watching the words crawl on the page, when the letters formed and re-formed,
and for a heartbeat she had seen the initial formula for the philosopher s
stone, and realized instantly that here was the secret to life eternal.
The couple spent the next twenty years traveling to every country in Europe,
heading east into the land of the Rus, south to North Africa, even into Araby
in an attempt to decipher and translate the curious manuscript. They came
into contact with magicians and sorcerers of many lands, and studied many
different types of magic. Nicholas was only vaguely interested in magic; he
was more interested in the science of alchemy. The Codex, and other books
like it, hinted that there were very precise formulas for creating gold out
of stone and diamonds out of coal. Perenelle, on the other hand, learned as
much as she could about all the magical arts. But it had been a long time
since she had seriously practiced them.
Now, trapped in the limo, she recalled a trick she had learned from a
strega a witch in the mountains of Sicily. It was designed for dealing with
knights in armor, but with a little adjustment
Closing her eyes and concentrating, Perenelle rubbed her little finger in a
circle against the car seat. Dee was absorbed in his phone call and didn't
see the tiny ice white spark that snapped from her fingertip into the
fine-grained leather. The spark ran through the leather and coiled around the
springs beneath. It shot, fizzing and hissing, along the springs and into the
metal body of the car. It curled into the engine, buzzing over the cylinders,
circled the wheels, spitting and snapping. A hubcap popped off and bounced
away and then abruptly, the car s electrics went haywire. The windows started
opening and closing of their own accord; the sunroof hummed open, then
slammed shut; the wipers scraped across the dry windshield, then beat so fast
they snapped off; the horn began to sound out an irregular beat. Interior
lights flickered on and off. The small TV unit in the left-hand wall popped
on and cycled dizzyingly through all its channels.
The air tasted metallic. Tendrils of static electricity now danced around the
interior of the car. Dee flung his cell phone away, nursing suddenly numb
fingers. The phone hit the carpeted floor and exploded into shards of melted
plastic and hot metal.
You , Dee began, turning to Perenelle, but the car lurched to a halt,
completely dead. Flames leapt from the engine, filling the back of the car
with noxious fumes. Dee pushed the door, but the electric locks had engaged.
With a savage howl, he closed his hand into a fist and allowed his rage to
boil through him. The stench of smoke, burning plastic and melting rubber was
abruptly concealed beneath the stink of sulfur, and his hand took on the
appearance of a golden metal glove. Dee punched straight through the door,
practically ripping it off its hinges, and flung himself out onto the cement
floor.
He was standing in the underground car park of Enoch Enterprises, the huge
entertainment company he owned and ran in San Francisco. He scrambled back as
his hundred-and fifty-thousand-dollar custom-made car was quickly consumed by
fire. Intense heat fused the front of the car into irregular clumps of metal,
while the windshield flowed like candle wax. The Golem driver was still
sitting at the wheel, unaffected by the intense heat, which did nothing but
bake its skin to iron hardness.
Then the garage s overhead sprinkler system came on, and bitterly cold water
sprayed down onto the fire.
Perenelle!
Soaked through, doubled over and coughing, Dee wiped tears from his eyes,
straightened and used both hands to douse the flames with a single movement.
He called up a tiny breeze to clear the smoke, then ducked his head to peer
into the blackened interior of the car, almost afraid of what he would find.
The two Golems that had been sitting on either side of Perenelle were now
nothing more than ash. But there was no sign of the woman except for the rent
in the opposite door that looked as if it had been hacked by an axe.
Dee folded to the ground with his back to the ruined car and beat both hands
into the filthy mixture of mud, oil, melted plastic and burnt rubber. He
hadn't secured the entire Codex, and now Perenelle had escaped. Could this
day get any worse?
Footsteps tip-tapped.
From the corner of his eye, Dr. John Dee watched as pointy-toed,
stiletto-heeled black boots came into view. And he knew then the answer to
his question. The day was about to get worse: much worse. Fixing a smile on
his lips, he rose stiffly to his feet and turned to face one of the few of
the Dark Elders who genuinely terrified him.
Morrigan.
The ancient Irish had called her the Crow Goddess, and she was worshipped and
feared throughout the Celtic kingdoms as the Goddess of Death and
Destruction. Once there had been three sisters: Badb, Macha and the Morrigan,
but the others had disappeared over the years Dee had his own suspicions
about what had happened to them and the Morrigan now reigned supreme.
She stood taller than Dee, though most people stood taller than the doctor,
and was dressed from head to foot in black leather. Her jerkin was studded
with shining silver bolts, giving it the appearance of a medieval
breastplate, and her leather gloves had rectangular silver studs sewn onto
the back of the fingers. The gloves had no fingertips, allowing the
Morrigan s long, spearlike black nails to show. She wore a heavy leather belt
studded with small circular shields around her waist. Draped over her
shoulders, with its full hood pulled around her face and sweeping to the
ground behind her, was a cloak made entirely of ravens feathers.
In the shadow of the hood, the Morrigan s face seemed even paler than usual.
Her eyes were jet-black, with no white showing; even her lips were black. The
tips of her overlong incisors were just visible against her lower lip.
This is yours, I believe. The Morrigan s voice was a harsh whisper, her
voice ragged and torn, like a bird s caw.
Perenelle Flamel came forward, moving slowly and carefully. Two enormous
ravens were perched on her shoulders, and both held their razor-sharp beaks
dangerously close to her eyes. She had barely scrambled out of the burning
car, desperately weakened by her use of magic, when she d been attacked by
the birds.
Let me see it, the Morrigan commanded eagerly.
Dee reached into his coat and produced the metal-bound Codex. Surprisingly,
the Crow Goddess did not reach for it.
Open it, she said.
Puzzled, Dee held the book in front of the Morrigan and turned the pages,
