Michael Scott - The Sorceress

Josh's eyes narrowed as a thought struck him. "I wonder…"

"What?"

"Maybe that's why the smell is so bad," he said slowly. "They must know we won't be able to take it and it'll keep us away."

"You really think they'd go to all that trouble? What-so they can talk about us?" Sophie looked at her brother again and her eyes winked briefly silver. "That's not your idea, Josh."

"What do you mean it's not my idea?" he demanded. "I thought of it." He paused and then added, "Didn't I?"

"For one, it's too smart," Sophie argued. "And it sounds like something Mars would think. From what I can tell from my memories-or the Witch's-there was a time when he thought everyone was after him."

"And were they?" Josh asked. Although the Elder was terrifying, he couldn't help feeling incredibly sorry for him. When Mars Ultor had touched him, Josh had felt the smallest bit of the warrior's unending pain. It was unbearable.

"Yes," Sophie said, eyes blinking silver, her voice now little more than a whisper. "Yes, they were. By the time he became Mars Ultor-the Avenger-he was one of the most hated and feared men on the planet."

"Those are the Witch's memories," Josh said. "Try not to think about them."

"I know." She shook her head. "But I can't help it. It all sort of creeps in around the edges of my mind." She shuddered and wrapped her arms around her body. "It's scaring me. What happens… what happens if her thoughts take over mine? What happens to me?"

Josh shook his head. He had no idea. Even the thought of losing his twin was terrifying. "Think about something else," Josh insisted. "Something the Witch couldn't know."

"I'm trying, but she knows so much," Sophie said miserably. She spun around, trying to focus on their surroundings and ignore the strange and foreign thoughts at the back of her mind. She knew she should be strong, she needed to be strong for her brother, but she couldn't get past the Witch's memories. "Everyone I look at, everything I see, reminds me how things have changed. How am I supposed to think of something ordinary when all this is happening? Look at us, Josh: look at where we are, look at what's happened to us. Everything has changed… changed completely."

Josh nodded. He shifted the map tube on his shoulder, the heavy sword rattling inside. From that very first moment back in the bookshop when he'd popped his head up over the edge of the cellar and seen Flamel and Dee fighting with spears of green and yellow energy, he'd known the world would never be the same again. That had been-what?-four days ago, but in those four days, the world had turned upside down. Everything he'd thought he knew was a lie. They had met myths, fought legends; they had traveled halfway around the world in the blink of an eye to fight a primeval monster and watch stone carvings come to lumbering life.

"You know," Sophie said suddenly, "we really should have taken last Thursday off."

Josh couldn't resist a grin. "Yeah, we should have." He'd spent weeks trying to talk Sophie into taking a day off so they could visit the Exploratorium, the science museum close to the Golden Gate Bridge. Ever since he'd heard about it, he'd desperately wanted to see Bob Miller's famous Sun Painting, a creation of sunlight, mirrors and prisms. Then his smile faded. "If we'd done that, then none of this would have happened."

"Exactly," Sophie said. She looked at the towering metal walls of rusting cars, the pockmarked muddy landscape and the red-eyed dogs. "Josh, I want things the way they were. Ordinary." She turned back to her twin, her eyes catching and holding his. "But you don't," she said flatly.

Josh didn't even bother trying to deny it. His sister would know he was lying; she always did. And she was right: even though he was exhausted and barely able to cope with his Awakened senses, he didn't want things to go back to the way they'd been; he didn't want to go back to being ordinary. He'd been ordinary all his life-and when people did notice him, they only saw him as half of a set of twins. It was always Josh and Sophie. They went to summer camp together, went to concerts and movies together and had never spent a holiday apart. Birthday cards were always addressed to the two of them; party invitations came with both of their names on them. Usually, it didn't really bother him, but over the past few months, it had all started to grate on him. What would it be like to be seen as an individual? What if there were no Sophie? What if he was just Josh Newman, not half of the Newman twins?

He loved his sister, but this was his chance to be different, to be an individual.

He'd been jealous of Sophie when her senses had been Awakened and his hadn't. He'd been scared of her when he'd seen her do battle, in control of impossible powers. He'd been terrified for her when he'd seen the pain and confusion the Awakening had caused. But now that his own senses were Awakened and the world had turned sharp and brilliant, he'd had a momentary glimpse of his potential and he was beginning to understand what he might become. He'd experienced the Nidhogg's thoughts and Clarent's impressions, he'd caught fleeting glimpses of worlds beyond his imagination. He knew-beyond any shadow of a doubt-that he wanted to go to the next stage and be trained in the elemental magics. He just wasn't sure he wanted to do it with the Alchemyst. There was something wrong with Nicholas Flamel. The revelation that there had been other twins before them had been shocking and disturbing, and Josh had questions-hundreds of questions-but he knew he wasn't going to get a straight answer from the Alchemyst. Right now he didn't know who to trust-except Sophie-and the realization that she would prefer not to have her powers was a little frightening. Even though his Awakened senses had given him a pounding headache and a sick sour stomach, had made his throat raw and his eyes gritty, he wouldn't give them up. Unlike his twin, he realized, he was glad he hadn't taken Thursday off.

Josh pressed his hand to his chest. Paper rustled under his T-shirt, where he still wore the two pages he'd snatched from the Codex. A thought occurred to him. "You know," he said softly, "if we had gone to the Exploratorium, then Dee would have kidnapped Nicholas and Perenelle and he'd have the entire Codex. He probably would've already brought the Dark Elders back from their Shadowrealms. The world might have already ended. There's no ordinary to go back to, Soph," he finished in an awed whisper.

The twins stood in silence, trying to comprehend it all. The very idea was terrifying: it was almost incomprehensible that the world they knew could end. Back on Wednesday they would have laughed at the idea. But now? Now they both knew that it could have happened. And worse-they knew it might still happen.

"Or at least, that's what Nicholas says," Josh added, unable to keep the bitterness out of his voice.

"And you believe him?" Sophie asked, curious. "I thought you didn't trust him."

"I don't," Josh said firmly. "You heard what Palamedes said about him. Because of Flamel, because of what he did and didn't do, hundreds of thousands of people have died."

"Nicholas didn't kill them," Sophie reminded him. "Your friend," she said sarcastically, "John Dee, did that."

Josh turned away and looked at the metal hut. He had no answer to that because it was the truth. Dee himself had admitted to setting fire and plague loose on the world in an attempt to stop the Flamels. "All we know is that Flamel has lied to us right from the very beginning. What about the other twins?" he asked. "Palamedes said Flamel and Perenelle had been collecting twins for centuries." Even saying the word collecting made him feel queasy and uncomfortable. "Whatever happened to them?"

A gust of icy wind whipped across the junkyard, and Sophie shivered, though not because of the cold air. Staring hard at the metal hut, not looking at her brother, she spoke very slowly, picking her words with care. She could feel herself growing angry. "Since the Flamels are still looking for twins, that means all the others… what?" She spun around to look at her brother and found he was already nodding in agreement.