Niten fit a Bluetooth earpiece into his left ear and pressed a button. “Yes.” He listened intently while Aoife watched him closely. In the backseat, Sophie stirred.
“We’re stuck in morning traffic,” Niten said quietly. He looked out the window. “Route 101 isn’t moving. I’d say we could be at least an hour away from our destination. Maybe ninety minutes. It depends what traffic is like over the bridge.”
Sophie stretched and leaned forward over the front seat. She looked at Aoife, who mouthed, Flamel, I think.
“That’s not good…,” Niten said into the tiny microphone. “Not good at all.”
Sophie and Aoife looked at one another. The immortal’s tone was grim.
“Do you have any control over the boy? Any influence at all?” He listened, nodding. “I’ll tell her,” he said finally, and hung up.
Aoife and Sophie sat in silence, waiting for the immortal to gather his thoughts, and when he finally spoke, it was in the formal language of his youth. “There is no easy way to say this, and I would be doing you a disservice if I tried to disguise the seriousness of the situation: the English Magician intends to sacrifice Josh to an Archon. Nicholas, Perenelle and Prometheus are using the skull to see through Josh’s eyes. They can hear everything he hears, but they have no way of warning him… and even if they could, they are not sure he would believe them. Dee has been working on him, poisoning his mind. And the Magician can be very persuasive. Apparently, he has told Josh that an Archon called Coatlicue will make him a necromancer.”
“Coatlicue,” Sophie breathed. The name brought on a flood of the Witch’s memories.
And they were terrifying.
“Coatlicue!” The girl felt as if she had been struck in the chest. For a moment she couldn’t breathe; black spots danced before her eyes. She pressed both hands to her mouth to prevent herself from screaming.
“Who is this Archon?” Niten asked. He looked to Aoife for an answer.
But the warrior shook her head. “I’ve heard the name, but only vaguely. It’s long before my time. I think there was a war and she was banished…”
“She is called the Mother of All the Gods,” Sophie said, her voice shaking. “She was an Archon scientist and a great beauty. But she experimented on herself and her experiments turned her hideous and insane. Now she’s like a ravenous beast.” Sophie turned to look at Aoife. “Out of her own DNA she created the original blood drinkers who eventually became your race. Coatlicue was the first vampire.”