The Alchemist's Flame

by Andre, Becca

  “Dumb move, Addie,” George said from behind me, his hand tightening around my throat.

  “Did you really think your pretty friend could get the drop on a couple of Hunters?” Henry asked.

  I must admit, I’m disappointed, Ian’s voice spoke in my mind.

  “What the—” Henry didn’t get to finish the statement as Ian reached up and gripped his forearm. A loud pop and Henry screamed.

  Still gripping Henry’s arm, Ian slung him aside. He did it with such ease that I jumped when Henry slammed into the bars at the front of his cell. He hit so hard, I expected to see dents in them.

  “I expected more of a challenge,” Ian said, tugging his black dinner jacket straight. The portal shimmered open, and Ian turned toward it.

  “Don’t move,” George said. “I’ll crush her wind pipe.” His fingers dug into my throat and I gagged.

  “Then I’ll kill you both,” Ian said coolly.

  “Perhaps, but she’ll already be dead.”

  Ian let the portal wink out.

  Henry groaned and rolled onto his side.

  “What are you doing here, alchemist?” George asked.

  “Brian,” I croaked around the pressure on my throat.

  “Brian’s dead,” George said, his tone flat. “The suits took him out of here and killed him.”

  “Not…PIA,” I rasped. “Neil.”

  “What?”

  “It would be easier for you to understand her words if you released her,” Ian said.

  Was it my imagination or had Ian’s eyes lightened? He could only use his magic when there was something dead to animate, and Henry was moving on his own.

  “And deny myself the pleasure of wringing her neck?” George asked. “I’ve waited a long time for this.”

  “George,” Henry whispered. “He’s not human.”

  “Not anymore,” Ian agreed.

  Henry rolled onto his hands and knees. Well, hand and knees. He cradled the other arm against his chest.

  “He’s as strong as James,” Henry added.

  “Stronger, I would wager,” Ian said. “I’ve been dead longer.”

  “There’s only one grim,” George said. “He’s a lich.”

  “Lich king,” Ian corrected. “But you are incorrect. There is another grim. That’s why we’re here.”

  “Neil used…Brian’s body…resurrect Gavin.” My words were a rough whisper under the pressure on my throat.

  “Gavin,” George repeated.

  I couldn’t decipher the emotion in his voice, if there was any emotion at all. He and his brothers had spent a little quality time with Gavin in the land of the dead last December. James had left them there before he brought them here.

  “I need…something of Brian’s,” I whispered. “To scry for Gavin.”

  “Why, so you can take him for your own?” George’s grip tightened. “Fucking alchemists.”

  “Do you feel that?” Ian asked.

  “What?” George demanded.

  “On your calf. It’s a pair of black widow spiders—or what’s left of them. I found them beneath your bunk, dead.” Ian’s eyes faded to white.

  “Necromancer,” George whispered. Apparently, he didn’t know what a lich king was.

  “They haven’t been dead long. Their venom is still potent.”

  George snorted. “Dead spiders. Is that the best you got?”

  Ian laughed, the sound so devoid of mirth that I shivered.

  “Hurt Addie, and I will not only kill you, I will Make you. And like those decaying arachnids I forced to drag their nearly limbless bodies up your trouser leg. I will do the same to you. How long will your Hunter’s spirit survive trapped inside a rotting, immobile torso?”

  My breath came in shallow gulps, and not only because of the pressure on my throat. One glance in Ian’s cold, white eyes and there was no denying that he meant every word.

  George released me.

  I took a hasty step away from the bars of his cell and turned around.

  George shook out his pant leg and a pair of dark shapes tumbled out. I didn’t get a chance to see if they were actually black widows before George crushed them with his shoe.

  A grunt from Henry, and I glanced over to watch Ian pull him up on his knees.

  “What are you doing?” George demanded.

  “Getting what I came for.” Ian ran his finger across Henry’s upper lip, through the blood dripping from Henry’s most likely broken nose.

  Ian released him and pulled a vial from the pocket of his dinner jacket. With unhurried care, he wiped his finger across the mouth of the vial, depositing the blood he had collected. He capped the vial, then stuck his hand through the bars, offering it to me. He looked over my shoulder and took a step closer, his eyes narrowing.

  I turned in time to see George throw something down the corridor.

  Glass shattered on the far end and I whirled to face the sound. The pane in the door at the end of the hall sported a fist-sized hole. A siren began to wail and lights came on overhead.

  George laughed. “I dug that brick out of the wall a while back. I had been planning to use that to brain a guard, but this will work.”

  “Addie?” Ian gripped a bar with his free hand.

  The door at the end of the corridor flew open before I could answer, and a pair of PIA agents ran into the hall, their guns aimed at my chest. One man’s eyes went wide. “It’s that alchemist.”

  So much for making a run for it.

  “Do you want me to—” Ian began.

  “No. Get out of here.” I wasn’t going to let Ian hurt these men. They were only doing their job.

  “But—”

  I looked over at him, still behind the bars of Henry’s cell, holding the vial of blood. “Take that and go.” I lowered my voice. “These men answer to Rowan.” I wasn’t in any danger.

  He held my gaze a moment, then nodded. The portal opened and he vanished into it.

  “What was that?” one agent asked.

  “Don’t move!” The other guy kept his gun trained on me. “Radio the chief,” he told the other guy. “Tell him we have the Flame Lord’s alchemist.”

  I gave the guy a glare and raised my hands, palms out and shoulder high.

  “Looks like we got a new cellmate,” George said.

  I rotated my hand, trying to ease the pressure of the handcuff binding my wrist to the chair I had been sitting in for the last half hour. A couple of agents had tried to play good cop, bad cop with me, but when my half truths failed to give them the response they wanted, they’d left me alone. I suspected I had been left to stew in my anxiety over what they were going to do to me, but I wasn’t too worried about that. My concern walked through the door fifteen minutes later when Director Waylon led a gray-robed Element into the room.

  “I believe this belongs to you,” Waylon said waving a hand at me.

  “Excuse me?” I spoke up. “I don’t belong to anyone.”

  “Thank you for releasing her to me,” Rowan said, ignoring my outburst.

  Waylon handed him a small set of keys—the ones to my cuffs, I assumed. “She wasn’t alone,” Waylon said. “Her accomplice got away.”

  “I know,” Rowan said, bending over my cuffs. “He called me and told me where she was.”

  “So you have no problem with your people breaking into my building?”

  “He’s not mine and I do have a problem with what they did.”

  The cuff snapped open and I rubbed my chafed wrist. “It’s not—”

  “You can explain yourself later,” Rowan said, his tone cold. He handed Waylon the keys. “I’ll take her now.”

  Waylon crossed his arms, his frown deepening as he glanced between us.
“When are you ever going to let me in, Your Grace? We’re on the same side.”

  Rowan stopped beside him and laid a hand on his shoulder. “You’re in deep enough.”

  “How about if I study alchemy? Would that make me part of your world? Then maybe I would truly be able to do my job.”

  “I would prefer you didn’t study alchemy,” Rowan said. “I have enough alchemists to watch.”

  “Ha ha.” I pushed up out of my chair.

  “Why did you break into my building?” Waylon asked me.

  “I had a few questions for those bozos in your basement.”

  “His Grace had only to call. I would have arranged it.” Waylon sounded so beaten down, I almost felt sorry for him.

  “His Grace isn’t a fan of my interrogation methods.”

  Waylon pressed his lips together, but didn’t comment. Rowan didn’t comment, either, and he maintained his silence as he led me out of the PIA offices to the limo waiting outside. He ignored the cameras and reporters that seemed to magically appear each time he visited the PIA in his robes. He waited by the door until I had climbed inside.

  I settled on the white leather seat across from him as the limo pulled away.

  “Well?” I said after we had ridden a few moments in silence.

  “Come here.” Oddly, he didn’t sound angry, but he hadn’t pushed back his hood, so I couldn’t judge his expression.

  “You can ash me just fine from over there.”

  “Come here, Addie.”

  I frowned.

  “Do I need to say please?”

  “No, that would just freak me out.” I got up and moved over to sit beside him. “Why aren’t you yelling at me?”

  “I’ll get to it.” He reached out and ran a hand along my jaw, tipping my chin upward. His fingers lightly brushed the tender skin of my throat. “Ian said he almost lost you.”

  “Ian exaggerates.” I reached up and pushed his hood off his head, so I could see his face. He frowned, a faint ring of orange around his pupils.

  “If they had hurt you, I would have burned them. Slowly.”

  My heart rolled over and I bit my lip to hold in the smile. He still cared. After he left last night without saying goodbye, I had begun to worry.

  “And then I would ash that damn lich for letting you get yourself into that situation.”

  I pulled back. “He told you it was my idea?”

  “He didn’t have to.”

  I huffed out a breath. “Damn it, Rowan. It’s not like I—”

  He pressed a finger to my lips. “I told you: I’ll yell at you later.”

  “Maybe I want to yell at you now.”

  His hand slid around behind my neck, his fingers twining in my hair. “Later.” He pulled me toward him and leaned down to cover my mouth with his.

  My hands came to rest on his chest. I really should push him away and put a stop to his usual heavy-handedness. Instead, I slid my arms up around his neck and kissed him back. God, I missed this. I missed him. He had spent most of the last six weeks out of town, meeting with the different Element families, organizing the summit. That is, when he wasn’t with Colby, trying to teach him control. And when Rowan was in town, all we had done was argue about Ian.

  “It’s not fair to try to end an argument like this,” I said.

  “What’s that saying? All’s fair in love and war?”

  “Which is this?”

  “I think we’re still hashing that out.”

  I leaned back to look him in the eyes. “I don’t like fighting with you.”

  “I don’t like it, either.”

  “Then stop.”

  He frowned. “So, I’m to blame? I wasn’t the one who let that lich sneak me into a PIA holding cell.”

  “I wasn’t in a cell.”

  “And this is the point you wish to argue?”

  “I don’t want to argue at all, remember?”

  “You were nearly strangled and ended up detained by the PIA. If I hadn’t spoken for you, you would have ended up in a cell.”

  “Well, that would make one fewer alchemist you would have to watch.”

  Rowan sighed and leaned back.

  I considered returning to my original seat when Marlowe, the limo driver, made a quick lane chance that would have thrown me onto the floor. I glanced out the window in time to watch him take an exit. “Where are we going?”

  “The airport,” Rowan said.

  “Why?” Was there something from the fire yesterday that needed clearing up?

  “David and Sebastien are flying in.”

  “David. Isn’t he—”

  “The European Fire Element. Sebastien is air.”

  The Elemental convention. They were starting to arrive.

  “Why did you go to see James’s brothers last night?” Rowan returned us to the previous topic.

  I sighed. Might as well get this over with. “I was also hoping to find something of Brian’s so I could scry for Gavin.”

  Rowan sat up straighter. “You are not going after him.”

  “We can’t leave him out there.”

  “You will not do this alone—or with that lich. I’ll go with you, or James.”

  “James.”

  Rowan frowned.

  “What? Your magic doesn’t work on a grim.”

  “Fine. I’m assigning James to you until this is resolved.”

  “You need him. What if Neil gets wind of the summit?”

  “James stays with you.”

  “I’ve got Elysia. She claims she can summon James if Gavin shows up.”

  “Elysia Mallory. The lich’s great-granddaughter.”

  “There are a few more greats in there, and she hates him more than you do.”

  “Then she has some sense.”

  I glared at him. “In other words, I don’t.”

  “He preys on your compassionate nature and he’s damn good at it.” He reached over and took my hand, surprising me. “We will never agree on this. You need to fulfill your oath and send him on his way before he really hurts you.”

  “Then help me. Find out where Xander’s ancestor is buried.”

  “You want me to damage my working relationship with the city’s most powerful necromancer on the word of a two-hundred-year-old lich who holds a grudge against his ancestor. The whole thing could be made up. It sounds made up.”

  “He exists. Neil and Xander were talking about him.”

  Rowan looked over at me. “You personally heard them?”

  “Yes, and they called him by name. Alexander Nelson, the original Deacon.”

  Rowan frowned, his gaze shifting to the scenery flashing past the window. “Even if he does exist, that doesn’t mean he did what Ian claims.”

  I groaned and slumped against the seat. And Rowan wondered why I took these risks. I had to. He didn’t believe me—and I had taken a blood oath to learn the truth.

  He leaned against the seat beside me, and neither of us spoke for the duration of the ride, though he continued to hold my hand. The whole situation left me miserable.

  We pulled into the airport fifteen minutes later. Rowan removed his robes and requested I remain in the car since my face was so recognizable. I agreed, though I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had been excluded. It was silly, but after watching Waylon express the same, it made me wonder.

  Rowan returned almost half an hour later. I’d found a pen and a few napkins, and had spent the time scribbling down a potential finder’s potion that incorporated both Hunter’s blood and the azoth. I hurried to gather my napkins from the seat beside me so Rowan could sit down. His companions took the seat across from us.

  “Gentlemen,” Rowan said once
Marlowe had closed the door. “Allow me to introduce my alchemist, Addie Daulton. Addie, this is David and Sebastien.”

  I internalized the teeth grinding over the my alchemist comment. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Likewise,” Sebastien said, giving me a big smile. His blond hair wasn’t as light as Era’s, but he had the same amber eyes. “It is a pleasure to meet the little lady who has so shook up the magical community here in the States.”

  I grinned, amused as much by the words as the way he spoke them. “You’re French.”

  “Indeed, mademoiselle.” He rattled off something in his native tongue.

  I glanced over at Rowan who was watching us with cool amusement. “What did he say?”

  “He said your charms haven’t been exaggerated.” The other man, David, answered for him. He spoke the words with a proper British accent that I wanted to think conveyed disdain. But I was probably reading too much into it.

  “You speak French, as well?” I asked him.

  “Enough to get by.” His expression didn’t change; he simply regarded me with cool, gray-blue eyes. The eyes surprised me. Both Rowan’s and Colby’s eyes were gray and charcoal. David didn’t fit the mold, though his short blond hair might shade toward red-blond. I would have to see it in the sunlight to be sure.

  “I’ve always wanted to learn another language.” I glanced over at Rowan. “I assume I don’t know any other languages.”

  He gave me a small smile before turning to the other men. “Addie suffers from amnesia.”

  “That is terrible,” Sebastien said. “An injury?”

  “No, potion. My Grand Master wiped my memory to steal a formula.” It was strange that Rowan hadn’t shared that.

  “Such a thing is possible?” David looked to Rowan when he spoke.

  “When you get a chance, I would like you to sit down with Addie and let her tell you about the things she is capable of. Your part of the world has a strong alchemic history. It’s not something you should ignore.”

  “But the alchemist is untalented,” Sebastien said, glancing between the two men. “This is true?”