All You Desire (14 page)

“Please, take a seat,” Vera told Haven and Iain. Three wicker chairs waited for them in one corner of the sunroom.

“Hello.” Phoebe greeted the couple warmly. When she saw Haven's alarmed expression, she smiled. “You must be shocked to find me looking so normal.”

“A little,” Haven admitted, relaxing a bit.

Phoebe chuckled. “I have to put on a good show at the spa. My clients would be terribly disappointed if I arrived at work dressed in my usual garb. And this must be Mr. Morrow.” She didn't just look at Iain—she examined him. Haven was amused but hardly surprised. Even older ladies couldn't resist Iain's charms.

“We've met,” Iain replied flatly. “At the Ouroboros Society.”

“Yes, of course. How could I forget?” Phoebe glanced at the blue-haired girl who still stood by the door. “Vera, dear, would you mind if I chatted with our guests in private?”

“Not at all,” Vera said, though Haven suspected she'd wanted to stay.

Once Vera had closed the door behind her, Phoebe finished watering the plants that lined the sunroom's windowsills. They weren't typical houseplants, Haven noticed. The tall, leafless stalks resembled the sort of reeds that might grow on the banks of faraway rivers. They exuded a faint fragrance that reminded Haven of something, though she couldn't quite figure out what it was.

“What is that you're growing?” Haven asked. “The plants' scent—it's familiar.”

“No living language possesses a name for this species. It's been virtually extinct for centuries.” Phoebe closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. “To me, it smells of cypress groves and olive blossoms. I would imagine that's not the scent you're experiencing. The fragrance is different for everyone. That's one of the reasons these plants are so essential to my work. But I'll explain more later. You must have many other questions to ask me. Shall we attempt to get a few of them out of the way?”

“Sure,” Haven agreed, searching for a good place to start. “I recognized half the women in this building. How long have you all been following me? Who are you? What do you want?”

Phoebe chuckled again. “I'll answer one question at a time, if you don't mind. We have been following you since your first trip to New York eighteen months ago. I knew you would find your way to the Ouroboros Society, and my sisters and I were waiting for you to arrive. We lost track of you for a year after you moved to Italy. Then we found you in Rome and followed you to Florence. We would have made contact there, but you disappeared once again. I must admit—you caught me by surprise when you arrived at the spa.”

“That's just
this
lifetime,” Haven said. “I know you've been following me much longer than that. In the nineteen twenties my name was Constance Whitman. I have a note someone once wrote her—a note that instructed Constance to call a certain telephone number if
he
ever found her.”

“Yes, I wrote that note myself. Constance never called. I assume you know what happened to her? She might have lived longer if she had taken my advice.”

“The
he
was Adam Rosier, wasn't it?” Iain asked curtly.

Phoebe turned to Iain. “Yes, but we don't call him that. We call him the magos. He's the reason I asked you both here this evening.” She took a key from her pocket and unlocked an old ebony cabinet on the far side of the room. A work of art built by craftspeople using skills that no longer existed, it had always been meant to hold precious things. Reaching inside, Phoebe withdrew a large handbound book, which she passed to Haven with great care. “This is our story. We keep it with us at all times to remind us of the importance of our mission. It contains every scrap of information we have collected on our adversary.”

Haven gingerly flipped though the book. Only the last few pages were typed in a language she could understand. Other sections were handwritten in everything from hieroglyphics to Old English. Tucked into the book's spine, however, were dozens of photographs. The first showed Adam strolling through a cemetery. The style of his suit dated the photo to the late nineteenth century. He wore a beard that ended in a neat little point at the tip of his chin. Otherwise he hadn't changed at all. On the back of the photo, someone had written
Cimetière du Père Lachaise, 29 Mai 1871
.

The next photograph Haven found had been taken in New York. In the background she spotted the stock exchange building on Wall Street. Thousands of men in hats and 1920s-style suits jammed the area, blocking traffic. A gentleman peered out a window of one of the cars stalled in the street. Haven felt her pulse quicken. She knew the handsome face well.

“I recognize Adam, but I can't read most of this,” Haven said, her hands shaking too badly to turn another page. “Can you tell me what it says?”

Phoebe settled into a seat, and Haven felt as if the old woman were bestowing an honor upon her, like a queen taking time to have tea with a subject.

“Perhaps I should start our story at the beginning. There are twelve of us,” Phoebe said. “Today we look nothing alike, but once we were all sisters. We lived in a small town on the eastern coast of Greece. Our father died, and because there were so many of us, we were forced to take in washing to make ends meet. It was a hard living but an honest one. Then a rumor started. A man passing through town had seen the twelve of us. He told the townspeople that we had offered him more than our laundry services. He claimed we were running a brothel. They stoned us to death in the streets. I was the oldest. I was twenty. The youngest of us was eleven. She was only a baby.”

“I'm so sorry,” Haven said. “And the man who started the rumor—it was Adam?”

“There's no doubt that it was. In fact, he looks exactly the same today as he did thousands of years ago.”

“Do you know what he is?” Iain asked.

Phoebe took the leather volume out of Haven's hands and closed it. “That's the one answer you won't find in this book. The truth is, even we don't know. He may not be truly eternal, but he's as old as mankind. All cultures have had a name for him. In Greece, he was Chaos. In Egypt they called him Seth. In India some still call him Ravana. I've heard people here refer to him as the devil, but that's not quite right. The Christian devil has a reason for doing the things he does. The magos does not.”

“Chandra told me that the Horae spend each lifetime fighting him,” Haven said.

“My sisters and I are drawn back to earth for one reason: to find the magos and exact our revenge. We are born into families scattered all over the globe. But we each hear the call the moment we draw our first breaths. Just as honeybees always find their way back to the right hive, we always return to each other. It often means traveling thousands of miles, but we reunite with our sisters as soon as we can. Even as children we devote our lives to the cause.”

“So you're the leader?” Haven asked.

“I am the oldest. When I am able, I take care of my sisters as I always have.”

“And you've been returning to earth for two thousand years?”

“Much longer than that,” Phoebe said. “The Horae have been fighting the magos for so many centuries that we've become part of a system of checks and balances. Without us, the world could plunge into darkness.”

“How do the Horae keep the world from ‘plunging into darkness'?” Iain didn't bother to conceal his skepticism. Haven cringed, but Phoebe appeared unperturbed.

“That is an excellent question, Mr. Morrow. We cannot kill the magos, so we lock him away whenever possible. It's not easy to do. He is usually difficult to locate. And quite slippery when we do find him. But during the decades he's imprisoned, the human race thrives. The Renaissance, for instance—it wouldn't have been possible without us.”

“And Haven's role in all of this would be?” Iain asked.

“She can help us put him where he can do no harm for a while. You see, none of the Horae can get close enough to the magos to imprison him. We've tried, and we invariably fail. But Haven is his weakness. He can never resist her. In fact, she's the reason we've been able to keep track of him. He's never remained in one place for so long. He's been in New York for almost ninety years, waiting for Haven to return to him. Now that she's here, we finally have what we need to lure him into our trap.”

“Forget it,” Iain said. “You're not going to use Haven as bait.”

“Iain!” Haven protested. “Don't you think we should hear the rest?”

“She's not going to tell you the whole story, Haven.” Iain glared at Phoebe. “You say you've locked Adam away before. That means he must have escaped. Am I right?”

“Yes,” Phoebe said.

“So what's going to happen to Haven when he gets out again?”

Phoebe nodded. “I can't predict the future, Mr. Morrow. I don't know what will happen should the magos escape. But you must understand—if Haven doesn't agree to assist us now, she'll have no hope of finding her friend. I am the only one who can help her see the life she needs to see.” She turned her attention to Haven. “This friend of yours who's missing. Is he the one Chandra met when you were running from the gray men?”

“Yes. His name is Beau,” Haven said.

“Chandra sensed a special connection between you. He's more than just your friend, isn't he?”

It felt like the old woman had reached into Haven's chest and seized her heart. “He was my brother.”

“Chandra suspected as much. When we met at the spa, you told me your friend came to New York to meet someone from his past.”

“That's right,” Haven confirmed.

Phoebe's face was grim. “I don't want to frighten you, Haven, but Beau may be in grave danger. There have been similar incidents in the past. Not long ago, a Society member disappeared shortly after she was reunited with a lover from one of her previous lives. I tried to warn her that the man wasn't who he claimed to be. The woman's corpse—what little was left of it—was discovered months later. They say she'd been tortured for weeks.”

No
. Haven shook her head at the thought. Things like that never happened to people like Beau.
They might
, a voice whispered, but Haven refused to listen. She knew that if she indulged her worst fears, her hopes wouldn't stand a chance.

“Who was the woman who died?” Iain demanded. “Why didn't I read about her murder in the papers?”

“Ouroboros Society scandals rarely make the papers,” Phoebe noted.

“I'll do it, Phoebe,” Haven interjected. “Whatever you want, I'll do it if you promise to help me find Beau.”

“Hold on—both of you. I agree that we've got to act fast to save Beau,” Iain said. “But why do we have to deal with Adam
now
? He isn't going to leave New York anytime soon. Why can't we work together and come up with a plan that won't put Haven in danger?”

“You have a habit of letting emotions cloud your thinking, Mr. Morrow,” Phoebe told him. “I assure you there's very good reason for our haste. As I mentioned, the magos has been in Manhattan since the 1920s. He still travels the world, of course, spreading chaos and discord. But at this point, we could have read the newspapers and known which city he calls home. All the stock market crashes and financial bubbles—he's even started to repeat himself. And it's made him very conspicuous. But the fact that he's been here for almost a century isn't a good thing for anyone. When the magos isn't on the move, chaos becomes concentrated in one spot, and the world becomes unbalanced. It could cause irreparable harm to this city—to the entire country. We can't afford to wait. We must take action immediately.”

“What do you think is going to happen?” Haven asked.

“We don't know,” Phoebe said. “But we do know that the magos has been working on a new scheme—one that has the potential to be extremely dangerous. You've been to the Ouroboros Society headquarters, have you not?” she asked Haven.

“I have,” Haven confirmed.

“And who did you see while you were there?”

Haven thought back, trying not to forget anyone. “I saw a few low-level OS employees. And a bunch of kids who'd come for past-life analysis.”

“That's right,” said Phoebe.

“I don't get it,” Haven said. “Did I miss something?”

“Did you happen to notice that the children in the waiting room were all the same age?”

“They were?” Haven remembered a little blonde girl she'd spoken to in the lobby of the OS, Flora, who claimed she'd once been a renowned epidemiologist named Josephine. Flora had been small, perhaps only eight or nine. Haven felt a pang of panic and hoped no harm had come to the little girl.

“Until ten years ago, children were not welcome in the Ouroboros Society,” Phoebe said. “With one or two exceptions, they were rarely allowed inside the building. Then suddenly, one day, it was announced that the OS would begin recruiting children who were nine years of age.”

“Is this true?” Haven asked Iain. “You must have met some of the kids while you were a member of the Society.”

“Sure,” Iain said. “But they were just little kids. I was more interested in what the adults were up to. I didn't think a bunch of nine-year-olds could do the world much harm.”

“At the moment, we are more worried about what's being done
to
them, Mr. Morrow,” Phoebe explained. “In that first year alone, the Ouroboros Society recruited twenty children. We've tried to contact some of the young members. They're alive—we know that for certain—but it's impossible to speak to them. All of the OS children are sent to a boarding school north of the city. It's called Halcyon Hall. The security around it is impossible to breach, and as far as I can tell, the children only return to New York once a year, on their birthdays. Even the parents refuse to speak about the OS. They've been bribed, I believe.”