Deborah Harkness - Shadow of Night

“No?” Matthew asked. I shook my head and bit my lip in frustration. Dee mistook my expression for annoyance with Jane, and he rushed to explain.

“Please forgive my wife. Jane finds this book most distressing, for it was she who discovered it among our boxes when we returned from the emperor’s lands. I had taken another book with me on the journey—a treasured book of alchemy that once belonged to the great English magician Roger Bacon. It was larger than this, and contained many mysteries.”

I pitched forward in my seat.

“My assistant, Edward, could understand the text with divine assistance, though I could not,” Dee continued. “Before we left Edward in Prague, Emperor Rudolf expressed an interest in the work. Edward had told him some of the secrets contained therein—about the generation of metals and a secret method for obtaining immortality.”

So Dee had once possessed Ashmole 782 after all. And his daemonic helper, Edward Kelley, could read the text. My hands were shaking with excitement, and I concealed them in the folds of my skirt.

“Edward helped Jane pack up my books when we were ordered home. Jane believes that Edward stole the book away, replacing it with this item from His Majesty’s collection.” Dee hesitated, looked sorrowful. “I do not like to think ill of Edward, for he was my trusted companion and we spent much time together. He and Jane were never on good terms, and at first I dismissed her theory.”

“But now you think it has merit,” Matthew observed.

“I go over the events of our last days, Master Roydon, trying to recall a detail that might exonerate my friend. But everything I remember only points the finger of blame more decidedly in his direction.” Dee sighed. “Still, this text may yet prove to contain secrets of worth.”

Matthew flipped through the pages. “These are chimeras,” he said, studying the images of plants. “The leaves and stems and flowers don’t match but have been assembled from different plants.”

“What do you make of these?” I said, turning to the astrological roundels that followed. I peered at the writing in the center. Funny. I’d seen the manuscript many times before and never paid any attention to the notes.

“These inscriptions are written in the tongue of ancient Occitania,” Matthew said quietly. “I knew someone once with handwriting very like this. Did you happen to meet a gentleman from Aurillac while you were at the emperor’s court?”

Did he mean Gerbert ? My excitement turned to anxiety. Had Gerbert mistaken the Voynich manuscript for the mysterious book of origins? At my question the handwriting in the center of the astrological diagram began to quiver. I clapped the book shut to keep it from dancing off the page.

“No, Master Roydon,” Dee said with a frown. “Had I done so, I would have asked him about the famed magician from that place who became pope. There are many truths hidden in old tales told around the fire.”

“Yes,” Matthew agreed, “if only we are wise enough to recognize them.”

“That is why I so regret the loss of my book. It was once owned by Roger Bacon, and I was told by the old woman who sold it to me that he prized it for holding divine truths. Bacon called it the Verum Secretum Secretorum .” Dee looked wistfully at the Voynich manuscript. “It is my dearest wish to have it returned.”

“Perhaps I can be of some use,” Matthew said.

“You, Master Roydon?”

“If you would permit me to take this book, I could try to have it put back where it belongs—and have your book restored to its rightful owner.” Matthew pulled the manuscript toward him.

“I would be forever in your debt, sir,” Dee said, agreeing to the deal without further negotiation.

The minute we pulled away from the public landing in Mortlake, I started peppering Matthew with questions.

“What are you thinking, Matthew? You can’t just pack up the Voynich manuscript and send it to Rudolf with a note accusing him of doubledealing. You’ll have to find someone crazy enough to risk his life by breaking into Rudolf’s library and stealing Ashmole 782.”

“If Rudolf has Ashmole 782, it won’t be in his library. It will be in his cabinet of curiosities,” Matthew said absently, staring at the water.

“So this . . . Voynich was not the book you were seeking?” Henry had been following our exchange with polite interest. “George will be so disappointed not to have solved your mystery.”

“George may not have solved it, Hal, but he’s shed considerable light on the situation,” Matthew said. “Between my father’s agents and my own, we’ll get Dee’s lost book.”

We’d caught the tide back to town, which sped our return. The torches were lit on the Water Lane landing in anticipation of our arrival, but two men in the Countess of Pembroke’s livery waved us off.

“Baynard’s Castle, if you please, Master Roydon!” one called across the water.

“Something must be wrong,” Matthew said, standing in the prow of the barge. Henry directed the oarsmen to proceed the extra distance down the river, where the countess’s landing was similarly ablaze with beacons and lanterns.

“Is it one of the boys?” I asked Mary when she rushed down the hall to meet us.

“No. They are well. Come to the laboratory. At once,” she called over her shoulder, already heading back in the direction of the tower.

The sight that greeted us there was enough to make both Matthew and me gasp.

“It is an altogether unexpected arbor Dianæ ,” Mary said, crouching down so that she was at eye level with the bulbous chamber at the alembic’s base that held the roots of a black tree. It wasn’t like the first arbor Dianæ , which was entirely silver and far more delicate in its structure. This one, with its stout, dark trunk and bare limbs, reminded me of the oak tree in Madison that had sheltered us after Juliette’s attack. I’d pulled the vitality out of that tree to save Matthew’s life.

“Why isn’t it silver?” Matthew asked, wrapping his hands around the countess’s fragile glass alembics.

“I used Diana’s blood,” Mary replied. Matthew straightened and gave me an incredulous look.

“Look at the wall,” I said, pointing at the bleeding firedrake.

“It’s the green dragon—the symbol for aqua regia or aqua fortis ,” he said after giving it a cursory glance.

“No, Matthew. Look at it. Forget what you think it depicts and try to see it as if it were the first time.”

“Dieu .” Matthew sounded shocked. “Is that my insignia?”

“Yes. And did you notice that the dragon has its tail in its mouth? And that it’s not a dragon at all? Dragons have four legs. That’s a firedrake.”

“A firedrake. Like . . .” Matthew swore again.

“There have been dozens of different theories about what ordinary substance was the crucial first ingredient required to make the philosopher’s stone. Roger Bacon—who owned Dr. Dee’s missing manuscript—believed it was blood.” I was confident this piece of information would get Matthew’s attention. I crouched down to look at the tree.

“And you saw the mural and followed your instincts.” After a momentary pause, Matthew ran his thumb along the vessel’s wax seal, cracking the wax. Mary gasped in horror as he ruined her experiment.

“What are you doing?” I asked, shocked.

“Following a hunch of my own and adding something to the alembic.” Matthew lifted his wrist to his mouth, bit down on it, and held it over the narrow opening. His dark, thick blood dripped into the solution and fell into the bottom of the vessel. We stared into the depths.

Just when I thought nothing was going to happen, thin streaks of red began to work their way up the tree’s skeletal trunk. Then golden leaves sprouted from the branches.