Intuition (20 page)

Rayne's mom walks away, and I know this might be my only chance. I take a deep breath and reach for Rayne's lifeless hand, being careful not to disturb the monitor on her finger or the tubes that are stuck into the veins on the back of her hand. I direct my thoughts through my body and into hers, hoping that she's with us enough to understand.
It's okay, Rayne. I'm here with you. Just show me what's going on. I can help.

I grip her fingers lightly, but I don't feel anything at all. Somewhere in the distance I can still hear the beeping of the monitor, so I squeeze my eyes shut tighter. I hold my breath as I wait, but I get no sensations.

I open my eyes again and look around the room. Through an opening in the curtain around the bed I can see Rayne's mom still talking to the nurse. I watch the lines in the monitors go up and down in rhythm and look at Rayne lying so still on the bed—right here with us, but still so impossibly far away. I'm the only one who can reach her, and I'm doing a crappy job of it. Her mom and the nurse will be back soon; I've only got moments to get through to her.

Taking another deep breath, I try to clear everything else away. In my mind I can hear Janine telling me to relax and get out of my own way, so I close my eyes and focus on that, pushing my thoughts through my chest and down my arms to where
my fingers are touching Rayne's. I picture a channel opening between the two of us, just like Janine taught me.

In an instant, I'm bombarded by confusing images—
children riding bareback, their long black hair flowing in the wind as they race along the base of a snow-covered mountain
. . .
a dance in a fancy drawing room where women in puffy, ornate gowns link arms with men in short pants and stockings as a small orchestra plays off to one side
. . .
hundreds of people in colorful clothes dancing barefoot on the muddy ground as a band plays loud rock music from a stage half a football field away.
And then there's pain. It's only fleeting, like a radio station that's not tuned correctly, but sputtering and intense. My skin feels like it's on fire, and my fingers ache like someone's squeezing them in a vise. I feel panic rising from somewhere deep inside, like being trapped underwater. I can see the surface and want more than anything to get there, but all I can do is sink farther toward the bottom.

Rayne's mom puts one hand on my shoulder and I gasp, coming back to the present. “Go ahead, talk to her,” she says gently. “She'll hear you.”

I watch Rayne's face for any sign that I connected with her just now, that what I just experienced is what she's seeing. I take her hand again, ready for more images and sensations, but all I feel is the cool dryness of her skin. I can't control the connections. It's more like they control me, and I feel weak and faint from the effort just now. “I'm here, Rayne,” I say softly, leaning in close. “Peter's out in the other room just waiting for another chance to get in here and see you. We can't get him to leave; he looks so scruffy and cute.”

I look over at Rayne's mom and she nods encouragement. “One of us is always here,” I say. “We're not going to leave you alone. You just make sure you stay with us, okay? Hang in there. I know it's tough.”

A nurse has been hovering by the curtain, but now she leans in toward Rayne's bed. “I have to take her vitals now. We need to let her rest.”

“Okay,” I say. “I'll be back soon.” I give Rayne's fingers one last squeeze, and it might be my imagination, but I think I feel the faintest pressure back.

Rayne's mom puts one arm around me as we walk back down the hallway, and I lean into her just a little bit. It feels like my legs are stuck in quicksand and I know I need to sit down soon. “You did great, honey,” she says. “I'm sure it really helped.”

My mind is racing with the images I saw and the sensations I felt. I was
with
Rayne in there, wherever she is right now. I could feel her pain and her frustration as she tries to stay with us.

“I'm going to go back and sit with her,” Rayne's mom says. “See if you can get Peter to go home, at least for a little while.”

“I will,” I say, pushing back through the double doors. I've got to sit down soon, or I feel like I might pass out.

“Her numbers are looking better,” I say as I walk into the waiting area, but I stop cold in the doorway. Peter's not alone. For a second, I think about running out of the room, but I know my legs won't carry me very far.

The two of them look up, and I see damp tears in the corner of Peter's eyes. He glances at Griffon and then at me. “Um . . .”

My legs buckle for real then, and I'm grateful for the chair that's leaning against the wall as I sink into it. I feel like I'm going
to throw up, so I put my head down toward my knees, knowing I look like an idiot, but glad to get away from Griffon's eyes.

“Cole,” Griffon says with alarm, and I feel his hand on my forehead. As soon as he touches me, he pulls back, obviously remembering that we're light-years away from physical contact at the moment. He kneels down. “You look pale. Are you okay?”

I try to sit up, knowing that I look wobbly. “Yeah.” I take another deep breath. The nausea seems to be passing, although my heart feels like it's beating out of my chest. “I'm okay. I just haven't eaten much today, that's all.”

“Is there a vending machine around here?” Griffon asks Peter. “She needs a Pepsi or something.”

“There's one two floors down. I'll go,” Peter says and dashes out the doorway, clearly glad to get away from whatever scene he imagines is about to happen.

Griffon squats down in front of me. “What did you do?”

The creak of his leather jacket as he moves and the faint, spicy scent coming from his body is too much. I put my head in my hands, feeling totally overwhelmed. “What do you mean?”

“Just now. Your Akhet vibrations are all wrong. Faint and out of synch.”

Staring at the speckled linoleum floor, I reply, “I made contact with Rayne. For a few seconds I could feel what she's feeling.” I stop. How can I explain to him that I could also see images, like her thoughts were somehow transmitted into my head?

“And now you feel terrible? You've got to be careful using your empath skills like that. You don't know what that could do to you.”

I look up at him for the first time, taking in the power of his
warm, amber eyes. Eyes I'd not quite managed to forget over the past few weeks. His hair is a lot shorter—without the curls he looks older, and I have to fight the urge to reach out and run my hand over the smooth suede at the back of his neck. “What else am I supposed to do? Just watch her die? I'll do anything I can to stop that from happening, no matter what it does to me.”

I hear footsteps in the doorway, but it's not Peter. “Is she okay?” Giselle asks, stepping into the room.

Griffon turns. “I think so. Just weak from connecting with Rayne.”

Giselle sits down next to me in a hard plastic chair, and I can smell the flowery, soapy scent of her perfume. “So she can really do this? Cole is really an empath, as you say?”

I stare at her. “I'm right here.”

Her mouth straightens into a tight line. “Of course. I'm so sorry. That was rude. Are you feeling better?”

“I'll survive.” I look at Griffon, wondering why he brought her here. She has nothing to do with Rayne.

Griffon looks at Giselle and then back at me. “We're on our way to the Peninsula,” he explains. “We have a meeting with the architects who are designing the new lab.” He pauses. “What did you sense? When you were in with Rayne?”

I take a deep breath and try to pick things out of the jumble of senses and images. “She's really confused.” I pause. “And there are a lot of images going through her head. Almost like memories, but a lot more random.”

“Wait,” Griffon says, staring at me. “What do you mean you saw her memories? I thought you could only sense other people's emotions, not read their minds.”

“I don't know.” I look up at him. “I was connecting with her, and it was like I could see what was going on in her mind and how she was feeling at the same time.” I take a deep breath, not sure I can explain something that I don't totally understand. “Not exactly like watching a movie; it was more like the impression of the things she was thinking. Does that make sense?”

Griffon's studying me closely. “Sort of. But I've never heard of anything like this before. What kind of images did you see?”

I close my eyes and try to remember. “Crazy things that don't seem to fit together. A flash of one scene and then a flash of another. None of it makes any sense.”

“Like a hallucination?” Giselle offers.

“Maybe,” I say, nodding. “Her head is splitting with pain and her skin hurts, like it's on fire.”

I see a look pass between the two of them. “Anything else?” Griffon prompts.

“Her fingers. Her fingers ache badly, like they're being squeezed really tight. They're almost blue, and her mom said she's having problems with her circulation.”

Griffon stands up in front of me and folds his arms, looking at Giselle as if he's trying to confirm something. “Meningitis, maybe?”

“No.” I shake my head. “Her mom said they ruled it out last night.”

“Okay. That's good.”

“Can you think of any other symptoms?” Giselle asks. “Anything you might have noticed yesterday?”

I think back to the blur of yesterday afternoon. Was it only yesterday? It feels like a lifetime ago. “Um . . . she had some really
violent convulsions, and they kept saying that her pupils were dilated. The paramedics thought that she was on something.”

“Hmm. Interesting.” Griffon looks at Giselle. “What do you think?”

She purses her lips thoughtfully. “If it's not meningitis, then it's still something that's affecting her nervous system.”

“How quickly did it start?” Griffon asks me. “Was she feeling sick for a long time?”

“No,” I said. “That's what's so weird. For most of the day she was fine. Then she just said that she had a headache and it felt like she had a fever. The next thing I knew, she was flat on the ground.”

Griffon paces a little in front of me. I sit as quietly as possible so I don't interfere with his thinking. “Okay,” he finally says, more to Giselle than to me. “This is going to sound crazy, but what about ergotoxicosis?”

Her eyes grow wide. “Saint Anthony's fire? Maybe. But we haven't had that in this country for centuries.”

“I saw a lot of it in Italy the lifetime I transitioned—all the symptoms are there,” Griffon says, shaking his head. “But where would she have gotten it?”

“I seriously doubt that it would appear organically,” Giselle says. “Not now.”

“Okay, what are you guys talking about?” I ask. They're speaking so quickly I can barely keep up.

“Ergot is a fungus that causes symptoms like you've described,” Giselle explains. “It started on rye seeds and was common throughout the Middle Ages. It causes hallucinations, convulsions, and gangrene.”

“Ergotoxicosis caused the Salem witch trials—the accusers were actually hallucinating because of the fungus. The convulsions made for a nice show,” Griffon says, and I wonder if he got to see that in person.

“And there are rumors that an ergot outbreak in late 1024 caused spontaneous Akhet transitions in thousands of people in Germany,” Giselle says. “But we haven't seen it in any part of the world for decades.”

“Wait, something can
cause
a person to become Akhet?”

Griffon gives Giselle a sharp look. “It's only a theory, and most Akhet don't believe it. An unusual number of Akhet transitioned that year, and the only thing they had in common was a critical case of Saint Anthony's fire. But it's never happened again.”

I feel a momentary panic as I remember what Veronique said about Rayne being ready to transition. “Could someone make the fungus? Like in a lab?”

Giselle shrugs. “I suppose so. There has been talk of people trying to synthesize the ergot mycotoxin, but as far as I know, nobody has ever succeeded. Why? Who do you know that would do this to your friend?”

“Veronique,” I say quietly. I don't want to believe she'd go this far. But I know she would.

Griffon's head snaps around. “What?”

“She's been seeing Rayne again,” I explain. “She has this idea that Rayne is the essence of Alessandra. I told her that it wasn't true, but she's completely convinced.”

“And she's a microbiologist, so she has the skills,” Griffon finishes for me. I can feel his anger as he speaks. “Plus, she's just crazy enough to try it. Why didn't you tell me?”

“You haven't exactly been around,” I snap at him. “But it doesn't matter. What does matter is, what do we do now? If it is what you think, is there a cure?”

“Not exactly,” Griffon says. “And if it goes untreated, convulsive ergotism can be fatal.”

Fatal.
“So why are we just sitting here? What can we do?”

“Hang on, there are treatments. Vasodialators and anticoagulants, along with Ativan to stop the hallucinations.”

“How are we going to tell the doctors? There's no way they're going to believe a couple of teenagers diagnosing a disease that disappeared centuries ago.”

Giselle reaches into her bag and pulls out a laminated medical identification tag from a hospital in Switzerland. “I've got this one.”

Of course. She's a doctor too. “What are you going to say?”

She clips the tag onto her jacket. “That I'm a friend of the family and that I've seen this in rural outposts on my trips with Médecins Sans Frontières. All I have to do is point them in the right direction—once they do the research, they'll figure it out for themselves.”