Alchemist

  He turned and walked in silence back to his chair. Conor watched him sit down and felt a moment of doubt. Be careful. Rorke was playing his game; a grand master trying to find a chink in his anger and succeeding.

  Almost.

  You bastard.

  He would see the glow of the setting sun below the lodestone at the mouth of the cave. Three or four minutes, that was all, before darkness began closing in. Conor could feel the tightness in the air. His thoughts strayed to Monty. Nearly twenty-four hours since he had seen her.

  He sat on the stone floor. Rorke’s head was framed against the orb and a chink of sky was visible now beneath the lodestone. Tiny coils of smoke from the incense rose either side of him. The camera, he remembered. Take a photograph while there’s still light. So that I can prove to the world that this place really exists.

  He slipped the camera surreptitiously from his pocket and brought it swiftly to his eye, framed Rorke centrally and pressed down. The camera jerked wildly in his hand as if it had been hit by something. There was a smell of burning plastic; the top of the camera was glowing red hot and was melting in his hands.

  Startled, he dropped it to the floor; the back sprang open and the film fell out. Thick, acrid smoke rose up as the casing sparked and crackled.

  Rorke was looking at him and smiling.

  Conor glared at him, struggling hard not to curse. Rorke wanted to get him angry, to make it a confrontation of force against force. That was how his mother had tried to beat them, and she had lost. She had warned him that their power would be too much and she had been right.

  Tonight he was using a different power. The same power, he was certain, that God had used against Satan. It was not brute force, or his omnipotence, that had won, it had been cunning. Whether he could do the same he did not know. He could only try.

  Rorke was quiet now, absorbed in his ritual. Conor folded his hands in his lap, closed his eyes and began the meditation of the Thirteen Portals that he had learned by heart. He felt his metabolism slowing down, sensed the darkness gathering outside, drawing the last remaining rays of light out from the cave. The bats had quietened and the cave was silent and still.

  The chill air was numbing his body. Suddenly he was standing at the edge of a lake. High above him he heard a scream. Charley Rowley, on fire, was hurtling down into the lake. He hit the water and vanished in a cloud of steam, with a solitary, terrible cry.

  Conor’s eyes sprang open. Although it was dark, he could sense Rorke smirking. The smell of incense was overpowering. Rorke was messing up his mind, trying to block his concentration. He closed his eyes, willing himself to stay calm.

  Resist no evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

  He resumed his meditation. Mind over matter. Mind over body. For twenty minutes he meditated without interruption, gradually slowing down his heartbeat. Counted it down. Sixty-five. Fifty-five. Forty-five. Thirty-five. Down. Twenty-five. Down. Fifteen. Ten. Five. One.

  One beat a minute.

  Held it there. One beat a minute.

  He felt a blast of hatred from Rorke, but made no attempt to resist it; instead, he absorbed it like a sponge. Images taunted him. His father plunging through the window. His mother spinning wildly, screaming incantations. Conor absorbed them all, sucked them in, allowing himself no emotional reaction. His ears were filled with a venomous babble of voices, strange tongues, incantations. His father. His mother. Reproachful, crying, frightened, lonely in death.

  One beat a minute. That was the only thought he allowed himself. One beat a minute. His mantra. He lost all track of time. Occasionally he could sense Rorke’s presence intruding, the rustle of his clothes, his nervous, ponderous breathing. Then, gradually, he began to sense the looming presence of something approaching.

  One beat a minute.

  There was a new sound, a gusting wind that whistled like the call of a giant bird, rising to a crescendo, then dying. Moments later it returned, rising in strength. It swirled several times around the walls of the cave with a low moaning howl then departed.

  It was here.

  One heart beat a minute. Outside there was a crackle that sounded like rain. But it wasn’t rain, it was wind, shaking the trees, the bushes, hurtling sand and dust and pebbles against the rocks. The crackle increased into a ferocious rending that sounded like thunder, then the wind burst into the cave, came at him from every direction, rocking him, tearing at his hair, trying to rip him from his seat. He moved to cover his face but his arms were frozen to his side; he was rooted.

  One beat a minute.

  The wind cut through his clothes, blowing harder, colder. Grit stung his cheeks, his hands. It was as if he were in the centre of an exploding bomb.

  Then he heard a voice, raised into a screech. Rorke.

  ‘Nema. Olam a son arebil des

  Menoitatnet ni sacudni son en te.

  Sirtson subirotibed

  Summittimid son te tucis

  Artson atibed sibon ettimid te

  Eidoh sibon ad

  Munaiditouq murtson menap

  Arret ni te oleac ni

  Tucis out satnulov taif

  Muut munger tainevda

  Muut nemon rutecifitcnas

  Sileac ni se iuq

  Retson retap.’

  Conor listened, absorbing every word. Though his metabolism had slowed right down his brain was clear, razor-sharp, and he knew immediately what Rorke was doing. The Lord’s Prayer, in Latin, in reverse.

  More incantations followed. The wind strengthened with each one, rocking Conor. Then a gust, the strongest yet, flung him sideways on to the floor. He lay there, his concentration barely disturbed.

  One beat a minute.

  Resist not evil. Absorb the energy. Resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

  Absorb.

  The Bible said to bend with the whirlwind. Bend, not resist. If you allowed yourself to bend, you did not break.

  Conor waited where he lay, pliant and absorbent. The wind tossed him across the floor, against the wall, then it picked him up and hurtled him across the cave. He crashed into the far wall with a bang that jarred every bone in his body, then thumped, in agonizing pain, on to the floor.

  One beat a minute.

  He lay still. A figure loomed out of the darkness, swept down at him, a hideous fluorescent figure in flowing robes with a skull for a face and goat horns rising from his head; it drew its face close to Conor’s, staring at him with socketless eyes and breathing fetid breath from its half-jawed rictus grin.

  ‘Conor, why didn’t you listen to your mom?’

  It was his father.

  He shrank back in terror. His concentration slipped. The skull pressed close to his flesh, whispered, ‘She warned you, Conor. She warned you so often. Warned you that you did not know what you were getting into.’

  His heart was thumping. Breathing too fast, much too fast! Concentrate! Draw it in, absorb! He closed his eyes, forced away the image, ignored the wind which picked him up and slammed him face-first into a stone step. Ignored the searing pain in his nose and the taste of blood in his mouth. One beat a minute one beat a minute one beat a minute.

  One beat a minute.

  ‘What’s up, Molloy? No fight? No spunk?’ Rorke was yelling at him. ‘Come all this way to get battered to pieces? Still conscious, are you, Molloy? Still happy to be here? Thinking about your little floosie?’

  Conor drew in Rorke’s voice, stored the venom, gave nothing back.

  One beat a minute.

  ‘Lot of things you don’t know, aren’t there, Molloy? I wonder who’ll be fucking her after you’re dead and gone? I wonder who’s fucking her tonight?’ Rorke’s voice cracked a fraction.

  The temperature in the room dropped sharply. The air filled with a banshee shrieking. Incantations in a hundred different tongues, all directed at him. He absorbed them calmly, filled up cavities in his brain with
them. He looked into the blackness; could see nothing. There was a sudden rattle and hailstones the size of marbles blasted his head, his face, his hands. The temperature rose, to a searing, choking heat. Then it dropped again. Wind came at him from every direction and he was lifted up, spun around and around in a vortex, slammed into a wall and crashed to the ground.

  One beat a minute.

  He waited. The wind lifted him again, high up; he felt the beating, spiny wings of bats on his face, felt their claws, their beaks, his ears filling with their buzzing, shrieking, whistling, then he was slammed to the ground again.

  One beat a minute.

  He clung to the thought; held his heart motionless.

  Beat.

  Long pause. Held it. Held it deeply, dearly, held that one thought in his mind and no other.

  Flames singed his face.

  Beat.

  Rorke’s enraged voice rang out. He was shrieking, venting anger, and Conor absorbed it, took it in, every word. The floor and the walls of the cave shook with a deep rumble like thunder. Then there was a lull. Rorke was tiring. He could feel it. The lull. Silence. You are old, Rorke. You are old and tired and out of practice. You have relied too much on your henchmen. You’ve lost the edge, lost your supreme powers…

  NOW.

  One hundred beats in one second. Conor’s heart was exploding like a jackhammer. Every scrap of wind, every ounce of energy in the cave that he had drawn into his body, every incantation, the heat, the cold, every ounce of Rorke’s rage, of his own rage that had been building for years, he powered out in that one second, powered at the dark hulk on the chair in the centre of the room, blasted it through the psychic shield of the pentagram.

  ‘Ayaaaaaayaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!’

  Rorke’s scream rang out through the darkness. Moments later a terrific sheet of lightning erupted in the centre of the cave. He saw Rorke glowing a vivid electric blue. Orange and green light arced around him. His hair shot up like spikes. His eyes bulged. His veins popped on his forehead. Fissures appeared in his cheeks. His clothes rippled and came apart at the seams, burst open. His arms flung outward, and cracks appeared in the skin of his chest and belly as if he were made of clay. His intestines began to uncoil like a serpent freeing itself from its nest.

  Then a sudden, bright light flashed, as if a bomb had detonated inside him. He glowed translucently for an instant, white hot, and screamed once more, a howl of agony that filled the entire cave and seemed to roar out into the night sky beyond. Then Conor’s ears went numb as a massive shockwave hit them.

  In sudden silence he watched Rorke explode into a vortex of wild, jagged streaks of electricity that raced out in every direction through the cave. Then they faded, until they had burnt themselves out.

  Then darkness again.

  Total silence.

  Conor lay still for several minutes. He tried to push himself to his feet but he had no strength. He crawled towards where he thought the door lay and fell sideways, his hand slithering in something wet and slippery. He laid his head down on the stone floor and closed his eyes. He had nothing left to give; he was drained, emptied. Nothing left to do now but curl up and wait to die.

  Slowly, sound began to return to his ears. In the distance he heard a babble of strange tongues. Faint, like a whisper at first, then getting louder.

  His last conscious thought was of Monty.

  135

  Israel. Monday 12 December, 1994

  A bird twittered.

  Slowly he forced his eyelids open. Beyond the outside entrance to the cave Conor could see a pink dawn sky. He lifted his face up off the floor and the movement was painful. His face felt puffy and his nose hurt. His mouth was parched.

  He staggered to his feet and swayed, one shoe on, one shoe off. The cave felt warm, quiet; it seemed to be filled with a deep, welcoming glow.

  The stone chair on which Rorke had sat had shattered and lay in pieces across the floor. There was a stain on one part of the wall, dark red like dried blood. Near it was a smaller stain. He saw a Rolex watch, the face smashed and twisted almost in half. A solitary sand-caked shoe lay upside down on the far side of the cave. Rorke’s. There was more blood beside it and what looked like a piece of splintered bone with skin attached. He saw a ragged strip of pin-striped cloth. Another strip of skin.

  Then he saw Rorke’s holdall close to the steps where he had been lying. He looked inside. There were two canteens, one full. He drank deeply, then stopped, knowing that he must ration himself for the walk back.

  His body, although aching and sore, now surged with energy. He looked around, up into the darkness, at the walls, down at the shattered throne. He was alone, but he did not feel lonely. The forces that yesterday had awed him and scared him now fuelled him and gave him strength. He was wanted here now. He belonged here. He looked up at the symbols on the walls, looked at the steps, then something caught his eye on the floor and he walked over to it.

  It was a gold pendant, in the shape of a frog’s head, on a chain. Conor picked it up and examined it. There was something rather vulgar about gold, he thought, dangling it by its chain.

  Everything depends on how you look at it, Molloy. You look at me and you see a monster; I look in the mirror and I see a gentleman.

  No, Rorke, he thought, no way. No gentleman would ever wear this. He carried it out through the cave, past the stake wedged into the crack in the rocks and threw the pendant hard out into the valley. He turned away before it had even dropped from sight, walked back towards the Cave of Demons.

  His cave, now.

  He saw his shoe just inside the entrance, slipped it on and tied the laces. Then he strode confidently into the cave. At first he kept outside the pentagram, then he shrugged, stepped over its outer circumference and walked slowly to the centre, and stood there in silence.

  Rorke’s words came back to him.

  … everyone thinks they can handle this thing – this power that you’re trying to wrest from me here, tonight … But there’s no longer good versus evil in this world. Good versus evil has become bad versus evil. You try to change, but in the end it’s you who gets changed, Molloy. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely …

  He walked out of the pentagram, feeling uncomfortable suddenly. It was dawn outside and the air would be cool. There were a good couple of hours before the sun reached its full heat. He should start now, he thought. Right now.

  There was a car waiting where the taxi should have been and Conor felt a beat of apprehension. It was a white Mercedes but it did not look like a taxi.

  When he was still a good quarter of a mile off, the driver’s door opened and a man in a brown suit with short hair and aviator glasses got out and hailed him with a formal, business-like wave. It was Major Gunn, he saw, as he came closer.

  Gunn opened the rear door of the car and held it for him, subserviently. ‘I thought there might be a problem, sir – if the taxi that brought you here dropped off two people, and only one returned …’

  ‘And you didn’t know which one it would be?’

  ‘No, sir.’ Gunn allowed the trace of a smile.

  Conor slumped on to the back seat. The door closed. Gunn started the engine and the cold air of the air-conditioning filled the interior. Conor lay back, absorbing it gratefully, then took the cold bottle of mineral water that Gunn passed him and drank until it was almost drained.

  Gunn drove for some minutes in silence. Then he said, quietly, ‘I’m glad, Mr Molloy. I’m very glad.’

  ‘I’m pretty glad too,’ Conor said, wryly. He lay back in the seat and closed his eyes.

  Rorke was wrong. It was possible to change things. If you were determined enough.

  He glanced through his lashes at Gunn’s face in the mirror. The test lay ahead. Was it possible for bad people to become good? Or for good to become bad?

  Grief lay ahead also. He needed to allow himself the time and the space to grieve properly for his mother. And then, some tim
e after that, he was going to sweep Monty up in his arms and carry her off to a quiet corner some place and tell her they were going to marry. It wasn’t going to be a question, it was going to be a statement.

  He finished the bottle of mineral water and started on another, which Gunn passed him automatically. He cradled it in his hands, pressed it to his cheeks, rolled it around his face, trying to chill off some of the heat from the sun.

  His eyes were raw from the glare and his hands were sunburned and hurt badly. He looked down at his clothes: his jacket was ripped in several places, three of his shirt buttons were missing and there was blood on his tie. Have to get a new suit, he thought and wondered, with sudden irrational concern, how they would find a decent men’s outfitter.

  Glancing out of the window again and back at the mountains, he remembered a line from a poem he had read years before. It was from Shelley, he thought. Yes, Shelley.

  Sometimes,

  The Devil is a gentleman.

  He smiled.

  EPILOGUE

  Saturday 27 June, 2002

  ‘Mack, time to go, we’re outta here!’

  Mack Molloy looked up for a moment at the sound of his father’s voice, then, his face screwed up tight in concentration, he stuck the crayon in his mouth and sucked on it as though it were a pretend cigarette, before adding some touches to his drawing with it.

  Monty smiled. Mack was forever making her smile. She watched him in his tracksuit bottoms, sweatshirt, mop of blond hair flopped forward, his face and hands smeared with crayon. He seemed to spend most of his time in a world of his own, quietly observing, drawing, thinking. Sometimes she worried that he thought too much, too deeply for a five-year-old. He bombarded her with questions about how things worked, about who God was, and about death. He was particularly interested in death.

  ‘Mack! C’mon, fella, got to get ready, got Alec’s birthday party to go to!’ Conor shouted.