The Sorceress sotinf-3

by Michael Scott

  Blue and white static crackled down the length of Perenelle's hair, which slowly rose and extended out behind her in a shimmering black halo. Her eyes blazed cold and green and an ice white aura bloomed around her, filling the interior of the ruined house with stark light. A dark wave of spiders scuttled into the shadows. "Do you know how many Dark Elders and their kith and kin have attempted to kill me?" Perenelle demanded.

  Areop-Enap shrugged, an ugly movement of all its legs. "Many?" it suggested.

  "And do you know how many are still alive?"

  "Few?" Areop-Enap suggested.

  Perenelle smiled. "Very few." ait up. My phone is ringing."

  Sophie ducked into a doorway, fished in her pocket and pulled out her cell phone. The battery had died in Hekate's Shadowrealm, but the Comte de Saint-Germain had found her a charger that worked. Tilting the screen, she peered at the unusually long number. "I don't know who it is," she said, looking from her brother to Nicholas.

  Josh looked over his sister's shoulder. "I don't recognize the number," he added

  "What does it begin with?" Nicholas asked, squinting, trying to focus on the screen.

  "Zero, zero, three, three…"

  "That's the country code for France," Flamel said. "Answer it; it can only be Francis."

  "Or Dee or Machiavelli," Josh said quickly. "Maybe we should-"

  But before he could finish, Sophie had pressed the Answer button. "Hello?" she said cautiously.

  "It's me!" Saint-Germain's voice was light and accentless, and Sophie could tell he was outside by all the noise in the background. "Let me speak to the old man. And don't tell him I said that!"

  Sophie bit back a grin and handed the phone to the Alchemyst. "You were right; it's Francis. He wants to talk to you."

  Nicholas pressed the phone to one ear and covered the other with his hand, trying to block out the noise of the traffic. "Allo?"

  "Where are you?" Saint-Germain asked in Latin.

  Nicholas looked around, trying to orient himself. "On Marylebone Road, just coming up to Regent's Park tube station."

  "Hang on; I've got someone on the other line." Nicholas heard Saint-Germain move away from the phone and relay the information in rapid-fire archaic French. "OK," he said a moment later. "Continue straight down the road and then wait outside St. Marylebone Church. You will be picked up."

  "How will I know the driver is working for you?" Nicholas asked.

  "A good point. Do you have reason to believe this conversation may be monitored?"

  "Both the Italian and the Englishman certainly have the resources," the Alchemyst said carefully.

  "That is true."

  "And there was an unwelcoming committee waiting for us. I would imagine they reported in before they came after us."

  "Ah." Saint-Germain paused and then said carefully, "I am assuming you took care of the problem discreetly."

  "Very discreetly. But…"

  "But?" Saint-Germain asked.

  "Although I used none of my aura, a certain amount of power was released. That's sure to have attracted attention, especially in this city."

  There was another pause; then Saint-Germain said, "OK, I've just sent the driver a text. Let me remind you of a party I held in Versailles in February 1758. It was my birthday, and you gave me a vellum-bound book from your personal library as a present."

  Nicholas's lips curled in a smile. "I remember."

  "I still have the book. The driver will tell you the title," he continued, raising his voice over the rattle of hammering in the background.

  "What's all the noise?" Flamel asked, slipping back into English.

  "Workmen. We're trying to shore up the house. Apparently, there is the very real danger that it will collapse into the catacombs below, and probably take half the street with it."

  Nicholas lowered his voice. "Old friend. I cannot tell you how sorry I am for the trouble I brought to your home. I will of course pay for the damage."

  Saint-Germain chuckled. "Please do not trouble yourself. It's not costing me anything. I've sold the exclusive rights to the story to a magazine. The fee more than takes care of the repairs, and the press coverage is invaluable; my new album is shooting up the download charts… if that is not a contradiction," he added with a laugh.

  "Which story?" Nicholas asked, glancing quickly at the twins.

  "Why, the gas explosion that damaged my house, of course," Saint-Germain said lightly. "I must go. I will keep in touch. And old friend"-he paused-"be careful. If there is anything you need-anything-then you know how to get in touch with us."

  Nicholas hit the Off button and handed the phone back to Sophie without a word. "He said-"

  "We heard." The twins' Awakened senses had allowed them to clearly hear both sides of the conversation. "A gas explosion?" Sophie asked.

  "Well, he could hardly say the damage was caused by some sort of primeval dinosaur, could he?" Josh teased. "Who'd believe him?" Shoving his hands in his pockets, he hurried after Flamel, who was already striding down the street. "Come on, sis."

  Sophie nodded. Her brother had a point. But she was also beginning to see how the Elders had managed to keep their existence a secret for so long. Mankind simply didn't want to believe that there was magic in the world. Not in this age of science and technology. Monsters and magic belonged to the primitive uncivilized past, and yet in the last few days she'd seen that every day there was evidence for magic. People reported impossibilities all the time; they saw the strangest things, the most bizarre creatures… and no one believed them. They couldn't all be wrong, lying, confused or misguided, could they? If the Dark Elders and their servants were in positions of power, then all they would have to do was dismiss the reports, ignore them or-as had just happened in Paris-ridicule them in the media. Soon even the people who had made the reports, the very people who had seen something out of the ordinary, would begin to doubt the evidence of their own senses. Just yesterday the Nidhogg, a creature that supposedly existed only in legend, had rampaged through Paris's narrow streets, leaving a trail of devastation. It had crashed across the Champs-Elysees and ripped apart a section of the famous quayside before plunging into the river. Dozens of people must have seen it; but where were their stories, their statements? The press had reported the event as a gas explosion in the ancient catacombs.

  And then all the gargoyles and grotesques on Notre Dame had come alive and crawled down the building. Using Josh's aura to enhance her own, Sophie had used Fire and Air magic to reduce the creatures to little more than shattered stone… and yet how had it been reported in the press?

  The effects of acid rain.

  As they'd sped through the French countryside on the Eurostar, they'd read the online coverage on Josh's laptop. Every news organization in the world had some story about the events, but they'd all told versions of the same lie. It was only on the wilder conspiracy Web sites and blogs that sightings of Nidhogg had been reported, along with shaky mobile-phone footage of the monster. Dozens of postings dismissed the videos and stills as fake, comparing them to images of Sasquatch and the Loch Ness monster that had been proven false. Only now, of course, Sophie was beginning to suspect that both of those creatures were probably real too.

  She hurried to catch up with Flamel and her brother.

  "Stay close, Sophie," Nicholas said. "You have no idea of the danger we're in."

  "So you keep telling us," she muttered, though right now she couldn't figure out how things could get any worse.

  "Where are we going?" Josh asked. He was still dizzy after the adrenaline rush, and now he was starting to feel shaky as well.

  "Just down here," Nicholas said, nodding toward a white stone church on their left.

  Sophie caught up with her brother and noticed that he was pale and there was a light sheen of sweat on his forehead. She gripped his arm and squeezed lightly. "How are you doing?" She knew what he was going through: the noise, the smells, the sounds of the city were starting to overwhelm his re
cently Awakened senses. She'd experienced the same shocking sensory overload when Hekate had Awakened her. But while the Witch of Endor and Joan had helped her control the wash of emotions and sensations, there was no one to help her brother.

  "I'm fine," Josh said quickly. "OK, not so well," he admitted a moment later, seeing the look of disbelief on his sister's face. She'd been through the same transformation; she knew what he was feeling. "It's just that everything…" He struggled to find the words.

  "It's just too much," Sophie finished for him.

  Josh nodded. "Too much," he agreed. "I can even taste the car exhaust."

  "Everything adjusts," she promised, "and it gets easier. Or maybe you just get used to it."

  "I don't think I could ever get used to this," he said, dipping his head and squinting against the brilliant sunshine breaking through the blue-black clouds. Sunlight sparkling on the wet streets sent painful daggers into his eyes. "I need sunglasses."

  "That's a good idea." Sophie trotted ahead a few steps. "Nicholas, wait up," she called.

  But though the Alchemyst glanced over his shoulder, he didn't stop. "We cannot delay," he snapped, and continued at a brisk pace.

  Sophie stopped in the middle of the street and pulled her brother to a halt with her. Nicholas had walked half a dozen paces before he realized that the twins were no longer behind him. He stopped and turned, waving them forward. They ignored him, and when he strode back to them there was something dark and ugly about the set of his face. "I've no time for this nonsense."

  "We need sunglasses for Josh, and for me too," Sophie said, "and water."

  "We'll get them later."

  "We need them now," she said firmly.

  Nicholas opened his mouth to spit out a reply, but Josh took a step forward, bringing him close to the Alchemyst. "We need them now." There was something like arrogance in his voice. Standing on the parvis in front of the cathedral in Paris, feeling the raw power flow through his body, watching the animated stone gargoyles shatter to dust, he had realized just how powerful he and his sister were. At this moment they might need the Alchemyst, but he needed them also.

  Nicholas looked into the boy's bright blue eyes, and whatever he saw in them made him nod and turn back to a row of shops. "Water and sunglasses," he said. "Any particular color sunglasses?" he asked sarcastically.

  "Black," the twins answered in unison.

  Sophie stood with Josh outside the shop. She was exhausted, but she knew Josh was feeling even worse. Now that the rain had blown over, the street was beginning to fill up. People of a dozen different nationalities walked past, chatting in a variety of languages.

  Sophie suddenly tilted her head to one side, brow creasing in a frown.

  "What's wrong?" Josh asked immediately.

  "Nothing's wrong," she said slowly, "it's just that…"

  "What?"

  "I thought I recognized some of the words those people were speaking."

  Her brother turned to follow her gaze. Two women in the long flowing abaya of the Middle Eastern countries, their heads covered and their faces hidden behind burkas, chatted together animatedly.

  "They're sisters… They're going to see a doctor just around the corner in Harley Street…," Sophie said in wonder.

  Josh turned to hear better and pushed his hair back off his ear. Concentrating hard, he managed to isolate the voices of the two women. "Sophie, I can't make out a word they're saying; I think they're speaking Arabic."

  Two smartly dressed businessmen walked past, heading toward Regent's Park tube station. They were both on mobile phones.

  "The one on the left is talking to his wife in Stockholm," Sophie continued, her voice now little more than a whisper. "He's sorry he missed his son's birthday party. The one on the right is talking to his head office, also in Sweden. He wants some spreadsheets e-mailed."

  Josh turned his head again, ignoring the traffic and the myriad other noises of the city. Suddenly, he found that by focusing on the two businessmen, he could pick up individual words. His hearing was so acute that he could even hear the tinny voices on the other end of the cell phone. Neither man was speaking English. "How can you understand?" he asked.

  "It's the Witch of Endor's knowledge," Nicholas said. He had stepped out of the shop in time to hear Josh's question. He pulled two pairs of identical cheap sunglasses from a paper bag and handed them over. "Not designer, I'm afraid."

  Sophie slipped the dark glasses onto her face. The relief was immediate, and she could see by her brother's expression that he felt the same. "Tell me," she said. "I thought it was just a lot of ancient stuff she passed on to me. I didn't realize any of it would be useful."

  Nicholas handed over two bottles of water, and the twins fell into step beside him as he hurried down the street toward St. Marylebone Church. "The Witch passed on all her knowledge to you when she wrapped you in the shroud of air. It was, I'll admit, too much for you to handle. But I'd no idea she was going to do it," he added quickly, seeing the scowl appear on Josh's face. "It was totally unexpected and completely out of character. Generations ago, priestesses would study with the Witch all their lives to be rewarded with only the tiniest fragment of her knowledge."

  "Why did she give it all to me?" Sophie asked, confused.

  "It's a mystery," he admitted. Spotting a gap in the traffic, the Alchemyst hurried the twins across Marylebone High Street. They were close enough now to see the elegant fa?ade of the church ahead of them. "I know Joan helped sift through the Witch's knowledge for you."

  Sophie nodded. In Paris, while she'd slept, Joan of Arc had taught her techniques for controlling the jumble of arcane and obscure information that washed through her brain.

  "I believe that what is happening now is that the Witch of Endor's memories and knowledge are gradually being absorbed into your own memories. Rather than simply just knowing what the Witch knows, you will also know how she knows it. In effect, her memories are becoming yours."

  Sophie shook her head. "I don't understand."

  They had finally reached the church. Nicholas climbed two steps and looked up and down the road, quickly scanning the passersby, twisting to look out toward Regent's Park before turning back to the twins. "It's like the difference between watching a game and playing the game. When you met Saint-Germain," he added, "you instantly knew what the Witch knows about him, right?"

  Sophie nodded. It had come to her in a flash that the Witch of Endor neither liked nor trusted the Comte de Saint-Germain.

  "Think about Saint-Germain now," the Alchemyst suggested.

  She looked at her brother, who shrugged, eyes invisible behind his own dark glasses. Sophie turned over her right wrist. On the underside of her arm was a gold circle with a red dot in the center. Saint-Germain had painlessly burned the tattoo into the flesh of her wrist when he'd taught her about the Magic of Fire. Thinking of Saint-Germain brought a sudden flood of memories: brilliantly intense physical memories. Sophie closed her eyes and in an instant she was in another time, another place.

  London, 1740.

  She was standing in an enormous ballroom, wearing a gown that was so heavy it felt as if it was pressing her into the ground. It was amazingly uncomfortable, biting and pinching, squeezing, constricting and contracting everywhere. The air in the ballroom stank of candle wax and too many perfumes, of overflowing toilets, cooked food and unwashed bodies. A crowd of people swirled around her, but as she moved forward, they unconsciously moved out of her way, clearing a path to the somberly dressed young man with the startling blue eyes. It was Francis, the Comte de Saint-Germain. He was speaking in Russian with a nobleman from the court of the infant emperor, Ivan VI. She found she understood what he was saying. The nobleman was hinting that Peter the Great's youngest daughter, Elizabeth, might soon seize power and that there would be business opportunities for a man of Saint-Germain's skills in St. Petersburg. The count slowly turned to look at her. Taking her hand in his, he bowed over it and said in Italian, "It is an hon
or to finally meet you, madam."

  Sophie's eyes blinked open and she swayed. Josh's arm shot out to catch hold of her. "What happened?" he demanded.

  "I was there…," Sophie whispered. She shook her head quickly. "Here, in London. More than two hundred fifty years ago. I saw everything." She reached out to squeeze his arm. "I could feel the clothes I was wearing, smell the stink of the room, and when Saint-Germain spoke in Russian I understood him, and then, when he talked to me in Italian, I understood that, too. I was there," she repeated still awed by her new memories.

  "The Witch of Endor's memories are becoming your memories," Nicholas said. "Her knowledge is becoming yours. Eventually, all that she knows, you will know."

  Sophie Newman shivered. Then she suddenly thought of something disturbing. "But what happens to me?" she asked. "The Witch has thousands of years of memories and experiences; I've only got fifteen and a half years, and I don't remember all of them. Could her memories crowd mine out?"

  Nicholas blinked hard. Then he slowly nodded. "I hadn't thought of that, but yes, you're right, they could," he said very quietly. "We'll have to ensure that that does not happen."

  "Why?" the twins asked together.

  Nicholas came down the steps to stand beside them. "Because we are nothing more than the sum of our memories and experiences. If the Witch's memories crowd out yours, then you will in effect become the Witch of Endor."

  Josh was horrified. "And what happens to Sophie?"

  "If that happens, there will be no more Sophie. There will only be the Witch."

  "Then she did it deliberately," Josh said, anger raising his voice enough to attract the attention of a group of tourists photographing the church's clock face. His twin nudged him and he lowered his voice to a hoarse whisper. "That's why she gave Sophie all her knowledge!" Nicholas started to shake his head, but Josh pressed on. "Once her memories take over completely, then she has a newer, younger body, rather than her old blind body. You can't deny it."

  Nicholas closed his mouth and turned away. "I have to… I have to think about this," he said. "I've never heard of anything like this happening before."