Unexpected Aka Necromancer's Beginnings

DeBrant

"Yes...Uncle. As in, brother to your father..." the old man said softly.

"My...uncle..." Xander said slowly, assimilating the information.

"Yes. Your uncle, Xander."

"How." It was something between a question and a statement of disbelief.

"Well, your father and I had the same mother and father...but if you're asking why you never knew that, it's because of the dog incident."

"Why?" Xander hadn't gotten up to complicated sentences. His brain was too busy working on keeping him upright and alive.

"I was...It was supposed to be MY child that got the gift. He'd worked it out so carefully, checking the dates and the family records. He was all set for a normal life. He even took his wife's name, Harris, to get away from the family."

"So..."

"When he saw the blue eyes and the black hair, he got scared and upset. He told me never to mention anything of my work or such to you, that he didn't want his child influenced by the very thing he was trying to shield his family from...but you grew, and he began to hope that perhaps you were just a normal boy. That his boy HADN'T got the gift. But every hope he had for a normal life was crushed the moment you brought in that dog..."

"You mean?"

"Yes, my boy. It's a family thing. Necromancers and other such things...they're part of being a LaVelle. Every third generation gets one with your talent, and the rest of us have respectable abilities all our own."

"What's yours?" Xander asked, trying to go bit by bit.

"I have a flair for spells, specifically Transformation spells." Said Gerard with a bit of pride.

"And Dad?"

"He was the finest at Protection spells, if I recall. At least I think so... That might have been your Aunt Myrtle..."

"Aunt Myrtle?" Xander repeated questioningly. The idea of his aunt doing anything other than flirting with his other relatives' dates at the family Christmas party was unusual to say the least.

"No, no... Myrtle was best at Glamours. It was your father who did the Protection spells. They're all around your house, you know. And Willow's... Once you started being friends with her, he did a few circles at her house to make sure she was okay also. Finest spell work in this damn town, if I may say so...'If you need a good spell, ask for LaVelle!'"

"I think I'm going to be sick..." Xander said suddenly. This was too much. He had dealt with more demons than the majority of people his age, but some newly discovered relation talking about his family's magical talents like they were bowling scores was too much after the whole 'necromancer' thing.

"Easy boy, easy..." Gerard said soothingly as he eased his nephew to a seat, "I know it's a little much to take in all at once, but it's your family..."

"And my father...?" Xander asked after a minute of simply absorbing all that had been told to him, "Why did he..."

"Why did he become such a piece-of-crap drunk?" Gerard asked softly.

"Yeah...why?"

"Because he found out what kind of a town this was, because he wasn't sure about what you might raise, because he was 35 years old, completely confused and grief-stricken, and he had refused the only family he had when he needed them the most then..."

"Bastard..." Xander said through clenched teeth, "Lousy, rotten, filthy, cowardly bastard..."

"No, Xander. I thought so at first, but you must understand how dangerous it is to be what you are...He was just-"

"What? Worried?" Xander asked, using the anger to bowl over his other emotions to a tolerable level, "He didn't want anything to hurt me, so he could do a better job of it?"

"No, he-"

"Don't. Okay, just don't. You haven't lived with him like that for 18 years of your life. You haven't suffered mental and physical abuse from his hands. You haven't lived your life in fear of your father because he was a Goddamned coward and hated you for something you couldn't prevent. So don't tell me it's not his fault, all right?"

The old man could see the fire in his eyes, the pain the boy was in, and how much it cost him to say what he was saying out loud. Xander had always hidden his pain. It was so much easier to laugh at himself than deal with what he had at home. And now he was telling off the only family member who seemed to give a damn about him. Xander felt like screaming.

"I wasn't going to say that, Xander..." his uncle said slowly, "I was only going to tell you that there was a time when you were everything to him. When he wasn't stuck so far inside the bottle that the only time he crawled out was to get into another one. And that, if you tell him...tell him everything on everything about everything...well, maybe you can bring him back."

"Bring him back?"

"Yes. Tell him about your friends. Tell him the good work you've done, are still doing. Tell him just who and what your friends are. What your girlfriend is...Show him that denying the problem or drowning it in booze only makes the trouble grow. Show him that you're going to be all right."

"But-"

Gerard looked him straight in the face as he said it, but the gentleness in his voice was plain. "He was a good man, Alexander. Show him the way to be one again. Show him how to be what he should. Show him you still love him, despite what he did to you, because I know you do, my boy. The passion in your tone told me. You still love him; show him how to love you..."

And with that, his uncle handed him a large wooden case, ushered him out, and closed the door.

Part 7