Close Contact (13 page)

I gaped at him. “For Zin’s sake, Marcus, I’m a GEP. We don’t
have
reputations to protect where sex is concerned!”

He helped himself to the wine I’d opened and carried it to the chair Reynard had vacated so abruptly. “To all of Madrea you’re a Bashalde girl and my ward. Unless you intend to declare your real identity, it’s imperative you follow the customs here. Especially since Jancen has taken the view that you’re a member of his family regardless of who your guardian might be. I wouldn’t enjoy being called out on the field of honor by a man of his age for neglecting my duty to protect your virtue.”

“You’re right.” I rubbed my temples, trying to ease the faint pounding I’d ignored when the commander was here. “I apologize. I forgot who I’m supposed to be.”

“It’s understandable, given the circumstances.” He sipped the wine thoughtfully. “And for what it’s worth, I think you were right to tell the commander the truth. He’s a fair man and very honorable. He’ll make a powerful ally. And I’m sure once he gets over the shock of hearing about a GEP’s sex life, he’ll start to see the advantages. The commander is very logical and straightforward, and he has a mind like a steel blade.”

Finishing off his wine, he put the glass aside, stretched out his legs, and folded his hands across his stomach. “Now, tell me about your conversation with the Sumantti.”

Involuntarily, my brow arched, mimicking Reynard’s favorite expression. “Didn’t Lillith tell you?”

“She gave me the facts. I’d like to hear your impressions of the exchange.”

My head tilted slightly as I considered the conversation I’d had with the stone. “She was angry. So angry in fact, that I’m worried about what she’ll do if she gets free.” I hesitated. “It was like talking to a child, Marcus. An extremely powerful, very scared child.” I shook my head. “I tried to convince her not to reach out for the girls they’ve stolen and she agreed to try, but I’m worried she won’t be able to help herself. Not if she sees it as a chance to get away from her captors.”

The fingers of his right hand drummed on his left for a moment. “How are they holding her? If she’s that powerful, how do they keep her contained?”

“I have an idea, but I’m not even sure it’s possible.”

“From your description, it sounds like they have her in a stasis box.”

“Exactly.” The pressure on my temples wasn’t helping much, so I closed my eyes to block out the fading sunlight. “But what’s confusing is that if it works on the Sumantti at all, would I even be able to communicate with her? I need
to talk to Kiera. She knows more about the crystals than anyone else. Lillith contacted Max, and they’re in the middle of a jump back to Orpheus Two. As soon as Kiera is dirt side, I’ll have Lillith get in touch with her.”

Marcus’s chair squeaked and I knew he’d shifted to study me. “Your headache is getting worse, isn’t it?”

Narrowly opening my eyes, I looked at him through my lashes. “Yes. I don’t suppose you have any more of that stuff you gave me this morning?”

“I do, but it would be dangerous to give you more now. And if it’s worn off this fast, it wouldn’t help, anyway.” His tone was deadly serious. “Echo, you
must
find out what your psi ability is and start using it. Until you do, the headaches will only continue to get worse. Do you understand that this could kill you?”

Forcing a smile took all my strength. “You’re being melodramatic, Marcus. My headache is a result of the Sumantti yelling in my brain. You have no idea how loud and forceful she can be. I’ll be fine after I get some rest.”

His sigh echoed around the room as he straightened and leaned forward. “No, Echo, you won’t be fine. Think of it like this: your psi energy is water spilling into an enclosed reservoir. If none of the water is used, the reservoir will fill to capacity. But the water is still being pumped in. The reservoir can’t hold it all and pressure builds. At some point, one of two things will happen. Either someone begins to remove the water at a faster rate than the reservoir can fill, or the force of the water will cause the reservoir to rupture.”

This time the grin came easier. “Are you saying I’m going to explode?”

His expression was grim enough to make the first flutter of fear start in my chest. “That’s exactly what I’m saying. Until you acquired the Imadei, you had your reservoir blocked so no water could enter it. Even the simplest Orpheus crystals
amplify psi ability. But the Imadei is a powerful crystal and your ability isn’t meager. It’s extraordinarily high. Since the moment you put it on, that crystal has been pouring metaphoric water into your reservoir at an enormous rate. And it’s starting to ooze through the cracks in your defenses. The verge sickness and the headaches are symptoms of the leakage.

“If you don’t start using it voluntarily, the ability will blast out on its own and you’ll have no control over it. Depending on what your talent is, it could destroy you and everyone around you.”

I made a heroic and futile effort to tamp down the fear that was suddenly choking me. “What if my so-called talent is growing plants? How would that threaten anyone?”

“Imagine this planet suddenly overgrown with a jungle so thick no one could cut through it.”

“Lillith, is he exaggerating?”

“No,” the ship responded. “If anything, he’s downplaying the danger. You need to listen to him, Echo. It’s not only your ability we have to worry about, but the Imadei. Remember, for all intents it’s a small Mother Stone, and we know how powerful they can be. It is imperative that you be in control of the stone, and that won’t happen until you can acknowledge and control your psi ability.”

By now my head was throbbing in time with my heartbeat, but that didn’t stop me from jumping to my feet and pacing frantically around the room. “Okay, I’ve got psi ability! Now tell me how in Zin’s name I’m supposed to use it when I don’t have any idea what it is.”

From somewhere in the distance I felt Peri’s startled query at my vehemence, and knew she was already winging her way back to the house.

“Admitting you have psi ability is a good first step,” Lillith said. “And we do have some clues as to what it might be.”

“You’ve been discussing me?” I paused to look suspiciously at Marcus.

“Of course we have,” he answered. “At least, we’ve talked about your probable talent.”

“Fine.” I threw my hands up and then winced as pain shot through my temples at the movement. “What are these clues you’ve come up with?”

“You contacted the girls, the ones they brought in on the black marketeers’ ship,” Lillith said. “It wasn’t a dream, Echo, and we don’t believe it was the Imadei. The stone’s primary goal would be to connect with the Sumantti. Has that type of ‘seeing’ happened at any other time?”

Saying I had psi ability and admitting it to myself were two different things, and for a moment I wrestled with what I wanted the truth to be versus what it really was. If I did this, I’d be giving up any chance I had of returning to my former employer. I’d be an agent for the rest of my life.

It was a horrifying and scary thought.

On the other hand, it seemed I was to have no choice in the matter. Unless I was ready to die. Even
I
wasn’t that stubborn.

With an odd sense of relief I stopped fighting fate and answered the ship’s question. “Yes. Twice now I’ve seen Reynard when he was somewhere else.”

Marcus was fully alert now, his gaze pinned on me. “Was he aware of you?”

I hesitated. “Maybe. The first time, he was eating breakfast with a large group of men. After I observed him for a second, he suddenly looked up and scanned the room, like he felt someone watching him.”

“And the second time?” Lillith asked.

“It was later the same day. I saw him examine the castle door right before you told me he was doing exactly that.”

Marcus got up and uncovered the sunstone lamps to alleviate the falling darkness, and brought me a cup of herbal tea.

Peri zoomed into the room and hovered in front of me, cooing encouragement as I drank the liquid. When I returned the glass to Marcus, she landed on my shoulder, sending waves of love and support. My headache didn’t go away, but it eased a little, as much because of Peri as anything else.

“Sit,” Marcus put the cup away and gestured to the chair. “We need to figure out exactly what’s going on with your ability.”

I perched on the edge of the seat, too tense to relax, as he continued.

“Lillith, I know you’ve been running probability programs and feeding what information we have to the psi examiner on Centaurius. Have you come up with anything?”

“A few theories. For lack of anything better, we’re calling Echo’s ability
ghosting
, since she can appear to other people but can’t manipulate her environment. It seems to be a combination of clairvoyance and astral projection with elements common to neither.”

“What elements?” I asked. My headache was slowly changing, the pain turning into something I’d never felt before. It was as if my head was stuffed with thick cloth, making it difficult to think, to hear, and I had to concentrate to hear Lillith’s response.

“With clairvoyance you could see events occurring in other places, which you seem to be able to do. With astral projection, your essence, or spirit, travels to another place. You did that, too. However, in neither case should anyone be able to see you or communicate with you, and the girl did. That’s the element we’re trying to understand.”

Marcus tapped his steepled fingers against his chin. “We
don’t know for sure if the commander actually saw her. A lot of people are able to sense if they’re being watched. I’d think a man with his training would be one of them. And maybe there’s something about Gaia that allowed her to see Echo.”

“Pelga,” I mumbled. “She’s Pelga.” All that cloth in my head was suddenly doing a slow shuffle, making it feel like something was crawling around inside my skull. I could barely think now.

“Interesting,” Lillith commented. “I did some checking after you mentioned this Pelga. She was your crèche mate, but she died at the age of five cycles from Chekhov disease and her DNA was retrieved for reprocessing.”

Chekhov disease was a childhood illness, usually mild, that produced flu-like symptoms in its victims that lasted about a week. Only in rare cases was it fatal, and no one knew why.

But that was wrong. My forehead wrinkled as my brain tried to function. “Pelga was recycled.” I forced the words out through suddenly clumsy lips. “She got her lesson wrong, and they took her away. They took her away and strapped her down to a bed under bright lights, and then they stuck needles in her. I saw her.”

“You couldn’t have seen her,” the ship said. “The hospital they had her in was on the other side of Centaurius and—Echo? Echo!”

Well, Marcus had said I was going to explode. From my shoulder Peri let out a scream that echoed around the room, but I could only think one thing as my surroundings faded.

Boom.

I
opened my eyes to the sound of hundreds of dragon birds screeching in alarm. They darted into the air, swooped in synchronous patterns, and then finally settled on convenient perches, peering at me in puzzlement while they chattered frantically at one another. For as far as I could see, a tropical jungle stretched the landscape, with adobe buildings snuggled between towering trees.

Panic closed my throat as several extremely large, stunningly beautiful men paused in what they were doing and headed in my direction. Holy Zin, were those spears they were carrying?

“Echo?”

The voice came from behind me, and I spun. “Kiera?”

I went weak-kneed with relief when I recognized the other woman. She was standing beside an older female who held Teeah, bouncing the child on her hip.

A perplexed expression flitted across Kiera’s face as she stared at me. “Yes, we just got back. Max didn’t tell me Lillith was here. That’s not like him.”

“She’s not here,” I whispered.

Her mouth turned down in a frown. “I don’t understand.
If she’s not here, how did you get…” She trailed off, her eyes going wide as she stared at me. “Great Goddess, with the sun behind you like that, I can almost see right through you. What’s going on here?”

The men had reached our location, but she waved them back as I tried to answer her.

“My psi ability.”

Her gaze sharpened. “You’ve figured out what it is? Does Dr. Daniels know?”

Dr. Daniels’s name was still on her lips when his image flashed through my mind. A rush of vertigo swamped my senses and abruptly I was standing on a white crushed-shell garden path beside a pink bench. Flowers native to Centaurius bloomed in controlled abandon from bushes that drank the strong early-morning light.

An involuntary whimper escaped, alerting the man a few meters away of my presence. He whirled abruptly, his eyes widening when he saw me.

“Agent Adams?” Dr. Daniels looked around wildly. “How did you get by my home security? Why aren’t you on Madrea, doing your job?”

As soon as he mentioned Madrea, I thought of Marcus. Before I could blink, the vertigo hit me again. Peri’s hysterical screaming turned to angry scolding as she hovered in front of me, and I could hear Marcus’s voice as he bent over my body.

“Ignore the damn demands! Agent Smith and Dr. Daniels will just have to get in line. We’ve got an emergency here.”

There was a slight pause during which, I assumed, Lillith was answering him. “Of course I’m trying to wake her up! She’s not responding. How are her vital signs?”

Another pause. “Well, that’s good, at least. Peri, will you please shut up?”

The dragon bird cut off in mid-scold and cooed at me.
The change in tone caught Marcus’s attention and he turned his head to see what was going on. With a shocked gasp, he stumbled back two steps and tripped over the small table, landing on his rear end with a thud.

“Echo?” His gaze whipped from me to my body and then back again as he scrambled to his feet. “I must say, even though we had an idea of what was happening, it’s a bit unsettling to see you twice in the same room. Can you get back in your body now?”

“I don’t know how! Every time I think of someone, I’m there with them. How do I stop?” The fear built until I didn’t know how I could contain it.

Marcus’s head tilted before he answered. “Lillith says you need to calm down. Your heart rate is increasing dramatically.”

Calm down? Calm down? How in Zin was I supposed to calm down when my spirit was all the way across the room and I didn’t have any idea how to merge it with my corporeal body? I needed help. I needed—Reynard!

The unreasonable certainty that he was the only one who could save me washed through my mind as the vertigo spun me again. I expected to appear in his room at the castle, but to my surprise, I landed in a room four times the size of Marcus’s house. The only usual furniture was a table with two chairs set near the front of the room. Every square inch of the wall space was taken up by row after row of actual paper books, and more shelves spanned the room with narrow aisles between them. There had to be thousands of books here.

For a split second, I simply gaped at the display, temporarily shocked out of my panic. When Reynard had talked about the king’s brother getting black-market copies, I’d been picturing electronic books. Paper versions hadn’t been made in centuries, except for rare special orders that cost enough
to pay off my indenture. Even the sheets for scribbling notes were made of reusable electronic paper that could be cleared with one swipe of a hand. How was the king reimbursing the black marketeers for all these?

My mind was still whirling when I ripped my gaze from the obscene wealth of paper and looked toward Reynard. He was at the table, bent over a book, head cradled in his hands. A sunstone lamp burned in front of him, casting its light over his face as well as the pages he perused so intently. It was a thick tome, and I leaned closer to see the title at the top.
Genetically Engineered Persons: From Creation to Adulthood.

Well, his foray into all things GEP would just have to wait. I was in trouble here. The fear returned with a vengeance and my voice quivered.

“Reynard?”

He jumped and lurched to his feet, one hand automatically going to his knife before he saw me and halted the action. “Echo? How did you get in here?” His gaze sharpened as he stared at me. “What’s wrong?”

I raised a hand in supplication. “Help me. Please. I can’t stop. I don’t know how to get back in my body.”

With no hesitation, he stepped toward me. “Where are you?”

“Marcus’s house.”

And by simply speaking the words, that’s where I was again. Both Marcus and Peri were expectantly watching the spot where I’d been last time, but now I was behind them.

“Back here.” I waved to get their attention. They both turned to see me better. “Please don’t mention any names.”

Marcus was frowning intently. “Lillith wants to know if you see any white filmy cords attaching you to your body.”

“No, there’s nothing connecting me.”

“So, it’s not any form of astral projection,” he mused. “But there has to be a way for you to get—”

The pounding hooves of a horse going full speed sounded outside, punctuated by the noise of a sliding stop. Marcus’s words were cut off by the sound of raised voices that drifted in through the windows. Abruptly, the door flew open and Reynard charged into the house, shaking Bim off before slamming it shut again. He must have had the horse waiting right outside the library to get here so fast.

Without pausing he went straight to my body, knelt and tugged the chain around my neck to bring the Imadei into view.

Marcus yelled as the commander reached for the stone, and I braced myself for the pain of his touch.

It never happened.

As Reynard’s hand gently enfolded the stone, a feeling of warmth and bliss washed over me, and my eyes drifted closed. I could literally feel the power of his will as he pulled my spirit back into my body. In spite of my relief, the analytical, obsessive part of me watched how he did it with a sense of awe. And by now I was so connected to the stone that I knew I could duplicate his actions all on my own, mentally, without the physical contact.

When I opened my eyes again it was to see the commander leaning over me, still cradling the Imadei in his palm, a light sheen of sweat coating his forehead. With one hand I reached out and cradled his cheek for a moment.

“Thank you,” I whispered as Peri cooed from the back of my chair. “You may have saved my life.”

Our gazes met and held until Marcus cleared his throat. “I’d better go calm Bim down. I’ll be right back.”

We both ignored him, concentrating too deeply on each other as the door closed to hear anything else. “How did you know what to do?” I asked.

He shrugged. “I can’t explain what happened. It just seemed like the right thing. How do you feel?”

I did a mental rundown. My heart was still pounding from the aftereffects of terror, but the headache was gone as if it had never existed. All in all, I felt better than I had in days.

“Amazingly good,” I told him. “I’m not even tired.”

“You said you weren’t like the Smith woman that way.” There was a question in his eyes now, and I sighed.

“I’m not an empath, Reynard. No one seems to know exactly
what
I am. And I didn’t want to admit I had any psi ability at all, because that would mean there was no chance of getting my old job back. But it doesn’t look like I have a choice in the matter now.” I rubbed my forehead, despair and confusion roiling inside me, and then pushed it all away. My old life was over. I had to accept that once and for all.

“Either I learn how to use this talent or it will kill me,” I continued. “Fortunately, after watching how you did it, I think I can get back to my body next time.”

“Excellent,” Lillith commented in my ear. “We need to do some experiments.”

Damn, I’d forgotten about her. “Can’t it wait until tomorrow? It’s been a long day.” And I really needed time to sort out everything that had happened.

“You just said you weren’t tired and Dr. Daniels has gone back to Alien Affairs headquarters to confer with the psi testers and run probabilities. He’s very excited that you’ve narrowed in on your ability and wants to know its exact limits.”

So much for some personal alone time. I grimaced and sat up straighter as Marcus came back in. Reynard immediately stood and moved two paces away. At my side, Peri ruffled her feathers and then settled watchfully. “What does Dr. Daniels want me to do now?”

“He wants you to try and visit someone you’ve never met before. Maybe someone you’ve only seen an image of.”

“Is he thinking this is some form of distance viewing?” Marcus asked.

“No, they have some theories, but at this point they need more information to either prove or disprove them.”

After thinking for a second, I nodded. “Okay, I’ll try to ‘visit’ the king.”

Reynard arched a brow. “You’ve seen him?”

“Yes, in a vid.” I didn’t tell him that I’d barely noticed the man because I was too busy drooling over him.

I took a minute to think about what, exactly, had happened the first time. It wasn’t easy to analyze because I’d been dizzy and confused. We had been talking about Pelga, but my mind had been thinking about Kiera, how I wouldn’t be in this fix if not for her. And suddenly her image had formed very strongly in my head, followed by a pushing feeling. I took a deep breath. “Okay, here goes.”

Eyes closed, I took a deep breath and brought the king’s image into my mind. Once it was firm, I put myself into the picture, saw myself standing next to him, and then pushed.

Nothing happened.

Closing my hand around the Imadei, I tried again, this time straining with all the strength I had in me and drawing on the crystal for more.

Still nothing. Finally, I opened my eyes and shook my head. “It’s not working. I can
feel
it not working. It’s like there’s some vital piece missing with the king that I had with Dr. Daniels and Kiera and Marcus.”

“Dr. Daniels says that’s excellent. Now try Jancen.”

Because I was paying more attention this time, I felt something that I can only compare to rapidly flipping pages, followed by an infinitesimal click as though something had locked into place.

Abruptly, I was standing in a darkened space. Jancen was in front of me, stretched out on a narrow cot, snoring gently.
Scattered rustlings from here and there told me we weren’t alone in the tent. Others were sleeping nearby. Smiling at the old man, I pictured myself sliding back into my body the way I’d don a comfortable robe. With no notable transition, I was back.

Marcus was looking at me, waiting patiently, and Reynard had moved back to my side, ready to intervene if necessary. Peri didn’t seem the least bit concerned. “It worked.”

Quickly, I told them what had happened, and knew Lillith was relaying my words to Dr. Daniels. There was a moment of silence before she responded.

“Dr. Daniels says he thinks they have enough information now to come up with a reasonable explanation for what you do and how you do it. He says to get some rest while they run it through the computer and he’ll talk to you in the morning.”

“Well,” Marcus stretched and glanced meaningfully at the commander, “guess I’ll head off to bed.”

“Just a second.” I stood and waved a hand at the table where there were enough chairs for the three of us. “Let’s all sit down. There’s something else I want to know.”

In my ear, Lillith sighed, and I figured she knew what was coming and hadn’t wanted to talk about it. When we were seated, with Peri perched on the back of the empty chair, I cleared my throat.

“Here’s the thing. When Reynard touched the Imadei, it should have hurt, badly from the information we have. But it didn’t. Not only was he able to touch it, he used it to help get me back in my body. Since the Imadei is attuned to my brain and no one else’s, how did he do it?”

The commander looked vaguely surprised as he turned to Marcus for an answer. When Lillith spoke, Marcus repeated her answer aloud so I was hearing it in stereo.

“Because his brain is operating on the exact same electrical wave pattern as yours, Echo. It shouldn’t be possible. Even identical twins have different electrical brain-wave patterns.”

“Then how…?”

“It’s an anomaly I can’t explain. But it did make me curious about the rest of the Madreans. After I scanned the commander the first time and realized he was different from other Naturals, I checked a large sampling of the other people on this planet. And I found something very amazing. The Madreans have evolved into the equivalent of normal GEPs, and from their brains’ electrical impulses, some exhibit the beginnings of rudimentary psi ability.”

I’d be hard put to say who was more surprised, me or Marcus. We both sat there with our mouths open, while the commander looked more puzzled than ever, and Peri chuckled deep in her throat as though laughing at a private joke only she had heard. I finally got my mouth closed enough to ask one of the zillion questions darting through my mind.