“Well.” Perenelle spoke without removing her gaze from the image above the skull. “I believe our first duty is to try to ensure that he reach his destination safely. If he crashes, he could be badly injured or killed. Sophie”-the tone of the Sorceress’s voice softened-“concentrate on your brother, make him focus on his driving.”

“How?” she asked desperately. She was having a hard time controlling the panic that threatened to overwhelm her. “How do I do that?”

Perenelle looked blank. She turned to Nicholas, but he shook his head. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “Just don’t let him do anything stupid.”

“This is Josh we’re talking about,” Sophie muttered. “He does stupid things all the time.” And always when she wasn’t there.

He was thinking about driving really fast.

This section of Shoreline Highway was relatively straight, and the fog wasn’t too thick. He could put his foot to the floor and just roar down the road.

Sophie wouldn’t like that.

The thought popped into his head even as his foot was pressing on the accelerator.

This was a dream.

Sophie wouldn’t like that.

His foot eased off the accelerator. He shook his head. Even in his dreams, she still tried to be the boss.

The group had been sitting around the table for more than ninety minutes, and Sophie was shaking with fatigue.

Aoife stood over her, both hands on her shoulders, pouring strength into her, but Sophie’s silver aura was now almost entirely the same pewter gray as the warrior’s, and the images hovering over the skull had faded and become almost transparent. “I’m not sure… how much longer… I can keep this up,” Sophie whispered. Her head was thumping and there were solid bars of pain across her taut shoulders and down her spine.

“Where is he now?” Flamel rasped, trying to make sense of the images, the snatched glimpses of streets and landmarks.

Niten leaned over Aoife’s shoulder, squinting at the flickering color image. “Turning off Van Ness Avenue onto Bay Street.”

Perenelle looked up at Prometheus. “Who is he going to? There must be some Dark Elders in San Francisco.”

“Several,” he said matter-of-factly. “Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent, keeps a house here, but this is too subtle for him. Eris is here; she used to hang out in Haight-Ashbury and still keeps an apartment there, but her glory days are over. She hasn’t got this sort of power.” The Elder suddenly leaned forward. “Sophie, have you any control over your twin?”

She looked at him, her eyes dull with fatigue.

“Can you make him turn or look in a certain direction?”

“I don’t know. Why?”

“See if you can get him to adjust the mirror. I want to see his eyes.”

Josh fiddled with the heater.