Four days ago, Perenelle Flamel had been kidnapped by John Dee and imprisoned on Alcatraz. Her guard, a sphinx, had been chosen for its special ability to feed off others’ auras—the energy fields that surround every living thing. The English Magician had hoped the sphinx would drain Perenelle’s aura and prevent her from escaping, but as Dee had done so often in the past, he had underestimated Perenelle’s abilities and powers. With the help of the island’s guardian ghost, the Sorceress had been able to escape the sphinx. It was only then that she discovered the island’s terrible secret: Dee had been collecting monsters. The prison cells were filled with horrific creatures from all over the earth, creatures most humans believed existed only in the darkest corners of myth and legend. But the most surprising discovery had lain in the hidden tunnels deep beneath the island. There, trapped behind magical symbols older than even the Elders, she had found the creature known as Areop-Enap, the Old Spider. The two had formed an uneasy alliance and defeated the Morrigan, the Crow Goddess, and her army of birds. But they knew that worse was to come.
“This weather is not natural,” Perenelle said softly, the merest trace of her French accent audible in her voice. She breathed deeply and grimaced. To her heightened sense of smell, the wind coming in off San Francisco Bay was tainted with the odor of something foul and long dead, a sure sign that it was abnormal.
Areop-Enap was perched high on a wall of the empty building. The enormous bloated spider was busy sheathing the shell of the house with a sticky white web. Millions of spiders, some as big as plates, others little more than specks of dirt, scuttled across the massive web in an undulating dark shadow, adding their own layers of silk to the dripping web. Without turning its head, the Elder swiveled two of its eight eyes to focus on the woman. It raised one of its thick legs straight up in the air, gray-tipped purple hair waving in the breeze. “Aye, something’s coming … but not Elder, and not humani, either,” it lisped.
“Something’s already here,” Perenelle said grimly.
Areop-Enap turned to look down at Perenelle. Eight tiny eyes were perched on the top of its eerily humanlike head. It had no nose or ears, and its mouth was a horizontal slash filled with long poisonous fangs. The savage teeth gave it a curious lisping speech. “What happened?” it asked suddenly, dropping to the ground on a gossamer thread.
Perenelle picked her way across the stone floor, trying to avoid the knotted strands of spiderweb that stuck to everything they touched. They had the consistency of chewing gum. “I was down at the water’s edge,” she said quietly. “I wanted to see how far we were from land.”
“Why?” Areop-Enap asked, stepping closer to the woman, towering over her.
“I learned a spell many years ago from an Inuit shaman. It changes the consistency of running water, turning it to something like thick sticky mud. Effectively, it allows you to walk on water. Inuits use it when they’re hunting polar bears out on ice floes. I wanted to see if it worked on warm salt water.”
“And?” Areop-Enap asked.
“I didn’t get a chance to try it.” Perenelle shook her head. Gathering her long mane of black hair in her hands, she pulled it over her shoulder. Usually, she wore it in a tight thick braid, but it hung loose now, and it was shot through with more silver and gray than even the day before. “Look.”
Areop-Enap stepped closer. Each of its legs was thicker than the woman’s torso, and tipped with a hooked spike, but it moved without making a sound.
Perenelle held out a hank of hair. A four-inch-long chunk had been neatly cut from it. “I was leaning over the water, gathering my aura to try the spell, when something came up out of the water with barely a ripple. Its jaws sliced right through my hair.”
Old Spider hissed softly. “Did you see it?”
“A glimpse, nothing more. I was too busy scrambling back up the beach.”
“A serpent?”
Perenelle reverted to the French of her youth. “No. A woman. Green-skinned, with teeth … lots of tiny teeth. I caught the flash of a fish’s tail as it dipped back into the water.” Perenelle shook her head and dropped her hair, settling it back over her shoulder, then looked up at the Elder. “Was it a mermaid? I’ve never seen one of the seafolk.”
“Unlikely,” Areop-Enap muttered. “Though it might have been one of the wilder Nereids.”
“The sea nymphs … but they are far from home.”
“Yes. They do prefer the warmer waters of the Mediterranean, but the oceans of the world are their home. I’ve encountered them everywhere, even amongst the icebergs of the Antarctic. There are fifty Nereids, and they always travel together … which suggests to me that this island is most likely completely surrounded. We’ll not escape by sea. But that is not the greatest of our concerns,” Areop-Enap lisped. “If the Nereids are here, then that probably means that their father, Nereus, is close as well.”
Despite her warmth, a shiver ran up Perenelle’s spine. “The Old Man of the Sea? But he lives in some distant watery Shadowrealm and only rarely ventures to this realm. He hasn’t come to our world since 1912. What would possibly bring him back?”
Areop-Enap bared its teeth in a savage grin. “Why, you, Madame Perenelle. You are the prize. They want your knowledge and your memories. You and your husband are amongst the rarest of humans: you are immortals without Elder masters controlling you. And now that you are trapped on Alcatraz, the Dark Elders will do their utmost to ensure that you not leave here alive.”
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. “Allô?”
“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-Elysées 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 recently 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.
Nic
holas 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.”