The Alchemist

"Elder Man Holding a Star" by Goce Ilievski

The world was ending.

Merciless, primordial magics swirl into a maelstrom vortex, connecting the sea to a sky filled with dark foreboding colours. A cataclysmic storm beyond the control of any remaining Gods—beyond the control of any man-made weapons.

Prophesied by seers for decades. Our ruin. Our Ragnarök. 

But there was hope. For in each prophecy laid bare a chance to survive.

‘Let the child of March rise, his hands our last hope, from which lead flows gold, and from which annihilation flows life.’

Turning base metal into gold? Turning our end into a beginning?

It was clear: the world needed an alchemist.

And so, the Gods and their many people turned to me, the last surviving alchemist. But I was old and frail, no longer a child, and barely able to spin gold like my early days. Undoubtedly, the prophecy was for another.

At the Gods’ mandate, I began to test, presenting a bowl of mercury to every man and every boy born within March. There were thousands, if not millions. But I worked my way through them all with a singular realisation.

Our saviour hadn’t been born yet.

It was a waiting game that even the Gods prayed for an end to. Their desperation to try and keep their immortality sent the world into a violent frenzy every March.  

I knew then, that if a boy ever did present as an alchemist, the Gods would corrupt and destroy the poor, young soul. Which had meant there was only one course of action…

Disappear.

For years I remained hidden, a master of shadows. My bowl of mercury and desire to save this world was a fixture of my past.

As all things must end, I planned, like others, to face the end of the world when it decided to come. But when the equinox of March passed on the same day as a solar eclipse, and only a single child was born across the world, my plan changed.

Standing in front of the boy, cradled in his mother’s arms, my bowl of mercury churned into the yellow brilliance of gold. From that point on, there was hope.

I was no longer the last alchemist.

It was easy enough to forge the boy’s birth certificate, giving the family and the boy a chance to grow in peace and comfort, knowing a mother’s love and a father’s discipline, away from the Gods and their manipulations.

But six years was all I could give them, for the storm of all our ends drew ever closer. And there was more to alchemy than turning base metals into gold.

Now, another six years later, with all my knowledge and wisdom passed on, I stand on the cliff with our last hope. I stare in horror as the storm pushes the sea forth to swallow an entire coastline of houses.

Seeing him shiver in the pelting rain, I clasp his shoulder, trying to offer him comfort. “You can do this, Ivan.”

Wide, brown eyes belonging to a twelve-year-old look up into mine, before flinching under a flash of lightning. Thunder so loud, so close, cracks terror into the boy. His small hands fling to his ears to try and drown out not only the sounds of the storm, but the screams of his people as the unrelenting vortex swirls inland.

He is breaking. But I can offer him strength.

Clasping his other shoulder, I kneel in front of him. “It’s ok. It’s ok,” I soothe. “I’ve taught you everything I know. Such will you have; such power over this world. Don’t you remember the last six years?” I give him a playful smile through my grey, bristly beard. “You’ve transmuted storms before. Even healed infected wounds, and helped dying trees blossom one last time.”

With every reminder and word of comfort, he relaxes. His shoulders are no longer by his ears. His heart rate no longer forces him to suck in short, quick breaths.

“You can do this,” I tell him.

Finally, he grips my forearms back, nodding. “I-I c-can do this.”

“Pull your will to you Ivan. Fortify yourself.”

Nodding again, I watch his throat move sharply over a lump of fear. “O-ok.”

I let go, standing with a simple question, a simple reminder. “How do we change base metal to gold?”

“We don’t. The gold is already there,” he says, like the answer has been drilled into his mind, over and over again.

“That’s right, Ivan.” I motion around me, letting the horizontal rain crash into me. “This is just an illusion. An illusion we break.”

“An illusion we b–” The wind whips Ivan to silence, causing the boy to shiver in his overcoat.

“Bend!” I press to answer for him. Seeing him on the shaking edge, I grip his fingers. “So, Ivan, tell me: is this a storm? Is this our end?”

He goes to shake his head in answer, but another white flash of lightning steals his wits. A swift clap of thunder seals our doom. Ivan flinches, snatching his hands away to press against his ears. Before I can say another word, he begins to wail. Before I can move to help him, he runs from me.

“Ivan!” I shout, his name instantly swallowed by the wind as my arm snaps out to halt his decent down the cliff. But I’m too late.

I’m alone on the cliff, our only saviour having long disappeared behind sheets of rain.

Cold. Shivering. The wind almost knocking me from my feet.

There was no point in running like Ivan. This storm would soon engulf the planet. Where was there to go?

I had tried. I had failed. All was lost.

Palms open, I watch water run across the deep valleys of my hand before flowing down my wrist to drop to the mud-soaked grass below my feet. Seeing the water for what it was, two gases at a specific temperature, I remember a simple lesson my master taught me over a century ago.

When at the end, start from the beginning.

Feeling the crack of thunder in my marrow, and the onslaught of hail against my frail form, there was no doubt. This was the end.

So, I start from the beginning and whisper the Codex of Alchemy to myself.

How do we change base metal to gold?

We don’t. The gold is already there.

An illusion we break.

An illusion we bend.

How do we change base metal to gold?

“We don’t!” I shout, turning to face the storm. I call my power and will to me.

One. Last. Time.

How long had it been since I had convinced my bowl of mercury to glow gold? How long had it been since people had sought me out to transmute their suffering to peace, their sadness to joy?

No one thought I had anything left to give. It was why, even the Gods, had looked to children. It was why I had looked to them too. How easy had I fallen to such base thoughts?

No more! This old dog had one more trick up his sleeve. An illusion all alchemists are warned about upon finding their master. An illusion that should never bent, should never broken. For fear the very fabric of reality unravels.

But I knew, breathing in the thrum of my warm power, I could contain it, I could direct it.

Mouth shut, mist curls in streams from my nose into the freezing air. For the final time, I look at the palms of my hands, noting the deep strength of my life line before its abrupt end.

And there it was, the first and final illusion that captures us all in its snare. The one illusion every alchemist fears.

There is no end. Not by this storm. Not by the final beat of my heart.

The wind’s roar falls silent. The rain lightens to kiss my skin. Almost-black clouds churn grey in hope.

Life is not being, is not a storm, is not a person. It is deeper. Unseen. Unable to end.

I reach for it, my hands disappearing before my very eyes, as the mask that is everything I am, disintegrates, atom by atom... 

…until, in unison with the storm, I become the truth at illusion’s beginning.