“Niccolo Machiaveli stood apart from the rest of the crowd, arms lightly folded across his chest, careful not to wrinkle his Saile Row- tailored black silk tuxedo. Stone gray eyes swept over the other bidders, analyzing and assessing them.”

“Niccolo Machiavelli folded his arms across his chest and looked at the alchemyst. “I always knew we would meet again,” he said in French. “Though I never imagined it would be in these circumstances,” he added with a smile. “I was certain I’d get you in Paris last Saturday.” He bowed, an old-fashioned courtly gesture as Perenelle joined her husband. “Mistress Perenelle, it seems we are forever destined to meet on islands.”“The last time we met you had poisoned my husband and attempted to kill me,” Perenelle reminded him, speaking in Italian.Over three thousand years previously, the Sorceress and the Italian had fought at the foot of Mount Etna in Sicily. Although Perenelle had defeated Machiavelli, the energies they unleashed caused the ancient volcano to erupt. Lava flowed for five weeks after the battle and destroyed ten villages.“Forgive me. I was younger then, and foolish. And you emerged the victor of the encounter. I carry the scars to this day.”“Let us try and not blow up this island,” she said with a smile. Then she stretched out her hand. “I saw you try to save me earlier. There is no longer any enmity between us.”Machiavelli took her fingers in his and bent over them. “Thank you. That pleases me.”

“When in doubt, we follow our hearts. Words can be false, images and sounds can be manipulated. But this...' He tapped his chest, over his heart. 'This is always true.”

“Don’t be creative. Don’t be stupid.”“That’s what Machiavelli said. You guys really have a lot of faith in me, don’t you?”“Neither one of us wants to lose you. Just be careful, Billy. Careful is my middle name.”Black Hawk rolled his eyes. “You told me it was Henry.”

“Here it comes," Niten said. The whites of his eyes,his teeth and his tongue had turned blue."Ready," Prometheus said.Nicholas Flamel touched the green scarab he now wore around his neck and felt it grow warm in his hand.The spell was a simple one,something he had performed a thousand times before, though never on such a large scale.A red-skinned head broke the surface of the water...followed by a second...and a third...and then a fourth head,black and twice as large as the others appeared. Suddenly there were seven heads streaking toward them."Let's hope no one if filming this," Niten murmered."No one would believe it anyway." Prometheus grinned. "Seven-headed monsters simply do not exist.If anyone saw it,they'd say it was Photoshopped.”

“The promise given was necessity of the past: the word borken is a necessity of the present" -Niccolo Machiavelli”

“The small Japanese immortal sat cross-legged, his two swords resting flat on the ground before him. He folded his hands in his lap, closed his eyes and breathing through his nose, forcing the chill night air deep into his chest. He held it for a count of five, then shaped his lips into an O and blew it out again, puncturing a tiny hole in the swirling fog before his face.Even though he would never admit it to anyone, Niten loved this moment. He had no affection for what was to come, but this brief time, when all preparations for battle were made and there was nothing left to do but wait, when the world felt still, as if it was holding its breath, was special. This moment, when he was facing death, was when he felt completely, fully alive.He’d still been called Miyamoto Musashi and had been a teenager when he’d first discovered the genuine beauty of the quiet moment before a fight. Every breath suddenly tasted like the finest food, every sound was distinct and divine, and even on the foulest battlefields, his eyes would be drawn to something simple and elegant: a flower, the shape of a branch, the curl of a cloud.A hundred years ago, Aoife had given him a book as a birthday present. He hadn’t had the heart to tell her that she’d missed his birthday by a month, but he had treasured the book, the first edition of The Professor by Charlotte Bronte. It included a line he had never forgotten: In the midst of life we are in death. Years later, he’d heard Ghandi take the same words and shift them around to create something that resonated deeply within him: In the midst of death life persists.”