The Alchemist's Flame (23 page)

I shrugged. “But back to your question,” I said to David. “I’m not creating magic from nothing. There are ingredients.”

“Mundane things like knotweed and flax oil,” he referenced a few ingredients in the formulas I had discussed. He had a good memory and a quick mind.

“Living things that are part of nature.” I closed my mouth, reminded once more of what Marian had told me. I had always understood, as every alchemist does, that the powerful potions were derived from herbs…or blood. Nature. Life.

Magic.

“Addie?” Rowan’s voice pulled me back to the moment.

My cheeks heated. “Let it sit in my subconscious?”

“That didn’t take long.” He smiled.

“I don’t fully grasp it, but it’s close.” I fisted my hand as if trying to grab something.

“Has my English failed me?” Sebastien asked David.

“No.” He frowned at me. “So you capture magic from the world around you?”

“That works as a basic description.”

“Don’t you mean magical energy?” Sebastien asked.

“No, he’s right,” I said. “I capture magic. Otherwise any ingredient would work. I just suck out the magical energy and convert it to my needs. You are the ones who use the raw stuff.”

“No,” David said. “Our magic comes from within us.”

“If that were the case, you would be born with it, like the necromancers. You wouldn’t have needed the magic to return to give you this ability.” I turned to Rowan. “That’s the difference between Old Magic and New.” It wasn’t that Old Magic had been here first, it was where the power came from.

He nodded. “Yes.”

Necromancers manipulated souls. That bit of magic within each of us. “So, what’s your magical energy source?” I asked.

“Clearly, it’s something that wasn’t here twenty years ago,” Rowan said.

But it was more than just an energy source. It had changed them. Rowan’s eyes had been blue, not to mention, I could capture the essence of his Element within his blood. And Lydia, dear Lydia, had told me that the magical were genetically different.

I paced the length of the table and back, my mind awash with questions, but no answers. And the biggest question of all: could I find a way to tap into this energy source? The possibility excited me, but what would I do with such energy? I wasn’t genetically designed to convert it to something else. As I told David, I could bottle magic, but I couldn’t make it.

I stopped. The azoth. Where did that fit in?

“Addie?” Rowan tried to get my attention.

A loud knock rattled the double doors to the hall.

“Your Grace?” The male voice was muffled, but I recognized James. He must not want to use Rowan’s name since he didn’t know who was in the room.

“Come in,” Rowan called out.

James walked into the room. His dark hair was tousled and he wore only a pair of sweat pants. Had he returned so quickly from his visit with Elysia? He took two strides into the room and stopped. His gaze swept over the others and settled on me.

I moved closer, apprehension unfurling in my stomach. “What’s wrong?”

“My…
brother
has been busy.”

Gavin. No. I closed the distance and laid a hand over James’s silent heart. “Who?” Who had Gavin killed?

“Ian.”

The raw punch of emotion hit me square in the heart, and I covered my mouth with both hands. Oh God. “He’s gone?”

“No.” James gripped my shoulders. “Gavin left him pinned to his workbench.”

I frowned. Okay, unpleasant, but Ian was dead. He didn’t feel pain. “Why do you look so stricken?” I whispered.

“Gavin pinned him to the workbench…

then dismembered him.”

Chapter
23

I
couldn’t get my mind to work. The image was too horrifying. Ian, dismembered and pinned to his laboratory workbench.

“Addie.” Arms came around me from behind, turning me until my cheek was pressed to Rowan’s gray robes. I inhaled his scent and struggled to ground myself in it.

“I need to go,” James said. “She—”

I pulled away from the comfort of Rowan’s arms. “We can’t leave him there.” Alone. Immobile. The horror tried to swallow me again.

James’s hands on my shoulders again jerked my attention back to him. “Elysia is with him.” He released me and raked a hand through his hair. “She’s calling her cousin. I’m to go to her grandmother’s funeral parlor and pick up some suturing thread.”

I realized Rowan’s arm was still wrapped around my waist. I gripped his wrist. Why would Elysia want to sew Ian back together? It would just be cosmetic. Ian didn’t heal. I couldn’t suppress the shudder.

“I’ve got to get back,” James said. “I don’t think Gavin will return, but…”

“Go,” Rowan said.

James nodded, then hurried from the room.

“Wait,” I said. “I want to go with him.”

“I’ll take you to the lab,” Rowan said.

“But—” But what? What could I do to help Ian?

Rowan slipped an arm around my shoulders and steered me toward the door. If he spoke to David and Sebastien, I didn’t catch the words.

I spent the drive to my place wrapped in Rowan’s arms, a situation I might have thoroughly enjoyed if my mind hadn’t been skittering around like a panicked rabbit. A saner part of me insisted that I get a grip and focus. I could fix this. I knew I could, but each time I tried to come up with a solution, my mind snagged on the horror that awaited me at the lab. Ian had been through so much. What if this finally pushed him over the edge?

“Hey,” Rowan whispered. He pressed his cheek to my forehead. “You’re shaking.”

“I can’t focus. I can’t—”

“Shh. Just breathe.” He kissed my forehead.

“He’s been through so much.”

“I know. You’ll find a way to make things right.”

“You think I can?”

“Of course.” His lips brushed my temple. “You’re the one who gave him back his body to begin with.”

I pulled back. “The Final Formula.” Spring was only five weeks away. “I’ll be able to brew it soon.”

Rowan smiled. “See?”

But five weeks?
I
would go insane if I had to wait that long.

I stopped inside the back door of my lab and stared. I hadn’t expected the mess. Shattered glassware, miscellaneous equipment, and loose papers lay scattered across the floor. It looked like every horizontal surface had been swept clear. Every horizontal surface except one.

I forced my feet forward and Rowan’s hand settled on the small of my back. We made our way across the minefield that had been my lab. My lab and Ian’s.

James and Elysia looked up from their places around the far countertop. Livie and, to my surprise, Grams stood at the counter opposite, the one that had been mine, unpacking a bag of equipment. I didn’t attempt to speak to anyone. Glass crunched underfoot as I stopped at the end of the counter. Ian lay on his back on the stainless steel surface. His eyes rose to meet mine, and in those vibrant blue depths, I glimpsed the mindless terror he struggled to hide.

I reached out and gripped his shoulder. “We need to discuss laboratory housekeeping,” I whispered. “I assume those dirty beakers in the sink are yours?”

“Sorry about that, Mistress. I didn’t get a chance to hide them under the cabinet.”

I leaned over and pressed my cheek to his. “Oh, Ian.”

“Please don’t cry for me, Addie.” The words came out in a broken whisper. “That’s one thing I cannot bear.”

And he could bear the rest of it?

I took a shaky breath and straightened, then wiped my tears from his icy cheek. “You’re right. I’m not helping.”

“Hey, I’m trying to hold it together here.”

I forced myself to look at the rest of him. “You’re doing a shitty job of it,” I whispered and gripped the edge of the counter.

“Watch her, Rowan,” Ian said.

“I’ve got her.” Rowan’s voice was soft as he stepped up beside me, his hand settling on my back.

“I’m okay,” I said, ashamed that they were more concerned about me than anything else. “I can do this.”

“You almost fainted the other day when you cut your finger,” Ian reminded me.

“Blood. I don’t do so well with blood.” This wasn’t that bad—if total dismemberment could be considered not
that
bad. Ian’s right arm was severed below the shoulder, and his left arm just above the elbow. The legs had both been cut off above the knees. Maybe it was the absence of blood, but it didn’t look real. If someone had hacked up a wax manikin, it would look like this. The limbs had been placed in their approximate positions, and I wondered if James and Elysia had had to hunt for them within the clutter, or had Gavin left him this way?

“How much suture thread did you bring?” Elysia asked her cousin.

“Three spools,” Livie answered.

“That should be plenty,” Grams said, her tone subdued.

What story had James given them to secure their help? Certainly, neither would want to assist the man who had cursed Elysia’s line of the Mallory Family.

“What are you going to do with the thread?” I asked, trying not to flinch.

“I’ll show you.” Elysia tugged up Ian’s linen shirt, exposing his stomach. He didn’t have the well-defined musculature Rowan displayed, but the muscles were toned and there was no fat on him. Whatever his life involved before he died, Ian had been fit.

“Watch here.” Elysia pointed at the hole to the right of Ian’s navel.

“What made that?” I suspected the wound had been created by whatever had pinned Ian to the workbench.

“Ring stand,” James answered. “We removed two of them.”

I grimaced. “I assume Neil is behind this.” After all, the only place on the mortal plane Gavin was permitted to be was Xander’s basement.

“He must have allowed it, but Gavin’s actions once he got here were his own,” Ian said. “Gavin didn’t like that I made him look like a fool chasing me through the land of the dead.”

Rowan frowned, no doubt realizing that Ian had incurred Gavin’s wrath when he decoyed him away from us last night.

“How did you manage that?” I asked Ian.

“I told you about my childhood.”

“Playing with hellhounds in the land of the dead?”

Livie turned to stare at us, and even Grams’s eyes widened.

I took a breath and continued. “Was Alexander as good at avoiding them as you?”

Ian closed his eyes.

I laid my hand on his chest. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

His eyes opened and God, the pain. His gaze shifted to Elysia, then returned to me. “Some wounds never heal.”

“But some do,” Elysia said, her tone soft. She waved me closer. “Watch.”

Elysia held up her arm, displaying the minor cut on the heel of her hand. “I cut myself removing one of the ring stands.” She squeezed the wound, making it bleed once more. I grimaced, but forced myself to watch as she ran the fingers of the opposite hand through the blood, then rubbed her bloody fingers over the hole in Ian’s stomach. My own stomach clenched when she dipped a finger into the hole.

“Gross, but why?” I asked.

“Just watch.”

I did. For a moment, it seemed nothing happened, then I noticed that the flesh around the wound had begun to pucker.

“Is the hole getting smaller?” I asked.

“Yes.” She rubbed a little more blood on the wound and it shrank even more.

“How does that work?” I studied the blood on her arm. “Does necromancer blood have healing properties?”

“The dead don’t heal.” Elysia looked up, her brow wrinkling. “It seems I have another blood gift.”

Ian frowned, but didn’t speak.

I eyed the wound in Ian’s stomach. It had been the diameter of a quarter; now it was closer to a dime. “This doesn’t seem so bad. So, with your blood and the sutures you can—”

“Won’t work,” Ian said.

“It will work.” Elysia frowned at him, then turned to me. “He’s being a weenie. He doesn’t want me to cut myself.”

“Don’t be a weenie, Ian.” I squeezed his shoulder.

“Do you know how much blood that would take?” he demanded.

I was already considering it. “From a necromancer of Elysia’s strength? All I need is about ten milliliters.”

“Of course.” James smiled. “If you purify the essence of her power.”

“Didn’t I say that you would find a way?” Rowan asked.

I blushed. I was such a sucker for his praise. “Satisfied?” I asked Ian.

“No, but I know when I’ve been overruled.”

I touched his cold cheek and gave him a smile. He might protest Elysia cutting herself, but hope still burned in his eyes.

“A potion then sutures?” Livie asked Elysia.

“Yes, we’ll prep him while Addie makes the potion.”

“Okay.” Livie selected a small set of scissors and moved to Ian’s side. She gave him an uncertain glance, then began to cut away his sleeve. I averted my eyes when she picked up his severed arm to remove the fabric.

“Addie, is she cutting up my sleeve?” Ian asked.

Livie looked up, her expression alarmed. I gave her a wink.

“Brace yourself.” I said to Ian and squeezed his shoulder. “The jacket didn’t make it.”

“I’ve been afraid to look.”

I wasn’t certain if his tortured tone was in jest or not. Ian was very fond of his clothing.

“Wow, is this silk?” Livie rubbed the red brocade between her fingers.

“Yes,” Ian answered her.

“This is exquisite. And the shirt. Hand-sewn Egyptian linen?”

“It was.”

“Beautiful craftsmanship.” She looked up, her expression still uncertain. “I could save the scraps. I might be able to do something with it. I’m good with a needle.”

He smiled. “I hope so.”

“Oh, right.” She laughed, a little color in her cheeks. “Sorry. I’m Livie, by the way. Well, Olivia.” She made a face. “Olivia Mallory.”

“Nice to meet you, Livie. I’m Ian.”

“I gathered that.”

I smiled. I could guess where she got her love of clothing. After all, she was Ian’s granddaughter, too.

Grams moved to Ian’s opposite side, and with the same indifference Livie displayed, began to remove the fabric from his other limb. “I’m Judith Mallory,” she said to Ian. “Livie’s grandmother.”

“An honor to meet you, ma’am.”

Grams nodded at the greeting. “I wished to thank you for helping Livie the other night. She is new to her talent and three zombies were too much.”

“Grams,” Livie complained. “Those weren’t natural zombies. Ask Addie.”

I snorted. “Personally, I don’t find any zombie natural.” The necromancers looked at me. “Sorry. Little humor from the non-magical person in the room.”

“Non-magical, my butt,” Elysia said.

“You noticed that, too,” Rowan spoke up.

Grams and Livie both looked over, smiling politely.

“Um, I don’t believe you’ve met Elysia’s grandmother and cousin,” I said, meeting Rowan’s gaze.

He smiled, understanding what I was asking. “It’s nice to meet you both. Within the magical community, most people call me Rowan. In the public eye, I prefer to keep my identity private, so I go by Flame Lord.”

“Oh my God,” Livie whispered.

“It’s an honor to meet you, Your Grace,” Grams said.

“The honor is mine,” Rowan said. “I’ve heard much about you from Elysia and Addie. Not to mention, James hasn’t shut up about that chocolate cake.”

Livie blushed.

“You certainly missed out.” I gave him a wink. “Now quit trying to score yourself a slice and help me find some glassware that isn’t broken.”

“Perhaps we should check under the cabinet.”

I laughed as he referenced Ian’s quip from earlier. Maybe all of us working together would patch up more than Ian’s physical form.

The wardrobe in Ian’s room thumped closed, and a moment later, Ian appeared in the doorway. He walked with a slight limp, but considering what he had been like a few hours ago, I thought it a wonderful sight.

I caught Elysia’s eye and she smiled, her relief evident. I didn’t call her on it, but she hadn’t left Ian’s side.

“Wow,” Livie whispered.

“You look great, Ian,” I told him.

“Thank you, but I could not manage the tie.”

I didn’t think it looked that different, but what did I know about such things? “Five weeks,” I said. “Then I’ll brew you the Formula.”

“I did not mean to sound ungrateful.” He opened and closed his right hand, frowning at it. “I’ve lost some dexterity.”

“Shall I?” Elysia asked, stopping in front of him. “Ernie, my roommate was a drama major. I frequently helped him with his ties, and they performed
A Christmas Carol
every year.”

Ian nodded. He watched her a moment in silence. “Your roommate was a man?”

Elysia smiled. “Yes.”

“Oh, it’s not like that,” Livie said quickly. “Ernie doesn’t like girls.”

“Trust me on that,” James said, looking up from the last of the glass he and Rowan were sweeping up.

Elysia finished with Ian’s tie and turned to face James. “Would you quit? He did
not
hit on you.”

Ian met my eye and I could tell he was trying not to laugh. He turned to face the small mirror that hung beside the doorway to the stairs. “Perfect,” he said, touching his tie.

“I do have some skills,” Elysia said.

“Yes.” Ian held her gaze.

She chewed her lip, then spoke. “Will you teach me how to use them?”

“I’m assuming you no longer refer to your ability with neckties.”

She ducked her head, to hide her smile, but when she looked up, her expression sobered. “Teach me necromancy?”

“I can do that.”

I gave them a smile and turned away. I had done my part. The purified essence of Elysia’s power had worked a lot better than her blood alone. Suddenly tired, I decided to leave them all to get better acquainted.

“Addie?” Ian stopped me. “You had a phone call from the lady in the genealogy department earlier.”

“Thank you. I’ll give her a call.”

“Addie is researching Ian’s family,” Elysia said to her grandmother. “He was entombed before his children were grown.”

“Well Joseph is—”

“Addie showed me his grave,” Ian said.

“Oh.” Grams pressed her lips together. “I’m sorry. That had to be hard.”