Johann’s clothes were stained all over, and a stinging rash had formed on his skin. His crotch was throbbing with pain, and he felt sick as a dog. To his relief he could still sense the tiny silver globe underneath the fabric of his shirt.
Lahnstein sat in front of him with crossed legs, while Hagen guarded the door in silence. Overly cautious, thought Johann. He was far too weak to stand up—and besides, he was tied to the back and legs of the chair with ropes.
“You look terrible, Doctor,” remarked Lahnstein, gazing at Johann with obvious disgust. “Like a heretic on his third day of torture.”
“That is exactly how I feel,” said Johann. The toxic fumes appeared to have affected his airways. Each word was agony.
Lahnstein gestured at the leather satchel lying on the floor beside Hermes. He wrinkled his nonexistent nose in disgust; the room stank of sulfur and other pungent acids. “What kind of witchcraft is in that bag? Tell me, what sort of devilish invocation had you planned this time?”
“Fireworks,” gasped Johann.
Lahnstein leaned forward. “I beg your pardon?”
“Fire . . . fireworks in honor of the pope. Isn’t that what they do today?” Johann attempted to smile. “Three cheers for Leo, victor over France.”
Lahnstein didn’t give in to Johann’s provocation, waving dismissively. “Whatever it was that you were planning, it nearly cost you your life. It would have been a fitting end for a quack and necromancer like yourself. And yet I am pleased you’re alive.” He scrutinized Johann coldly. “Did you really think we didn’t know where you’ve been hiding? Hagen has been watching you and your assistant for a while now. Truly an extraordinarily shabby hole you picked out. The wine must be ghastly.”
“Better than . . . to drink from the pope’s dog dish.”
“Is that all you have left? Insults?” Lahnstein smiled, which, on his monstrous face, looked like a bulldog baring its teeth. “You have fallen a long way, Doctor.”
“What . . . what are you planning to do with my grandson?”
Lahnstein raised an eyebrow. “How interesting of you to ask. I was about to ask you something very similar.”
He shuffled closer with his stool until he was just a hand’s breadth away from Johann’s face. Johann could smell a sharp-smelling perfume that reminded him of the pine forests of France. He guessed the representative used it to cover up the foul stench of the poorly healed scab.
“Mandragora, bezoar, amber, Salamandra salamandra, sulfur, dens pistris,” listed Lahnstein quietly, as if he feared they might be overheard. “Do you know this recipe?”
Johann hesitated. Those were precisely the ingredients Hagen had killed the alchemist for. Why was Lahnstein asking? Did he know that Karl had seen Hagen?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Johann said eventually.
“You are the most famous alchemist of the empire and you’re trying to tell me you don’t know what those ingredients are used for? Are you trying to play me for a fool?” Lahnstein signaled to Hagen, whereupon the giant stepped forward and landed two well-aimed punches in Johann’s belly, causing him to cry out in pain. When Johann vomited this time, only green bile came out.
“We need neither rack nor glowing pincers, Doctor,” said Lahnstein. “Hagen developed other methods on the battlefields that make stubborn prisoners talk. I will ask you again.” He held the list of ingredients in front of Johann’s nose. “Mandragora, bezoar, amber, Salamandra salamandra . . . What is it about? Is this a recipe to produce the philosopher’s stone? Speak up!”
Johann groaned, kept his head down, and thought hard. So far he had believed that Hagen had fetched all those ingredients for Lahnstein, but now it would appear that the papal representative didn’t know anything about it. Or was this a trap? Johann decided to take a huge gamble.
“If I tell you, will you give me your word that no harm will come to my grandson?”
Another wave from Lahnstein brought another punch. “I don’t care about your grandson, damn it!” snarled Lahnstein. “God alone will decide whether the brat lives or dies. I only want to know what this recipe is about. I questioned every alchemist in Rome, and no one was able to tell me. Spit it out, Doctor! Now. It is important! Does it serve to make gold or not?”
For the first time, Johann noticed a fearful twitch in Lahnstein’s eyes.
“It . . . is not for the production of gold,” he said.
“But?” persisted Lahnstein.
“The formula is from TheSworn Book of Honorius, an old book of sorcery of which only very few copies survive. The recipe serves . . .” Johann paused. “The recipe serves as an invocation. Those ingredients combined with the right spells summon the devil.”
“Summon the . . . the devil? Is it true? I knew it, damn it! I knew it all along!” Lahnstein looked at Hagen. “Not a word of what is being said here can ever get out, understood? It would be the end of all of us!”
Hagen nodded in silence and leaned on his longsword.
“And you really believe such a ritual can summon the devil?” Lahnstein asked Johann in a whisper. “Or is it yet more heretic nonsense that the likes of you use to frighten the common people?”
Johann looked at him from red eyes, his skin covered in rashes, his voice as hoarse as a spirit from the underworld. “If you had asked me earlier, I’d have said that it is nonsense, nothing but hocus-pocus and a show for the stage. But now . . .” He coughed blood. “Yes, I believe the devil truly can be summoned with this ritual. Trust me—I’ve seen him myself. And he is worse than anything you can imagine. Because deep down the devil is a man, too. If we don’t stop him, he is going to destroy the world as we know it. And he will laugh as if it were the funniest joke.”
Lahnstein said nothing for a long while. Outside, beyond the thick walls of Castel Sant’Angelo,
