shaking girl tightly, supporting her. Joan was wearing shiny blue-green satin
pajamas and was still holding her sword in a metal gauntlet. She turned to
look over her shoulder as her husband stepped into the room. You missed the
fun, she said in French.
I heard nothing, he apologized, in the same language. Tell me.
It was all over in minutes. Sophie and I heard a disturbance at the back of
the house. We ran downstairs just as two women smashed their way in through
the hall door. They were Disir, they said they had come for Scathach. One
attacked me, the other turned her attention to Sophie. Even though she was
speaking an obscure variant of the French language, she dropped her voice to
a whisper. Francis this girl. She is extraordinary. She combined the magics:
she used Fire and Air to defeat the Disir. Then she wrapped them in fog and
froze it to a lump of ice.
Saint-Germain shook his head. It is physically impossible to use more than
one magic at a time , he said, but his voice trailed away to a whisper. The
evidence of Sophie s powers sat in the center of the hallway. There was a
legend that the most powerful Elders were able to use all the elemental
magics simultaneously. According to the most ancient myths, this was the
reason one of the reasons that Danu Talis sank.
Josh is gone. Sophie suddenly shook herself free of Joan s grip and spun
around to face the count. Then she looked over his shoulder to where an
ashen-faced Flamel stood leaning in the doorway. Something s taken Josh,
she said, desperately frightened now. And Scatty s gone after him.
The Alchemyst shuffled into the center of the room, wrapped his hands around
his body as if he was freezing and looked around. Then he bent to scoop up
the Shadow s matching short swords from where they lay amongst the rubble.
When he turned to look back at the others, they were all startled to see that
his eyes were bright with tears. I am sorry, he said, so terribly,
terribly sorry. I have brought this terror and destruction to your home. It
is unforgivable.
We can rebuild, Saint-Germain said airily. This will give us the excuse we
needed to remodel.
Nicholas, Joan said very seriously, what happened here?
The Alchemyst dragged up the only unbroken chair in the room and slumped into
it. He hunched forward, elbows on his knees, looking at the Shadow s gleaming
swords, turning them over and over in his hands. Those are Disir in the
block of ice. Valkyries. Scathach s sworn enemies, though she s never told me
why. I know they have pursued her down through the centuries and have always
allied themselves with her enemies.
They did this? Saint-Germain looked around the ruined kitchen.
No. But they obviously brought something with them that did.
What s happened to Josh? Sophie demanded. She shouldn't have left him alone
in the kitchen, she should have waited with him. She would have defeated
whatever had attacked the back of the house.
Nicholas held up Scathach s weapon. I think you should be asking what s
happened to the Warrior. In the centuries I ve known her, she s never let her
swords out of her grasp. I fear she s been taken .
Swords swords Sophie pulled away from Joan and began desperately searching
through the rubble. When I went to bed, Josh had just come back from sword
practice with Scatty and Joan. He had the stone sword you gave him. She
summoned a wind to raise a chunk of heavy masonry and toss it aside,
revealing the floor beneath. Where was the sword? She felt a flicker of hope.
If he d been captured, then surely the sword would be on the floor? She
straightened and looked around the room. Clarent isn't here.
Saint-Germain walked to the hole where the back door had been. The garden was
a ruin. A chunk of stone had been ripped out of the fountain and the bowl
cracked in half. It took him a moment to recognize the U-shaped hunk of metal
that had been his back gate. Only then did it sink in that the entire back
wall was missing. The nine-foot-tall wall was now little more than a stump.
There were powdered and crushed bricks scattered all across the garden,
almost as if the wall had been pushed down from outside.
Something big very big has been in the garden, he said to no one in
particular.
Flamel looked up. Can you smell anything? he asked.
Saint-Germain breathed deeply. Snake, he said firmly. But that s not
Machiavelli s odor. He stepped out into the garden and drew in a deep
lungful of cool air. It s stronger out here. Then he coughed. This stench
is fouler, much fouler , he called. This is the stink of something very,
very old .
Drawn by the wailing car alarms, Saint-Germain crossed the garden, clambered
over the broken wall and looked up and down the alley. House and car alarms
were ringing, mainly to his left, and there were lights on in the houses at
that end of the street. In the mouth of the narrow alleyway, he could see the
crushed remains of a black car.
Whatever it was attacked this house, he said, darting back into the
kitchen. There s a two-hundred-thousand-euro car at the end of the street
that s only fit for the scrap yard.
Nidhogg, Flamel whispered in horror. He nodded; it made sense now. The
Disir brought Nidhogg, he said. Then he frowned. But even Machiavelli
wouldn't bring something like that into a major city. He s too cautious.
Nidhogg? Joan and Sophie asked simultaneously, looking at one another.
Think of it as a cross between a dinosaur and a snake, Flamel explained.
But probably older than this planet. I think it s got Scathach and Josh went
after it.
Sophie shook her head firmly. He wouldn't do that he couldn't he s terrified
of snakes.
Then where is he? Flamel asked. Where is Clarent? It s the only
explanation: he s taken the sword and gone in search of the Shadow.
But I heard him calling to her for help .
You heard him call her name. He might have been calling out to her.
Saint-Germain nodded. It makes sense. The Disir only wanted Scathach.
Nidhogg grabbed her and ran. Josh must have followed.
Maybe it grabbed him and she followed, Sophie suggested. That s the sort
of thing she d do.
It had no interest in Josh. It would have just eaten him. No, he went of his
own accord.
That shows great courage, Joan said.
But Josh isn't brave , Sophie began. Yet even as she was saying it, she
knew it wasn't entirely true. He d always stood up for her in school and
