Nicholas Flamel 1 - The Alchemyst sotinf-1 Read online

  Nicholas Flamel 1 - The Alchemyst

  ( Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel - 1 )

  Michael Scott

  He holds the secret that can end the world.

  The truth: Nicholas Flamel was born in Paris on September 28, 1330. Nearly 700 years later, he is acknowledged as the greatest Alchemyst of his day. It is said that he discovered the secret of eternal life.

  The records show that he died in 1418.

  But his tomb is empty.

  The legend: Nicholas Flamel lives. But only because he has been making the elixir of life for centuries. The secret of eternal life is hidden within the book he protects--the Book of Abraham the Mage. It's the most powerful book that has ever existed. In the wrong hands, it will destroy the world. That's exactly what Dr. John Dee plans to do when he steals it. Humankind won't know what's happening until it's too late. And if the prophecy is right, Sophie and Josh Newman are the only ones with the power to save the world as we know it.

  Sometimes legends are true.

  And Sophie and Josh Newman are about to find themselves in the middle of the greatest legend of all time.

  For Claudette, of course

  iamque opus exegi

  I am legend.

  Death has no claim over me, illness cannot touch me. Look at me now and it

  would be hard to put an age upon me, and yet I was born in the Year of Our

  Lord 1330, more than six hundred and seventy years ago.

  I have been many things in my time: a physician and a cook, a bookseller and

  a soldier, a teacher of languages and chemistry, both an officer of the law

  and a thief.

  But before all these I was an alchemyst. I was the Alchemyst.

  I was acknowledged as the greatest Alchemyst of all, sought after by kings

  and princes, by emperors and even the Pope himself. I could turn ordinary

  metal into gold, I could change common stones into precious jewels. More than

  this: I discovered the secret of Life Eternal hidden deep in a book of

  ancient magic.

  Now my wife, Perenelle, has been kidnapped and the book stolen.

  Without the book, she and I will age. Within the full cycle of the moon, we

  will wither and die. And if we die, then the evil we have so long fought

  against will triumph. The Elder Race will reclaim this Earth again, and they

  will wipe humanity from the face of this planet.

  But I will not go down without a fight.

  For I am the immortal Nicholas Flamel.

  From the Day Booke of Nicholas Flamel, Alchemyst

  Writ this day, Thursday, 31st May, in

  San Francisco, my adopted city

  THURSDAY,

  31st May

  CHAPTER ONE

  OK answer me this: why would anyone want to wear an overcoat in San

  Francisco in the middle of summer? Sophie Newman pressed her fingers against

  the Bluetooth earpiece as she spoke.

  On the other side of the continent, her fashion-conscious friend Elle

  inquired matter-of-factly, What sort of coat?

  Wiping her hands on the cloth tucked into her apron strings, Sophie moved out

  from behind the counter of the empty coffee shop and stepped up to the

  window, watching men emerge from the car across the street. Heavy black wool

  overcoats. They re even wearing black gloves and hats. And sunglasses. She

  pressed her face against the glass. Even for this city, That'sjust a little

  too weird.

  Maybe they re undertakers? Elle suggested, her voice popping and clicking

  on the cell phone. Sophie could hear something loud and dismal playing in the

  background Lacrimosa maybe, or Amorphis. Elle had never quite got over her

  Goth phase.

  Maybe, Sophie answered, sounding unconvinced. She d been chatting on the

  phone with her friend when, a few moments earlier, she d spotted the

  unusual-looking car. It was long and sleek and looked as if it belonged in an

  old black-and-white movie. As it drove past the window, sunlight reflected

  off the blacked-out windows, briefly illuminating the interior of the coffee

  shop in warm yellow-gold light, blinding Sophie. Blinking away the black

  spots dancing before her eyes, she watched as the car turned at the bottom of

  the hill and slowly returned. Without signaling, it pulled over directly in

  front of The Small Book Shop, right across the street.

  Maybe they re Mafia, Elle suggested dramatically. My dad knows someone in

  the Mafia. But he drives a Prius, she added.

  This is most definitely not a Prius, Sophie said, looking again at the car

  and the two large men standing on the street bundled up in their heavy

  overcoats, gloves and hats, their eyes hidden behind overlarge sunglasses.

  Maybe they re just cold, Elle suggested. doesn't it get cool in San

  Francisco?

  Sophie Newman glanced at the clock and thermometer on the wall over the

  counter behind her. It s two-fifteen here and eighty-one degrees, she said.

  Trust me, they re not cold. They must be dying. Wait, she said,

  interrupting herself, something s happening.

  The rear door opened and another man, even larger than the first two, climbed

  stiffly out of the car. As he closed the door, sunlight briefly touched his

  face and Sophie caught a glimpse of pale, unhealthy-looking gray-white skin.

  She adjusted the volume on the earpiece. OK. You should see what just

  climbed out of the car. A huge guy with gray skin. Gray. That might explain

  it; maybe they have some type of skin condition.

  I saw a National Geographic documentary about people who Can't go out in the

  sun , Elle began, but Sophie was no longer listening to her.

  A fourth figure stepped out of the car.

  He was a small, rather dapper-looking man, dressed in a neat charcoal-gray

  three-piece suit that looked vaguely old-fashioned but that she could tell

  had been tailor-made for him. His iron gray hair was pulled back from an

  angular face into a tight ponytail, while a neat triangular beard, mostly

  black but flecked with gray, concealed his mouth and chin. He moved away from

  the car and stepped under the striped awning that covered the trays of books

  outside the shop. When he picked up a brightly colored paperback and turned

  it over in his hands, Sophie noticed that he was wearing gray gloves. A pearl

  button at the wrist winked in the light.

  They re going into the bookshop, she said into her earpiece.

  Is Josh still working there? Elle immediately asked.

  Sophie ignored the sudden interest in her friend s voice. The fact that her

  best friend liked her twin brother was just a little too weird. Yeah. I m

  going to call him to see what s up. I'll call you right back. She hung up,

  pulled out the earpiece and absently rubbed her hot ear as she stared,

  fascinated, at the small man. There was something about him something odd.

  Maybe he was a fashion designer, she thought, or a movie producer, or maybe

  he was an author she d noticed that some authors liked to dress up in

  peculiar outfits. She d give him a few minutes to get into the shop, then

  she d call her twin for
a report.

  Sophie was about to turn away when the gray man suddenly spun around and

  seemed to stare directly at her. As he stood under the awning, his face was

  in shadow, and yet for just the briefest instant, his eyes looked as if they

  were glowing.

  Sophie knew just knew that there was no possible way for the small gray man

  to see her: she was standing on the opposite side of the street behind a pane

  of glass that was bright with reflected early-afternoon sunlight. She would

  be invisible in the gloom behind the glass.

  And yet

  And yet in that single moment when their eyes met, Sophie felt the tiny hairs

  on the back of her hands and along her forearms tingle and felt a puff of

  cold air touch the back of her neck. She rolled her shoulders, turning her

  head slightly from side to side, strands of her long blond hair curling

  across her cheek. The contact lasted only a second before the small man

  looked away, but Sophie got the impression that he had looked directly at

  her.

  In the instant before the gray man and his three overdressed companions

  disappeared into the bookshop, Sophie decided that she did not like him.

  Peppermint.

  And rotten eggs.

  That is just vile. Josh Newman stood in the center of the bookstore s

  cellar and breathed deeply. Where were those smells coming from? He looked

  around at the shelves stacked high with books and wondered if something had

  crawled in behind them and died. What else would account for such a foul

  stink? The tiny cramped cellar always smelled dry and musty, the air heavy

  with the odors of parched curling paper, mingled with the richer aroma of old

  leather bindings and dusty cobwebs. He loved the smell; he always thought it

  was warm and comforting, like the scents of cinnamon and spices that he

  associated with Christmas.

  Peppermint.

  Sharp and clean, the smell cut through the close cellar atmosphere. It was

  the odor of new toothpaste or those herbal teas his sister served in the

  coffee shop across the street. It sliced though the heavier smells of leather

  and paper, and was so strong that it made his sinuses tingle; he felt as if

  he was going to sneeze at any moment. He quickly pulled out his iPod earbuds.

  Sneezing with headphones on was not a good idea: made your ears pop.

  Eggs.

  Foul and stinking he recognized the sulfurous odor of rotten eggs. It

  blanketed the clear odor of mint and it was disgusting. He could feel the

  stench coating his tongue and lips, and his scalp began to itch as if

  something were crawling through it. Josh ran his fingers through his shaggy

  blond hair and shuddered. The drains must be backing up.

  Leaving the earbuds dangling over his shoulders, he checked the book list in

  his hand, then looked at the shelves again: The Complete Works of Charles

  Dickens, twenty-seven volumes, red leather binding. Now where was he going to

  find that?

  Josh had been working in the bookshop for nearly two months and still didn't

  have the faintest idea where anything was. There was no filing system or

  rather, there was a system, but it was known only to Nick and Perry Fleming,

  the owners of The Small Book Shop. Nick or his wife could put their hands on

  any book in either the shop upstairs or the cellar in a matter of minutes.

  A wave of peppermint, immediately followed by rotten eggs, filled the air

  again; Josh coughed and felt his eyes water. This was impossible! Stuffing

  the book list into one pocket of his jeans and the headphones into the other,

  he maneuvered his way through the piled books and stacks of boxes, heading

  for the stairs. He couldn t spend another minute down there with the smell.

  He rubbed the heels of his palms against his eyes, which were now stinging

  furiously. Grabbing the stair rail, he pulled himself up. He needed a breath

  of fresh air or he was going to throw up but, strangely, the closer he came

  to the top of the stairs, the stronger the odors became.

  He popped his head out of the cellar door and looked around.

  And in that instant, Josh Newman realized that the world would never be the

  same again.

  CHAPTER TWO

  J osh peered over the edge of the cellar, eyes watering with the stink of

  sulfur and mint. His first impression was that the usually quiet shop was

  crowded: four men facing Nick Fleming, the owner, three of them huge and

  hulking, one smaller and sinister-looking. Josh immediately guessed that the

  shop was being robbed.

  His boss, Nick Fleming, stood in the middle of the bookshop, facing the

  others. He was a rather ordinary-looking man. Average height and build, with

  no real distinguishing features, except for his eyes, which were so pale that

  they were almost completely colorless. His black hair was cropped close to

  his skull and he always seemed to have stubble on his chin, as if he hadn't

  shaved for a couple of days. He was dressed as usual in simple black jeans, a

  loose black T-shirt advertising a concert that had taken place twenty-five

  years earlier and a pair of battered cowboy boots. There was a cheap digital

  watch on his left wrist and a heavy silver-link bracelet on his right,

  alongside two tatty multicolored friendship bracelets.

  Facing him was a small gray man in a smart suit.

  Josh realized that they were not speaking and yet something was going on

  between them. Both men were standing still, their arms close to their bodies,

  elbows tucked in, open palms turned upward. Nick was in the center of the

  shop, while the gray man was standing close to the door, his three

  black-coated companions around him. Strangely, both men s fingers were

  moving, twitching, dancing, as if they were typing furiously, thumb brushing

  against forefinger, little finger touching thumb, index and little finger

  extended. Tendrils and wisps of green mist gathered in Fleming s palms, then

  curled in ornate patterns and drifted onto the floor, where they writhed like

  serpents. Foul, yellow-tinged smoke coiled and dripped from the gray man s

  gloved hands, spattering onto the wooden floor like dirty liquid.

  The stench rolled off the smoke, thickening the atmosphere with the scent of

  peppermint and sulfur. Josh felt his stomach twist and lurch and he swallowed

  hard; the rotten-egg smell was enough to make him gag.

  The air between the two men shimmered with tendrils of green and yellow

  smoke, and where they touched, sparks hissed and sizzled. Fleming s fingers

  moved, and a long fist-thick coil of green smoke appeared in the palm of his

  hand. He blew on it, a quick hissing breath, and it spun up into the air,

  twisting and untwisting at head height between the two men. The gray man s

  short, stubby fingers tapped out their own rhythm and a yellow ball of energy

  spun from his hands and bobbed away. It touched the coil of green smoke,

  which immediately wrapped around the ball. There was a sparking snap and the

  invisible explosion blew both men backward across the room, sending them

  crashing across the tables of books. Lightbulbs popped and fluorescents

  shattered, raining powdery glass onto the floor. Two of the windows exploded

  ou
tward, while another dozen of the small square panes shattered and

  spiderwebbed.

  Nick Fleming tumbled to the floor, close to the opening to the cellar, almost

  landing on top of Josh, who was standing frozen on the steps, wide-eyed with

  shock and horror. As Nick clambered to his feet, he pushed Josh back down the

  stairs. Stay down, whatever happens, stay down, he hissed, his English

  touched with an indefinable accent. He straightened as he turned and Josh saw

  him turn his right palm upward, bring it close to his face and blow into it.

  Then he made a throwing motion toward the center of the room, as if he were

  lobbing a ball.

  Josh craned his neck to follow the movement. But there was nothing to see and

  then it was as if all the air had been sucked out of the room. Books were

  suddenly ripped from the nearby shelves, drawn into an untidy heap in the

  center of the floor; framed prints were dragged from the walls; a heavy

  woolen rug curled upward and was sucked into the center of the room.

  Then the heap exploded.

  Two of the big men in black overcoats caught the full force of the explosion.

  Josh watched as books, some heavy and hard, others soft and sharp, flew

  around them like angry birds. He winced in sympathy as one man took the full

  force of a dictionary in the face. It knocked away his hat and

  sunglasses revealing dead-looking, muddy, gray skin and eyes like polished

  black stones. A shelf of romance novels battered against his companion s

  face, snapping the cheap sunglasses in two. Josh discovered that he, too, had

  eyes that looked like stones.

  And he suddenly realized that they were stones.

  He was turning to Nick Fleming, a question forming on his lips, when his boss

  glanced at him. Stay down, he commanded. He s brought Golems. Fleming

  ducked as the gray man sent three long spearlike blades of yellow energy

  across the room. They sliced through bookshelves and stabbed into the wooden

  floor. Everything they touched immediately started to rot and putrefy.

  Leather bindings snapped and cracked, paper blackened, wooden floorboards and