Black dawn (13 page)

Delos
turned his wide golden eyes on the old man, who was now shrinking and babbling
,
his trembling hands held up as if to ward off a blow.

The king changed his grip, lifted the boy's arm.

"Now, brat!
Now!"

Blue fire erupted. It poured in a continuous
stream like the water from a high-power fire hose.
It struck the old man and
spreadeagled
him against
the wall, his eyes and mouth open with horror. And
then there was no old man. There was only a shad
owy silhouette made of ashes.

"Interesting," the king said, dropping the boy's
arm. His anger had disappeared as quickly
as
it
had come. "Actually, I thought there would be
more power. I thought it might take out the wall."

"Give him time." The woman's voice was slightly
thick, and she was swallowing over and over.

"Well, no matter what, hell
be
useful." The king
turned to look at the others in the room.
"Remem
ber-all of you.
A time of darkness is coming. The
end of the millennium means the end of the world.
But whatever happens outside, this kingdom is
going to survive."

Throughout all of this, the little boy sat and
stared at the place where the old man had been.
His eyes were wide, the pupils huge and fixed. His
face was white, but without expression.

Maggie struggled to breathe.

That's-that's
the
most terrible thing I've ever seen.
She could hardly get the words of her thought out.
They
made you
kill
your teacher-he made you do it.
Your
father.
She didn't know what to say. She
turned blindly, trying to find
Delos
himself in this
strange landscape, trying to talk to him directly.
She wanted to look at him, to hold him.
To comfort
him.
I'm so sorry.
I'm
so sorry you had to grow up
like that.

Don't
be stupid,
he said.
I grew up to be strong.
That's what counts.

You grew up without anyone loving you,
Maggie
said.

He sent a thought like ice.
Love is for weak peo
ple. It's a delusion. And it can be deadly.

Maggie didn't know how to answer. She wanted to shake him.
All that stuff about the end of the millennium and the end of the world-what did
that mean?

Exactly what it sounded like,
Delos
said briefly.
The prophecies are coming true. The world o
f hu
mans is about to end in blood and darkness. And then the Night People are going to rule again.

And that's why they turned a five-year-old into a
lethal weapon? Maggie wondered. The thought
wasn't for
Delos
, but she could feel that he heard it.

I am what I was meant to be,
he said.
And I don't
want to be anything else.

Are you sure?
Maggie looked around. Although
she couldn't have described what she was doing, she knew what it was. She was looking for
something
... something to prove to
him ...

A scene flashed in the crystal.

The boy
Delos
was eight. He stood in front of a
pile of boulders, rocks the size of small cars. His
father stood behind him.

"Now!"

As soon
as
the king spoke, the boy lifted his arm.
Blue fire flashed. A boulder exploded, disinte
grating into atoms.

Again!

Another rock shattered.

"More power! You're not trying. You're useless!"
The entire pile of boulders exploded. The blue
fire kept streaming, taking out a stand of trees be
hind the boulders and crashing into the side of a
mountain. It chewed through the rock, melting
shale and granite like a flamethrower burning a
wooden door.

The king smiled cruelly and slapped his son on
the back.

"That's better."

No. That's horrible,
Maggie told
Delos
.
That's
wrong.
This is
what it should be like.

And she sent to him images of her own family.
Not that the
Neelys
were anything special. They
were like anybody. They had fights, some of them pretty bad. But there were lots of good times, too, and that was what she showed him. She showed him her life
...
herself.

Laughing
as
her father frantically blew on a
flaming marshmallow on some long-past camping
trip. Smelling turpentine and watching magical col
ors unfold on canvas
as her mother painted.
Perch
ing dangerously on the handlebars of a bike while Miles pedaled behind her, then shrieking all the
way down a hill.
Waking up to a rough warm
tongue licking her face, opening one eye to see Jake
the Great Dane panting happily.
Blowing out can
dles at a birthday party.
Ambushing Miles from her
doorway with a heavy-duty water
rifle
...

Who is that?
Delos
asked. He had been thawing;
Maggie could feel it. There were so many things
in the memories that were strange to him: yellow
sunshine, modern houses,
bicycles
,
machinery
but
she could feel interest and wonder stir in him
at the people.

Until now, when she was showing him a
sixteen
year
-old Miles, a Miles who looked pretty much
like the Miles of today.

That's Miles. He's my brother. He's eighteen and he just started college.
Maggie paused, trying to feel what
Delos
was thinking.
He's the reason I'm here.
He got involved with this girl called Sylvia-I
think
she's a witch. And then he disappeared. I went to
see
Sylvia, and the next thing I know I'm waking
up in
a slave-trader's cart. In a place I never knew existed.

Delos
said,
I
see.

Delos
, do you know him? Have you seen him
be
fore?
Maggie tried to keep the question calm. She
would have thought she could see anything that
Delos
was thinking, that it would all be reflected in
the crystals around her, that there was nothing he could hide. But now suddenly she wasn't sure.

It's best for you to leave that alone,
Delos
said.

I can't,
Maggie snapped back.
He's my
brother! If
he's in trouble I have to find him
-I have to help
him. That's what I've been trying to explain
to you.
We help each other.

Delos
said,
Why
?

Because we do.
Because that's what people
are
supposed to do. And even you know that, somewhere
down deep. You were trying
to help me in my
dream

She could feel him pull away.
Your dreams are
just your fantasies.

Maggie said flatly,
No
. Not this one. I had it before
I met you.

She could remember more of it now. Here in his mind the
details
were coming to her, all the things

that
had been unclear before. And there was only
one thing to do.