Burning Lamp (8 page)

“You know how it is with legends, Mrs. Pyne. One way or another, a sexual encounter of some sort is always involved in the tale.”

A great mystery had just been solved, although Griffin could not know it. After all this time, she finally understood why Smith had been determined to rape her that night thirteen years ago. He had believed that sexual intimacy with a dreamlight reader was required before he could acquire the powers of the artifact.

“What is it,” she asked cautiously, “that makes you so certain that you are in danger of becoming an unstable multitalent?”

“Facts, Mrs. Pyne. I assure you, I base my concerns on hard evidence.”

“Such as?”

“I came into my second talent a few weeks ago.”

“Good heavens. You can’t be serious, Mr. Winters.”

“It was accompanied, just as the journal warned, by nightmares and hallucinations.”

She watched him open a drawer, unable to believe what she was hearing. “Are you telling me that you have actually developed a new psychical ability?”

“That is exactly what I am saying, madam.” He glanced curiously at the stack of old newspaper clippings and colorful advertising flyers he had uncovered.

“Not that drawer,” she said quickly. “The next one down. What is your second talent?”

He closed the drawer full of papers and opened the one below it. “Let’s just say that it is unpleasant.”

“Mr. Winters, under the circumstances, I think I am entitled to something more in the way of an explanation. Do you refer to your shadow-talent?”

“No. That is my first talent, the one that developed when I was in my teens.” He reached into the drawer and removed the velvet-shrouded object inside. “I have recently gained the ability to plunge another person straight into a waking nightmare.”

She frowned. “I don’t understand.”

“Neither do I, at least not entirely.” He examined the velvet sack. “For obvious reasons, there has not been much opportunity to experiment. All I can tell you is that I can trap a man in a nightmare. What he does while he is lost in the dream is unpredictable. On the one occasion I actually employed the talent, the individual collapsed and died.”

“I see.” A chill slithered through her.
Never forget that he is a crime lord
. Men in his profession were not above murdering people to achieve their objectives.

There was a muffled
thunk
when Griffin set the black velvet sack on top of the steamer.

“I have reason to believe that my victim had a weak heart,” he said.

She recovered from the initial astonishment. “Well, that might explain a great deal.”

“Certainly.” His voice was cold and dry. “Another man might have merely been maddened by the visions and perhaps decided to jump out a window.”

He began to untie the knot in the black cord that secured the sack.

“You are quite sure you generated nightmare energy?” she asked, curious now.

“There is no doubt in my mind.”

“Actually, that is very interesting,” she said.

He slanted her an unreadable look over his shoulder. “I have just told you that I can kill a man with my new talent, Mrs. Pyne. You do not sound suitably impressed, let alone horrified. Somehow I expected a stronger reaction from a social reformer.”

She ignored his sarcasm, too intrigued with her own reasoning. “What you describe is not unlike what I can do with my own senses,” she said.

His smile was pure steel. “You are in the habit of dispatching people with your talent?”

“No, of course not. The most I can do is render an individual unconscious, as I did with that enforcer in the alley behind the brothel. But the principles of the para-physics involved may be similar.”

“You sound like a scientist making an observation in a laboratory. We are talking about a
killing
talent, Mrs. Pyne.”

“Hear me out, sir. Our mutual affinity for the energy in the lamp indicates that we both draw our powers from the dreamlight end of the spectrum. But it sounds as if you are simply capable of reaching much deeper into the dark ultralight regions than I can.”

“Simply?”

“I do not mean to minimize your ability,” she said quickly.

“Mrs. Pyne, when you put Luttrell’s enforcer into that very deep sleep, did you touch him?”

“Yes, of course. That is the only way I can generate the level of energy required to do such a thing. Physical contact is required.”

“The other night I killed a man who was standing a good three, maybe four paces away from where I stood. I never laid a hand on him.”

She drew a sharp, startled breath. “That is a very powerful talent, indeed. How did you discover it?”

“While I was engaged in what you would no doubt consider the sort of hobby one would expect a crime lord to pursue.”

“What hobby?”

“I was conducting some business in the study of a certain gentleman at about two o’clock in the morning. Suffice it to say that the gentleman in question was not aware of my presence in his household.”

She drew a sharp breath. “You broke into someone’s home and searched his study?”

“Does that surprise you?” The cold amusement was back in his voice. “Given my profession, that is?”

“Well, no. I suppose it doesn’t. It’s just that, considering your obvious rank and position in the criminal underworld, one would have thought that you no longer dabbled in such petty crimes, at least not personally. You control a vast criminal consortium. Surely you employ people who can do that sort of work for you?”

“You know the old saying ‘If you want a job done properly, do it yourself.’ ”

“Nevertheless, to take such an unnecessary risk seems quite . . . extraordinary.”

“No offense, Mrs. Pyne, but when it comes to risks, you are in no position to lecture me.”

She discovered she did not have a ready response to that.

“To conclude my story,” he said, “I was interrupted in the midst of the search by the homeowner and another man. There was no time to retreat back out the window and nowhere to hide. I used my shadow-talent to conceal myself. I was then obliged to witness a very heated argument between the two men. The gentleman reached into the drawer of the desk, pulled out a gun and prepared to shoot his visitor. That was when I intervened.”

“Why?” she asked.

He got the cord untied. “Because the man who was about to be shot was a client of mine.”

“A client?
Your
client?”

“He wanted answers to some questions. I had agreed to find them. In any event, I used my nightmare talent against the gentleman with the gun without even thinking about it. It was a reflexive, intuitive reaction.”

“The way it always is the first time,” she said quietly, remembering her own first experience with her talent.

“The man screamed,” Griffin said, his voice very low. “It was unlike anything I have ever heard. An unearthly sound, as they say in sensation novels. And then he was on the floor. Dead.”

“What of your client?”

“Not surprisingly, he fled the scene, thoroughly shaken. He never saw me. Later he and everyone else, including the police, concluded that the man who had tried to murder him had suffered a stroke. I saw no reason to correct that impression.”

“I hear the scientist in your tone again, Mrs. Pyne.”

“I believe I mentioned that my father specialized in paranormal research,” she reminded him. “Perhaps I picked up a few of his character traits. You are convinced that this nightmare-generating talent of yours is new?”

“I think I would have noticed early on if people in my vicinity were plunging into states of abject terror for no apparent reason.” She refused to be put off course by his sarcasm. An idea had taken shape in her mind and she could not let it go.

“The thing is,” she said, “I cannot help but wonder if perhaps your new ability is somehow linked to your first talent. In which case it would not necessarily be a second power, if you see what I mean. Maybe it is nothing more than an aspect of your original talent, one that took longer to develop.”

“I told you, there are other symptoms that the curse has struck,” he said, grim impatience edging his words. “When I am awake, I experience occasional hallucinations. I can deal with those. When I sleep, however, I endure nightmares so extreme that I awaken in a cold sweat, my heart pounding.”

“I see,” she said gently.

It occurred to her that a crime lord might have good reason to suffer from nightmares. She decided not to mention that it might be his conscience that was inflicting the bad dreams. She doubted that he would appreciate that observation. As for the hallucinations, she had no such easy explanation.

Griffin pulled down the sides of the velvet sack, revealing the artifact. He stood very quietly for a time. Adelaide sensed the energy swirling around him.

“There is no doubt,” he said quietly. “This is the real Burning Lamp.”

Adelaide moved closer to the relic. Her palms prickled. She had examined the relic any number of times over the years but it never ceased to fascinate her and send a frisson across her senses.

The lamp was about eighteen inches tall and gleamed like gold in the weak light. As she had told Griffin, it looked more like a metal vase than an old oil lamp. The tapered bottom section was anchored in a heavy base inscribed with alchemical symbols. The sides flared out as they rose upward. Murky gray crystals were embedded in a circle just below the rim.

“What do you sense?” Griffin asked. He did not take his eyes off the lamp.

“Dreamlight,” she said. “A great deal of it.”

“Can you work it?”

“Possibly,” she said. “But not alone. From time to time over the years I have tried to access the energy in that lamp. I can make it glow faintly but that is all. But I can tell you one thing, if it is ever truly ignited, there may be no going back.”

He picked up the artifact and carried it to the small attic window to get a better look. “How do I go about lighting it?”

“You don’t know?”

“I handled the artifact a few times when I was younger but I was never able to activate it. My father believed that was because I had not inherited the curse. The lamp was stolen when I was fifteen. This is the first time in two decades that I have seen it.”

“What about Nicholas’s journal? Didn’t he provide instructions on how to work the lamp?”

“If you know anything about the old alchemists you know that they were all obsessed with their secrets. Nicholas did not leave much in the way of specific instructions. I think he assumed that the man who tried to access the energy in the lamp would be guided by his own intuition and that of the dreamlight reader.”

“I see.”

“Well, Mrs. Pyne?” he said. “Will you work the lamp for me and reverse the process that has begun? Will you save me?”

She opened her senses and looked at his dreamprints. They burned on the wooden floorboards. He believed the legend, she thought. Whether or not it was true, he was convinced that he had inherited the Winters Curse.

“I will try to work the lamp for you,” she said.

“Thank you.”

“But I want to read your ancestor’s journal before I attempt to manipulate the energy of the thing.”

“I understand. I will bring it to you this evening.”

“I’m afraid that will not be convenient. I am committed to attend the theater with friends tonight. Surely there is no great rush here. Judging by your dreamprints you are not on the brink of any sort of psychical disaster. Bring the journal to me tomorrow morning. I will study it and then decide how to proceed.”

He did not look pleased by the short delay but he did not argue.

“Very well, perhaps you are right,” he said. “My fate is in your hands. I will pay you whatever you ask.”

“Yes, well, as to the matter of my fee,” she said, “I really do not need your money. I am, as it happens, a rather wealthy woman.”

“I understand. Please know that I am in your debt. If there’s ever anything a man in my position can do for you, you have only to ask.”

“As it happens, I do have a favor to request in exchange for my assistance with the lamp,” she said.

He looked at her. His eyes were suddenly very, very green and as hot as his dreamprints. Energy floated across her nerves. She could have sworn that the shadows had deepened in the room.

“Ah, yes, the bargain you mentioned,” he said very softly. “What do you want in exchange for saving me, Mrs. Pyne?”

She steeled her nerve. “Your expertise and professional advice.”

Once again she could tell that she had caught him off guard.

“On what subject?” he asked, very wary now.

She tipped up her chin. Her intuition was warning her that she should never have started down this particular road but she refused to change course.

“You pointed out that the strategy I have been employing in the brothel raids has become predictable,” she said. “I require a fresh approach.”

“No.” The single word was flat and unequivocal.

She ignored the interruption. “Mr. Pierce spoke very highly of your abilities in matters of strategy. Indeed, he said that no one is as skilled as you, sir.”

“No.”

“You know far more about Luttrell and the way he thinks than I do.”

“No.”

She drew herself up. “Therefore, in exchange for working the lamp I ask that you help me devise a new technique for conducting effective brothel raids.”

“What you are asking, Mrs. Pyne, is that I assist you in devising a strategy that will surely get you killed. The answer is no.”

“Give the matter some thought, sir,” she urged.

“I may be bound for hell, madam, but at least when I arrive at the gates I will not have that particular sin on my conscience.”

He turned and walked toward the door, the lamp gripped in one hand. He did not look back.