Then how could she control the luceres?
She couldn't. Not in the true sense of control. But she's persuasive. Especially when what she's suggesting is what you want to do anyway.
His tone and choice of pronoun made me glance up sharply. Was he remembering his father—the medicine man who'd embraced his bear spirit, who'd lived as an animal all of the time and come to crave human flesh because of her?
Or was he speaking about himself? Sawyer had told me once that she could make anyone do anything that she wished.
Despite my fur, I shivered. What had she made him do? What might she still?
If the Naye'i is that powerful, she doesn't need to kill me. She can rule all the forces of darkness just by wanting to.
It doesn't work that way.
Seems like the way things were supposed to work aren't the way they're actually working.
Certain things will happen. The leader of the darkness will kill the leader of the light, resulting in Doomsday. Doomsday will lead to Armageddon.
Some people say Apocalypse, some Armageddon. Is that like potato, po-ta-toe?
What does a potato have to do with anything?
I wanted to rub my forehead, but I had no hands. He was so damn literal all the time.
What is the difference between Apocalypse and Armageddon?
The final battle between God and Satan is called Armageddon. Apocalypse is a general term for the end of the world.
I guess that made as much sense as anything else.
We need to go after the luceres.
I killed most of them.
Sawyer wasn't a seer or a DK, he was something else, something I'd never been quite sure of. I wondered if Ruthie was. She trusted him. I didn't. He was a killer. But then weren't we all?
We should round up the few you missed.
No point. They'll return to their hidden lives until they're called again. Luceres spread out, blend in. They could be anywhere.
I growled and scraped my claws across the carpet, reveling in the ripping and tearing shriek, wishing it were a lucere beneath my paws, or the woman of smoke.
How do we kill her?
If I could, I'd have done it already. We'll just have to keep searching, keep trying.
A little random, wouldn't you say?
What isn't?
I lifted my head, sniffed the air, caught again the distant drift of flames and ashes. Why do you smell of smoke?
I've told you before; she's part of me.
The Navajo are matriarchal. They believe the mother's side is strongest. No matter what I said, Sawyer wouldn't stop believing it, too. Sometimes I worried that she would bring him to the dark side. The thought scared me almost as much as Sawyer did. If he ever joined the Nephilim, we were finished.
The power that poured off him—morning, noon, and even in the dead of night—reminded me of the tornado Ruthie had spoken of. Inside Sawyer lay a storm of destruction just waiting to get out.
Is that why you conjured her all those years ago? Because she's part of you? Because, like all neglected children, you long for her approval?
His eyes flared. I'd never asked him about that night; I hadn't wanted him to know I'd been spying. But he must have known; otherwise why had he given me the magic turquoise that would keep her from killing me?
You think I'm secretly working for my mother?
Had I? Not really. But I couldn't be sure. Not with him.
I'd touched Sawyer, in the most intimate way a woman could touch a man, and I'd seen a lot, but I hadn't seen everything. Sawyer was capable of blocking me in a way that no one else could. I knew he was hiding something, but I didn't think he was hiding that.
Why did you call her that night? I pressed.
He rose to his feet, shaking his fur as if he'd just climbed out of a mountain lake. I half expected cool water to sprinkle over me like rain.
We had things to discuss.
Call her now, I ordered, I'd like to discuss a few things.
You've always had more guts than sense, he muttered. Did you learn nothing from getting your ass kicked the last time? You aren't ready to meet her again.
Make me ready.
His amusement fled, and he glanced away. I can't.
Who can?
He didn't answer.
So you aren't going to conjure her?
There was a time when I could bring her to me with fire and blood and magic, but that time ix gone.
Why?
She's stronger. She resists the spell. Maybe she always could, but now she knows there's no point in trying to seduce me.
Seduce you? I swallowed, tasting something rotten, something green and slimy and just plain wrong, at the back of my throat.
His eyes met mine. If it meant getting me on her side, she'd do anything.
You're her son.
She's an evil spirit, Phoenix. The only thing being her son means is that I've got magic, and she wants it.
Can she absorb power like ... I paused. Well, like I can?
No one absorbs power like you can.
I wasn't sure if I should be happy about that or even more freaked out.