The Necromancer (8 page)

When Joan spun around, she discovered that the other tigers had disappeared too. “Very impressive,” she said.

“You just have to show them who’s boss,” Scatty answered, kneeling beside the huge saber-toothed tiger. She ran her hand over the back of its head, then raised its eyelid to look at it. The beast rumbled but made no attempt to get up.

Joan crouched beside her friend. She looked at the tiger’s teeth. The incisors were the length of her hand and tapered to points that could probably pierce armor.

“The trick,” Scatty said, “is to hit them just where the base of the skull touches the spine. The blow stuns them.”

“And if you miss?”

“Then you just make them mad.” Scatty’s smile revealed her own savage teeth. “But I don’t miss.” She patted the huge beast. “It’ll wake up with a headache.”

Joan of Arc straightened and tapped her friend’s shoulder.

“What?” Scatty looked up.

Joan nodded toward the hill. The twenty-two saber-toothed tigers had gathered on the brow. They were joined by two more, and then another four appeared. They all looked to be fully grown adults, and their rumbling growls actually vibrated through the ground.

“Do you think this one might have been the leader of the pack?” Joan asked.

The animals parted and another saber-toothed tiger appeared. It was huge, towering head and shoulders over the others and at least half as long again. Its dun coat was white with the lines of ancient scars, one of its bottom teeth had broken off into a ragged spur, and its left eye was only a white glassy globe.

“This one is the leader of the pack,” Scatty said, taking a step backward.

The creature’s single good eye moved from the tiger on the ground to Scatty and back to the tiger again. And then it opened its maw and growled. The sound was incredible, a bone-shaking rumble that sent birds wheeling into the air for miles around. Then, slowly, almost delicately, it started to pick its way down the incline.

Scatty took a step toward the creature, but Joan caught her arm. “Do you remember something you taught me when I was fighting the English?” she asked urgently.

Scatty looked at her blankly.

“You told me that it was a mistake to fight the scarred warriors. They were the survivors.” The Frenchwoman nodded toward the beast approaching them. “Look at this creature. It has survived many battles.”

Scathach looked at the huge scarred saber-toothed tiger. “I am the Shadow,” she said simply. “I can defeat her.”

Joan’s fingers tightened on her friend’s arm. “You also told me never to engage in a battle unless it was completely unavoidable. You don’t have to do this.”

“You’re right, I suppose.” Scatty sighed, then asked, almost regretfully, “So what do we do?”

“We run!”

N
iccolò Machiavelli took a deep breath of the salty sea air and pressed his hands against his aching stomach. Before he’d become immortal he’d been troubled with ulcers, and although his Elder master had cured him of all human ills, at times of great stress his stomach still cramped. Now, standing on the quay on Alcatraz, staring out toward San Francisco, his stomach felt as if it were on fire.

“We’re going to be fine, just fine,” the young man in the stained jeans and battered cowboy boots standing beside him said for the tenth time. “We’re going to be fine.”

“William,” Machiavelli said carefully, keeping his voice low, “how long have you been immortal?”

“One hundred and twenty-six years,” Billy the Kid said proudly.

“I became immortal in the year 1527,” the Italian said, glancing at the American. “I was alive when Columbus claimed discovery of this country. I am not the oldest immortal—I am older than Dee, but the Alchemyst Flamel is older than I, Duns Scotus is even older still, and Mo-Tzu older still. Gilgamesh is older than all of us. But I have had more contact with the Elders than these others. And let me tell you that our Elder masters do not countenance failure. They demand complete obedience. They expect results. And we have failed,” he added. He held up his closed fist and extended his little finger. “We were sent here to kill the Sorceress Perenelle”—he stuck a second finger up—“and release the creatures in the cells into the city.” Another finger. “Perenelle escaped, in our boat,” he added, extending a fourth finger, “leaving us trapped on the island with the monsters still in their cells. We failed. We are most definitely not going to be fine.”

Both men turned as the sound of an engine drew nearer. Machiavelli shaded his stone-gray eyes and saw a boat approaching, leaving a wide white wake across the bay.

Billy held up his cell phone. “I called for help,” he said, almost apologetically. “What do you reckon will happen?”

Machiavelli sighed. “We will be summoned before our masters and our immortality will be removed. We will die. Quickly, if we are lucky, but our masters are often cruel.…”

Billy shuddered. “Not sure I like the thought of that. I’ve sort of grown used to being immortal.” Then he shook his head quickly. “My master is …” He paused, trying to find the proper word. “He’s different from some of these other Elders. I can explain all this to him.” He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the prison buildings behind him. “We’ll be fine.”

“Please stop saying that.”

A bright red speedboat pulled up to the dock and a tall, striking-looking Native American with copper skin and hatchet-sharp features grinned up at Billy the Kid. “Our master wants to see you—you too,” he said, looking at Machiavelli. “You are both in so much trouble.”

T
he cucubuths closed in on Dee.

Dozens had crowded into Covent Garden; scores more lined the roofs of the surrounding buildings, and their bestial howls still echoed across the city. The shaven-headed leader spread his arms wide, exposing the black tattoos that snaked along the underside of his arms. “What are you going to do now, Doctor?”

Dee reached under his coat and touched the hilt of the stone blade that hung beneath his arm. He had fashioned a sheath for it out of two leather belts. He had no idea what would happen if he actually used the sword. He had carried Excalibur for centuries and still had only the vaguest understanding of its powers. His limited experience with Clarent suggested that it was even more powerful than its twin blade. Though now that they had fused, they had to be even more powerful … or did the two cancel each other out?

The Magician quickly considered his options. If he did wield the sword, he was sure it would light up the London skies for miles around, and probably blaze into the nearby Shadowrealms. But if he didn’t use the sword or his powers, then the cucubuths would capture him and bring him before his Dark Elder masters. And he most certainly did not want to do that: he hadn’t reached his five hundredth birthday yet. He was far too young to die.

“Come quietly, Doctor,” the cucubuth said in the ancient Wendish language of east Europe.

Dee’s hand tightened on the hilt of the sword. He felt its chill numb his fingers, and instantly, strange and bizarre thoughts flickered at the very edges of his consciousness.

Cucubuths in leather and hide armor … vampires wearing chain mail and metal … wading ashore from narrow metal boats, fighting on a beach, battling hairy, primitive one-eyed beasts …

The sound that sliced through the night was so high-pitched it was almost beyond the range of human hearing: a single drawn-out wavering note.

The cucubuths fell as if they had been struck. Those closest to Dee dropped first, and then in a long rippling wave the creatures toppled to the ground, hands pressed to their ears, writhing in agony.

Virginia Dare stepped out of the shadows, her flute pressed to her lips, and smiled at Dee.

“I am indebted to you.” The doctor bowed deeply, an old-fashioned gesture last used in the court of the first Queen Elizabeth.

Virginia drew in a breath. “Consider this repayment for the time you saved my life in Boston.”

One of the cucubuths reached for Dee’s ankle and he kicked the hand aside. “We should go,” he said. A few of the creatures were already staggering to their feet, but another series of piercing notes from Dare’s flute dropped them to the ground again.

Stepping lightly over the mass of squirming bodies, Dare and Dee made their way out of Covent Garden. Dee paused at the King Street entrance and turned to look back. The cobbled square was a mass of twisting, shifting bodies. Some of the creatures were already beginning to lose their human appearance as their hands and faces reverted back to their beast forms. “That’s a neat trick,” he said, hurrying to catch up with Dare, who had continued on down the street, still playing the flute. “How long will the spell last?” Dee asked.

“Not long. The more intelligent the creature, the longer the spell endures. On primitive beasts like these: ten, twenty minutes.”

The street was littered with cucubuths squirming in pain, their hands pressed to their ears. Two fell off the roof of a building directly in front of Dee and Dare, hitting the ground hard enough to crack the paving slabs. Without breaking stride, Virginia stepped over their twitching bodies. Dee walked around them; he knew a simple fall would not harm the creatures, only slow them down.

“I learned the tune from a German,” she said between breaths. “He used to be a rat catcher.”

“What made you choose my side?” Dee asked.

“You promised me a world,” Virginia Dare said seriously. “You better keep that promise,” she added. “I learned some other tunes from the rat catcher, and believe me, you do not want me to play them.”

The Magician attempted a laugh. “Why, that sounds almost like a threat …,” he began.

“It was,” she said, then grinned. “Actually, it was more than a threat. It’s a promise.”

T
he ravens watched the slender female figure step out of the shadows, a long wooden flute pressed to her lips.

Vaguely—more a sensation in their bones than a vibration in the air—they experienced the ghost of a sound. Ancient instincts sent them soaring upward, higher and higher, away from the deathly noise.

From their great height, they watched the cucubuths fall like grass flattened by a wind. And they saw Dee and the woman move through the bodies, strolling unhurriedly away from the chaos.

In his Shadowrealm, Odin watched the couple through the raven’s eyes. Who was this woman and how had she rendered the cucubuths unconscious?

The Elder frowned, trying to focus on the female humani. There was something about her, something almost familiar. She was obviously an ally of Dee’s, and she possessed what looked like one of the ancient artifacts of power.

And suddenly, the name came to him in a flood of bitter memories, and he threw back his head and howled in delight. Virginia Dare: one of the few immortals who had slain their master and survived. He had known her master and counted him a friend. Now he could avenge the death of his love and his friend.

“Bring Dee to me,” he instructed the ravens. “Kill the female.”

High above the city, the ravens followed the immortal humani and the Elder watched through their eyes.

“W
hen we first saw her, we thought it was Scatty,” Josh said.

“Aoife of the Shadows,” Perenelle said, “Scathach’s twin sister.”

“Younger or older?” Josh asked. He was twenty-eight seconds younger than his sister, and although he was a head taller, he still felt like the little brother. Perenelle and Josh had climbed down the metal fire escape and were standing in the alleyway behind the shop, waiting for Nicholas to join them.

“Well that depends on whom you talk to,” Perenelle said with a smile. “Scathach says she is the elder, but Aoife claims that she was born first.”

Nicholas appeared at the top of the stairs and started to climb down. He was moving slowly and awkwardly because of the wooden box strapped to his back.

“Scatty never said anything about having a sister,” Josh said. He found the concept hard to believe. He couldn’t imagine ever not acknowledging his sister, his twin.

“Yes, well, they had a terrible argument a long time ago. There was a boy they both loved. Cuchulain, the Hound of Ulster. And despite his name, he was completely human.”

“What happened?” Josh asked.

“He died,” Perenelle said shortly, then she sighed. “Scatty will not speak of it, but Cuchulain died a hero’s death. The sisters blamed one another for it, though as far I can see, neither was entirely to blame. Cuchulain was young and headstrong. No one could control him. He was also one of the finest warriors who ever lived, and the last to be trained by both Aoife and Scathach. The sisters have not spoken in a very long time. In the early days, Scatty remained in Europe and the Americas while Aoife traveled south into Africa, where she was worshipped as a goddess. Then Aoife went east into the Orient, where she now spends most of her time. I doubt they have met in the last four or five centuries.”

“Was Aoife responsible for Cu … Coo …”

“Cuchulain.”

“For his death?” Josh asked.

“As responsible as Scathach. If they had fought by his side, he would not have died.”

Nicholas reached the end of the ladder and Perenelle and Josh helped him down the last steps. He stood leaning against the wall, his breath coming in great heaving gasps, and Josh suddenly realized that the Alchemyst was now an old man. He looked at Flamel closely, and as he did it became clear just how much the events of the past week had aged the man—his close-cropped hair was now almost bone white, and wrinkles were etched deeply into his forehead and cheeks. The veins on the back of his hands were prominent, and the skin speckled with age spots. Josh turned to look at the Sorceress. She too had aged, though not quite so dramatically as her husband. Perenelle caught him staring at her and her smile turned wistful. Reaching out, she pressed her forefinger to Josh’s chest. Paper crinkled under his T-shirt. “Unless we get the Codex and renew the immortality spell, we will be dead of old age within a matter of days.” Abruptly, her green eyes grew huge with tears. “Nicholas first, then me.”