> “‘The blood of the dragon ignites the heart of infinity,’ he said. ‘Dragon’s blood is in that stone, of this I am sure.’”
Only three months had passed since the fake gold token had exploded in the Greenacre fountain, but in that small space of time it felt like I had undergone a metamorphosis of sorts, and from the looks of it, so had Beatrice.
“Umm, hello to you, too,” I said, as she walked slowly toward Hugo and me. “What do you mean, ‘why am I back so soon?’ I’ve only just found you!”
“You haven’t. You didn’t,” she said blankly. “You were here four days ago. We had a very frank conversation about my vitality serum, you slept outside my tent for several nights, which I thought was weird, and then when I woke up this morning, you were gone.”
“Beatrice,” I said. “None of that happened. I’ve been working with Hugo—he’s a Guild member—all week to locate you. We just flew in from-”
The realization hit me like a ton of bricks, and as much as I didn’t want to know the truth, I asked the question anyway.
“Which me was here?”
Beatrice cocked her head and stared at me, as if trying to pierce through a glamour that wasn’t there.
“Jade, with the red hair. Except she said to not to call her that anymore. Said she had found a more suitable name.”
“And you still thought it was me?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. “Who else would it have been?”
“Jen,” interjected Hugo, “what did you do with the glamour necklace?”
“I put it in my office and closed the door behind it. You don’t think … but no one else can get in there.”
“That’s correct,” said Hugo. “But that doesn’t mean that someone can’t get out from the inside.”
“Did you two come all the way out here to chat amongst yourselves?” asked Beatrice. “I thought you were looking for me. Here I am. What do you want?”
I looked at Hugo, who shrugged, so I tabled the troubling revelation about my office theft and got right to it.
“The Compendium,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.
“Ah,” she said. “Well, then you came all the way out here for nothing. I don’t know where it is. Now, if you don’t mind, I need to get back to work.”
Beatrice turned away from us and shifted her attention and her hand back to the giant tree. Hugo and I stood there in awkward silence, not knowing whether to interrupt her or whether to leave and come back later. There was something … off about my former mentor. It wasn’t just her clothes or her hair. It was the cadence of her voice, like she wasn’t all there. Had the stress of the explosion, Garrett’s surprise divorce, and her flight cross-country finally cracked that hard exterior front she had always labored to maintain?
“What do you mean, you don’t know where it is?”
She ignored me, her focus directed entirely at the tree. After a few minutes of silent reflection, something changed within her posture. She became more rigid, more still, her breathing slowing to a crawl. If I had smacked her on the head, I doubted she even would have registered the blow.
“This is who you thought was going to help you?” asked Hugo. “She’s lost her damned mind, trying to talk to a tree.”
“It wasn’t like … she’s clearly not herself. You weren’t there that night.”
“Neither is that version of her,” he replied. “Are you planning on waiting here all day?”
“Maybe,” I said. “I’ve got nowhere else to be.”
“That makes one of us,” said Hugo. “I’m needed elsewhere, so if you are going to-”
A guttural suddenly cry rang out, disturbing the peaceful forest like a lightning bolt crackling down from the sky. If there had been a flock of birds nearby, they all would abruptly taken flight. Hugo and I covered our ears to block it out, but it was useless. I crouched down in pain, as the sound overwhelmed me and when I finally forced my eyes back open after it had stopped, I saw the still-stoic Beatrice standing there, just as she was. Except something was different.
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Her hand was glowing.
It was faint at first, a blue shimmer that could have been confused for the sun’s rays reflecting through the canopy. But then it grew both in size and brightness, enveloping her palm as if she was charging up a fireball in a video game.
“What … what is she doing?” I asked Hugo, who looked as if he had just seen the ghost of a long-dead family member.
“You never mentioned this,” he said gruffly.
“I don’t know what ‘this’ is!” I hissed. “She never told … I never saw her do anything like that before.”
The blue glow continued emanating from Beatrice’s hand and spread up her arm and across her body. I was reminded of the purple power she had siphoned from her ring, enabling her to punch through solid stone, but it was absent from her fingers. Whatever this was, it was something new.
As was the green glow that had suddenly appeared on the portion of the tree that Beatrice was touching. She had noticed it too, as her stance had changed just slightly and her catatonic face now bore the makings of a snarl. The strength of the arboreal opposing force continued to grow, and so too did Beatrice’s resolve. Sweat formed on her brow and I didn’t know whether to shout words of encouragement or run as far away as I could.
The green and the blue kept pushing against each other until their combined output threatened to overwhelm my retinas. Even with my hand covering my eyes, I could still see the battle raging before me, like two samurai trading blows but unable to land the kill stroke. Not even the earth around us was immune, as I felt rippling tremors pushing against my feet.
Beatrice broke her silence and screamed, and I realized that the first shriek earlier hadn’t been from her, but somehow, the tree, which now echoed its opponent.
Finally, a blinding flash erupted from the nexus of colors, which cascaded out into the forest, throwing Hugo and me onto our backs when it reached us. I tried to get to my feet, but found that the wind had been knocked out of me, and so I crouched on the ground for several minutes while I recovered.
I looked over to where Beatrice had stood moments ago, only to find an immense cloud of dust suspended in the air, blocking my view. The tree still towered above us, so whatever she had tried to do thankfully hadn’t sent it crashing down. Hugo stumbled over to me and offered his hand, before a coughing fit doubled him over, and instead I helped pull him back upright. We stared at each other, not knowing what to say or what to do. Even with all I had witnessed since my initiation into the world of alchemy, this encounter had shaken me in a way I hadn’t felt before, and I wondered if Hugo shared that sentiment.
A figure appeared within the dirt mass and a few seconds later, Beatrice herself emerged. Her face looked ashen and drained, as if she had poured her life essence into that blue glow. Blood dripped down from her nose and poured forth from her attacking hand. But the most visible sign of her encounter was the gray streak of hair that was now interlaced within the black strands. She hobbled toward us and I wasn’t sure if she was going to make it the last several feet. Before I could reach her side to steady her, she stopped in her tracks and stared blankly ahead.
“I failed,” she whispered.
And then she collapsed.
----------------------------------------
The woman who had attacked the largest known tree in the world lay asleep in her cot of a bed, a damp towel pressed against her forehead. She had been sleeping since we had dumped her onto the mattress last night, after carrying her along the trail back to the car and then another hour and a half of a silent ride “home.” Looking around the spare house, Hugo had decided as soon as we had parked that a random Airbnb was a better option, and he had departed in silence and had not yet returned. To be honest, I wasn’t sure if he was actually going to return.
He was shaken by what he had seen out in the forest, that much was certain. After Beatrice had fainted, Hugo rushed us away from the General Sherman Tree within seconds, as if it was about to uproot itself and attack. He had said little during the trek down the mountain, only mumblings of “unnatural” and “forbidden” here and there.
At half past 11, he finally returned, a tray of coffees in his hands.
“Here,” he said, handing me one of the drinks. “Had to drive halfway back to Fresno to get these.”
“I was a few minutes away from renting my own car,” I said, sipping the lukewarm brown liquid and resisting the immediate urge to spit it out. “You sure you weren’t just deciding whether to bolt altogether?”
Hugo checked his watch and grimaced.
“Of course not. Plus, the plane won’t be ready until tonight at the earliest. Thanks again for that.”
“Don’t mention it,” I said. “What are you tracking now?”
“None of your damn business,” said Hugo, before turning away and staring out the window.
“Fine, sorry I said anything. Was just curious.”
“Yeah, and I was just hoping not to cross paths with a thaumaturge this decade.”
“A what?” I asked.
“He means me,” said Beatrice, who stumbled into the living room and nearly fell over before I braced her over my shoulder and sat her down on the loveseat next to the couch I had slept on.
“I don’t understand,” I said.
“What else is new?” said Beatrice and Hugo almost at the same time.
“Oh, now you two are a comedy duo?” I said, shaking my head.
“A thaumaturge is an alchemist who relies on forbidden sources of prima materia,” said Hugo.
“They didn’t use to be forbidden,” Beatrice replied, rubbing her temples and clearly still not recovered from her ordeal in the forest.
“Yes, that’s correct,” said Hugo. “So you’re not totally ignorant about the world you are trying to upend.”
“I’m not trying to upend anything,” said Beatrice. “I was minding my own business when the Guild came after me. So excuse me for wanting to defend myself when you assholes try to kill me for a third time.”
“Where did you get it?” Hugo asked.
“Do you really want to know?”
“Yes,” he said. “I need to understand who I’m dealing with.”
“So you can do what? Report me to the alchemy police? In any event, it’s gone. Used up. Didn’t think that tree would fight back. Should have known better.”
“Yes, you should have,” said Hugo. “The brazenness of attacking an Ancient and thinking you could waltz out of there with its power. I’ll ask you again, where did you get that blue?”
“Where else?” Beatrice said with a chuckle that made her grab her ribs in pain. “From people.”