Midnight Crystal (20 page)

The base and body of the lamp were still undergoing some kind of alchemical change. As they watched, the gold metal became translucent. Energy built higher in the atmosphere and inside the artifact.

In another moment the lamp was abruptly transparent, as though it were made of the purest crystal. A seething storm of ultradark light flared and roiled inside the artifact.

All but one of the murky crystals set into the rim heated with paranormal fire. Each displayed a different color of the dreamlight spectrum. Without warning, a rainbow of psi lanced out from the circle of stones and splashed against the walls of the garage.

“So much power,” Adam whispered. “I understand now. I can channel it, but only if you hold the center.”

“Yes,” she said.

Probing gently, she found the rhythm of the heavy, shifting waves of raw dreamlight. The pulses and oscillations of the storm infused into the lamp were almost but not quite identical to Adam’s. His own wavelengths were astonishingly strong, but here and there she sensed a slight lack of harmony in the currents.

“I think I’ve found the source of your nightmares and hallucinations,” she said. “I should fix the problem before we run any experiments on the lamp. We don’t want to take any chances with this much energy.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Some of your currents are a little out of sync. I’ll just make a few minor adjustments.”

She went to work with a sense of certainty, easing her own energy into the storm brewing inside the lamp. Obeying her intuition, she tuned Adam’s patterns so that his dreamlight currents resonated with those of the artifact.

She finished the last bit of repair work with a great deal of satisfaction.
Just like turning a key in a lock and opening the right door,
she thought. She started to tell Adam that the small task was completed and that they could now proceed to explore the potential of the lamp.

Like turning a key in a lock
.

The old words that Nicholas Winters had written in his journal slammed through her.

What had she done?

There was no time to contemplate the enormity of the step she and Adam had just taken. A blaze of energy erupted from the lamp. The psi rainbow became blindingly brilliant, illuminating the darkened garage in all the colors of the darkest end of the spectrum. Ultraviolets, ultragreens, ultrareds, and ultrayellows blazed across cold concrete.

Adam’s body went rigid, his head flung back, face twisted in a mask of mortal agony.

He dropped the lamp. The artifact landed with a thud, barely missing Marlowe’s bare toes. It went dark immediately. Adam collapsed, unconscious, beside the lamp.

HE CAME AWAKE TO A REALM OF DARKNESS LIT ONLY by a long shaft of underworld light. It took him a few seconds to realize that he was lying on the floor of the garage. There was a blanket underneath him and one over him. A pillow cushioned his head.

“What the hell?”

A cheery chortling sound made him look to the side. He saw Gibson sitting nearby. The dust bunny was munching on a cracker. The cracker looked familiar, Adam decided. It looked like it had come from the stash upstairs in his kitchen.

“Good morning to you, too.” He pushed himself to a sitting position and checked his watch. Five o’clock. “I don’t suppose you’ve got any coffee to go with that cracker?”

The elevator doors hissed open. Marlowe walked out, a mug in her hand.

“I’m the one with the coffee,” she said. She came toward him through the shadows. “When I checked your dreamlight a few minutes ago, it looked like you were about to wake up. How do you feel?”

He thought about the question. “Good. Very good.” He pushed aside the blanket, got to his feet, and took the coffee from her. “Okay, maybe a little stiff from sleeping on the garage floor, but all in all, I feel a hell of a lot better than I have in a month.”

“Sorry about leaving you down here in the garage all night. After you crashed I couldn’t wake you. There was no way I could get you upstairs, so I brought the blankets and pillows down here.”

“Thanks. I appreciate it.”

She moved through the angled light from the catacombs. He saw that she was wearing the jeans, turtleneck, and boots she had worn last night. Her hair was scraped back into a knot. The shadows under her eyes told the story.

“You didn’t sleep, did you?” he asked.

“I wasn’t sure how the lamp had affected you. I thought it best to keep an eye on you until you woke up.”

The realization that she’d felt obliged to stand guard annoyed him.

“You spent the night watching me sleep?” he said.

“I wanted to be sure you were okay. It’s just a little after five. You were only out for three hours. I did go upstairs to make some coffee at one point.”

He swallowed some of the coffee and couldn’t remember the last time anything had tasted that good. Because she had made it for him, he realized.

“Thanks,” he said. He sounded surly, even to his own ears. He couldn’t help it. He’d passed out last night. He didn’t like knowing that she had seen him in such a weak, helpless state.

She smiled. “It’s okay. I went to sleep on you the night before last.”

“Right.” It wasn’t the same thing at all, but he decided there wasn’t much room to argue. “Where’s the lamp?”

“Over there.”

He followed her gesture and saw a dark lump in the shadows.

“Why did you put it way over there?” he asked.

“It gives off a lot of disturbing energy, even when it isn’t lit. I thought it might interrupt your sleep.”

He crossed the garage and picked up the lamp. For a moment or two he contemplated it. Marlowe waited quietly. After a while he looked at her.

“Think I came into my third talent last night?” he asked.

She glanced at the garage floor beneath his feet. He knew she was reading his prints.

“You came into the third
level
of your talent,” she said deliberately. “You are no Cerberus.”

He looked back down at the lamp. “You’re certain?”

“Absolutely. Trust me; I would know.”

She sounded very sure. He exhaled slowly.

“Did you notice that one of the crystals remained dark?” she asked.

“Can’t say that I was paying close attention,” he admitted. “But according to the old records, every time the lamp has been lit, one crystal has always stayed dark.”

“The Midnight Crystal.”

“That’s what Nicholas Winters called it. The family concluded centuries ago that it was dead. The theory is that Nicholas was already going insane and losing his talents when he forged it. All he cared about was vengeance. He deceived himself into believing that he had infused the last crystal with some kind of psychic command.”

“Which is, technically speaking, impossible,” Marlowe said.

“Yes. But it leaves us with the next question.” He looked at her. “Will I be able to work this thing to stop the dissonance in the maze?”

“I can’t answer that. But I can tell you that you don’t have a chance of channeling the energy in the artifact without me.”

He smiled faintly. “Still partners?”

“Someone’s got to save the underworld.”

“That would be us,” he said. “Let’s go upstairs and get some breakfast, partner.”

HIS PHONE RANG AS HE FOLLOWED MARLOWE OUT of the elevator into his living room. He glanced at the code. Adrenaline spiked.

“It’s Fortner.” He opened the phone. “Winters. Did that pair I sent to you last night wake up?”

“The two hunters are still unconscious.” Elliot said. He sounded grim and weary, as if he, too, had spent the night keeping watch. “The parapsych doc says that even if they do wake up, they won’t have much in the way of coherent memory. But we ID’d them. Couple of hunters who moonlight as hired muscle.”

“Working for O’Conner and Drake?”

Elliott snorted. “You must be psychic. They’re free-lancers but, yes, as it happens they have done some odd jobs for O’Conner and Drake.”

Marlowe stopped in the middle of the room, listening. Gibson wriggled out of the crook of her arm and tumbled to the floor. With what appeared to be unerring instinct, he headed toward the kitchen.

“What about that flashlight weapon?” Adam said into the phone. “Anything on it yet?”

“Not much. There is a crystal of some kind inside, but the lab techs tell me they’ve never seen anything like it. Their instruments say that it’s dead, though. No energy left in it at all.”

“Alien technology?”

“Certainly a possibility. Wouldn’t be the first artifacts of power to come out of the jungle.” Elliott paused. “You said there was only one of these devices at the scene?”

Adam met Marlowe’s eyes. “Right. You’re thinking there may be more?”

“Who the hell knows?” Elliott exhaled heavily. “Like I told you, watch your back.”

“Any word from Galendez and Treiger?”

“Last report was that O’Conner and Drake come and go from their office, but there are no signs of any unusual activity. Are you sure you don’t want to move on them? This is your call, but after what happened last night—”

“Not yet,” Adam said. “I need to know what they’re up to before we take them down. That goes double now that we know about the crystal weapon. Talk to you later.”

He closed the phone, aware that Marlowe was watching him with an interested expression.

“Nothing on the flashlight?” she asked.

“Lab techs think it might be alien technology. But whatever it is, it’s gone dark. They don’t think it’s capable of generating any energy now.”

She unzipped her small leather backpack and took out the flashlight she had commandeered. She contemplated it for a moment.

“I’ll bet this one is dead, too. I think we can attribute that to your second talent.”

He cocked a brow.

“I mean the second aspect of your talent,” she corrected hurriedly. She dropped the flashlight into the backpack. “When you hit those men with that crushing wave of nightmare energy, they were both fully rezzed. You scrambled their senses while they were both running hot and focusing through the flashlights. Got a hunch the power surge probably blew out the crystals.”

“Like melting amber?”

“Yes. The crystals most likely need to be tuned to function, just like amber. Finely tuned instruments or machines of any kind are always delicate. Doesn’t take a lot to throw them out of whack or destroy them.”

He headed for the kitchen. “Which means your lab techs probably won’t find anything helpful when they examine that one.”

“Maybe not. Adam?”

He picked up the coffeepot and turned on the faucet. “Yeah?”

“You lied to your boss about last night,” she said.

“Elliott’s not my boss. Not any longer.”

“You lied to him from start to finish. He doesn’t know that I have the second flashlight. He doesn’t even know that you have the lamp, does he?”

“It’s better this way. I told you, I think he’s got a leak in the Bureau. Best bet is that O’Conner and Drake have someone inside, close to Fortner. Someone he trusts.”

“Wow. And I thought I was paranoid. You really don’t trust anyone, do you?”

“That’s not true.” He finished filling the pot and turned off the faucet. “I trust the members of my family.”

“That’s it? Just your own family?”

He glanced at her. “And you, Marlowe. I trust you.”

She smiled. “Well, naturally. Partners have to trust each other.”

“No,” he said. “They don’t. But it certainly helps if they do.”