Twenty-Four

I hadn’t yet decided how much would be prudent to tell my old friend—that a living gargoyle was living with me, that a murderous alchemist had recently come to town, or perhaps that a book of dangerous backward alchemy was in my possession—when he sent me a second email.

Too much to say over email, he wrote. Checked my schedule and I’ve got a couple of days off work this week. As long as you’re in the U.S., I can catch a flight to see you.

I agreed there was too much to say over email. In person, I would also be able to confirm that he was still the same good man I’d known over a century before. Some things about people change over time, but some don’t. I hoped Tobias was still the pure-souled Toby I’d once known.

We made plans for him to fly to Portland in two days. I also had an email from Veronica, apologizing for the joke she and Ethan had played and saying she’d started work on my website. I sent quick email replies, then practically flew down the stairs in search of Dorian, my sickness nearly forgotten.

“Salut!” the gargoyle said as I came through the kitchen’s swinging door. He hopped down from his stepping stool and wiped his hands on his flour-covered apron. His balance was a little off, with two missing stone toes, but he quickly recovered. “You are well enough to venture to the market! I have made a shopping list.”

“Dorian, I found someone who can help us.” I didn’t even care that flour and some sort of red paste covered a swath of the kitchen walls, including the curtains that prevented curious onlookers from spotting Dorian. I took the list and set it on the countertop.

“You are feeling braver about the magician?”

“No, I found a man I trust.” I accepted a miniature red velvet cupcake from Dorian’s outstretched hand, and told him about Tobias.

“And he will be here in two days?” Dorian asked once I concluded.

“He’s flying in on Wednesday. Can I have another cupcake?”

“Non.”

“No?” That was a first.

“You have not yet eaten lunch.” He gave a sniff. “Have I taught you nothing about being a civilized person in these months we have known each other?”

I threw my arms around the gargoyle.

“Nor have I taught you enough about being dignified,” he mumbled, though he hugged me back. “Your fidgeting is making me nervous, Zoe. I can see you do not wish to be cooped up in the house with me today. I will pack your lunch as a picnic basket to take with you.”

“Take with me?”

He gave a Gallic shrug. “Your friend is not arriving for two days. Plenty of time for exploring more leads that might help us, n’est pas?”

With a heavy picnic basket loaded into the passenger seat of the truck, I drove to the theater. I didn’t know what I hoped to find, but Dorian was right. There was so much going on that if I was well enough to leave the house, I should be doing something productive.

As I approached the theater, I caught a glimpse of Penelope’s distinctive hair. She was driving the SUV I remembered, with Peter in the passenger seat. They were pulling away from the theater.

Should I?

I followed them for several minutes, careful not to get too close in my distinctive 1940s truck. It turned out I was too careful. In a city of narrow bridges with hidden entrances, it was impossible to hang back and still see where they turned. I lost them.

I pulled off the road and realized I was next to River View Cemetery. Could that be where they’d gone? The cemetery land was on a hillside overlooking the Willamette River, near where the sapphire necklace from the Lake Loot had been discovered by the young boys. I put the truck into gear and eased up the winding hillside drive that lead through the cemetery.

I could see why Dorian liked this graveyard, one of the forested areas he frequented under the cover of night. River View Cemetery cultivated a peaceful beauty, from its welcoming walkways and weeping cherry trees to its personalized headstones and mausoleums, each in its own style rather than dictated by the cemetery board. It didn’t have as many ornately carved statues as some, such as Highgate Cemetery in London, but it was calm and hospitable.

I felt myself fading, so I was glad Dorian had insisted on packing me a picnic lunch. My body was too exhausted to carry the picnic basket far, so I found a sunny spot on a patch of cut grass with views of the river, a small grouping of ornate mausoleums, and headstones with loving memorials from families. I spread out a blanket and opened the basket from Dorian. The heaping picnic basket contained enough food for at least four people. I found two homemade baguettes with vegetables flavored with olive and walnut tapenades, an assortment of fruit, a thermos of chai tea, and a large mason jar of homemade green juice made with apple, celery, parsley, spinach, and ginger. I knew what was in the juice because of a handmade label with Dorian’s distinctive French handwriting that adorned the outside of the jar. While he’d taught me many things about transforming food through cooking, I’d taught him the importance of labeling all of one’s transformations.

Though picnicking in cemeteries has fallen out of fashion, the Victorians loved it. Society wasn’t always death-phobic in the way it is today. Death used to be much more integrated into life. It was difficult to dismiss it so easily when it was more common, but it also wasn’t hidden from sight when it did happen. Though sorrow was involved, it was a natural part of life, and therefore it was celebrated as such, in part through beautifully constructed cemeteries.

I wondered how I would one day die. Through violence while helping someone? An incurable sickness? Or simply a car accident I never saw coming? I thought of it often. Though I had achieved a degree of immortality in a more natural way than alchemists who practiced the “death rotation” of backward alchemy, I hadn’t purposefully sought out this aspect of alchemy. Yet I would never end my own life as my old love Ambrose had, when he took his own life after he outlived his son. My life wasn’t easy, but it brought many joys, including many new ones I’d found here in Portland.

The reason most true alchemists seek out the Elixir of Life is so they may live long enough to achieve a greater understanding of life. Especially in past times when life spans were so much shorter, there was so much unfinished business. Therefore a longer life goes hand in hand with alchemy’s quest to turn the impure into the pure. The Flamels used their longer lives and alchemical skills to transmute gold that they gave to charities. I and others I had once known used our herbal healing skills to help others, such as what I’d done for Toby. We couldn’t purify all of the world’s evils, but maybe one day the world would be ready.

I sipped Dorian’s chai tea and wondered what it would be like to see Tobias (as I should now call him, apparently) again, until I was startled out of my thoughts.

I was under the impression that the treasure hunters had packed up and left the area, but that didn’t appear to be the case. Not completely. A fence was in place in an attempt to keep people out of the unstable areas where a minor landslide had occurred due to the winter flooding, but I spotted two men with metal detectors. They were cutting through the cemetery on their way to the steep public lands beyond that had suffered the brunt of the landslide. That was the area where experts speculated the sapphire necklace had come from before it washed down the hillside.

I froze when I spotted a third man with a metal detector. This man stood out. I knew him. A thick head of gray hair that fell to his shoulders and hearty black eyebrows gave him a distinctive look. This wasn’t someone who could be easily forgotten. He was one of the two men I’d seen sneaking around the theater. The friend of the dead man, Wallace Mason.