Midnight Crystal (10 page)

“Everything?”

“About how our so-called relationship is just a convenient cover story we’re using while we work a joint project involving a major find in the underworld. I told her I’d tell her the details later.”

“I’m waiting for the bad news.”

“She said she was going to invite your parents and you to dinner. Tonight. Before we go to the clinic to see your sister.”

“That’s nice of her.”

“Adam, pay attention here. I’ve had one or two other dates in my life. Mom never invited them or their parents to dinner. She knew the relationship wouldn’t last long.”

“Because your relationships never last long.”

“The thing is, she knows now that what you and I have isn’t a relationship. I have to ask myself why she’s making a big deal about inviting you and your folks to dinner. That’s the kind of thing parents do after a couple has been formally matched. Any way you look at this, it makes me very uneasy.”

“Maybe this isn’t about us, Marlowe.”

She paused. “What do you mean?”

“Maybe this is about old times.”

“Whose old times? Not mine.”

“I just talked to my dad. Turns out thirty-five years ago, your father and my father both worked on a special task force, a joint Bureau-Arcane operation that was set up to track down a gang of rogue talents.”

She was stunned into momentary speechlessness.

“My dad and your father?” she finally got out. “Worked a case together?”

“Yes.”

“I didn’t know that the Bureau and Arcane had ever worked together.”

“Evidently the last time was thirty-five years ago,” Adam said. “The gang they took down consisted of some powerful ghost hunters and some Arcane talents. The leader was named Gregory LeMasters. Ring a bell?”

“Sure. He was a legendary psi-path of the first order. The LeMasters gang controlled the drug trade from the catacombs. Absolutely ruthless.” She paused. “But my father is a businessman.”

“So is mine. Now. Doesn’t mean they don’t have interesting pasts. Dad’s got a talent for working an obscure kind of ghost light. Evidently it was the same kind of alien psi that LeMasters used. Very powerful stuff.”

She thought about it. “My father is a strat talent. That means he has an ability to think like the opposition.”

“Or the bad guys, in this case.”

“I can see where your father and mine would have made a good team,” she said.

“There was a third member of the team that took down the LeMasters gang: Elliott Fortner.”

“The Bureau chief? Small world.”

“Especially underground,” Adam said. “You know, the older I get, the more mysterious the older generation becomes.”

ELLIOTT FORTNER CRANKED BACK IN HIS CHAIR AND steepled his fingers. He studied Adam with his pale gray eyes. “Why the hell didn’t her name pop up when we hacked into Arcane’s files to look for a dream reader?”

“Probably because she’s a Jones.”

“It was a Jones who developed the scale the Society uses to measure talent in the first place. Are you telling me they don’t use it to rank themselves?”

Adam almost smiled. As the man in charge of the Frequency City office of the Bureau, Elliott Fortner routinely kept more secrets in a month than most people kept their entire lives. But nothing irritated him quite as much as discovering that others could conceal secrets just as well as he did.

Elliott was a tall, distinguished-looking man in his mid-fifties. Like a lot of men at the top of the organization, he had started out in the catacombs in his late teens. But when it had become apparent that he had a rare talent for working blue ghost energy, he had been tapped by the Bureau. His intelligence, ambition, and passion for his work had taken him all the way to the executive’s office.

It helped, of course, that Elliott had married into one of the most powerful families in the Guild, Adam thought. As with any other large organization, those kinds of connections were an asset to advancement. Nevertheless, within the Guilds, ultimately, it always came down to raw power. No one got to the top unless he possessed a lot of talent.

“The Joneses have always been notoriously secretive when it comes to their own individual talent levels,” Adam said.

Elliott exhaled slowly and tapped his fingertips together. “Can’t blame them, I suppose. The public has always been wary of those who command a high level of psi. That was true throughout history back on Earth, and it’s true here on Harmony.”

“Yes.”

“Even though the environment on this world has accelerated the development of the paranormal aspects of human physiology, not everyone is comfortable around strong talents. Still a lot of fear and suspicion out there.”

“Sometimes for good reason.”

Elliott raised his brows. “You say she has agreed to help you find the lamp?”

“Yes,” Adam said.

He walked to the window and looked out at the towering wall of the Dead City across the lane. The cramped offices of the Frequency City branch of the Chamber’s Bureau of Internal Affairs occupied the third floor of a small, anonymous Colonial-era building located deep in the heart of the Quarter. The ground floor was empty, the windows boarded up. The second floor housed the Bureau’s lab.

“Can you trust Marlowe Jones, given the history between your families?” Elliott asked.

“It’s old history, most of it based on myths and legends.”

“According to what you’ve told me, the lamp itself is a legend.”

“The lamp is real, trust me. It’s been in my family, off and on, since the late seventeenth century back on Earth.”

“Off and on?”

“This isn’t the first time it’s gone missing.” Adam turned away from the view of the quartz wall and looked at Elliott. “My gut tells me it’s our only hope of stopping whatever is happening down there in that maze.”

“You’re still sure of that?”

“When it comes to those ruins, I can’t be certain of anything. But unless and until one of the lab techs comes up with a better idea, the lamp is all we’ve got.”

“I don’t like the idea of bringing the Arcane people in on this.”

“Marlowe’s right. When it comes to the paranormal, Arcane has accumulated more experience than all of the Guilds put together.”

“They may be experts in the paranormal, but this is alien energy we’re dealing with. When it comes to that kind of psi, we’re the experts.”

“Energy is energy, and we need all the help we can get. I’ve already given the orders. The Arcane team will be going underground to join our people later today.”

Elliott did not look pleased, but he nodded once. “You’re in charge of this project. It’s your call. Meanwhile, you and Miss Jones had better get busy and find that damn lamp.”

“That’s the plan.” Adam headed for the door.

“Adam?”

“Yes, sir?” He reminded himself that he no longer reported to Elliott. There was no need to call him sir. But old habits died hard, especially when you were dealing with a legend like Fortner.

“Watch your back,” Elliott said. “Judging by what happened at those ruins, you’d better assume that Drake and O’Conner have hired a pro.”

“SHE’S A JONES, AND SHE’S A LITTLE DIFFERENT,” ADAM said. “I think you’ll like her, Vickie. She’s strong. Like you. You’ve been telling me for years that I need a woman who will stand up to me.”

Vickie did not respond. From a distance you wouldn’t know that anything was wrong, Adam thought. It wasn’t until you got closer that you realized that there was no indication of awareness in her vivid green eyes. Her once-animated face lacked all expression. She sat motionless in the wheelchair, gazing straight ahead at the hospital rose garden.

Her dark hair was cut in a sassy style that suited her. She wore an expensive red cashmere sweater, dark blue trousers, and loafers. Adam knew that his mother made certain that Vickie was always well-groomed. During the day, Vickie always looked as though she was about to dash out the door or go into her office at the university.

At night she wore one of her own nightgowns, not hospital issue. Diana Winters was working on the theory that somehow the element of normalcy in attire would help break through the trancelike state in which Vickie was trapped.

“Marlowe’s coming here to meet you tonight,” Adam said. “She says dreamlight energy is always strongest around midnight. I know that other dreamlight talents have examined you, but Marlowe is a lot more powerful than the others. Off the charts, I think.”

It had been two weeks since he had carried Vickie out of the maze. Officially, the doctors had not given up hope, and the nurses were full of positive stories about miraculous recoveries after serious parapsych trauma. But he knew that the experts had run through all of their options, including the use of one of the strange ruby amber devices that had recently been discovered in the jungle. The ruby amber instruments were alien technology. No one knew how they worked, but some people with an unusual kind of talent were able to use them to treat certain types of psi-trauma. The ruby amber had not worked on Vickie.

The hospital was a private parapsych facility that catered exclusively to members of the Guilds and their families. He and Vickie were sitting at the far end of the serene, elegantly maintained grounds. He had wheeled the chair down here because the roses were in bloom. Vickie had always loved flowers, always loved color.

She looked thinner than ever today, he thought. The experts said there had been no change in her condition, but he sensed that she was getting weaker. The staff had assured him that she was eating properly and she received daily physical therapy. But something inside her was fading. He was losing his kid sister, and he was to blame.

In a few minutes he would urge her out of the wheelchair and take her for a short walk through the rose garden. He knew from experience that she would not resist, but he also knew that she would show no reaction. Everyone else in the family took her for walks, too, when they visited, which was daily. They got the same lack of results. He wished she would struggle or show some stubbornness. The Winters were all fighters. But it was as if Vickie had given up and gone to sleep.

“The first time I saw Marlowe, she was wearing a lot of leather and riding a Raleigh-Stark,” he said. “Got to tell you, there’s nothing like the sight of a woman in leather on a high-rez bike to make a man sit up and take notice.”

Vickie gazed straight ahead at the roses. He looked at the garden, too. The sundial in the center evolved into a glittering shard of mirror quartz. Nicholas Winters appeared in the face of the dial. His eyes burned psi-green. His mouth opened. He spoke in a voice that came not just from beyond the grave, but from beyond the Curtain.

Adam suppressed the hallucination with an act of will. He was getting better at it, he thought. Some days he was almost able to convince himself that the nightmares and the daytime visions were starting to fade.

“You know, Vickie, if any of your shrinks knew that I was having these damned hallucinations, they would suggest that I check in here, too.” He got to his feet. “Let’s take a walk.”

He tugged her gently out of the wheelchair and guided her along the path. When they had completed the circuit, he settled her into the chair and took her back to the private room. He placed a book in her lap, one of her favorite novels of romantic suspense.

“I’ll be back later tonight with Marlowe Jones,” he said.

Vickie did not respond. He left her sitting in front of the window that looked out over the gardens.