Prometheus ignored the question. He reached out and placed his hand on top of the Flamels’. Instantly, the room was flooded with the smell of aniseed and the skull turned a deep ruby color. “I can link to the boy, but you will need to focus on the Magician,” he said almost apologetically. “Are you sure you want to do this? It will age you.”

“Do it,” Perenelle said, and the Alchemyst nodded.

“Then let us see what the Magician has in store for the boy,” the Elder said through gritted teeth as images formed over the skull: crystal-clear pictures in vivid color.

And suddenly they were looking through Josh Newman’s eyes at Virginia Dare’s face.

CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

“Can’t you drive any faster?” Aoife snapped. “I could push this heap quicker.”

“My foot is flat to the floor,” Niten said calmly, “but the vehicle is forty years old and it’s only got a fifty-horsepower engine.”

“Piece of junk,” Aoife muttered. She looked at Sophie stretched out on the long backseat behind them. Reaching over, she pulled a blanket across the girl’s shoulders. “You’d think an Elder would have a better car than this antiquated minivan,” she said, turning back to Niten.

“I’m surprised Prometheus even had a car. And it’s not a minivan, it’s a microbus. I like it,” the Japanese immortal said. “This is a 1964 Volkswagen Microbus. And it still has its original red and white paint job. Usually they’re painted all the colors of the rainbow.”

“Listen to you. Since when did you become such a car expert?” Aoife asked sarcastically.

The tiniest of smiles moved Niten’s lips. “You do know that I collect classic cars, don’t you?”

Aoife looked at him in surprise. “No,” she said finally. “I never knew that.”

“How long have you known me, Aoife?” he asked in formal Japanese.

She frowned and replied in the same language. “There was a battle, I seem to recall.”

“We met at the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600.”

She nodded slowly. “Yes, I remember.”

“I thought you were Scathach,” he reminded her.

Aoife smiled and nodded again.

“But the moment we started to fight, I knew you were not the girl I had fought before. You had a different style.”

“And I defeated you,” she reminded him.

“You did,” he agreed. “Just the once.” He turned the big steering wheel, maneuvering the van onto the narrow two-lane highway. “So you’ve known me-what?-for more than four hundred years… and yet, what do you really know about me?”

Aoife stared at the slender black-suited man and shook her head. “Not a lot,” she admitted.

“And why is that?” he asked.

She shrugged.

“Because you were never interested,” Niten said gently. “You are the most self-obsessed, selfish person I know.”

The warrior blinked in surprise. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“This is not a criticism,” he continued, “merely an observation.”