The Alchemyst (18 page)

“I am,” Sophie said immediately, before her brother could protest. She was afraid that if he made a quip, the goddess would do something to him. Something ugly and lethal.

The goddess turned to look at Josh.

He sought out his sister in the gloom. The green light lent her face a sickly cast. The Awakening was going to be dangerous, possibly even deadly, but he could not allow Sophie to go through it on her own. “I’m ready,” he said defiantly.

“Then we will begin.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

D
ee waited until the last of the birds and cats had disappeared into Hekate’s Shadowrealm before he left the car and strolled toward the hidden opening. Senuhet, Bastet’s servant, had left earlier, eagerly following his mistress into the Shadowrealm, but Dee had not been quite so enthusiastic. It was always a bad idea to be first into battle. The soldiers in the rear were the ones who tended to survive. He was guessing that Hekate’s guards had massed just beyond the invisible wall, and he had no inclination to be first through the opening. It didn’t make him a coward, he reasoned; it just made him careful, and being careful had kept him alive for many hundreds of years. But he couldn’t hang around out there forever; his inhuman masters would expect to see him on the battlefield. The small man drew his two-thousand-dollar leather coat tightly around his shoulders the moment before he stepped into the opening, leaving behind the chill early-morning air and stepping into…

…a battlefield.

There were bodies everywhere, and none of them were human.

The Morrigan’s birds had changed when they entered Hekate’s Shadowrealm: they had become almost human…though not entirely so. They were now tall and thin like their mistress; their wings had stretched, becoming long and batlike, connected to human-shaped bodies by translucent skin and tipped with deadly claws. Their heads were still those of birds.

There were a few cats scattered among the field of feathers. They too had become almost human when they stepped into the Shadowrealm, and like Bastet, they had retained their cat heads. Their paws were a cross between human hands and cat claws, tipped with curved, razor-sharp nails, and their bodies were covered in a fine down of hair.

Looking around, Dee could see no sign that any of Hekate’s guards had fallen in battle, and was suddenly frightened: what did the goddess have guarding her realm? He reached under his coat, pulled out the sword that had once been called Excalibur and set off down the path to where the huge tree rose out of the morning mist. The sunrise ran bloodred along the ancient black blade.

“Birdmen,” Scathach muttered, and then added a curse in the ancient Celtic language of her youth. She hated birdmen; they gave her hives. She was standing at the entrance to the Yggdrasill, watching the creatures appear out of the forest. The mythologies of every race included stories of men who turned into birds, or birds who transformed into half-human creatures. In her long life Scatty had encountered many of the creatures and had once come perilously close to death when she’d fought a Sirin, an owl with the head of a beautiful woman. Since that encounter, she’d been allergic to bird feathers. Already her skin was starting to itch and she could feel a sneeze building at the back of her nose. The Morrigan’s creatures moved awkwardly, like hunched-over humans, dragging their knuckles on the ground. They were poor warriors, but they often succeeded by sheer force of numbers.

Then Bastet’s cat-people appeared. They moved slowly, stealthily, some standing on two feet, but most moving on all fours. Here, Scatty knew, was the basis of the great cat legends of Africa and India. Unlike the birds, the cat-people were deadly fighters: they were lightning fast, and their claws were capable of inflicting terrible damage. Scathach sneezed; she was also allergic to cats.

The strange army came to a halt, perhaps awed by the incredible building-sized tree or just confused by the sight of a single warrior standing framed in the open doors. They milled about; then, as if driven by a single command, they surged forward in a long ragged line.

The Warrior twisted her head from side to side and rolled her shoulders, and then her two short swords appeared in her hands. She raised them above her head in an
X.

It was the signal the Torc Allta and the nathair had been waiting for. Seemingly from nowhere, hundreds of the terrifying lizards hurtled out of the sky, with the sun at their backs, and swooped over the advancing army. They flew in great sweeping circles, their huge wings raising enormous plumes of gritty dust that blinded and confused the birds and cats. Then the Torc Allta, who had been lying concealed in the tall grass and behind the twisting roots of the Yggdrasill, rose in the middle of the attackers. As Scatty hurried back into the depths of the house, she realized how closely the noises of the battle resembled feeding time at the San Francisco Zoo.

“We’re running out of time,” Scathach yelled to Flamel as she raced into the corridor.

“How many?” Nicholas asked grimly.

“Too many,” Scatty replied. She paused briefly and then added, “The Torc Allta and nathair will not be able to hold them for long.”

“And the Morrigan and Bastet?”

“I didn’t see them. But you can be sure they’re coming, and when they do…” She left the sentence unfinished. With Hekate busy Awakening the twins, nothing would be able to stand against the two Dark Elders.

“They’ll come,” he said grimly.

Scatty stepped closer to Flamel. They had known each other for over three hundred years, and although she was his senior by nearly two millennia, she had come to regard him as the father she no longer remembered. “Take the twins and flee. I’ll hold them here. I’ll buy you as much time as possible.”

The Alchemyst reached out and placed his hand on the Warrior’s shoulder and squeezed. A tiny pop of energy snapped between them and they both briefly glowed. When he spoke, he unconsciously reverted to the French language of his youth. “No, we’ll not do that. When we leave here, we go together. We need the twins, Scatty—not just you and me, but the entire world. I believe that only they will be able to stand against the Dark Elders and keep them from achieving their ultimate aim and reclaiming the earth.”

Scatty looked over his shoulder into the gloomy chamber. “You’re asking a lot of them. When are you going to tell them the whole truth?” she asked.

“In time…,” he began.

“Time is something you do not have,” Scatty murmured. “You’ve started to age. I can see it in your face, around your eyes, and there’s more gray in your hair.”

Flamel nodded. “I know. The immortality spell is breaking down. Perenelle and I will begin to age a year for every day we go without the formulation for immortality. We will be dead by the end of the month. But by then it will not matter. If the Dark Elders succeed, the world of the humani will have already ceased to exist.”

“Let’s make sure that doesn’t happen.” Scatty turned her back on Flamel, then sank to the ground, back straight, her legs folded, feet turned high on her thighs in a full lotus position, arms outstretched, palms wrapped around the hilts of the swords that were lying across her lap. If the cats or birds broke into the house and found the corridor, they would have to get past her to find Hekate—and the Warrior would make them pay dearly.

Hekate had given Flamel a short staff made of a branch of the Yggdrasill, and now, holding it in both hands, he took up a position directly outside the door to the chamber where the goddess was working with the twins. If any of the invaders did manage to get past Scathach, they would then face him. Scatty would fight with her swords, hands and feet, but his weapons were potentially even more destructive. He held up his hand and the narrow space grew heavy with the smell of mint as his aura flickered and sparked into green life around him. Though he was still powerful, every use of magic weakened him and drew on his life force. Scatty was right; he had started to age. He could feel tiny aches and vague pains where there had been none before. Even his eyesight was no longer as sharp as it had been only the day before. If he was forced to use his powers, it would speed the aging process, but he was determined to give Hekate all the time she needed. He turned to look over his shoulder, trying to penetrate the gloom. What was happening in there?

“We will start with the elder,” Hekate announced.

Sophie could feel her brother drawing a breath to protest, but she squeezed his fingers so tightly that she could actually feel his bones grinding together. He kicked her ankle in response.

“It is traditional,” the goddess continued. “Sophie…” She paused, then said, “What is your family name, your parents’ names?”

“Newman…and my mother’s name is Sara, my father is Richard.” It felt odd calling her parents anything other than Mom and Dad.

The green light in the chamber brightened and they could see Hekate outlined against the glowing walls. Although her face was in darkness, her eyes reflected the green light like chips of polished glass. She reached out and placed the palm of her hand against Sophie’s forehead. “Sophie, daughter of Sara and Richard, of Clan Newman, of the race humani…”

She began in English, but then drifted into a lyrically beautiful language that predated humanity. As she spoke, Sophie’s aura began to glow, a misty silver light outlining her body. A cool breeze wafted across her skin and she was suddenly conscious that she was no longer hearing Hekate. She could see the goddess’s mouth moving, but she could not make out the words over the sounds of her own body—the breath hissing in and out of her nose, the rush of blood in her ears, the solid beat of her heart in her chest. There was a pressure on her temples, as if her brain were expanding inside her skull, and an ache ran the length of her spine and spread outward into all her bones.

Then the room began to lighten. Hekate—looking older now—was standing outlined in shifting streams of sparkling lights. Sophie suddenly realized that she was seeing the goddess’s aura. She watched as the lights twisted and curled around Hekate’s arm and flowed down into her fingers, and then, with a tingling shock, Sophie could actually feel it penetrating her skull. For an instant she was dizzy, disorientated, and then, through the buzzing in her ears, Hekate’s words abruptly started to make sense. “…I Awaken this terrible power within you….” The goddess moved her hands over Sophie’s face, her touch like ice and fire. “These are the senses the humani have abandoned,” Hekate continued. She pressed her thumbs lightly against Sophie’s eyes.

“To see with acuity…”

Sophie’s vision bloomed, and the darkened chamber came to blazing light, every shadow picked out in exquisite detail. She could see each thread and stitch on Hekate’s robe, could pick out individual hairs on her head and follow the map of tiny wrinkles that were visibly growing at the corners of her eyes.

“To hear with clarity…”

It was as if cotton had been pulled from Sophie’s ears. Suddenly, she could
hear.
It was like the difference between listening to music on her iPod headphones and then to the same track on her bedroom stereo. Every sound in the room magnified and intensified: the wheezing of her brother’s breath through his nostrils, the tiny shifting creaks of the huge tree above them, the scritch-scratching of invisible creatures moving through the roots. Tilting her head slightly, she could even hear the distant sounds of battle: the screeching of birds, the roars of cats and the bellowing of boars.

“To taste with purity…”

Hekate’s fingers brushed Sophie’s lips and suddenly the girl was conscious that her tongue was tingling. She licked her lips, finding traces of the fruit she had eaten earlier and discovering that she could actually taste the air—it was rich and earthy—and even distinguish the water droplets in the atmosphere.

“To touch with sensitivity…”

Sophie’s skin came alive. The fabrics against her skin—the soft cotton of her T-shirt, the stiff denim of her jeans, the gold chain with her birth sign around her neck, her warm cotton socks—all left different and distinct impressions on her flesh.

“To smell with intensity…”

Sophie actually rocked backward with the sudden eye-watering explosion of scents that invaded her: the spicy otherworldly odors of Hekate, the cloying earthiness of her surroundings, her brother’s twenty-four-hour deodorant, which was plainly not working, the supposedly unscented gel in his hair, the mint of the toothpaste she had used earlier.

Sophie’s aura began to glow, silver mist rising off her skin like fog off a lake. It surrounded her body in a pale oval. She closed her eyes and threw her head back. Colors, smells and sounds were rushing at her: and they were brighter, stronger, louder than any she had ever experienced before. The effect from her heightened senses was almost painful…no, it
was
painful. It hurt. Her head throbbed, her bones ached, even her skin itched—everything was just too much. Sophie’s head tilted back, and then, almost of their own accord, her arms shot out to either side…and she rose four inches off the dirt floor.

“Sophie?” Josh whispered, unable to keep the terror from his voice. “Sophie…” His sister, wrapped in an undulating silver glow, was floating in the air directly before him. The light from her body was so strong that it painted the circular chamber in shades of silver and black. It was like a scene from a terrifying horror movie.

“Don’t touch her,” Hekate commanded sternly. “Her body is attempting to assimilate the wash of sensations. This is the most dangerous time.”

Josh’s mouth went dry and his tongue was suddenly too big for it. “Dangerous…what do you mean, dangerous?” Something in his mind clicked and he felt as if his worst fears were about to be realized.

“In most cases, the brain cannot cope with the heightened sensations of Awakening.”

“In
most
cases?” he whispered, appalled.

“In almost every case,” Hekate said, and he heard the regret in her voice. “That is why I was unwilling to do this.”

Josh asked the question he really didn’t want answered: “What happens?”

“The brain effectively shuts down. The person is left in a coma from which they never awaken.”

“And Flamel
knew
this could happen?” Josh asked, feeling a great surge of anger begin in the pit of his stomach. He felt sick. The Alchemyst had known the Awakening could, in all likelihood, send him and Sophie into a coma, and yet had still been prepared to let them go through with it. The rage burned within him, fueled in equal parts by fear and a terrible sense of betrayal. He’d thought Flamel was his friend. He’d been wrong.