Michael Scott - The Magician

“Yes, it’s been lonely,” she admitted, “very lonely.”

“I know about lonely,” Sophie said thoughtfully. “With Mom and Dad away so much or moving us from city to city, it’s hard to make friends. It’s almost impossible to keep them. I suppose that’s why Josh and I have always been so close; we’ve had no one else. My best friend, Elle, is in New York. We talk on the phone all the time, and e-mail and chat on IM, but I haven’t seen her since Christmas. She sends me photos off her cell every time she changes her hair color, so I know what she looks like,” she added with a smile. “Josh doesn’t even try to make friends, though.”

“Friends are important,” Scathach agreed, squeezing Sophie’s arm lightly. “But while friends come and go, you will always have family.”

“What about your family? The Witch of Endor mentioned your mother and brother.” Even as she was speaking, images from the Witch’s memories popped into her mind: a sharp-faced older woman with bloodred eyes and an ashen-skinned young man with blazing red hair.

The Warrior shrugged uncomfortably. “We don’t talk much these days. My parents were Elders, born and raised on the isle of Danu Talis. When my grandmother Dora left the island to teach the first humani, they never forgave her. Like many Elders, they considered the humani to be little better than beasts. ‘Curiosities,’ my father called them.” A flicker of disgust crossed her face. “Prejudice has always been with us. My mother and father were even more shocked when I announced that I too was going to work with the humani, to fight for them, to protect them when I could.”

“Why?” Sophie asked.

Scatty’s voice grew soft. “It was obvious to me, even then, that the humani were the future and that the days of the Elder Races were drawing to a close.” She glanced sidelong at Sophie, who was surprised to find Scathach’s eyes bright and glittering, almost as if there were tears in them. “My parents warned me that if I left home, I would bring shame on the family name and they would disown me.” Scatty’s voice trailed into silence.

“But you still left,” Sophie guessed.

The Warrior nodded. “I left. We didn’t speak for a millennium…until they were in trouble and needed my help,” she added with a grim smile. “We talk occasionally now, but I’m afraid they still consider me an embarrassment.”

Sophie squeezed her hand gently. She felt uncomfortable with what the Warrior had just told her, but she also realized that Scatty had shared something incredibly personal, something that Sophie doubted the ancient warrior had ever shared with anyone else. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

Scathach squeezed back. “You didn’t upset me. They upset me-more than two thousand years ago, in fact-and I can still remember it as if it were yesterday. It’s been a long time since anyone took the trouble to ask about my life. And believe me, it’s not been all bad. I’ve had some wonderful adventures,” she said brightly. “Did I tell you about the time I was the lead singer in an all-girl band? Sort of goth-punk Spice Girls, but we only did Tori Amos covers. We were very big in Germany.” She lowered her voice. “The problem was, we were all vampires…”

Nicholas and Josh turned onto the Rue de Dunkerque and discovered there were police everywhere. “Keep walking,” Nicholas said urgently as Josh slowed. “And act natural.”

“Natural,” Josh muttered. “I don’t even know what that means anymore.”

“Walk quickly, but don’t run,” Nicholas said patiently. “You’re completely innocent, a student on the way to class or heading to a summer job. Look at the police, but don’t stare. And if one looks at you, don’t turn away quickly, just let your eyes drift on to the next character. That’s what an ordinary citizen would do. If we’re stopped, I’ll do the talking. We’ll be fine.” He saw the skeptical look on the boy’s face and his smile widened. “Trust me, I’ve been doing this for a very long time. The trick is to move as if you have every right in the world to be here. The police are trained to look for people who look and act suspicious.”

“Don’t you think we fall into both categories?” Josh asked.

“We look like we belong-and that makes us invisible.”

A group of three policemen didn’t even look in their direction as they walked past. Josh noticed that each was wearing a different type of uniform, and the men seemed to be arguing.

“Good,” Nicholas said when they were out of earshot.

“What’s good?”

Nicholas inclined his head in the direction they had just come. “You saw the different uniforms?”

The boy nodded.

“France has a complicated police system; Paris even more so. There is the Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie Nationale and the Prefecture de Police. Machiavelli has obviously pulled out all the stops to find us, but his great failing has always been that he assumes that other people are as coldly logical as he is. He obviously thinks that if he puts all these police resources on the streets, they will do nothing but search for us. But there is a great deal of rivalry between the various units, and no doubt everyone wants the credit for capturing the dangerous criminals.”

“Is that what you’ve made us into now?” Josh asked, unable to disguise the sudden bitterness in his voice. “Two days ago, Sophie and I were happy, normal people. And now look at us: I barely know my own sister. We’ve been hunted, attacked by monsters and now we’re on a police most-wanted list. You’ve made us criminals, Mr. Flamel. But this isn’t the first time you’ve been a criminal, is it?” he snapped. He shoved his hands deep into his pockets and closed them into fists to prevent them from shaking. He was scared and angry, and the fear was making him reckless. He’d never talked to an adult like that before.

“No,” Nicholas said mildly, his pale eyes starting to glitter dangerously. “I’ve been called a criminal. But only by my enemies. It seems to me,” he added after a long pause, “that you’ve been talking to Dr. Dee. And the only place you could have encountered him was in Ojai, since that was the only time you were out of my sight.”

Josh didn’t even think about denying it. “I met Dee when the three of you were busy with the Witch,” he admitted defiantly. “He told me a lot about you.”

“I’m quite sure he did,” Flamel murmured. He waited by the curb as a dozen students on bicycles and mopeds sped past; then he strolled across the street. Josh hurried after him.

“He said that you never tell anyone everything.”

“True,” Flamel agreed. “If you tell people everything, you take away their opportunity to learn.”

“He said you stole the Book of Abraham from the Louvre.”

Nicholas walked for half a dozen steps before nodding. “Well, I suppose that is true too,” he said, “though it’s not quite so straightforward as he would like to paint it. Certainly, in the seventeenth century, the book briefly fell into the hands of Cardinal Richelieu.”

Josh shook his head. “Who’s that?”

“Have you never read The Three Musketeers?” Flamel asked in astonishment.

“Nope. Didn’t even see the movie.”

Flamel shook his head. “I’ve got a copy in the shop…,” he began, and then stopped. When he’d walked away from the bookshop on Thursday, it had been a trashed ruin. “Richelieu appears in the books-and the movies, too. He was a real person and was known as the l’Eminence Rouge-the Red Eminence-so named after his cardinal’s red robes,” he explained. “He was King Louis XIII’s chief minister, but in reality he ruled the country. In 1632, Dee managed to trap Perenelle and me in a part of the old city. His inhuman agents had surrounded us; there were ghouls in the earth beneath our feet, Dire-Crows in the air, and Baobhan Sith were tracking us through the streets.” Nicholas shrugged uncomfortably at the memory and looked up and around, almost as if he expected to see the creatures appear again. “I was beginning to think that I was going to have to destroy the Codex rather than see it fall into Dee’s hands. Then Perenelle suggested one last option: we could hide the book in plain sight. It was simple and brilliant!”