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man’s eyes shot open. Leesa gasped. His eyes were without eyeballs—no iris, no pupil, nothing. Just a flat, pinkish film. Despite the empty eyes, Leesa was certain the man could see. She shuddered.
    “Leesa, are you alright?”
    The image of the fat man vanished. Leesa opened her eyes and found herself sitting in the snow. Somehow, Dominic was hovering over her. She blinked, wondering if this was another vision, but he was still there.
    “Yeah, I’m okay. I think.”
    “What happened?” Cali asked from behind Dominic. “You got this vacant look on your face, and then you plopped down onto your butt.”
    Helped by Dominic, Leesa pushed herself put to her feet.
    “I’m not sure,” she said. “I had this weird vision—the snowman turned into this creepy fat guy. It was sort of like one of my dreams, only I wasn’t sleeping.”
    Dominic guided Leesa a few feet away from her friends.
    “I need to talk to Leesa privately for a moment,” he told them. They all nodded and moved back toward the snowman.
    Dominic rested his hand reassuringly on Leesa’s shoulder. “Tell me what you saw.”
    Leesa described the man she had seen as clearly as she could recall. Dominic’s brow furrowed as he listened and his eyes grew hard.
    “The Necromancer,” he said when Leesa was finished. “You have just described the Necromancer.”
    “How? Why?” Leesa asked, totally puzzled. “I don’t under-stand.”
    “The how is easy. Waziri do not need to be asleep to have dream visions, though I am a bit surprised you were able to do it.”
    Leesa sighed, not all that thrilled at the idea of possessing yet another talent she had absolutely no control over.
    “As for why,” Dominic continued, “that I do not know. But you have now seen the face of our enemy. Remember it well.”
    Leesa shuddered again as she pictured the Necromancer’s hideous countenance—there was no way she could ever forget it. The image had ruined the snowman for her—she couldn’t look at it now without seeing the Necromancer instead. She hoped that would stop soon.
    “Did you see anything besides the Necromancer?” Dominic asked. “Any of his surroundings, perhaps?”
    Leesa shook her head. “No, nothing. His image just kind of emerged from some sort of dense mist. Why?”
    “I was hoping you might have seen something to confirm he is still back in Europe, that’s all.”
    Leesa’s heart rate quickened. She hadn’t really thought at all about where the Necromancer might be. She hoped picturing the loathsome creature did not mean he was anywhere nearby.
    “Do you have any reason to think he’s not?” she asked worriedly.
    “No, not at all. It takes a lot to get him to leave his castle. I expect he will remain there until his plans are complete, or almost so. Still, some confirmation would not hurt.”
    Leesa closed her eyes and forced herself to picture the image one more time, searching for any hint the Necromancer might be in a castle, but she saw nothing but the mist and his hideous form and face. She opened her eyes and exhaled deeply, hoping fervently that her vision was as close as she ever got to seeing him.
     

 
    5. TREASURE
     
    L ate Wednesday afternoon, Leesa was alone in her room, sitting on the edge of her bed and practicing her everywhere/nowhere meditation. She had hoped the technique would be one of those things where once you got it, you could do it almost every time, but sadly, that had not turned out to be the case. About half the time she successfully reached the intended state of emptiness, but the rest of the time she was unable to flush interfering thoughts from her head. Dominic said this was normal and to try to stop fighting it, because fighting it almost guaranteed the opposite result from what she sought. Not fighting it was easier said than done, however.
    She expected him to arrive any time now to work with her some more. Dominic didn’t have a phone, so of course they couldn’t make arrangements like