches with representatives from every clan had been tasked with carrying out the executions by the Premier of Europe. My history teacher had said the witches were given a choice: kill the Nekro or have all the races go to war against all witches. For the witches, the choice had been simple enough.

  I’d been taught that the isolated cases of necromancy which showed up from time to time were the result of individuals finding grimoires that had managed to escape the purge.

  My name on this book… that was different. Grimoires had certainly escaped, and not just in far flung libraries to be discovered years later. This grimoire proved witches who traced their power back to the Nekro had escaped the executions and done their best to hide in other clans.

  I turned the page. My eyes skimmed across the lines of runes before returning to the top. The first words hearkened back to some of my earliest lessons.

  When you honor life, when you honor the Earth, do not forget death’s place in the cycle. Just as the Earth greets you, it will welcome your cold body. A body that will soon feel the caress of cold earth if you are not of the Nekro. Your magic will twist inside you, burning you from the inside, for the secrets in here are only intended for Nekro eyes.

  Both of my magics twisted inside me, rising up.

  My eyes refused to move off the page, continuing to read rune after rune. This page was a spell, one that was activated simply by reading it, something I’d heard of in theory but not experienced.

  Burn, burn as you burned the Nekro. Burn for the betrayal of your own. Burn unless you have been touched by death.

  Starting at my toes, my magic burned through me, lighting my nerves on fire. All of my nerves but the ones in the side of my left leg. The necromancy followed behind, replacing the unbearable heat with ice. If I could’ve opened my mouth, I would’ve screamed.

  As you burn, rise. Rise and unleash the fire.

  I didn’t know if it was good or bad, but I didn’t—couldn’t stand. My magic had worked its way up to my chest, and every breath brought with it a searing pain of flames going down my throat and into my lungs.

  My necromancy charged after my magic, replacing the fire with ice that burned in its own way.

  One coherent thought broke through the pain. A mother who truly loved me would’ve left a warning.

  The cold reached my lungs, then my throat. If I made it through this, I wasn’t sure which was worse to breathe, fire or ice.

  And take our secrets to the grave.

  The flames reached my head, and if my eyes continued to read the spell, I had no idea what it said. Ice crept into the base of my skull, adding an entirely new level of pain that I’d never imagined. My brain became a battlefield, a warring line between two extremes, and I no longer had it in me to care which won. The fire was killing me, and if it didn’t, then the ice would finish the job.

  Monique hadn’t left me a grimoire, she’d cursed me and dammed me to this torment. That b—