An Excerpt from The Alchemist’s Kiss by AR DeClerck
Icarus knew he was lucky to have friends such as these. He’d saved them both once upon a time, and they’d both saved him in return. He’d been set on a dark path before he’d found Archimedes dying in a London back alley. Without his friendship, Icarus had no doubts he might have turned his magic on himself in a few month’s time. Cora had appeared to him as a vision on the hill at Gettysburg. The sunlight winking off the red of her hair and calling to him. He’d been tired of it all by then, and she had renewed his purpose. He’d sensed a power in her even then, and the fact that she owned the diabhal laimhe could not be by chance.
“I am worried.” he admitted at last.
Both sets of eyebrows went up. He was not a man beset by worries on a normal day. He looked away from their eyes and down at his hands.
“When we returned to London after the war I began to feel another magic near.”
“That long?” Cora’s gasp was quiet. “Is that why you shut yourself away from us?”
“In part.” Icarus poured himself another cup of tea and sipped it as he leaned back. Now that he’d begun his tale he knew he would have to finish it. “After Gettysburg I was….”
He trailed off and the room was silent except for the ticking of Archimedes’ clockwork.
“After Gettysburg I threw myself into training my protege.” He smiled at Cora briefly. “But I was tired. Tired of magic and demon-hunting. Tired of death.”
Archimedes nodded, and Icarus could see that, he, too, recalled the senseless violence of the American Civil War. They’d traveled to the states in pursuit of a demon, and had gotten caught up in the death and destruction of the battle.
“Soon I began to feel something when we would walk the streets of London. Some invisible eye that watched me from afar. Another wizard.”
“But London is your territory!”
He smiled at Cora’s outrage. It was true that he’d claimed the city of London as his own when he’d expelled the dark wizards living there and had taken the city under his protection.
“Indeed.” Archimedes sat back and crossed his arms over his chest. The gold of his metal arm winked in the firelight. “There aren’t many wizards with the power to confront you.”
“Not many.” Icarus agreed. Because he’d been bonded to his magic on a soul-deep level, he had more control over it than most. Spells and alchemy came easily to him, and his magic was eager to do his bidding.
“Whoever it is, they’ve been sending the demons into London.” Cora stirred a bit of cream into her coffee and frowned at Icarus. He hated to see the lines crease her forehead as she worried over it all. “They were controlling the ones we saw last night. Whoever this Master is.”
“I believe so.” Icarus leaned his head back on the chair as it continued to pound. He’d become increasingly weak as the other wizard’s presence had become more and more pronounced. Every time he used the power of the rune on his palm it took his body longer and longer to recover.
“But you’ve discovered something.” Cora drank deeply of the coffee, and he could feel her eyes on him. “We’ve not been out at night in months, but last night you insisted that Belch Alley was the place to be.”
“Tell us what has you worried, Ic.” Archimedes’ hand was warm on his forearm. He raised his head to look at his friend.
“I believe I have discovered the identity of the wizard we’ve referred to as the Master.”
Cora put her cup on the table and patted her lips with her lacy napkin. “Well spill it then, Icarus. We haven’t all day.”
He sat forward, and from their worried glances he knew he was as pale as he felt. He trembled with the effort it took to appear nonchalant.
“The wizard in London is my father.”
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