06 The Enchantress

by Michael Scott

  “What a question!” Isis snapped.

  Sophie and Josh looked at one another. The twins were sitting in two narrow seats directly behind Isis and Osiris. Virginia Dare crouched on the floor behind them. Josh had attempted to give her his seat, but she’d told him she preferred not to be strapped in. She patted his face as she thanked him, and the touch sent a flush of heat through his entire body.

  Richard Newman—Osiris—swiveled around in the black leather seat and smiled. “Yes, we really are your parents. And we really are archaeologists and paleontologists—or at least, we are in your Shadowrealm. Everything you know about us is true.”

  “Except the Isis and Osiris, rulers of Danu Talis, part,” Josh said. “Or the whole aging and immortality thing.”

  Osiris’s smile broadened. “I said everything you knew about us was true. But I didn’t say you knew everything about us.”

  “What do we call you?” Sophie asked.

  “What you’ve always called us,” Isis said. She was controlling the crystal and gold vimana, her long-fingered hand flat on a glass panel, tiny movements of her thumb and forefingers sending the craft buzzing through the air.

  Sophie stared at the back of the woman’s head. This woman looked like her mother, talked and moved like her mother … and yet … there was something different, something wrong. She glanced sideways at her twin and knew instinctively that he was feeling exactly the same way. The man who looked like her father was smiling at them. And the smile was identical to the one she knew so well in her own Shadowrealm, Earth—wrinkles creasing the corners of his eyes, little lines at the corners of his mouth. His lips were tightly shut, just like those of her father, who never opened his mouth when he smiled. She’d always thought he was self-conscious of his long eyeteeth. “Vampire teeth,” he’d called them when she was a child. She’d laughed at it then, but now the words were chilling.

  “I think I’ll call you Isis and Osiris,” she said eventually—it felt right—and from the corner of her eye, she could see Josh nodding in agreement.

  “Of course,” Osiris said evenly. “I’m sure this is a lot to take in. Let’s get you back to the palace and get some food into you. That’ll make things easier.”

  “Palace?” Josh asked.

  “Just a small one. The bigger one is in a nearby Shadowrealm.”

  “So you are the rulers here?” Virginia Dare called up from her place on the floor.

  The tiniest flicker of annoyance danced across Osiris’s face at the question. “We are rulers, yes, but we are not the ultimate rulers. Another rules.”

  “Though not for much longer,” Isis said. She turned her head to smile at her husband.

  This time Osiris’s pointed incisors appeared against his lower lip as he grinned. “Not for very much longer,” he agreed. “And then we will be the rulers of this world and all the worlds beyond.”

  “So we are definitely on Danu Talis,” Josh said, almost talking to himself. He raised his head to look out the speeding vimana. All he could see from his side was the mouth of a massive volcano, a thin thread of gray-white smoke curling into the skies. “The famous source of all the legends of Atlantis.”

  “Yes, this is Danu Talis.”

  “When?” he pressed.

  Osiris shrugged. “It’s hard to say, really. The humani have adjusted and readjusted their calendars so often that a precise measurement is impossible. But roughly ten thousand years before your time on Earth.”

  “From our time?” Josh said. “Not your time?”

  “This is our time, Josh. Your world is just a shadow of this one.”

  “But you lived in our world also.”

  “We have lived in many worlds,” Isis said, “and many times, too.”

  “Your mother is right,” Osiris said. “We have walked between the worlds for millennia. Between us we have probably explored more of the Shadowrealms than any other Elders.”

  “So you’re Elders?” Sophie asked.

  “Yes, we are.”

  “And what does that make us?” Josh asked. “Are we Elders or Next Generation?”

  “That remains to be seen,” Osiris said. “At this particular point in time, there are no Next Generation. And if all goes according to plan, then there will be no Next Generation. They only arrived after the sinking of the island.”

  “All that matters is that you are here and that you have both been Awakened and trained in many of the Elemental Magics,” Isis said.

  The craft dipped and suddenly a vast circular, mazelike city appeared before and below them. Sunlight ran silver and gold off stretches of canals and waterways that ringed a huge pyramid at the center of the city. The streets were teeming with people, and the tops of scattered small pyramids blazed with fire from torches, while others were bright with flags. There seemed to be houses, palaces, temples and mansions in dozens of architectural styles. At the fringes of the city lay a vast warren of low tumbledown buildings.

  “It’s huge,” Josh breathed.

  “The largest city in the world,” Osiris said proudly. “In fact, it is the center of the world.”

  Josh pointed toward the enormous pyramid the city was obviously built around, and the sprawling palace that lay beyond. “Is that where we’re going?”

  “Not yet.” Osiris smiled. “That is the royal Palace of the Sun, currently home to Aten, the ruler of Danu Talis.”

  “It looks busy …,” Josh began.

  Isis suddenly sat forward and the vimana dipped sharply. “Husband!” she called, alarm clear in her tone.

  Osiris spun around and leaned forward to stare at the pyramid. The air above the palace was busy with vimanas of all shapes and sizes, and lines of black-armored guards were taking up position on the ground. An enormous crowd milled in front of the building, and there were people streaming in from all the surrounding streets.

  Isis glanced sidelong at Osiris. “Looks like something happened while we were away,” she said quietly.

  “Bastet!” he hissed. “I should have known she’d not leave well enough alone. Change of plans: take us down. We need to attend to this immediately.”

  “Down?” Isis said, even as the vimana’s engine dulled to a low whine and the craft gently seesawed over a broad market square full of stalls bright with colored awnings. The space was thronged with short, squat, deeply tanned people, the majority of whom wore plain white woolen robes or white shirts and trousers. A few glanced at the vimana, but no one paid it any particular attention. Two anpu guards in leather armor, carrying shields and spears, came running toward the vimana, but when they saw who was aboard, they abruptly turned away and disappeared down a side street. Dust swirled as the craft settled in the center of the square.

  “Virginia, I am leaving the twins in your care,” Osiris said as the top of the craft peeled back.

  “Mine!” Virginia Dare blinked surprise.

  Osiris nodded. “Yours.”

  Isis swiveled around in her seat to look at Sophie and Josh. “Go with Virginia. Your father and I will be back soon, and then we’ll have a family supper and catch up. We’ll answer all your questions, I promise. There are great things in store for you. You will be recognized as Gold and Silver. You will be worshipped. You will rule. Go now, go.”

  The twins unstrapped from their seats and stepped out into the late-afternoon air. They breathed deeply, clearing their lungs of the dry, metallic ozone odor of the vimana. The market square was filled with a thousand strange and not entirely pleasant smells: fruit—some of it rotting—exotic spices and too many unwashed bodies crammed close together.

  “Where are you going?” Virginia asked Osiris.

  The Elder stopped in the vimana’s doorway. “We have to get to the palace, and I don’t want to bring the children into danger,” he said. He pointed to where a gold spire rose over the rooftops. The spire was topped with a billowing flag, and stitched into it was what looked like an ornate eye. “That’s our home. Go there. Wait for us.” He looked a
round the square. Most of the stall holders had turned to gaze at the tall bald-headed man. Not all were able to conceal the expressions of loathing on their faces. Osiris took his time to look over the crowd. No one would meet his eyes. “No one will harm you,” he said loudly, voice echoing across the square. “No one will even try. They know my vengeance would be terrible indeed.” He leaned forward and rested a hand on Virginia’s left shoulder. She immediately shrugged it off. “Protect my children, immortal,” he said quietly. “If anything were to happen to them, I would not be pleased. Nor would you.”

  Virginia Dare stared into the Elder’s blue eyes. He dropped his gaze first. “I don’t like threats,” she breathed.

  “Oh, this is not a threat,” he said softly. He stepped out of the vimana, and a low moan ran through the crowd. “Let it be known,” he boomed, “that these three are under my protection. Assist them, guide them, protect them, and I will be bountiful. Hinder them, misdirect them, harm them, and you—all of you—will know my vengeance. This is my word, and you know my word is law.”

  “Your word is law,” the crowd murmured. Some of the older men and women got down on hands and knees and pressed their foreheads to the stones paving the ground; some of the younger people only bowed their heads.

  Osiris glared at a group of youths. “If I had more time, I would teach them a lesson for their insolence …,” he muttered. He stepped back into the vimana. “Go now. Do not delay. Head straight for the building with the pennant. We’ll be back as quickly as possible.”

  The side of the Rukma vimana closed behind him and the craft hummed into the air, leaving Sophie, Josh and Virginia Dare standing alone in the center of the square. The vimana had barely disappeared over the rooftops when a tomato came sailing over the heads of the crowd and spattered onto the ground at Josh’s feet. A second and a third followed.

  “I’m glad to see Isis and Osiris really command the crowd’s respect,” Josh said.

  “Let’s go,” Virginia called, catching them both by the arms and pulling them back. “It usually starts with fruit …”

  A rock clattered off the ground and shattered.

  “… but it always ends with stones.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Colors.

  Bright, brilliant colors …

  Shimmering, dancing threads of iridescence …

  Pulsating bands of light …

  Nicholas rose over the pier, riding higher and higher on nearly invisible curling waves of air that spun and twisted beneath him. He looked down and saw the huddle of people below and recognized himself in the middle of the group.

  He was flying.

  And the feeling was extraordinary.

  There had been a time when he had taken to the skies almost every day and seen the world through Pedro’s eyes. He had never truly understood the lure of flight until he had soared over the island jungles of the Pacific, the winding, ruinous streets of Rome and Ireland’s patchwork green fields and looked down through Pedro’s huge eyes. Nicholas knew then why Leonardo da Vinci had invested so much time in creating machines that would allow man to fly. Maybe the rumors were true; maybe Leonardo had been immortal and had learned to see the world through a bird’s eyes.

  Although it was late afternoon and the light was fading, the world seen through the parrot’s eyes was alive with vibrating flares and streamers of color. The Embarcadero blazed yellow and gold, sending lines of heat billowing out over the water.

  Nicholas could feel the wind moving over his body, the whispering ripple of feathers flickering against one another. Years of flying with Pedro had taught him not to think, to simply focus on a destination and then allow the parrot’s nature to take over. Below him, the water was cloudy with phosphorescent bubbles, alive with streaks of hot and cold channels.

  Alcatraz was less than a mile from shore, which was no distance for wild parrots, but Flamel knew the bird would not be comfortable flying out over the water. Even the vague thought of land made the conure turn sharply and head back to the Embarcadero’s blaze of lights. The parrot squawked, and the birds on the shore lining the roofs in washes of color screamed in welcome.

  Nicholas visualized the distinctive shape of Alcatraz again and the bird swerved—almost reluctantly—and headed away from land. It rose higher, farther from the salt spray, allowing the Alchemyst to see the island clearly: a long, low, ugly shape topped by the white prison building with the tall finger of the lighthouse jutting into the sky. Behind him and to his right, the Bay Bridge was a ribbon of red and white streaks, while off in the distance, the Golden Gate Bridge was a horizontal smudge picked out in shimmering lines of heat and warm air.

  In contrast, Alcatraz was in total darkness, and no heat radiated off the ground

  As he got closer to the island, the Alchemyst realized that Perenelle had been right. There were no other birds in the air over the shores. The ever-present Western gulls that haunted the island’s rocks, coating them in white, were missing, and as he coasted in closer, he realized that nothing was moving. There were no cormorants or pigeons. But Alcatraz was a bird sanctuary; hundreds of birds nested there every year.

  Nicholas shuddered and felt the shudder ripple through the little bird’s frame. Something had fed.

  When it reached the rocky shoreline, the conure dipped and rose on air currents, then swooped in over the dock and dropped down to land on top of the map and guide stand. Nicholas let the bird rest for a moment. Hopping from foot to foot, it turned in a full circle, allowing him a complete view of the docks. They were deserted. Nor was there any sign of Black Hawk’s boat. He took some consolation from the fact that he could see no wreckage, either, and he hoped the immortal hadn’t fallen to the Nereids.

  Nicholas urged the bird upward with a single thought and it flew in slow circles over the bookshop and Building 64. Going higher still took him over the ruined Warden’s House, and for the first time since reaching the island, he spotted a low pulse of light. The conure landed on one of the metal beams that supported the ruined house, then sidled along the bar, claws scratching on the metal, and peered down. In the corner of the ruins, covering the tumbled walls and gaping floor, was an enormous mass. It looked like a ball of hardened mud. With the parrot’s enhanced sight, Nicholas could just about make out a shape within the mud: a massive creature, tightly curled into a ball wrapped around with too many legs. It was a spider. It throbbed with a slow, regular light: Areop-Enap was still alive.

  Yet where was everyone?

  Black Hawk had dropped Mars, Odin and Hel on the island. They couldn’t all be dead, could they? And where were the monsters? Perenelle had spotted boggarts, trolls and cluricauns in the cells. She’d seen a child minotaur, at least one Windigo and an oni. Another corridor held dragon-kin, wyverns and firedrakes.

  The parrot was tiring now, and Nicholas knew he’d have to get it back to the mainland soon. He would have one quick look around and then head back before night fell. He circled the lighthouse, then, catching a sudden spark of light, soared over the prison building and dropped into the recreation yard.

  The yard was awash with energy.

  The ghostly remains of incredibly powerful auras snaked and coiled across the huge flagstones, writhing like serpents. There was pure gold and shining silver, the stinking yellow of sulfur and a thread of pale green scattered across the ground. And in the center of the yard, there was the fading impression of a rectangle, shimmering with the remnants of ancient energies. The merest hint of the outlines of four swords was etched into the stones.

  A door slammed open. The parrot started upward as light blazed, and Nicholas turned to see Odin race through a narrow doorway and down a flight of stone steps. The one-eyed Elder stopped at the bottom of the stairs and turned to face the way he had come, a short spear in either hand.

  Mars appeared in the door and held it open, and then Machiavelli and Billy the Kid raced through, carrying Hel between them. The Elder’s arms were draped over both immortals’ shoulde
rs, and her legs were dragging on the ground, trailing a dark liquid in their wake. Mars slammed the metal door shut and put his back to it. The warrior’s black leather jacket hung in shreds, and the short sword in his hand dripped a bright blue liquid. Even in the gathering gloom, Nicholas could see that his eyes were bright with excitement. The door behind Mars shuddered in its frame, but the Elder braced himself and held it shut until Machiavelli and Billy had reached the end of the steps and Odin stepped out to protect their back.

  The one-eyed Elder gestured to Mars and the big man launched himself away from the door—just as a spiky tusk burst through the metal and ripped upward, shredding it like paper.

  Mars and Odin took up positions at the bottom of the steps, protecting Machiavelli and Billy, who were tending to Hel’s wounds on the steps of the exercise yard. Billy had pulled off his belt and wrapped it around the Elder’s torn legs, and his hands were dark with her blood.

  Silent and invisible, the parrot circled overhead.

  Nicholas tried to make sense of what he was seeing: Mars and Odin working together with Billy and Machiavelli, protecting them while the American worked on Hel’s wounds. Nicholas was confused: the Italian was no friend to the Flamels or their cause and had fought on the side of the Dark Elders all his long life. Maybe Machiavelli had somehow tricked the others? The Alchemyst shook his head and the parrot mimicked the movement. Fooling Mars was a possibility; maybe Hel, too. But no one could fool Odin. Maybe Machiavelli and Billy had finally chosen the right side. What was it Shakespeare had said about misery making strange bedfellows?

  It took an enormous effort of the Alchemyst’s will to urge the parrot to drop lower. The bird’s every instinct was to flee. The yard was now alive with buzzing colored auras, the stink of Elder blood and the stench of beasts.

  The creature that filled the shattered doorway was huge. It looked like a boar, but it was the size of a bull and its tusks were the length of a man’s arm.

  “Hus Krommyon,” Mars said. “The Crommyonian Boar. Not the original, of course. Theseus killed that one.”