Luther’s eyes rolled. “A secret, Lizbeth.”
I lifted my hands, surprised to discover they were shaking. I put them behind my back, clasping my fingers together in an attempt to still the trembling. “Forget I asked.”
“What else?” Ruthie pressed.
I reached again into the dark recesses of another mind. “Lions?”
Luther’s head bobbed. “The seal was used to mark magical icons of legend and the sacred name was replaced with lions, which were a symbol of Solomon.”
I started, but Ruthie continued to speak. “The hexagram with the lion accents is known as the Seal of Solomon.”
Solomon. Swell.
“The key is with the Phoenix,” I murmured.
Which explained how the dead woman had come back to life, then turned into a brightly colored bird and flown into the sun. I don’t know why I hadn’t caught on before. My only excuse, one I’d used many times before, was that I’d been a little busy to connect the dots since I’d been dealing, again, with half demons that were trying to kill me.
“Now what?” I asked.
“You’ll have to infiltrate the Nephilim.”
“Excuse me?” My voice was so loud I startled a bird from a nearby bush.
“How you think you’re gonna get the key back?”
“Kill them all and take it?”
“Could.” Luther’s bony shoulders lifted, then lowered. “But there’s a lot more of them than there were, and they’re gettin’ stronger every day. Infiltrating is a better bet.”
“They know me. I’m not going to be able to sneak up and pretend to be one of them.”
“Don’t sneak, child; walk right in the front door and volunteer.”
“And they’ll believe my sudden change of heart because they’ve all had recent lobotomies?”
“No, Lizbeth.” Luther took a deep breath, then let it out slowly, looked toward the mountain, up at the sky, back to the house, the hogan and finally me. “They’ll believe it because the Phoenix is your mother.”
CHAPTER 17
I was speechless. Might be a first. But seriously, what could I say to a revelation like that?
“I—uh—” I blinked several times and finished with, “What?”
“Did you think your name was plucked out of a hat?”
“Sure.”
“It wasn’t.”
I wrestled with the word “duh.” If I let that comment past my lips, I’d only get smacked. I swallowed hard; it felt as if the comment were literally a rock in my throat, but I forced it down.
“Isn’t this something I should have been told before she rose from the dead and flew off with the key to ruling the world?” Or at least all the demons in it.
“What good would it have done?”
“What good?” My voice rose; hysteria bubbled just beneath the surface. “What good? Isn’t knowledge power?”
“She was dead, Lizbeth. I had no idea she would crawl out of her grave and fly away.”
“Isn’t that what a phoenix does?”
“Not exactly.” Luther’s full, youthful mouth puckered in a very Ruthie-like way. “A phoenix dances upon the flames of its funeral pyre, then rises from its own ashes to live another thousand years.”
“Fan-fucking-tastic,” I muttered. “My mother was—is—a Nephilim.”
It was a revelation on par with discovering that the Uncle Charlie everyone was always referring to had the last name of Manson.
“Not exactly,” Ruthie repeated.
“What exactly?”
“She’s other.”
“Like Sawyer?”
“No one’s like Sawyer.”
Another comment that deserved a “duh” but wouldn’t be getting one.
I thought back to what I’d been told about those who were “other.” Grigori plus human equals Nephilim. Nephilim plus human births a breed. But a Nephilim breeding with a Nephilim gave rise to something apart from both humans and monsters. A being that could never truly be either one. By combining two forces of evil, those that were other could become stronger than either of the parents who created them.
“My mother is other,” I murmured. “The product of two Nephilim.”
Somewhere in the back of my mind, the demon began to laugh. I ignored it. I was getting better at that by the minute.
“What kind of Nephilim?” I asked.
Luther shrugged. “Seers see the Nephilim at hand, not their entire family tree.”
“Someone should know.”
Luther glanced toward the mountain again, then quickly back. “Perhaps. But not me.”
“What about my father?”
“What about him?”
“Who is he? Where is he? Should I expect him to try and kill me any time soon?”
“I’ve never heard a word about your father.”
“I’m supposed to believe that?”
“I’ve never lied to you, child.”
I laughed. “You told me I was an orphan.”