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    The Necromancer
    The Necromancer
    The Necromancer
    Ebook167 pages1 hour

    The Necromancer

    By Douglas Clegg

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    About this ebook

    Occult societies, murder, brothels, London, and a young debauched Victorian on the loose... From New York Times bestselling and award-winning author Douglas Clegg comes "...a cross between the Marquis de Sade and Charles Dickens...Scintillatingly brilliant."*

    "Readers will find themselves enthralled by the early life and lessons of young Justin Gravesend...There is a richness to the prose in this book reminiscent of 'The Confessions of an Opium Eater' penned so long ago. Side by side, they might have been written by contemporaries, and that is the magic of Clegg's prose in this volume." -- FeoAmante.com Reviews.

    A short, disturbing novel (novella), 140 pages in print.

    "...A terrific prequel to the Harrow House novels as readers obtain an intriguing look at Gravesend through his late nineteenth century journal and a scholarly introduction to Necromancy...Together these segments give this strong 'coming of age' horror tale a deep Victorian Era feel. Fans of the series will treasure this brilliant work, while newcomers will go chasing after the rest of the series." -- The Best Reviews.

    *"...Like reading a cross between the Marquis DeSade and Charles Dickens.. [Clegg's] prose is scintillatingly brilliant in parts and I was sucked right into this squalid tale of black magic...gem of horror literature..." - Alternative Reality Webzine.

    "Justin Gravesend's story is one of perversity and debauchery and his embracing of it. Clegg does not back away from the more unsavory elements, yet keeps the language of the time (presumably the late 1800s), so that sometimes it felt as if I were reading something from Boccaccio or the like. 'The Necromancer' is never anything less than compelling, and I finished this relatively short tale in two sittings." - Craig's Book Club Reviews.

    The man who created Harrow had a secret history.

    In The Necromancer, Douglas Clegg explores the story of Justin Gravesend's youth and his induction into the organization known as the Chymera Magick.

    From a Welsh village to the back alleys of London, university student Justin meets his destiny in the underworld known as The Pandemonium.

    Books by Douglas Clegg:

    Afterlife
    Goat Dance
    Purity
    Dark of the Eye
    The Words
    Wild Things
    The Children's Hour
    The Criminally Insane Series:
    Bad Karma
    Red Angel
    Night Cage
    The Harrow Series:
    Nightmare House
    Mischief
    The Infinite
    The Abandoned
    The Hour Before Dark
    You Come When I Call You
    Naomi
    The Nightmare Chronicles
    The Machinery of Night
    Isis
    The Necromancer

    Praise for Douglas Clegg's fiction:

    "Clegg is the best horror writer of the post-Stephen King generation."
    -- Bentley Little, author of The Policy

    "Clegg delivers!"
    -- John Saul, bestselling author of Faces of Fear and The Devil's Labyrinth.

    "Douglas Clegg has become the new star in horror fiction."
    -- Peter Straub
    author of Lost Boy, Lost Girl and the New York Times Bestseller Black House (with Stephen King)

    "Clegg's stories can chill the spine so effectively that the reader should keep paramedics on standby."
    -- Dean Koontz

    "Clegg is one of the best!"
    -- Richard Laymon

    "Douglas Clegg is a weaver of nightmares!"
    -- Robert R. McCammon
    author of The Queen of Bedlam and Speaks The Nightbird.

    tags: Victorian, Victoriana, horror, brothel, occult, cult, Harrow, suspense, diary,magic, black magic, supernatural, debauchery, literary, London, murder, ritual

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDouglas Clegg
    Release dateDec 7, 2014
    ISBN9780979686269
    The Necromancer
    Author

    Douglas Clegg

    Douglas Clegg is a screenwriter, poet, and the author of dozens of novels, novellas, and short story collections. His fiction has won the Bram Stoker Award and the International Horror Guild Award. He is married to Raul Silva and lives near the New England coast, where he is currently writing his next work of fiction.

    Read more from Douglas Clegg

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      Book preview

      The Necromancer - Douglas Clegg

      Visionary

      1

      She slams my head back against the wall and holds her hand against my chest, pushing down upon the area above my heart, tearing at the slender hairs around my nipple, her spit landing on my eye as I slap her as hard as I can across her face, and reach for her hair, pulling it back as hard as I can; I manage to cover her biting mouth with my gloved hand, and when I let go, she cries out, Yes, please, yes, yes, sweet, sweet, and then I feel the building of the orgiastic light as waves of undiluted pleasure, set free from conscience, rise within me, within me and my willing partner; she is going there with me, she is giving herself to our destination, and I press myself into her opening flower, holding myself there for the count of one, two, three, four, five, and then the Veil opens before my eyes, and for the first time I see the creature with the three mouths and the fingers like talons, and in its eyes, a feral kindness, like the wolf-cub found in the woods, and I watch, as if floating in the air before it, as it spreads its seven translucent wings and tears greedily into the offered sacrifice.

      It wants the throat.

      The sacrifice turns her head slightly, to offer.

      Her throat is a delight; it is a torment; it

      is

      meat

      .

      It is the first milk from a mother, the first taste

      of

      life

      .

      1

      My First Birth and Family

      I was told that on the night I was born, my mother saw a terrible face at the window of the midwife’s house, of a man who seemed the very Devil.

      Given that I have spent most of my life in the Devil's shadow, I believe my mother saw the truth.

      2

      I was born a monster, and I grew from a monstrous life, and if you read of this, you will understand. I had no choice in my monstrosity.

      Fate takes us by the hand and leads us where we are meant to go, and, in turn, we bite her for the pleasure of it. I am a murderer and a scoundrel, but once, I was a child, just as you once have been. Once I sought the goodness of all creation.

      Once, I was a common urchin in a tidal pool, surrounded by eagerly

      devouring

      eels

      .

      My life was never my own, but was drawn up as if by a great draughtsman, this Necromancer who had found the relics and used them to enslave me and bring me into

      the

      Veil

      !

      I should have burned my books and instead turned to the quiet rustic life to which I had been born, and died with coal-dust in my throat and seven babies ‘round the room, and a wife at the hearth!

      Instead, I allowed the curse that had been laid upon me at the hour of my birth to grow and fester. I followed my will, my flesh, and those who guided me, to this most wondrous and terrible place! Read this

      and

      know

      !

      I have seen the other side of existence and it has torn away all conscience from me, and yet, I love the horror more than I love life itself and would not turn back if given the choice.

      3

      Pleasure and its humours in the human body are what allow us to experience the mystical world.

      My first pleasure was my mother’s nipple and my last, in my twenty-first year, was found at the breast of the Whore of Babylon, that visionary salve, that nectar of the necropolis, the supreme Lotos of the Visionary.

      Why me? We each cry, alone, to the universe, to the mute gods or God. Why this fate? Why my destiny and not the destiny of the comfortable life, free of terror and abominations of the flesh? Why not the hypocritical, cushioned life of the normal man? Why not the world in which God is for Sundays and life consists of hours of labor followed by a few hours of entertainment and rest? Why this soul searing?

      This I cannot answer satisfactorily. I was chosen before I even knew a choice could be made. My only answer can be that it was destiny itself, carved on my bones and sung within the chambers of my heart.

      I had a sponsor bring me to the attention of that secret society called the Chymera Magick. I could not have avoided my destiny had I desired to

      do

      so

      .

      My life is written on my skin, tattooed as surely as if needles had been pressed into me, in the pathways of my blood, and the subcutaneous layers, the prick of life – and of the Occult Arts – dug chigger-like into me, and it is there. We are not mind, although we feel we are. We are body, we are flesh, we are the points of hair and the torn skin, and it is the obliteration of the mind that brings us in contact with the visions and the truth. It is through the destruction of social hypocrisy, of taboo, of restraint, that opens us up, that finds doorways where there have been none, and bores holes into us, opening us to the vibrant hum of the cosmos.

      In the story of my life, you will read of terrible things, by your standards. You will read of vows broken, of demons raised, of bodies used unnaturally, of deviancy, and unholy ritual, of nuns brought into the orgy pit, and of men used as women, and women used as men. Do not flinch from this, for that is the squint of the weak human mind that we believe we possess.

      Use these shocking acts as a way of awakening the creature within

      its

      cage

      .

      The one who is the Many. The Lord of the Flies is no Devil. The Lord of Pestilence is no beekeeper of souls.

      He is our brother.

      Use this to gain wisdom and seek your heaven. I have seen the afterworld, and I will tell you it is more terrible than the worst tortures of this fair land. Do you walk the Earth and believe it unmerciful and unjust? The life beyond this one is ten thousand times more horrible. It is a screaming moment frozen in an eternal chamber of torment.

      You would do well to seek the disordering of your senses now, to ungird yourselves of your weighty prison of the mind and unleash every desire of your flesh, every forbidden thing you can imagine, let it come

      to

      pass

      .

      The end of your life already circles around you. You shall be bitten by its ravening silver teeth, and torn by its pincers. You must embrace it and open yourself

      to

      it

      .

      As

      I

      did

      .

      4

      I came into the world feeling as if something important had been taken from me. And it is this, more than my want of wealth and power and happiness, that has driven me to my current state.

      My name is Justin Gravesend, although this was not my name at birth.

      Then, I was named Iestyn, a Welsh form of Justin, meaning, of course, the just. It was an old-fashioned name to have when I was a boy, but it was a relief to avoid the Biblical names that were so

      popular

      then

      .

      I was born near an ancient colliery and its spoil heaps, in operation since the Middle Ages, which seemed fitting since it was its own kind of torture chamber. The coalfields were the dark heart of all our existences, with the wool industry taking second place.

      The village where I grew up was small then, called Cwthshire, pronounced Coo-shire, and our nearest city, a good forty miles, was called Llangolen, and even that was not much of a

      city

      then

      .

      I am sorry to say that our little village no longer exists, abandoned when the local mining ended with several explosions that killed many miners and closed off the mine itself.

      When I was a child, it was my kingdom.

      We lived near three rivers, one wide and broad that ran through the village, tamed as a canal before my birth, called the Range for a reason I never have understood, and two slimmer

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