The Necromancer (7 page)

Dee’s right hand moved. It started low on his hip, palm up, rising at an angle, twisting in midair, so that the palm caught the creature under the chin. The tattooed cucubuth’s teeth snapped together, and the force of the blow lifted him off his feet and sent him sprawling across the cobblestones. Dee’s right leg shot out, catching the biggest creature high on the inside of the thigh, numbing his entire leg, dropping him to the ground into a puddle of dirty water, a look of shocked surprise on his broad brutish face.

The third cucubuth darted away from Dee. “Mistake, Doctor,” he snarled, “big mistake.”

“I’m not the one who made the mistake,” Dee whispered. He took a step closer, hands loose at his sides. The Magician had survived for centuries because people always underestimated him. They looked and saw a slight gray-haired man. Even those who knew his reputation imagined him to be nothing more than a scholar. But Dee was more—much, much more. He had been a warrior. When he had still been fully human, and later when he had become immortal, Dee had traveled across Europe. It was a lawless time, when brigands and outlaws roamed the roads, and even the cities themselves were not safe. If a man was to survive, he had to be able to protect himself. Many people had made the mistake of underestimating the English doctor. It was a mistake he never allowed them to repeat. “I don’t need to use my aura to hurt you,” the Magician said softly.

“I am cucubuth,” the creature said arrogantly. “You may have surprised my brothers, but you will not be able to use the same trick on me.”

The Magician heard groaning behind him and glanced over his shoulder to find the cucubuth leader scrambling to his feet. He was holding his jaw in both hands and his eyes looked unfocused.

“You have injured my little brother.”

“I’m sure he’ll make a full recovery,” Dee said. Cucubuths were almost impossible to kill, and even possessed the vampire ability to regenerate injured limbs.

The largest of the three came slowly and painfully to his feet. He stood awkwardly balanced on his left leg, rubbing his right furiously, trying to bring feeling back into it. “And you’ve ruined my jeans,” he growled. The seat and legs of his jeans were black with water.

“What are you going to do now, Doctor?” the unharmed skinhead asked.

“Come a little closer and I’ll show you.” Dee’s smile was as ugly and inhuman as the cucubuth’s.

The creature suddenly threw back his head and his mouth formed a sound that could never have come from a human throat. It was a cross between a bark and a howl. All the pigeons gathered on the Covent Garden roofs took to the air in an explosion of flapping wings. From somewhere nearby, what sounded like a wolf howl echoed across London’s rooftops. It was joined by another, and then another until the air trembled with the terrifying primeval sounds. All traces of humanity left the cucubuth’s face as he laughed. “This is our city, Doctor. We have ruled Trinovantum since before the Romans claimed it as their own. Have you any idea how many of us are here now?”

“I’m guessing it’s more than a few.”

“Many, many more,” the creature snarled. “And they’re coming. All of them.”

From the corner of his eye, Dee saw movement. Glancing up, he saw a shape move on the triangular roof of St. Paul’s Church opposite. A skinhead appeared, silhouetted against the evening sky, then another, and another. There was a commotion on the other side of the square as six skinheads appeared, and then, at the opposite entrance, another three appeared.

The human tourists, seeing the sudden influx of skinheads and fearing a brawl, began to scatter. Shops hastily closed. Within moments, only the ugly shaven-headed cucubuths were left in Covent Garden’s cobbled square.

“So what are you going to do now, Dr. Dee?”

T
he noise echoing across the London rooftops and up into the skies alerted the ravens: the primeval howling of cucubuths that had once terrified primitive humani huddling in caves.

Huginn and Muninn dipped toward the sounds.

Blackbirds and crows streamed past them, the simple creatures radiating raw fear. Doves whirled in the air almost directly below; frightened, but incapable of doing anything about their fear, they settled back onto the rooftops around a broad cobbled square, only to immediately rise into the air again as another howl broke through the night.

The ravens flew low across the Thames River, over Victoria Embankment and the Royal Opera House. They spotted the first of the cucubuths in the streets below, seeing through its almost-human guise to reveal the beast-man beneath, with its tusks and ragged claws. Each cucubuth was swathed in a dark aura. And there were hundreds of them, running, loping, jogging, singly and in pairs, converging on the enclosed space of Covent Garden.

Instantly, the ravens knew that they must have found the English Magician. As one, their beaks worked to form a single word: “Dee.”

And in a place beyond time, in an isolated Shadowrealm, Odin awoke.

The Elder’s huge gray eye opened, but he did not see the bitter snowfields and towering ice crystals that surrounded him. He found he was looking down on a scene in shifting monochrome and without sound: a single human surrounded by three cucubuths. More and more of the creatures swarmed closer. And even though there was no sign of Dee’s distinctive aura, Odin knew the human was the English Magician.

The Elder bared his teeth in a ferocious grin: those to whom Dee owed allegiance wanted him brought before them for sentencing and punishment, but Odin had other plans. The huge figure pushed away from the only living thing in his world—a puny and twisted version of the Yggdrasill—and prepared to cross the Shadowrealms.

H
e’d found the rear door to the bookstore open.

Josh Newman shrugged off his backpack as he stepped into the gloomy hallway and then waited, allowing his eyes to adjust. The stink was incredible—a mixture of rot and mildew, a sickly mustiness overlain with the noxious stench of bad eggs. He tried to breathe only through his mouth. Closing his eyes, he concentrated on his hearing. Since Mars Ultor had Awakened him, he’d become extremely conscious of just how important the senses of hearing, taste and smell were. Modern humans tended to rely heavily on sight; Josh had come to realize that his Awakened senses were really the same heightened senses that primitive man had possessed and needed to survive.

But there were no sounds in the building: it even felt deserted.

Less than a week ago, he’d run up and down this corridor unloading a delivery of books from the back of a van. Now all the boxes he had so carefully piled on top of each other were black with mildew, the sides burst open, the books swollen like rotten fruit, almost unrecognizable.

Less than a week ago.

The realization suddenly brought home to Josh how much had changed in the past few days, how much he had discovered and how little he—and the rest of the world—knew about the truth.

Taking a deep breath, the fetid air catching at the back of his throat, Josh then opened his eyes and crept down the corridor, pushed open the door and stepped out into the bookshop.

And stopped in shock.

The shop was an unrecognizable ruin, lost beneath a thick layer of dust and furry mold—it was decaying right before his eyes. The sunlight shafting through the filthy streaked windows showed that the air was thick with drifting spores. Josh clamped his lips shut; he didn’t want to risk getting any of them in his mouth. He took a step forward and felt the creaking floorboards shift beneath his weight. A bubble of foul black liquid formed on the wood, and his foot began to sink. Jerking back, he pressed himself against the wall, only to discover that it too was slimy with decay. The plaster was so soft his fingers sank into it.

Looking around, Josh realized with horror that the shop was being eaten: this fungus was feeding off everything—wood, paper, carpet. What was the place going to look like in a couple of hours?

He’d come to the bookshop because Nicholas and Perenelle lived in the apartments above it, and he was hoping that they had returned there. Glancing upward, he noticed the gaping hole in the ceiling, the trailing wires and rotten joists. He suddenly wondered how long it would be before the supports gave way and the upper floors collapsed and then the rest of the building crashed into the cellar.

He edged his way along the wall toward the stairs. It stood to reason that the Flamels would have more than one address in the city. They must have set up places they could escape to if danger threatened. Josh hoped that he’d be able to find an address upstairs—a bill, a letter, something, anything to give him a hint of where they were. The banister shifted as he grabbed it—the wood had the consistency of jelly. He pulled his hand back in disgust and was about to rub it against his jeans when he stopped. If the filthy black mold was able to eat through wood, what would it do to his pants? The last thing he needed now was for his pants to rot off his legs. Could this eat through his flesh? he suddenly wondered with a shudder. The desire to turn and run was almost overwhelming, but he knew that his only chance of finding his sister lay with the Flamels, so he started up the stairs.

Each step moved beneath his weight. He was halfway up when his foot went all the way through a stair with a dull snap. He felt the entire staircase sway, and he realized that it was going to collapse. He launched himself up the rest of the way just as the staircase shuddered and collapsed, crashing into the shop below. Josh’s chest slammed onto the landing; his legs dangled in midair as his fingers scrambled to grab hold of the thick carpet covering the upper floor, but it ripped and shredded to threads in his grip. He attempted to scream but the sound got caught at the back of his throat. A chunk of carpet ripped away in his hand and he jerked backward.…

Iron-hard fingers caught his wrists.

Josh was hauled up and found himself looking into Perenelle Flamel’s bright green eyes. “Josh Newman,” she murmured as she set him down gently on the landing. “We were not expecting you.”

Nicholas appeared out of a doorway and stopped beside his wife. “We were expecting … trouble,” he said quietly. “It’s good to see you.”

Josh rubbed his numb wrists. Perenelle’s strength was astonishing, and she’d almost wrenched his shoulders out of their sockets when she’d lifted him straight up in the air. He pressed his hands against his chest where it had hit the landing and took a deep breath. He was bruised, but he didn’t think he’d broken any ribs.

“What brings you here, Josh?” Perenelle said softly, her eyes searching his face. She answered her own question: “Sophie.”

“Sophie’s missing,” Josh said breathlessly. “She was kidnapped by a girl calling herself Aoife. She said she was Scathach’s sister,” he added. “She sure looked like her.” He saw their expressions change slightly, watched what he recognized as fear flicker in the Alchemyst’s eyes. “That’s not good, is it?”

Perenelle shook her head. “Not good at all.”

“V
ingt … vingt-et-un … twenty-two.” Joan of Arc slid down the grassy incline and rejoined her companion on the banks of the narrow stream. “What do you call twenty-two saber-toothed tigers?” the slender, gray-eyed woman asked breathlessly. “A pack, a pride?”

“I call them trouble,” Scathach said shortly. She straightened and looked back up the incline. “And you’re about to tell me they’re heading this way.”

Joan nodded. “They are heading this way,” she said with a grin.

Scathach tapped her foot at the edge of the stream. It fit into a huge splayed footprint sunk in the mud. “This is their watering hole.” Closing her eyes, she breathed deeply and then pointed with one of her matched short swords. “More are approaching from the south.”

“And from the east,” Joan added.

Scatty opened her eyes and looked at her friend. The late-afternoon sunshine turned Joan’s pale skin golden. “How do you know?”

The Frenchwoman caught the red-haired warrior’s shoulder and turned her. Three enormous saber-toothed tigers had appeared out of the tall grass. They stood still, savage jaws gaping, eyes wide and unblinking, only their tails twitching slightly. “Fight or run?” Joan asked.

“If we run, they’ll chase us,” Scatty said matter-of-factly.

“If we fight, they’ll overpower us. There are too many of them. Maybe thirty in total.”

The largest of the saber-toothed tigers moved almost in slow motion and took a tentative step forward. Enormous slit-pupiled golden eyes fixed on Scathach.

“I think he likes you,” Joan murmured. She touched the sword strapped to her shoulder and realized that if all the creatures attacked at once, her weapon would be useless.

“I’ve always preferred dogs,” Scathach said, watching the creature carefully. “You know where you are with dogs.” She slid her matched swords into their sheaths on her back and pulled her nunchaku from their pouch on her hip. “Stay here,” she commanded, and then, before Joan could reply, she raced toward the tiger.

The huge creature froze.

A dozen steps carried the warrior across the ground, the nunchaku buzzing and spinning in her right hand.

The tiger hunched, tail swishing wildly, ropy threads of saliva on its enormous teeth … and then it jumped, thick claws extended.

“Scatty!” Joan managed to gasp, even as the red-haired warrior launched herself into the air, like a swimmer diving into the sea. Her leap carried her straight over the tiger, and her nunchaku snapped out, the blunt end of the twelve-inch length of carved wood catching the creature on the back of the skull. Scatty spun in midair and landed lightly on her feet. The tiger, stunned by the blow, crashed to the ground in a tangle of limbs. The beast immediately clambered shakily to its feet, wobbled and then fell over again.

Scatty turned to face its two companions, tapping the nunchaku in the palm of her left hand. The creatures looked at her, looked at their companion, then stepped back, melting into the long grasses.