The Alchemist's Illusion Read online

  Setting the bag and stalk of brussels sprouts on the kitchen counter, Dorian retrieved the stepping stool. The three-and-a-half-foot-tall gargoyle had originally been carved for the gallery of gargoyles at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, as part of the 1850s renovation by Eugène Viollet-le-Duc. The architect then realized that Dorian was too small to be seen from the ground, so the gargoyle was cast aside for the larger chimeras that now adorn the cathedral. It meant Dorian was also too short for the height of an average kitchen counter.

  The sight of a gargoyle cooking in my kitchen had taken a bit of getting used to. Dorian resembles the famous Thinker gargoyle now atop Notre Dame, with similar horns and snout. His horns now wriggled more freely, and his wings were soft, like the feathers of a phoenix risen from the ashes. Though unlike a bird, he couldn’t fly.

  “Superb,” he said, sniffing the pears. His snout crinkled in ecstasy. “I am beginning to think the Elixir reinvigorated my senses. Not taste, but smell. The olfactory senses are the strongest. You experience them both when you smell the aroma before taking a bite, and also right before you swallow. It is as if I have been rescued from a desert island where I lived only on coconuts and the water I captured by condensation … before being rescued by a prince who is secretly my father.”

  “Have you been watching daytime television soap operas again?”

  Dorian crossed his arms. “If a certain alchemist would get me the books I requested from the library, I would not have to.”

  “My library account was suspended for defacing library books.”

  Dorian gasped. “What have you done, Zoe?”

  I scowled at the gargoyle. “It’s your doing. It’s all the cookbooks you’ve written in.”

  “But I am fixing them! How can one properly capture the complex flavors of a stew without deglazing a pan? Or use garlic without letting it rest? Or—”

  “I know, Dorian, but you can’t write in library books.”

  “But—”

  “For any reason.”

  He looked at me thoughtfully for a few moments. “What if a recipe would poison someone?”

  “You found a poisonous recipe?”

  “No. Not as of yet. But this would be an exception, no?”

  I sighed. “If you find poison, you can fix it. But that’s it. All right?”

  He relaxed his arms and studied my face. “What is wrong, my friend?”

  “I’ve had the strangest evening.”

  “You have broken Max’s heart?”

  “What? No! Why would you say that?”

  Dorian shrugged. “You are home earlier than expected. I understood you were having dinner with Max.”

  “I didn’t want to see him while I was upset, because I didn’t want to lie to him.”

  “Nor to see him when your hair looks like you have run through a field of brambles.”

  I ran a hand through my hair. It’s cut at an angle and falls well above my shoulders. Since it’s naturally bright white, I keep it cut stylishly to make it look as if I dye it to be trendy.

  “What has upset you?” Dorian asked, blinking up at me.

  “I saw a painting that looks like Nicolas Flamel. Before I could look more closely, I had to run away—because a woman accused me of killing someone.”

  Dorian’s clawed hand flew to his mouth. “C’est terrible! For an alchemist, you are not very good at hiding.”

  “I got out of there, didn’t I?”

  “True.”

  Dorian pushed open the swinging door and disappeared into the living room. I followed in time to see him peeking carefully through the curtains we always kept drawn.

  “Les flics have not descended,” he declared. “I see no police cars. I believe you are safe. Why do you attract such inopportune people? And I understand why you believe you saw Nicolas in a painting. It is because of the letter he left you. But it is no use, Zoe. You cannot decipher it. Even after you used heat to recover more of the ink, it revealed nothing more.”

  Over the past several months, I’d tried everything I could think of to raise the ink beyond the few visible words. Dearest Zoe, If you find this one day … I hope you can help. All my efforts had achieved was showing darker versions of doodles in the margins. But now …

  I swore. It seemed so obvious now.

  “Dorian, it really is a painting of Nicolas. And I was wrong about the methods I’ve been using to raise the ink. That portrait tonight showed me how I can decipher his note.”

  four

  1597, Prague, Bohemia

  The artist squinted at the painting, arm outstretched with the brush in hand, then frowned. The shadows …

  “Your methods are fascinating, Philippe,” a voice from behind said.

  Coarse bristles slipped across the flax canvas, transforming the deep blue of the sky into a sickly puce.

  “I have never seen paint like yours,” the interloper added.

  Philippe Hayden glared with fury at the man who’d entered the studio. It had taken the painter a full week to transform the green malachite crystals into Egyptian Blue. And this painting had been turning out so well, a true representation of alchemy.

  No matter. When you knew how to transform minerals into pigments as well as Philippe, you could create more precious Egyptian Blue. It wouldn’t do to offend the visitor, Edward Kelley.

  Edward was an enigma to Philippe. The man’s ears had been sliced as a message he was not to be trusted—his crime was some form of fraud, Philippe had heard—yet he still charmed his way into courts. Edward was the only alchemist in Rudolf II’s court who’d ever had a kind word to say about Philippe. The others dismissed the painter as an uncivilized barbarian or an eccentric at best. An eccentric! In the court of Bohemia, of all places, where the “Mad Alchemist” king’s mood swings were infamous, peacocks roamed the castle grounds, and alchemists’ workshops lined a prominent street within the walls of Prague Castle. Yet it was Philippe Hayden who was considered eccentric.

  “You were supposed to bring me Dragon’s Blood,” Edward said. He didn’t look or act his forty years. Only a few flecks of gray threaded the thick brown hair that fell to below his shoulders.

  Philippe frowned. There wasn’t much cinnabar left to create the dark orangey-red paint that could transform dull sunsets into dramatic ones. Cinnabar, fancifully known as Dragon’s Blood, was precious to both artists and alchemists. Philippe set the paint brushes in a solution of vinegar and handed the thumb-sized chunk of cinnabar to Edward. “I lost track of time.”

  “What are you painting?”

  “Before it was ruined?” Philippe stopped speaking before saying something even more regrettable.

  “Surely you can fix the sky. I did not wish to startle you, but it was as if you were in a trance.”

  It’s called concentration, the painter wished to tell the dilettante. “This is an alchemist’s workshop at sunset.”

  “A creative interpretation,” Edward murmured. He looked over the painting, then took his leave.

  Philippe bolted the heavy wooden door. It wouldn’t do to have people able to enter without warning. Nicolas Flamel had been right. Secrecy was essential for both of them. The painter smeared more dirt-colored paint under bright blue eyes and cinnabar-colored hair, wishing they were duller and less apt to draw attention, then checked the lock again.

  Philippe turned back to the canvas and its hidden alchemical messages. These teachings were not the obscure codes that required an insider’s knowledge to be deciphered; they needed only an observer’s interest and intelligence. That way, anyone worthy—not just hand-selected men—could discover alchemy’s secrets.

  Sharing this arcane knowledge through art was what had ostensibly brought Philippe to Prague Castle. Yet there was a deeper, secret reason why Philippe was there. One the artist had not admitted even to Nicolas Flamel.

/>   five

  “The note from Nicolas doesn’t use physical alchemy,” I continued as Dorian stared at me, becoming more animated as I spoke. “It uses the concepts of alchemy, not the science. I’ve been using physical chemistry and alchemy to try and raise faded ink. But what if this wasn’t a straightforward letter that faded? I think the message was disguised all along.”

  Dorian narrowed his eyes.

  “You’re skeptical, I know. But this—”

  “Non. You are right. It is a sound theory. I was simply contemplating what to cook with this new bounty.”

  I laughed and wrapped my arms around Dorian. I hadn’t felt this hopeful since finding the note. “Go ahead and cook. You can keep me company here in the kitchen. I can do my experiment right here. I’ll be right back.”

  Dorian hopped up on his stool, deftly lifted a chef’s knife, and began dicing turnips. Next to my old wooden cutting board was a glass bowl of acidulated water. That’s the fancy name for water mixed with a little bit of acid, such as lemon juice, to keep certain fruits and vegetables from turning brown before the cook is ready to use them. The bowl was filled with sliced apples. I looked forward to sampling whatever creation he was making.

  Dorian had taught me just how similar alchemical transformations are to culinary transformations. Both involve organic matter reacting to what’s put into it. And as with cooking, the personal intent one adds to alchemy makes all the difference.

  Filled with anticipation, I left the kitchen and headed for my basement alchemy lab.

  When most people think of alchemy, they think of medieval men hunched in a dark workshop turning lead into gold. I never got the hang of that, perhaps because I didn’t care enough. My strength was extracting a plant’s essence to create a purer version of its healing powers.

  Since alchemy was a precursor to modern chemistry, alchemical tools share a lot in common with what you’d find in chemistry labs. My basement lab was where I’d tried everything I could think of to raise the faded ink in Nicolas’s note. I’d increased the temperature of the ink and paper with different heat sources, bathed and starved the ink of light, and changed the alkaline balance of the paper. Yet each of those experiments was about chemical transformation. As I now realized, I’d been approaching it all wrong. It was an artistic transformation I needed.

  I retrieved the note from where I’d left it locked inside a cabinet drawer and hurried back up the stairs. I pushed through the kitchen’s swinging door, held the faded paper flat in my hand, and raised it to eye level.

  “What are you doing?” Dorian asked. He’d moved on to mincing onions.

  “Anamorphosis,” I said, squinting at the paper. Nothing. I rotated it 90 degrees.

  “What is that, Greek? I wish you would speak Latin like a civilized person.”

  Since the strange alchemy book that had originally brought Dorian to life had been written in Latin, it was his first language.

  “It’s an art term,” I said. “The most famous example is the sixteenth-century painting The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein the Younger, where he painted a skull that you can only see if you view the painting at a sharp angle. Philippe Hayden’s paintings used the same technique.”

  I held the note parallel to the floor but at eye-level. The paper was slightly lumpy from the experiments I’d done on it, so I kept shifting it, looking for a way to make the lines turn into something more. I’d assumed the faint sketches behind the writing were simply old unfinished doodles from Nicolas’s quirky mind; paper was a lot harder to come by in those days. But perhaps, just as Hayden’s artwork contained hidden layers of meaning that were revealed with shifting perspectives, so too did this note.

  “Hold this.” I handed Dorian the paper and ran to the attic, taking the stairs two at a time.

  Hayden wasn’t as famous as Michelangelo or other Renaissance painters, but I knew his work well because of the Flamels’ interest. The artist had painted alchemical subjects more accurately than any painter of the time. That had raised controversy amongst alchemists because they felt such paintings released the arcane knowledge of their secret art into the world more freely than was wise. Nicolas and Perenelle liked Hayden’s work because they understood that telling the truth about alchemy, through artwork, was the right thing to do. Unlike most alchemists, they believed that sharing this level of true knowledge wasn’t opening the floodgates. Representing true alchemy in art was not directly handing people the Philosopher’s Stone and the Elixir of Life. People still had to work to achieve those goals through personal transformation. Hayden’s work included enough clues to lead interested, worthy individuals to the books that would reveal more.

  I reached the attic and flung open the steamer trunk that sat beyond the organized shelves. The room held the inventory for my online business, Elixir, where I sold items I’d accumulated over the years in order to keep myself going financially. I’d only ever managed to transmute stone minerals into a few ounces of gold, so I’d tried various things over the years to make enough money to live in the ever-changing world. I was an apothecary for many years, but I tended to give away more medicines than I sold because I’ve never been good at turning away someone in need. That’s when I began saving the simple items that took on more value over time. During the decades I traveled around the United States in my Airstream, I sold small items at flea markets, but after buying my fixer-upper in Portland, I’d sent for the larger items I’d been keeping in storage in Paris. And that, of course, was how Dorian found his way to me.

  I cast aside my Victorian Vampire-hunting kit and an unruly stack of World War II trading cards. A glint of light in the far corner of the trunk caught my eye. The cylindrical mirror would do the trick. I tucked it into my pocket and hurried back down the stairs.

  “There.” I held the curved mirror to the paper, revealing the sketches to be letters. “Dorian, listen to this.”

  The words came in and out of focus as I held the paper and mirror in unsteady hands. I read the words in the old French they were written in.

  “I might not survive, but if I do, I will be imprisoned … I am not afraid to die. But I fear for the world if I do not complete this important task. I must prevent … You must … stop them … You will find … ”

  Dorian’s horns drew together, the equivalent of scrunching his brow in confusion. “Your mentor spoke like Yoda?”

  “It’s missing some words. Some of the ink really has faded too much to read. And the wrinkles in the paper aren’t helping.”

  “Read it one more time, s’il vous plait,” Dorian said.

  As I complied, he wrote the words on the notepad he used for shopping lists. “Maintenant, I have an idea.”

  He tossed onion skins into the compost bin, dried his hands on a kitchen towel, and hopped off his stool. He opened a drawer and removed a rolling pin and motioned for me to hand him the note. With the paper in one hand and the rolling pin in the other, the gargoyle marched over to the dining table, where he began to roll the fragile paper with the wooden pin.

  If it had been anyone besides Dorian, I would have objected. But he used cooking tools with a softer touch than I used to think possible.

  “We make a good team, you and I,” he said, handing the flattened paper back to me with pride. “Try again with the mirror.”

  “I might not survive,” I began reading again, “but if I do, I will be imprisoned … I am not afraid to die. But I fear for the world if I do not complete this important task. I must prevent … You must … stop them … You will find … ” I broke off and gasped. “There’s another line! In the Philippe Hayden painting.”

  I’d been right about the portrait. It was by Philippe Hayden. And it contained a clue to the whereabouts of Nicolas Flamel.

  six

  Dorian kissed the rolling pin. “I have always told you my high-end cooking supplies were worth it. I have enabled your first b
reakthrough. I am glad you have a clue to find Monsieur Flamel.”

  How had the painting ended up in Portland four hundred years after its creation? Dare I hope Nicolas was still alive?

  “What was the dangerous task he mentions, and how did his portrait come to be here?” Dorian asked, echoing my own thoughts.

  “All this time,” I murmured, feeling my throat constricting. “All these years when I never heard from him, it wasn’t because he’d abandoned me and lost his humanity—it was because he was either dead or imprisoned.”

  Who was he asking me to stop? What information had Philippe Hayden hidden in the painting? And what had become of Perenelle? Nicolas hadn’t mentioned her in the legible portion of the note I could read.

  “Do not look so forlorn, mon amie,” Dorian said. “You are the person who taught me to have hope, and it is why I am alive today. You will find Monsieur Flamel, and I will find my stolen alchemy book. Alas, I have not seen any signs of it yet.” Dorian pointed his rolling pin at the pile of European newspapers sticking out of the recycle bin. “But I have hope.”

  Backward alchemy was a dark alchemy that used unnatural shortcuts and had claimed many lives. We’d put an end to it, but Dorian felt responsible that we couldn’t entirely close that chapter of our lives while the book still existed.

  “The book is harmless now,” I said as I grabbed my silver raincoat.

  Dorian frowned. “You are leaving to be with Max now?”

  “I’m going to see the painting again first, but yes, then I’m going to see Max.”

  Dorian clicked his tongue. “I have read enough novels to know what it is to be in love. Max is in love with you. It is clear you mean the world to him. Yet you can never tell him the truth about yourself. It is impossible. Mark my words. If there is one thing you must fear, it is that the man who loves you will be your downfall.”