Michael Scott - The Magician

“I’ll pay,” Josh said thickly, blood thundering in his head, adrenaline coursing through his body.

“I know you will.” The huge sword moved, first touching Josh’s right shoulder, then his left before moving back to his right. The faintest outline of his aura winked into existence around his body. Wisps of gold smoke started to curl off his blond hair, and the scent of citrus grew stronger. “Hence-forth you will see with acuity…”

Josh’s bright blue eyes turned into solid gold discs. Immediately, tears gathered and ran down his face. They were the color and texture of liquid gold.

“You will hear with clarity…”

Smoke coiled from the boy’s ears.

“You will taste with purity…”

Josh opened his mouth and coughed. A puff of saffron-colored mist appeared, and tiny amber sparks danced between his tongue and teeth.

“You will touch with sensitivity…”

The boy brought his hands up to his face. They were glowing so brightly that they were almost transparent. Sparks leapt and curled between each finger, and his badly chewed fingernails were polished mirrors.

“You will smell with intensity…”

Josh’s head was almost completely enveloped in golden smoke now. It trickled from his nostrils, making it look as if he were breathing fire. His aura had thickened, solidified around his shoulders and across his chest, becoming shiny and reflective.

The god’s sword moved again, tapping lightly against the boy’s shoulders. “Truly, yours is one of the most powerful auras I have ever encountered,” Mars said quietly. “There is something else I can give you-a gift-and this I give freely. You may find it of use in the days to come.” Stretching out his left hand, he rested it on top of the boy’s head. Instantly, Josh’s aura burst into incandescent light. Streamers and globes of yellow fire curled from his body and bounced around the room. Phobos and Deimos were caught by the blast of light and heat, and it sent them squealing and scrambling behind the stone plinth, but not before their pale skin had reddened and the tips of their snow white hair had darkened and crisped. The searing light drove Dee to his knees, gloved hands pressed against his eyes. He rolled over, burying his face in his hands as spheres of fire bounced off the floor and ceiling, spattering against the walls, leaving scorch marks on the polished bone.

Only Machiavelli had escaped the full force of the explosion of light. He’d turned away and ducked out of the room in the last instant before Mars had touched the boy. Curling up in a ball, he hid in the deep shadows outside the door while streamers of yellow light ricocheted off the walls and hissing balls of solid energy blazed out into the corridor. He blinked hard, trying to clear the streaked afterimages seared onto his retinas. Machiavelli had seen Awakenings before, but never anything this dramatic. What was Mars doing to the boy, what gift was he giving him?

Then, through his blurring vision, he saw a vague silvery shape materialize at the other end of the corridor.

And the scent of vanilla filled the catacombs.

P erched on top of the water tower on Alcatraz, surrounded by huge Dire-Crows, the Morrigan sang softly to herself. It was a song first heard by the most primitive of ancient men, now imprinted deep into humankind’s DNA. It was slow and gentle, lost and plaintive, beautiful…and utterly terrifying. It was the Song of the Morrigan: a cry designed to inspire fear and terror. And on battlefields across the world and down through time, it was often the last sound a human heard in this life.

The Morrigan drew her black feathered cloak about her and gazed out across the fog-locked bay toward the city. She could feel the heat of the mass of humani, could see the seething glow of almost a million auras within San Fancisco itself. And every aura was wrapped around a humani, each one rich with fears and worries, filled with succulent, tasty emotions. She pressed her hands together and brought the tips of her fingers to her thin black lips. Her ancestors had fed off humankind, had drunk their memories, savored their emotions like fine wines. Soon…oh, so very soon, she would be free to do it again.

But before that she had a banquet to enjoy.

Earlier, she’d received a call from Dee. Finally, he and his Elders had been forced to agree that it was now too dangerous to allow both Nicholas and Perenelle to survive; he had given her permission to slay the Sorceress.

The Morrigan had an eyrie high in the San Bernardino Mountains. She would carry Perenelle there and over the next few days drain every last one of the woman’s memories and emotions. The Sorceress had lived for almost seven hundred years; she had traveled across the globe and into Shadowrealms, had seen wonders and experienced terrors. And the woman had an extraordinary memory; she would have remembered everything, every emotion, every thought and fear. And the Morrigan would relish them all. When she was finished, the legendary Perenelle Flamel would be little more than a mindless babe. The Crow Goddess threw back her head and opened her mouth wide, her long incisors white and stark against her dark lips, her tongue tiny and black. Soon.

The Morrigan knew that the Sorceress was in the tunnels beneath the water tower. The only other entrance was through a tunnel that was accessible only at low tide. And although the tide would not turn for hours, the rocks and cliff face around the cave mouth were covered with razor-billed crows.

Then the Morrigan’s nostrils flared.

Over the salt and iodine smell of the sea, the metallic stink of rusted metal and rotting stone and the musty scent of countless birds, she suddenly smelled something else…something that didn’t belong, not in this place, not in this age. Something ancient and bitter.

The wind shifted, and the fog curled with it. Beads of salty moisture suddenly glistened on a thread of silver hanging in the air before her. The Morrigan blinked her jet-black eyes. Another thread wavered in the air, and then another and another, crisscrossed in a series of circles. They looked like webs.

They were webs.

She was coming to her feet when a monstrous spider erupted from the shaft below her and landed squarely on the side of the water tower, its huge barbed feet biting into the metal. It scuttled toward the Crow Goddess.

The mass of birds ringing the water tower spiraled skyward, screaming raucously…and were instantly trapped in the enormous web floating overhead. They fell back on top of their dark mistress, entangling her in a writhing mass of feathers and sticky web. The Morrigan slashed her way free with razor-tipped nails, gathered her cloak about her and was about to take to the air when the spider climbed over the top of the water tower and drove her back, pinning her down with a huge barbed foot.

Perenelle Flamel, astride the spider’s back, a blazing spear in her hand, leaned forward and smiled at the Morrigan. “You were looking for me, I believe.”

S ophie ran.

She was no longer afraid; she didn’t feel sick or weak anymore. She just had to get to her brother. Josh was directly ahead of her, in a room at the end of the tunnel. She could see the golden glow of his aura lighting up the darkness, smell the mouthwatering scent of oranges.

Pushing past Nicholas, Joan and Saint-Germain, ignoring their cries to stop, Sophie raced for the glowing arched doorway. She had always been a good runner and held track records for the hundred-meter in most of the schools she’d attended, but now she practically flew down the corridor. And with every step, her aura-fueled by anger and determination-grew around her, sparking, crackling and metallic. Her enhanced senses flared, her pupils shrinking to dots and then expanding to silver discs, and instantly the shadows vanished and she could see the gloomy catacomb in all its shocking detail. Her nostrils were assaulted with a variety of smells-snake and sulfur, rot and mold-but stronger than all the others was the orange scent of her brother’s aura.