“Witch,” he murmured.
“Yeah,” I agreed. “The spell he was casting kind of gave it away.”
“Spell?”
“Bowl of blood, a lot of hand-waving, a chant I couldn’t hear.” Sawyer frowned. “You know what that means?”
“No, but I’ve never known a bowl of blood to be a good thing.”
Sawyer left the room, returning quickly with a book so old the paper looked like parchment, the writing on the cover faded and spidery. Trust him not to have an Internet connection for research. No, he had to have a book that appeared as old as his soul, written with a quill.
He opened it, thumbed through, then met my gaze. “This is the being responsible for killing Ruthie and all the others.”
I started and reached for the book. “How do you know that?”
“A Strega is not only a medieval Italian witch but a vampire, one with the power to control animals. So if he didn’t kill her outright—”
“He sent those things to do it for him.”
All the pieces were falling into place. We’d already established that whoever had set the chaos of doomsday in motion had to have more power than most Nephilim. A witch from medieval Italy certainly fit the bill.
I skimmed the text, frowned and glanced up. “I don’t see any way to kill it.”
“Maybe there isn’t one.”
My heart lurched. “That’s impossible.”
“Is it?”
“I’ve got to call Jimmy.”
Sawyer tossed me my cell phone battery. I snapped it in, pleased to discover I had service, then punched buttons until I found Jimmy’s number. I got voice mail.
“It’s me,” I said. “Liz. Call me right away.”
I disconnected, frowning. “The phone didn’t even ring.”
“You’ll have to explain why that makes you frown. I’ve never owned one of those things.”
“What?” I glanced up. “Oh. The phone goes to the message service without a ring if it’s turned off, or out of juice—”
“Or at the bottom of the ocean along with its owner?”
“Why would you say that?”
“Wishful thinking?”
“1 gotta get to New York.”
Sawyer caught my arm as I tried to rush by. “Don’t you find it interesting that the one you’re seeking is a vampire?”
“Lately, isn’t everyone?”
His ringers tightened. “Listen to me.” His voice was a growl; his eyes flickered to beast and back again. “A dhampir is the son of a vampire.”
An icy finger trailed down my spine. “Coincidence.”
“Is it?”
“Jimmy’s on our side. Even you said so.”
“Maybe I was wrong. Isn’t Sanducci an Italian name?”
“Who knows? Even if it is, that doesn’t mean he is. Jimmy could be anything. For all we know some social worker plucked the name out of a hat like they did for me.”
“You truly think the name Phoenix was random?”
I had, but now I wasn’t so sure.
Sawyer waved away my questions before I could ask them. “I told you already, I know nothing about your past beyond what you do. 1 just find the fact that you were named for a mythical bird that is reborn out of the ashes again and again to be curious.”
A lot was, lately,
“If Jimmy were working against us, I’d have known when I touched him.” I frowned, remembering the flicker of fangs and blood, his seemingly logical explanation of his subverted vampire nature. “Ruthie would have told me.”
“Ruthie’s dead. Ghosts don’t know who killed them, that’s usually why they’re ghosts.”
“She’s not a ghost.”
“Then what is she?”
Crap. I had no idea.
“We’re back to Jimmy killing Ruthie? I thought we established that was impossible.”
“I think we established it was impossible that I’d killed her.”
“He wouldn’t.”
Sawyer just stared at me and said nothing.
“I refuse to believe that Jimmy would kill Ruthie.”
“Maybe he didn’t kill her with his own fangs, but her identity was leaked, as well as the identity and whereabouts of all the others.”
“He didn’t know all the others.”
“Someone did.”
“Even if the Strega is his—” I swallowed, and my throat clicked loudly in the still, empty morning. “Father. That doesn’t mean Jimmy betrayed the federation, that doesn’t mean he won’t kill him.”
“No? Funny that the Strega’s in New York and so is Sanducci.”
“We know why he went there.”
“We do?”
“Aaargh!” I yanked my arm free, and he let me. “Stop talking.”
“Just one more thing,” Sawyer murmured. I glared. “I’ve never tried the method, more’s the pity, but there’s a legend that says in order to end the existence of a dhampir—”
I stilled as the skin on the back of my neck prickled. In horror or delight? I wasn’t sure I’d ever know the answer to that question. But I held my breath, waiting for him to finish.
“You must kill him twice in the same way,” he said.
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know. It’s a legend.”
“Jimmy said not to believe the legends.”