to it as possible when you activate your powers and make the Philosopher’s Stone. The two energies combined trigger the Blackening,” Simon said.
Donna took a steadying breath. It all seemed so far away, almost unreal. She tried to focus on one thing at a time. It was like a math problem. Okay, so she hated math, but she could get by if she concentrated.
“So, just what is the fifth ingredient?” she asked. And how much more complicated could things get? That was the question she really wanted to ask.
Quentin fixed Donna with a serious expression. “The fifth ingredient will prove the most … challenging.”
She laughed, but the sound came out angry rather than amused. “I already have to go to Hell to get the Gallows Fruit. You’re saying there’s something more difficult than going to Hell?”
Miranda joined in, nodding. “The fifth ingredient is a mystery. That’s the point. No living creature knows what it is—every copy of the Silent Book has a blank space where that item should be listed.”
“Or,” Rachel put in, “perhaps it’s been blurred or erased with magic. No alchemist in modern times has been able to figure out what this ingredient is. It’s believed that only the spirits of the dead have the information, and of course not all of them. Only those who reside in the Otherworld, Demian’s realm.”
Miranda pulled her briefcase onto her lap and began to open it. “Which could be where this comes in.” She produced what looked like a lump of polished black stone. It was flat, and roughly circular in shape, lying in her hands like something innocuous yet potentially filled with dangerous power.
The object looked remarkably like John Dee’s scrying mirror, which Donna had seen photographs of on the British Museum’s website.
“I thought that was destroyed in the fire along with everything else!” She couldn’t keep the excitement out of her voice.
Miranda’s lips twisted into a smile. “You don’t really think that the Order of the Crow would leave original alchemical artifacts unprotected in a public museum, do you? Dr. Dee’s work was certainly controversial, but it was also important. We keep his true grimoires safe—along with this.”
Donna nodded. “His scrying mirror.”
Quentin and Simon exchanged glances. It was the Archmaster who spoke. “Donna, it will have to be you who uses the mirror to contact the Otherworld spirits. Since you hold the prima materia, it will make the communication that much easier. None of us here are mediums.”
Donna remembered that John Dee had to work with a medium named Edward Kelley in order to contact the “angels” and spirits whom he sought alchemical knowledge from. Some stories said that Kelley was a fake, nothing more than a charlatan, while others seemed to indicate he was very much the real deal. Donna also recalled reading a theory that while Dee and his medium thought they were contacting angels, they were in fact speaking with demons.
Of course, she had to go and think about something like that right now. She sighed, gazing at the glossy black surface of the scrying mirror where it rested on Miranda’s lap.
Her mentor tucked her blonde hair behind her ears and fixed Donna with a serious expression. “This is a powerful artifact, but only as powerful as the seer who wields it.”
Donna shook her head. “I’m no seer.”
“Although I hate to agree with the Demon King on anything,” Miranda replied with a smile, “I think you’re going to discover that you are capable of far more than you believe.”
Quentin nodded agreement, although his face was filled with concern.
“Okay, hand it over,” Donna said. “I’ll try communicating with the dead while you guys continue your war council.”
The Archmaster pushed himself painfully to his feet, shaking off Simon’s supporting hand. “I’ll get you set up in my study, then leave you some privacy. Spirits are often more inclined to speak when they don’t have an audience.”
“What about all those public séances you see on TV?” Donna asked.
He raised his eyebrows. “What do you think?”
“Ah … ” She joined him at the door.
Quentin turned back to the room’s occupants. “When I return, I suggest we move upstairs, to a larger space. Other alchemists will be arriving soon.”
There was a murmur of agreement behind her, and the sound of people gathering their things together as Donna followed the Archmaster.
This is my life now, Donna thought. She hated it, but maybe if they could get though this—impossible as it seemed—
she could finally be free.
She gripped Dr. Dee’s scrying mirror in her