The Blackthorn Key

“That’s the key you seek,” Isaac said. “Take it. It is Benedict’s gift to you.”


This was it. I’d finally found the last of Master Benedict’s message. I stared at it, awed, proud . . . and scared.

Isaac’s hand on my shoulder nearly made me jump. “Be careful, Christopher. What you’re doing is dangerous.”

He hardly needed to remind me how many people wanted me dead. But that wasn’t what he meant. “With this legacy comes a choice you will have to make,” he said. “Knowledge can bring us great wonders, but it can also bring great suffering. What to do with such knowledge is a choice Benedict has always struggled with. In the end, perhaps he could only win that struggle by passing his choice on to you.”

I blinked. “I . . . I don’t understand.”

Isaac sighed. “The person who told you that the killers seek power was correct. The Archangel Michael is God’s general. He leads the armies of heaven in the never-ending struggle against the forces of hell.”

Isaac opened the book with the ouroboros on the cover and showed us an image inside. It was an angel, with flowing hair and spread wings, driving a sword into a dragon.

“To exalt him,” Isaac said, “the Lord gifted Michael with unique power.”

He turned the page to a different illustration. Here, the Archangel stood over twisted, crippled, hellish figures. He held his hand high, and it glowed with holy fire. The demons below burned in God’s light, screaming.

“Just as apothecaries’ healing remedies take many forms, so, too, can the First Matter take many forms. The Archangel’s Fire is the raw essence of the Prima Materia. It is God’s power unchecked.”

Isaac turned to me. “I told you before there was no true cult, just killers who hide behind its name. This aspect of the Prima Materia, the Archangel’s Fire, is what they seek. As bad as their crimes have been, if they find it, things will be much, much worse.”

“Why?” Tom said nervously. “What are they going to do?”

“The battlefields of England used to be covered with knights.” Isaac spread his hands, as if drawing the scene. “Sheathed in plate, they were impenetrable, the lords of the land, the pinnacle of five thousand years of war. Tell me: When was the last time you saw an armored knight?” He leaned against the shelf. “Firearms removed knights from the battlefield. Their armor, the seat of their strength, was useless against simple men armed with black powder.

“Now imagine going into battle with Michael at your side. Gunpowder would be no more sophisticated, hold no more power, than a stone from a sling. The man who discovers the Fire could change the world. And if the wrong people get ahold of it . . .”

He stared into the distance. “An army that walks with the Archangel will be invincible.”





CHAPTER


30


WE RETURNED TO THE CRYPT under the mausoleum in the Mortimer garden. Tom held the torch. I carried the parchment, my master’s key.

After what Isaac had shown us, Tom and I stared at the mural in a new light. We saw the ouroboros, the First Matter, the serpent swallowing its own tail. We knew the figures inside, too. God’s general, the Archangel Michael, driving his sword into Satan, the dragon, as the Devil’s minions writhed below, swallowing darkness.

Armed with Master Benedict’s key, we finally knew the poison to feed them.





VOCABULARIUM ALCHEMIAE


THE THREE PRINCIPLES



salt the contractive force

crystallization, contraction





sulfur the expansive force

dissolution, evaporation





mercury the integrative force

balancing salt and sulphur





THE FOUR ELEMENTS



earth

cold and dry

melancholic





water

cold and wet

phlegmatic





air

hot and wet

sanguine





fire

hot and dry

choleric





PLANETARY METALS



gold / Sun





silver / Moon





iron / Mars





mercury / Mercury





tin / Jupiter





lead / Venus





copper / Saturn





TERRESTRIAL MINERALS



saltpeter





quicklime