Doomsday Can Wait (Phoenix Chronicles, #2)(70)

"How are people distinguished if no one knows their name?"

"Most have nicknames," Whitelaw answered. "Something for the white people to call them. It's still considered bad manners by many of the old ones to call someone by their name in their presence."

I glanced at Sawyer. He'd lost his cigarette and was staring at Whitelaw with murder in his eyes.

"What do you know about the Naye'i?" I blurted.

"Dreadful Ones. The most evil spirits the Navajo have."

"Ever hear how to kill one?"

"Kill?" Whitelaw's face creased. "An evil spirit? I don't think that's possible."

Carla had said we might have to help him piece things together. But how would I do that if I didn't know the pieces in the first place?

"Spirits are good and evil," Whitelaw mused. "Both light and dark. There was something once . .." His voice trailed off; he stared out the window.

I glanced at Sawyer, whose stoic gaze remained on Whitelaw. Luther still hung by the door; he'd be the first one out if getting out were a good idea. I had a feeling he'd be hanging out by the open doors for several years to come. Poor kid.

Suddenly Whitelaw spun and headed for his desk. He flipped through a pile of books, tossed several papers aside. "It's not written anywhere; I heard it. Someone told me." He rubbed his forehead for several seconds, then "Something," he murmured, "something about killing the darkness."

It was only because Sawyer's eyes had made me un-easy before that I bothered to glance at him now. He was lifting his hand, still staring at Whitelaw. I didn't think; I stepped between them.

Behind me. Luther's snarl rumbled. I didn't dare glance back and see what was happening. I didn't dare move at all.

Whitelaw's eyes had gone wide, the dark brown irises looking like demonic egg yolks in the middle of a sea of white. He saw that Sawyer meant murder; I could smell it. That scalding scent of ozone in the air, the very same scent that signaled fury in Mommy Dearest.

"Go on," I ordered, and when Whitelaw hesitated, I snapped, "Hurry."

Whitelaw wasn't stupid. He knew he was in trouble, that he'd better spit out the information because once he did there'd be no more reason to kill him. Once the method to kill the darkness was shared, it could no lon-ger die with him.

The question was, why did Sawyer want it to?





CHAPTER 26


"Stop that!" I ordered the room at large.

Luther's snarls faded, which was as good an indication as any that Sawyer had lowered his hand. Didn't mean he wouldn't raise it again. Didn't mean he couldn't kill Whitelaw in some other way. Although I had to think that if Sawyer could have, he would have.

"What are they?" Whitelaw whispered, eyes still too wide and too white.

"You wouldn't believe me."

"I think I might."

I thought he might, too, but—

"Not now," I said, and he nodded, understanding the urgency was still there.

"To kill the darkness," he murmured, "one must embrace it."

"Embrace?" My lip curled. That was so not going to happen.

"Embrace or become. I remember asking and he said—"

"Who said? A Navajo?"

It seemed impossible that the Navajo would know that their evilest evil spirit would be the future leader of Hell's army. Hell being a Christian concept as well as its leader.

However, I was finding out that Christianity didn't mean so much in terms of end-time prophecy. Sure, the Christians were the authors of it, but maybe that was only because they'd been the first to write it down.

Whitelaw shook his head. "The Navajo believe in evil, which is why they don't like to talk about it. Sometimes, talking about it"—he lowered his voice, pointedly keeping his gaze from straying to Sawyer—"brings it forth."

"Let's hope not," I murmured, and Whitelaw shuddered, making me wonder if his yapping about supernatural entities, his writing down of those legends, had brought forth things that had no business being brought forth.

"When I was doing research for my book on Revelation," he continued, "I spoke with a rabbi who had an interesting theory about the end of the world. He said that the final battle would be between good and evil."

"What's so interesting about that?"

"He didn't use those terms. He used darkness and light. Said the only way to defeat the darkness was with the light. That the light would have to . . ." Whitelaw squinted, closed his eyes, then blurted the rest. "Embrace the darkness and in doing so would become it. Only then could evil be defeated."

"Become," I repeated, glancing at Sawyer. He shrugged, but he wasn't looking at me, he was still looking at Whitelaw as if he wanted to do something very unpleasant to the man.

Luther stood between us, back to me, his gaze on Sawyer. I'd been wrong. The kid hadn't gone out the door at the first sign of trouble, he'd stepped forward to face it. I was so impressed.

"I had no idea what he meant," Whitelaw mused. "Those old languages are difficult to figure out and sometimes the translations are wrong and sometimes they mix dialects."

He was gibbering. The longer I was here, the more I thought Whitelaw just might be a little psychic himself. He was certainly feeling the "gonna kill you" vibes that were washing off Sawyer like bad BO.