Michael Scott - The Alchemyst

Sophie spun the whip above her head, scattering drops of liquid silver inevery direction. Let me give you a taste of what I can do. The silver whipcracked and snapped as she approached.

Scatty suddenly found that three of her adversaries had transformed into anAmerican robin, a house finch, and a song sparrow, while the exotic-lookingcatman directly in front of her warped into a confused Siamese.

Sophie cracked the silver whip again and again, beating away their attackers,droplets of silver splashing everywhere, and more and more of the cat-andbirdmen returned to their natural forms. Get away from Nicholas, she said,her lips not moving in synch with her words, or we will find out what yourtrue shape is, Bastet, who is also Mafdet, Sekhmet and Menhit.

Bastet slowly stepped away from Flamel and raised herself to her fulltowering height. Her slit-pupiled eyes were wide, her mouth tightly closed.

It has been a long time since anyone has called me by those names. Who areyou certainly no modern humani girl?

Sophie s mouth moved, the words taking a moment or two to follow. Beware this girl, Bastet. She is your doom.

Bastet s fur was bristling and her bare arms dimpled with goose bumps. Thenshe slowly backed away, turned and raced toward the burning Yggdrasill. Forthe first time in millennia, she was frightened.

Nicholas dragged himself to his feet and staggered toward Sophie, Josh andScatty. He stepped up to Sophie. Perenelle? he whispered.

Sophie turned her head to him, eyes blank and unseeing. Her mouth worked, andthen, as in a badly dubbed movie, the words came. I m in San Francisco, heldin the basement of Enoch Enterprises. I m safe and well. Take

the children south, Nicholas. There was a long moment of silence; then, whenshe spoke again, the words came quicker than Sophie s lips could move, andthe girl s silver aura began to fade and her eyes started to close. Take them to the Witch.

D r. John Dee was becoming frantic. Everything was falling apart, and nowthere was every possibility that he was going to have to take an active partin the battle.

Flamel, Scatty and the twins had managed to escape from the interior of theYggdrasill and were now fighting on the opposite side of the field, no morethan two hundred yards away, but he couldn t get to them it would meancrossing a battlefield. The last of the Torc Allta, both in their human andboar form, fought running battles with the cat-and birdmen. The nathair hadalready been defeated. Initially, the winged serpents had brought chaos andconfusion to the cats and birds, but they were lumbering and awkward on theground, and most had been killed once they d landed. The massive army of TorcAllta had thinned considerably, and he guessed that within the hour, therewould be no more wereboars left in North America.

But he could not afford to wait that long. He had to get to Flamel now. Hehad to retrieve the pages of the Codex as soon as possible.

From his hiding place behind a clump of bushes, Dee watched the Elders.Hekate was standing in the doorway to her tree home, surrounded by the lastof her personal Torc Allta guard. While the boars fought the cats and birds,Hekate alone faced down the combined forces of the Morrigan and Bastet.

The three ignored the half-human animals fighting around them. To the casualobserver it would have seemed as if the three Elders were simply staring atone another. Dee, however, noted the purple-gray clouds that gathered onlyabove the Yggdrasill; he saw how the delicate white and gold flowers strewnaround the huge tree withered and died, turning to black paste in an instant;he had seen the unsightly sheen of fungus that appeared on the smoothlypolished stone path. Dee smiled; surely it would not be long now. How muchlonger could Hekate stand against the two Elders, aunt and niece?

But the goddess showed no sign of weakening.

And then she struck back.

Although the air, now stinking from the burning tree, was still, Dee watchedas an invisible, unfelt breeze whipped the Morrigan s cloak about hershoulders and buffeted the huge Bastet, making her tilt her head and leanforward into the wind. The patterns on Hekate s metallic dress whirled withblinding rapidity, the colors blurred and distorted.

With growing alarm, he saw a dark shadow flowing across the withering grassand then watched as a swarm of tiny black flies settled on Bastet s fur,crawling into her ears and up her nose. The Cat Goddess howled and staggeredback, rubbing furiously at her face. She fell to the ground, rolling over andover in the long grass, attempting to free herself from the insects. More andmore kept coming, and they were joined by fire ants and recluse spiders,which crawled out of the grass and swarmed over her body. Crouched on allfours, she threw back her head and screamed in agony, then turned and ranacross the field, rolling and crawling in the grass, splashing through alittle pool, trying to clean the insects from her body. She was more thanhalfway across the field before the thick, swirling cloud left her. Sherubbed furiously at her face and arms, leaving long scratches on her skin, before climbing to her feet and striding back toward the Yggdrasill. And thenthe swarm of flies, thicker now, re-formed in the air before her.

In that moment, Dee considered that perhaps just perhaps Hekate could win.Splitting Bastet and the Morrigan had been a master stroke; ensuring thatBastet could not get back was simply genius.

Realizing that she could not return to the Yggdrasill, Bastet hissed herrage, then turned and raced over to where Flamel, Scatty and the twins weretrying to defend themselves. Dee saw her leap an incredible distance andbring the Alchemyst to the ground. That gave him some satisfaction, at least,and he allowed himself a slight smile, which quickly faded he was stilltrapped on this side of the field. How was he going to get past Hekate?

Even though the Yggdrasill was burning furiously, with whole sectionsblazing, burning leaves and blackened strips of branches spiraling down,sticky streamers of sap exploding from collapsing branches, Hekate s powersseemed undiminished. Dee ground his teeth in frustration; all his researchindicated that Hekate had brought the tree to life by imbuing it with alittle of her own life force. In turn, as it grew, it renewed and replenishedher powers. Burning the tree had been his idea. He had imagined that as itburned, she would weaken. But on the contrary: setting the tree alight hadonly served to enrage the goddess, and her anger had made her all the moredeadly. When Dee saw Hekate s lips twitch in what might have been a smile andthe Morrigan stagger and then step back, he began to realize that here, inher own Shadowrealm, the Goddess with Three Faces was simply too strong forthem.

Dee knew then that he would have to act.

Keeping to the shadows of the trees and tall grasses, he moved around thetrunk of the enormous Yggdrasill. He was forced to crouch down and hide as aTorc Allta in its boar shape crashed through the undergrowth directly infront of him with at least a dozen cat-people and twice that number ofbirdmen clinging to him.

Dee came out of the undergrowth on the opposite side of the tree from whereHekate and the Morrigan fought. To his right, he could see that something washappening with Flamel s group; birds and cats were scattering in everydirection and then he realized that he was seeing ordinary birds and everydaycats fleeing, not the half-human creatures. The Morrigan s and Bastet stransformation spells were failing: was Hekate that powerful? He had to endthis now.

Dr. John Dee lifted the short-bladed sword in his hand. Dirty blue lightcoiled down its length, and for an instant the ancient stone blade hummed asan invisible breeze moved across the edge. The twisting snakes carved intoits hilt came to twisting, hissing life.