The Chalice of Immortality (9 page)

Fred did just that—or tried to, anyway. He climbed down from his barstool and walked to the place where Goga had popped up. He went so far as to get down on his hands and knees, feeling along the carpet for a hidden latch or edge to a trap door. Then he stood up and walked behind the bar. He stamped his feet along the floor, even jumping up and down, looking for the secret to Goga's disappearance.

“All right. Then you must have an identical twin.”

Goga tilted his head back and laughed. “My dear mama would tell you that
one
of me was more than enough.”

“You must tell us,” Fred implored him. “How did you do that?”

Goga grinned. He snapped his fingers and disappeared. An instant later, he reappeared. “Magic.”

Amelia's face drained of color. She couldn't trust her eyes. She was certain what she was seeing was real—but it couldn't be!

“Then tell me,” she said, her voice trembling, “even if we…believed your outlandish claims, why would you help us? What's in it for you?” She had learned from her husband to question the motives of anyone with a deal too good to be true.

“I have certain nefarious enemies searching for me.”

“Well,” Fred drawled, “it would seem to me that since you can make yourself appear and disappear so easily, it would be quite simple to elude them.”

“Ah, that would be true if my enemies were ordinary mortals like yourselves. But they are not. They are as powerful as I am—perhaps more so.”

Amelia leaned an elbow on the bar, fascinated. This had all the makings of the most extraordinary adventure ever. “Go on.”

“I have a certain object…I need it kept safe. And I need it off this island within a few days. If my sources are correct, my enemies will soon be arriving. In exchange for granting both of you the freedom to fly the skies invisibly—I shall entrust you with a chalice. You must ask no questions about it. You must not drink from it. And you must not reveal its existence to anyone. You will disappear with the chalice…and sometime in the future, I will come and retrieve it. Perhaps at that time, you will wish to come back from your adventure. And what a story that will make!”

Amelia looked at Fred. All her life, she had longed for adventure—even a touch of danger. And this strange, magical man had just offered her the chance of a
hundred
lifetimes.

“Fred?” She cocked an eyebrow at her navigator, who grinned.

“I'm game,” he said.

Amelia reached her hand across the bar. “You have a deal, Goga.”

The two of them shook on it, and Amelia Earhart, “Lady Lindy” of the skies, became deliriously excited at the thought of the freedom she would now be able to enjoy. It was as if her very breath was lighter now.

Theo said, “We must go back to England at once! Kolya, you're to come with Damian and me. We're nearing the end of the chalice's twisted path.”

Damian found Irina, Isabella's older sister, and told her to make sure all of the family returned to the casino. The chalice's path had become clearer and led back to the sausage shop, of all places.

Damian and Theo cast spells, and instantly, Nick and his two older cousins were back in Lady Daphne's bed and breakfast, emerging out of the hall closet in the entryway. They went downstairs and found Lady Daphne in her kitchen having a cup of hot tea and a scone, a wolf curled at her feet.

“Blimey, duckies! You're back! Just dropping in my closets, are you now? I was having a cup of tea before bedtime,” she chuckled. “The many surprises of this inn!”

Nick was grateful that she was in a flannel nightgown and curlers—and not her meat-covered apron. He leaned down and hugged her, happy to avoid the sausage bits.

“Lady Daphne,” he said anxiously, “we need to see a woman who is a customer at your tea shop. She always sits at the same table, and she wears a white scarf. Do you know who I'm talking about?”

“I know precisely whom you wish to see. Her name is Millie.”

Nick looked at Theo and Damian. “That must be her nickname.”

“Where can we find her?” Theo asked. “It is very, very important.”

“Why, right upstairs. She stays in Room C.”

Nick hugged Lady Daphne again. “Thanks!”

The three of them bounded up the stairs. Nick knocked on the wooden door of Room C. There was silence for a few moments, and then the door opened wide. Standing there was the woman from the crystal ball.

“I've been expecting you,” she said softly. “Come in.”

Nick looked at each of his cousins and stepped into her room. They followed.

Amelia Earhart—a little older than her pictures, but with the same slightly shy smile—gestured toward chairs around a small table. The four of them sat down.

“Expecting us?” Nick asked.

“I knew someday the right guardian would come. I know of your bravery. I know about the wolves. I thought you would be the one.”

“You've been missing…all this time?” Nick asked, still amazed that she was Amelia Earhart.

“Yes. Fred and I—our plane disappeared over the Pacific. After a search, my husband had me declared legally dead. He remarried a few months later, thus assuaging any guilt I felt over my bit of deception.” She smiled wryly at them.

“Amelia—” Nick started to speak.

“Call me Millie,” she said. “It's the name I had as a little girl—my sister gave me that nickname.”

Nick said, “How? How have you been able to hide all this time? And…do you have the chalice?”

Theo said, “Did you know we were here for it? We need it, Millie. Nick's father…he's under a very, very deadly spell. Do you know the power of the chalice?”

She nodded. “I can take you to the chalice. But first, a story. And then a promise from you, before I lead you to it.”

Nick nodded. “Whatever promise you need. Please…” He thought of his father's translucent skin. “I don't know how much time we have.”

“Fred Noonan and I made a deal—a deal with man named Goga. We took the chalice and took to the skies, and he arranged for us to simply disappear. At the time,” she smiled ruefully, “I felt trapped by my life. I know it sounds crazy, but I was a younger woman then. I was impetuous. I wanted to fly. I didn't ask to become an icon.” She played with her white scarf. “I just like wearing this. I didn't expect that suddenly scarves like this would be all the rage with girls who looked up to me.”

She sighed and put her hands in her lap. “I made the choice of an impetuous woman without thinking through all the details. All my life I'd been so headstrong. No one could tell me anything differently. So I made the decision rashly. At first, the freedom was delightful. Fred and I simply disappeared, along with the plane, over the middle of the ocean. He and I…” She laughed. “We flew around the world. We saw things that still sustain me. We were delirious with the sheer joy of flying again.”

“And the chalice?” Theo asked.

“The chalice rode with us in the cockpit. I kept it in a velvet pouch—the same one it was in when Goga gave it to us. We expected that one day, that strange Russian would simply appear and ask for it back. Some nights, Fred and I would sit on whatever airfield we had landed at, and we would marvel at the strange turn our lives had taken. The magic was wonderful. I mean, we would sometimes just walk into a restaurant and steal plates of delicious food. We'd fuel our plane without being seen. We lived like vagabonds, and I have no doubt that the people at the airfields we went to, the places we visited, thought a pair of mischievous ghosts had done what we had just done. And some nights, we pondered just what that chalice was—we knew it had to have something to do with magic.”

“You were curious, of course,” Damian said.

“Indeed. And then—then Fred and I began to see strange things on our adventures. We saw what I now know are Shadowkeepers. We would sense them, these shadowy creatures, and we were always just a few steps ahead of them, it seemed.”

“What did they look like?” Theo asked.

“Sometimes, I thought they looked like winged demons. Other times, it just seemed as if darkness was encroaching on us. When I saw them, a chill passed over me that I could not warm up from. We'd be taking off for the air as they arrived at an airfield. Occasionally, I saw one fly across the moon like a shadow—the wing span was perhaps thirteen feet. We knew we could not keep ahead of them forever. And then Fred and I realized there was a flaw in Goga's plan.”

“What was that?” Damian asked.

“We had no way to contact him. We were waiting for him to come to us—but we didn't know when that might be. So we flew back to Hawaii to try to track him down, and there, we learned he had been killed.”

“How?” Nick asked.

“In the attack on Pearl Harbor. It wasn't even a Shadowkeeper that got him. In the strangest of turns in our already strange adventure, he was killed by the evil of regular people, not the evil of the Shadowkeepers. So now Fred and I were stuck. Of course, thinking about it now, remembering it, I can't believe we were so foolish.” She put her hands on the table and shook her head.

Theo reached out and patted her hand. “Magic can do that. It's bewildering. It's exciting. It's intoxicating. It's seductive. Do not feel ashamed, Millie. Magic has been the undoing of many a mortal, and many a Magickeeper.”

“Fred took it hardest, but we decided to make the best of it. However, one day, we were attacked by Shadowkeepers. They came at us while we slept in sleeping bags beside our plane, here in England.”

“Was there a man among them?” Theo asked.

“No. These were tall, almost seven feet, I think, with a wide wingspan. They flew, like the ones I had seen fly across the moon, on leathery wings. Their faces were
almost
human, though distorted. And their oily skin seemed to drip this foul-smelling—” She wrinkled her nose. “I suppose you know what they smell like.”

Nick nodded. “Sure do. Like egg salad left on a school bus in June!”

Millie laughed. “Yes, I believe so.”

“So what happened?” Theo asked gently.

“Fred was killed, and the chalice was stolen. I escaped by reaching my plane and locking myself in the cockpit. But once they had the chalice, they didn't seem to care much about me.” She looked up, eyes teary. “Over time, since we only had each other, Fred had become my best friend. Losing him—it was devastating.”

She was silent for several long minutes. “But I didn't become a pilot—didn't take the risks I took, didn't change aviation history for women—for nothing. I am Amelia Earhart, after all. So I made it my life's mission to find out about the chalice, to find out more about the magic world. That's what I have been doing all these years. I have been to Las Vegas. I have been in a room with Howard Hughes. I followed the trail wherever it led me.”

“But…we see you now. How did you become un-invisible again?” Nick asked.

“I followed the trail to Las Vegas, where I saw Howard Hughes. And then I heard a rumor about a Magical Curiosity Shoppe.”

“Madame B.!”

“Yes. She helped me attain my human form again. Gave me several potions. It was she who told me about the power of the chalice, what it could do. Since I had resisted its powers, she felt that I would be an acceptable guardian for it. I was always just a few steps behind the chalice. And then I heard of a Magickeeper—a painter named Vadim.”

“I know him,” Damian practically growled. “He painted the ceiling in my casino.”

“And he painted a ceiling for Liberace. He stole the chalice from Liberace, who, as near as I can figure it, acquired it from one of Howard Hughes's inner circle, some of whom were stealing from him. Vadim took the chalice, but he also stole one of Liberace's silver candelabra and a painting! He was a thief, and I had the feeling that perhaps he did not know what he was in possession of. I used one of Madame B.'s potions to temporarily cause him to fall into a deep sleep.”

Theo smiled. “Clever. The Sleeping Beauty potion.”

She nodded. “And then I stole the chalice back.”

“It's a shame I was not there,” snarled Damian. “The perpetrator would have suffered. Vadim would have been turned into a piglet, and he would already be
bacon
by now!”

Millie stared up at them, eyes glistening. “I wanted to wait until I found someone I could trust, truly trust to become its new caretaker.”

“So you'll take us to it?” Nick asked.

“I will.”

That night, under a still and starless sky, Nick, Theo, Damian, and Millie walked down a silent path lined with lime trees leading to Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon. They entered the doors and passed through archways, their footsteps echoing on the marble.

Nick looked at the stained glass windows and the carvings in marble. The cavernous ceilings of the nave carried every sound high and hushed. Damian materialized a torch to lead the way.

They walked through the whole church until they stood at the sanctuary behind a brass railing.

“Here lies William Shakespeare,” Millie said. “He bought the rights to care for the chancel, and therefore, he had the right to be buried in this very building.”

Nick stared down. There was a flat stone, not like any grave he had ever seen. “So he's in there?”

“Actually,” Theo said. “It's Shakespeare; his wife, Anne Hathaway; and their daughter, Suzanna. His son-in-law too. All together for eternity.”

“What does it say on his grave?” Nick asked. There were letters carved into the old stone, but in the dim torchlight, he could just barely make them out.

Millie lifted her head, reciting the words, apparently from memory, in a clear voice.

Good frend for Jesus sake forebeare,

To digg the dust encloased heare.

Blese be y man y spares thes stones,

And curst…

“So there's a curse on the grave?” Nick interrupted.

“Yes,” Millie said. “And as I researched the Chalice of Immortality and saw its danger and its power, I followed it all the way back to William Shakespeare. Once I had it in my possession again, I thought I would bring it full circle to rest with the great playwright. He placed this curse on his grave so that grave robbers would not disturb his bones at a time when grave robbing was a common crime.”

“We know,” Nick said. “Sir Arthur Conan Doyle got it from the heir of a doctor who bought bones from grave robbers.”

“Worse,” Millie said, “in Shakespeare's time, sometimes people bought the right to a grave and just put the new bones of the dead over the older ones. Shakespeare feared, given his fame, that his bones might be stolen and sold. Or that some stranger would be buried on top of him.” She shuddered.

“So he's really in there?” Nick asked.

“He's really in there. The curse worked. Until me, of course, but I wasn't
robbing
Shakespeare's bones, I was merely putting something there to rest with him—something I needed kept safe.” She reached out and took Nick's hand. “Look at my face, Nick.”

He stared at the weathered face of Amelia Earhart. In her eyes, he still saw the tomboy she had been once, young and longing for the skies.

“Once mortals mingle with Magickeepers, they age differently, slower. I am very old, though I don't look it—not entirely. But even I know that immortality is wrong, Nick. It is not the natural order of things. We are all meant to die one day, even great men like Shakespeare. Even”—her voice choked off a little—“great friends like Fred Noonan. I miss him still, but I understand that people live, and people die. And I need to be sure that you understand that, too.”

“I do. I really do. I don't want my father to die from a spell. I wish my mother hadn't died at Rasputin's hand. Somehow, I think my life would have been very different if she hadn't died. But I understand that someday, we all die. I just want it to be when it's
supposed
to happen, not because a Shadowkeeper has worked evil magic.”

“You must make me one promise.”

“What?”

“Heal your father, then lock this chalice away so no more lives are lost because of it.”

Nick looked at Theo, who nodded.

“Of course, Millie,” Nick replied. The Winter Palace Hotel and Casino had a near-impenetrable vault where relics were kept.

“And don't drink of it yourself,” she added.

“I won't.”

“I mean it. I sipped water from it, one time. Still not aware of its full power. And I could feel it taking hold of me. That night, every time I shut my eyes, I saw the chalice in my mind, its gold shimmering, its ruby calling me like a siren's song. I heard it whispering,
Drink.
I decided then the chalice was far better resting with someone
already
dead, like Shakespeare, than someone living who might be tempted by it.”

She exhaled. “All right, then, my long adventure comes to an end tonight. I can live out the rest of my days at Lady Daphne's. Go ahead, Theo…open the grave. I had to do it with a crowbar. I trust you can do it far more easily.”

Theo waved his arms, uttering a spell in rapid-fire Russian. The top slab lifted with a grating sound of stone rubbing against stone.

“Go on, Nick,” Theo commanded. “Get the chalice.”

Nick peered in at the tomb of Shakespeare. Dusty bones, teeth, a skull, and a velvet pouch. “Sorry, sir,” he whispered. He knelt next to the now-open grave and reached his hand into its darkness. He found the hand and finger bones clutching the velvet bag that Millie had placed in the grave. With a shudder, he gently dislodged the bag and pulled it out.

Theo replaced the slab, which closed with a resounding thud. He uttered another spell, then translated. “I said, ‘May your bones not be disturbed for another thousand years.'”

Nick opened the black velvet bag. The large chalice gleamed, giving off its own pulsing light and energy. The gold was the shiniest he had ever seen.

“We have it at last,” he whispered. As he held the chalice, he flashed on a vision of its one-time guardian, William Shakespeare.

***

Stratford-upon-Avon, March 25, 1616

William Shakespeare sat at his desk, composing his last will and testament with a long quill pen. His handwriting was slightly unsure, as it was a terrible premonition he had that was causing him to draft his will. As he wrote, he sipped from the chalice on his desk. He stroked the chalice, his most wondrous chalice. His most hated chalice.

Like a battle with a dangerous foe, the chalice represented turmoil for Shakespeare. He was convinced that the chalice was the
only
thing that kept the words flowing through him. When he drank from the chalice, new ideas flooded his mind. His sonnets seemed to compose themselves. They would rush into him—precious words.

In fact, the chalice, he was now certain, was the reason he was a playwright—the reason he had fame. As the world's greatest playwright and part-owner of his own theater company, he felt a little bit like a fraud. And this displeased him.

How had this happened? At one time, he was
certain
the words were his own. But now? Now he was not so certain. He cursed the day the chalice came into his life.

And yet, he could not part with it.
Never!
The idea, the very idea, filled him with a cold dread.

Hamlet.
Act five, scene two. He had written of a poison in the chalice meant for Hamlet—who refused to drink from it. Shakespeare had found ways to honor the chalice in his plays. Sometimes, it was only in a party scene. But sometimes, the chalice played a real and integral part. Shakespeare would sit with the crowd in disguise as he had that first time with
Romeo and Juliet
and smile bemusedly because the audience had no idea.

He heard a knock on his door and assumed it was his servant.

“You may enter,” he called out.

But instead of his servant, in stepped the Russian, Fyodor.

Shakespeare gasped. “How long it has been, my friend, how long? I scarce believe it is you. Are you a ghost, come to frighten me to death?” Shakespeare looked down at his will and then up at Fyodor. It had been many years since he'd seen the Russian, but the man had not aged a day. How was that possible?

“I have come for the chalice, William.”

Shakespeare reflexively grabbed the chalice and clutched it to his breast.

“No! You must not. No! You shall not!”

“You were intended as its guardian for a brief time, but admittedly, my enemies made my return here one of great difficulty.”

“No.” Shakespeare felt an icy chill settle over his heart. This could not be happening. He would never be able to write another word—not without his beloved chalice. His accursed chalice! There was a true battle inside him, but he could not give the cup to the Russian.

“I can see that it has a power over you,” Fyodor said.

“It is my life! The chalice makes my words possible. It fills me with inspiration.
Hamlet
,
Henry VIII
,
Othello
…my greatest plays were created while I imbibed from the chalice. This chalice has brought me acclaim.”

“No,” the Russian said darkly. “You composed those words! You did! You are in the chalice's possession. I should not have left it here this long. This will be painful, but I must take it from you.”

“No! I shall murder you with my own hand rather than let you take this chalice!”

“Do you hear yourself, William Shakespeare? Look at your trembling hand, your sweating brow! Look! Look at what you have become—a slave.”

“I am no slave.”

“You are. A slave to this chalice. You must let it go, William. You must. Now hand it to me.”

Still Shakespeare clutched it to his bosom.

“I said, hand it to me!” Fyodor spoke Russian words, some sort of spell, Shakespeare surmised. Inside his very room, it thundered. Lightning flashed. The room went dark. And when the thunder and lightning had stopped and his lantern was again lit, Shakespeare realized that Fyodor had the chalice. He had wrested it from him.

“Please, please, I beg of you! Do not take it!”

“No,” Fyodor said, shaking his head sadly. “It is too dangerous.”

With that, the Russian walked out of the room to the anguished cries of William Shakespeare.

Alone, without his chalice, Shakespeare thought he might weep. A single tear splashed down on his will. He picked up his quill pen and continued, deciding which of his heirs would inherit his things.

When he was done, he stared down at his last will and testament.

Shakespeare whispered, “I might as well die. Without my chalice, I am nothing.”

He placed his quill pen on the desk and stared forlornly out the window. He was fifty-two years old.

And in exactly four weeks, though he was not ill, William Shakespeare died.

Of a broken heart.

***

Nick blinked, out of breath. He relayed the vision he had, then said, “Such a sad end.” He stood up and looked at Millie. “I don't know how to thank you.”

“Thank me by being a good guardian of the chalice, Nick. Don't let it destroy you. Don't allow it to muddle your head or to bond with you. It's too dangerous.”

Nick nodded. “I won't.” Then he looked at Theo. “I hope the chalice is as powerful—for just this one time—as I need it to be.”

Theo reached out to touch the chalice. “It is.” He shut his eyes and inhaled, using magical senses. He spoke, almost in a whisper. “Its origins are in Egypt at the time of Ramses II. He was, like all the pharaohs, powerful and omnipotent, and often ruthless. When he discovered a plot to assassinate him, he condemned all the conspirators—including one of his wives—to death. One of those condemned to die was a magician. The method of execution was to force the condemned to commit suicide.”

Nick shuddered , remembering Theo's lesson on Socrates, the philosopher who was sentenced to drink poison.

“On the eve of the execution, three Magickeepers assembled under cover of darkness. Speaking the most powerful incantations over the chalice, uniting the magic of all three and their bloodline, they created a chalice that would render the magician into death to be revived later when they exhumed him from his tomb. But because their spell interfered with life and death, they realized, once they saved their friend, that the chalice would need to be guarded. It had powers of immortality, powers over death that no Magickeeper—or ordinary mortal—should have. Magicians are not meant to be gods.”

Millie whispered, “Now you know why I had to be so careful about who took possession of the chalice.”

Nick hugged Millie. “I promise I will be a good guardian.”

“I can tell.”

“We have to go now, Millie.” He clutched the chalice and the four of them ran from the church.

“Theo, look!”

The wolves were waiting for them. Seven of them sat like obedient dogs in the middle of the stone pathway between the lime trees. They howled. But without Isabella, Nick had no idea what the wolves were saying to them.

“If they are here, they must want to warn us about something,” Nick said. There was no other logical explanation. “Let's get Millie back to Lady Daphne's, and then we must fly home.”

They raced through the empty streets, wolves following them, paws scraping on the stone pathways, to Lady Daphne's, and Nick saw, standing on the bed and breakfast's thatched roof, a figure dressed in a black monk's habit. He hovered like a ghost and stared down at them.