“Is it need or is it want, child?”
“He’s . . .” My voice trailed off. I’d been going to say necessary, but instead I said, “Powerful.”
“So are you.”
“Two’s better than one,” I repeated.
“Is it?”
When she started answering my questions with questions, I always got a headache.
“You’re telling me I shouldn’t get him back?”
“Yes,” Ruthie said. “That’s exactly what I’m telling you.”
Since Ruthie’s motto had always been—Do whatever you have to do to win—I was shocked nearly speechless.
“But—” I began.
“Jimmy was right to burn the book,” she interrupted. “The temptation is too great.”
“I’m not a four-year-old with a box of chocolates, Ruthie. I can control myself.”
“Hmm,” she said, and I saw red.
I pushed back from the table, and this time my chair did fall over. The thwack of the wood against the tile made me flinch, but I left it where it lay.
“You think I’ll be tempted to force Mait to raise Sawyer before I stick a dagger in his pretty green eye?”
Ruthie lifted a brow, which was all it took for me to pick up the chair.
“Sit,” she ordered again, but I couldn’t. Instead I paced to the window. The kids were now playing basketball on a full cement court, complete with a painted three-point arc, free-throw line, and boundaries.
“Mait knows better than to give us back one of our most powerful players,” Ruthie said quietly. “You won’t be able to force him to do anything.”
“Wanna bet?” I murmured.
“Payment must be made, Lizbeth. Always. You can’t reverse death without consequences. And sometimes those consequences are for the raiser and not the raisee.”
I spun around. “You think I’m afraid?”
“No.” Her dark solemn eyes caught and held mine. “I am. You’re the leader of the light. The choices you make aren’t your own. You have to be sure the sacrifice is worth the reward. Weigh the effect of what you do on the future. And if you don’t know what that effect will be . . .” She let out a long, sad breath. “Best not to do anything at all.”
She was right, and I knew it.
My eyes burned. I lowered my head, staring at the worn kitchen tile as I blinked several times hard and fast. Deciding to let Sawyer lie was like killing him all over again.
Ruthie remained silent while I got hold of myself. It never took me very long. I’d been getting hold of myself all my life.
“You know where I can get a charmed dagger?”
Ruthie searched my face. She must have been satisfied with what she saw there because she smiled softly. “You’re a sorcerer, charm one yourself.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Learn.” She snapped her fingers, and I woke up in my room.
The storm had passed, leaving the air smelling cool, fresh, and clean. At least until the sun rose and heated the streets and the overgrowth until they again smelled a little like garbage.
I glanced at the clock. Middle of the night. I couldn’t exactly call the local charmed dagger shop, even if I knew the number. It was times like these that I really missed Xander Whitelaw. The professor had been able to find out just about anything.
I stared at the ceiling and suddenly remembered something—really someone—so I scrambled out of bed, tore through my backpack, and found the slip of paper with a cell number.
Bram answered on the first ring, and he sounded wide-awake. “ ’Lo?”
“This is Liz.”
“Liz who?”
“From the cemetery.” When he didn’t say anything, I continued, “You meet a lot of women named Liz near cemeteries?”
“You never told me your last name.”
I wasn’t sharing the name Phoenix when Bram had dreamed of a great, multicolored bird. That would be a good way to gain a very lethal stalker. I had enough things trying to kill me already.
“Neither did you,” I pointed out.
“You’re right,” he agreed, but he didn’t tell me his name. “What can I do for you?”
“Know how to charm a dagger?”
“You’ve run into a sorcerer who needs killing.”
He did know his Nephilim. “Can you help me?”
“What type of sorcerer?”
“Sosye.”
“Haitian. Okay. Get a piece of paper. Draw a square. Within the square write what you want to happen. Then use the sharp instrument—”
“Any sharp instrument?” I asked. “Doesn’t it have to be a dagger?”
“Anything sharp enough to kill should work. Use it to slice the paper into small pieces as you repeat, ‘I want to be successful in all my undertakings.’ ”
“Then?”
“Kill the thing.”
“That’s it?”
“You think there should be goat’s blood and moonlit holy water?”
Since there usually was . . .
“Seems too simple.”
“Not if you don’t know what to do, and most charmers won’t tell you. Cuts down on their income.”
“How did you find out?”
“The usual way.”