The Enchantress (The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel)

mouths. The ancient texts glowed orange, then red and finally blue, thickening and sinking below the surface like veins beneath skin.
    Prometheus was ablaze. His aura streamed from his body in helixes of power, bathing the statues . . . bringing them to life.
    Tsagaglalal had been the clay statue closest to Prometheus. One moment she was without consciousness, and the next she existed. Opening slate-gray eyes, she was instantly aware of her surroundings. The heat awakened memories, thoughts and implanted ideas—she knew who she was. She even knew the name of the figure feeding her raw burning energy.
    She was Tsagaglalal.
    She lifted her arm and a sliver of hardened clay fell away and shattered on the ground, revealing dark flesh beneath. She brought the hand to her face and flexed her fingers, dirt crumbling from them.
    Behind her, a second statue, a male, shifted slightly, and a slab of clay fell away from his torso to expose rich golden skin beneath. She turned stiffly and looked at him. Memories that could never have been hers gave her his name. This was Gilgamesh, and together, they were the first of the First People.
    Prometheus’s aura had brought them to life. It had kept Tsagaglalal alive for many, many millennia.
    And Prometheus’s aura burned within her still.

    Tsagaglalal sat cross-legged on the Golden Gate Bridge, with her back to the city. Prometheus and Niten lay stretched out by her side. She had arranged them with their feet pointing toward the city so that when she sat between them, she would be able to touch their foreheads.
    Pressing both hands against her stomach, Tsagaglalal breathed deeply and felt heat bloom within her. Her white jasmine-scented aura was touched by a suggestion of anise and burned with the merest hint of red.
    Tsagaglalal’s age was not measured in centuries or millennia, but in hundreds of millennia. She had seen the rise and fall of countless civilizations and had explored endless Shadowrealms, lived entire lives on worlds where time flowed differently. There was so much she had witnessed, so much she had done, and yet there was one great mystery whose answer had always eluded her: who had created her? Prometheus had brought her to life, but who had carved the human-sized clay statues and then placed them in the Nameless City?
    After millennia of searching, she was still no closer to the truth. Even her husband, the legendary Abraham the Mage, had been unable to answer the question. “And maybe you will never know,” he’d told her once. “But what I do know is that you are here for a reason. You and your brother were meant to be found. You were meant to be brought to life by Prometheus. Perhaps one day you will discover the reason for your existence.”
    And now, sitting on a cold damp bridge on a summer’s evening in San Francisco, Tsagaglalal believed she might have discovered that reason.
    Intense heat flowed through her body, down her arms and into her hands, which were cupped, left hand atop right hand, in her lap. Her fingers glowed, the tips burning red, then yellow and finally white-hot. Her fingernails melted and a thin gelatinous fluid leaked from her fingertips and dribbled into her hands.
    The smell of jasmine was gone now, replaced by the thick cloying odor of anise.
    Tsagaglalal looked down. A puddle of rich bloodred aura shimmered in her palm. With infinite care, she lifted it . . . and then stopped. It was not enough. She’d used too much of her aura earlier, rejuvenating herself; she only had enough aura for one.
    But which one?
    Tsagaglalal looked from Niten to Prometheus and then back to the immortal. She liked him. He was quiet and unassuming, and yet she knew he had a reputation as a fearsome warrior and a man of honor. He was remarkable: he had gone into battle against the Spartoi, knowing that he would probably not return. He’d been prepared to sacrifice his life to save the city. He deserved to live.
    Tsagaglalal looked to her right: Prometheus was an Elder. Surely in the battle ahead, his powers would prove more useful? And much more importantly, Prometheus was, in many respects, her father. His aura had given her life, and now it was only right and proper that she should return the gift to him.
    Tsagaglalal blinked and suddenly there were tears on her face and the world dissolved into rainbow fractures. She had only ever cried once before, and that was when Danu Talis had fallen and she’d lost her husband.
    “I’m sorry,