Midnight Crystal (12 page)

“I noticed. So did Elizabeth.”

“Working together on a joint project is one thing,” Sam said. “But if those two get involved in a serious affair, there could be repercussions throughout both Arcane and the Guild.”

“Your family was Arcane once, at least until the Era of Discord. John Cabot Winters made his choice after the conflict. He could have stuck with the Society. Instead, he embedded his family into the heart of the new Guild organization here in Frequency. He had to know that would cut him off from Arcane.”

“It’s not like they chose different sides during a civil war,” Sam said. “They fought together against Vance’s rebels. Saved each other’s lives more than once, according to the old journals.”

Neither of them spoke for a while. They watched the couple on the terrace.

“Well, one thing’s certain,” Sam said eventually. “It’s a good bet that neither of our ancestors foresaw something like this happening. How the hell can it work, Ben?”

Ben looked at the way Adam was positioned beside Marlowe: close but not quite touching, leaning in a little, the way a man did when he was feeling protective, the way a man did when he wanted to make it clear to other men that this woman was his.

“Damned if I know,” Ben said. “But if it does work, it could accomplish what you and I used to dream about all those years ago.”

“Build some bridges between Arcane and the Guilds?”

“Look what the underworld has done to your daughter, what it might do to the cities. If Adam is right, the destructive power in that maze is enormous. Even if he and Marlowe do manage to resolve this problem, who knows what else is waiting to bite us down below? There are only two organizations that can even begin to deal with the dangers underground.”

“Arcane and the Guilds.”

“They need to share resources and talents, or the technology the aliens left behind just might get us all in the end. Hell, maybe whatever took out the aliens is still down there, just waiting to pounce.”

“What about the liaison that seems to be forming out there on your terrace?”

“I don’t know how it will turn out,” Ben admitted. “But there’s one thing I can tell you for sure.”

“What?”

“There’s not a damn thing either of us can do to stop it.”

“I AM SO SORRY TO HEAR ABOUT YOUR DAUGHTER’S condition,” Elizabeth said gently. “I can only imagine how devastating it must be for you.”

“Thank you,” Diana Winters said. “It has been so awful. At first the doctors were optimistic that Vickie would recover. But lately they’ve given up. They won’t say it out loud, but I can see it in their eyes. They simply do not know what is going on with Vickie. They admitted that they have never dealt with any parapsych trauma quite like the one that she suffered.”

They both looked at the painting on the wall. It was one of Elizabeth’s favorites, a scene of the ruins of Old Frequency glowing in the night beneath a lightning-charged thunderstorm.

“You do realize that Marlowe may not be able to help Vickie,” she said.

“I know,” Diana said. “But at this point we’re willing to try anything.”

“Of course.”

Diana closed her eyes. Tears glistened at the edge of her lashes. “Forgive me. It has all been such a strain on the family. Not only am I worried sick about my daughter, I’m afraid that Adam blames himself for what happened to her. Nothing Sam or I say to him can convince him to accept the truth. It was a terrible accident, but it was not his fault. Vickie was—
is
a professional, and she’s a Winters. She wanted to go on that exploratory expedition into the maze, and she was fully qualified.”

They walked along the length of the gallery and stopped at the window at the far end. Down below on the terrace Marlowe stood with Adam. The energy of sexual awareness that shivered in the air around the couple was evident, even from this distance, Elizabeth thought. She had been keenly aware of it earlier, during dinner.
Oh, Marlowe, what have you done? You’re falling in love with a descendant of Nicholas Winters
.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Diana said.

Elizabeth smiled wistfully. “Probably the same thing you’re thinking.”

“Trying to stop whatever is happening between those two would be like trying to stop a hurricane,” Diana said.

The tall clock chimed softly at the end of the gallery. Elizabeth glanced at her watch.

“Almost midnight,” she said. “Time to go to the clinic.”

Diana took a deep breath. “I’m afraid to hope.”

There was nothing to say, Elizabeth thought. But she was a mother, too. She understood. She put her arm around Diana. Together they walked back along the gallery to the staircase.

“I’M SORRY, BUT I CAN’T ALLOW YOU TO BRING WHATEVER that animal is into the ward,” the nurse said. Her name was Nancy Hawkins, and she was not pleased by the late-night visitors to the clinic.

Marlowe reached up to her shoulder to pat Gibson. “It’s all right. He’s a therapy dust bunny.”

Nancy did not appear convinced. “I’ve never heard of a therapy dust bunny.”

“Trust me,” Marlowe said. “I do a lot of dreamlight work. I have discovered that people with severe parapsych trauma sometimes respond well to dust bunnies.”

“I’ve never heard that,” Nancy said.

Marlowe felt a little sorry for her. The nurse’s dreamprints were those of a dedicated healer whose only goal was to protect her patient. But Nancy Hawkins was outnumbered and outgunned tonight. Marlowe and Gibson had not come alone to the hospital. Adam, his parents, and her own mother and father had accompanied them. Faced with the heads of both the Winters and the Jones clans, two of the most formidable families in Frequency, there was little Nancy could do. Her only option was to call hospital security, and everyone, including her, knew that she would not take that step. She might not like what was happening, but she was, after all, dealing with her patient’s family. They had rights, too.

Abandoning the battle to bar Gibson from the ward, she turned and started down the hall. “I’ll take you to Vickie’s room.”

Marlowe and the others followed her along the quiet corridor, past the rooms of sleeping patients.

Marlowe kept her senses throttled back to the lowest possible level. Hospitals and medical clinics were always bad, but parapsych wards were the worst. There was no way to tune out all of the layers of disturbing and often just plain depressing dreamprints. Some of the dark, warped energy was so powerful and so terribly sad that Marlowe found herself brushing tears away from her eyes. Some of it was twisted in ways that sent chills down her spine.

Over the years the dreamlight generated by the patients had soaked into the very walls and floors. No amount of scrubbing could remove it. No disinfectant was strong enough to erase the seething, luminous miasma of human psychic misery.

On her shoulder, Gibson muttered anxiously, sensing her unease. As she always did on these occasions, she took comfort from his presence. They were a team.

Adam tightened his grip on her arm. “Are you going to be all right?” he asked.

“Yes, of course.” She realized with a little flash of astonishment that she was taking comfort from him as well. She and Adam were also a team. She fumbled in her purse for a tissue, found one, and blew her nose. “Not the first time I’ve visited a parapsych ward. Just takes a little acclimating, that’s all.”

Elizabeth glanced back at her. “Marlowe?”

“I’m fine, Mom. You know how it is. I’m a pro.”

Elizabeth smiled in sympathetic understanding. “Yes, I know, dear.”

Up ahead, Nancy made one last appeal to Diana. “Of course you are allowed to visit your daughter at any time, Mrs. Winters. But I strongly advise against disturbing Vickie’s routine like this. It’s after midnight, and there are so many of you. There is no telling how the presence of strangers may affect her.”

“We won’t all go into her room,” Diana Winters assured her. “Just Miss Jones.”

Nancy looked back at Marlowe, brows tensed with disapproval. “Are you a parapsych therapist of some kind, Miss Jones?”

“I’m good with dreamlight,” Marlowe said. “I don’t know yet if I can do anything for Vickie. I just want to take a look at her prints. I will try not to disturb her. You don’t even need to turn on the lights in her room.”

“I see.” Nancy said. She came to a halt in front of a partially open door and gave Marlowe a sharp look. “Please be careful. Vickie is more easily agitated late at night.”

“Dreamlight is always stronger at night,” Marlowe said, keeping her voice equally soft. “If she typically shows more anxiety after dark, that may actually be a good sign.”

“Why do you say that?” Nancy asked.

“Because it indicates that her trouble may be a disturbance in the ultradark end of the spectrum.”

“And that’s your area of expertise?”

“Yes.”

Nancy searched her face for a few seconds. Marlowe felt a little shiver in the atmosphere and knew that the nurse was focusing energy through standard resonating amber, most likely her small amber pendant.
Surprise, surprise,
she thought. Nancy Hawkins possessed some degree of talent, and she was using it to take a reading.

Whatever Nancy sensed must have satisfied her, because she beckoned to someone inside the room. A middle-aged woman appeared in the doorway. Her name tag read Tina. A professional sitter, Marlowe thought. Diana Winters had explained that they had hired someone to stay at Vickie’s bedside throughout the night.

Tina looked at the small crowd in the hallway and then glanced questioningly at Nancy.

“Is something wrong?” she asked softly.

“No,” Nancy said. “Tina, this is Miss Jones. She’s a strong dreamlight talent. The Winters family wants her to examine Vickie.”

“I understand,” Tina said. She looked at Diana. “But I must warn you that Vickie is somewhat agitated at the moment. In fact, I was just about to call in Miss Hawkins to ask if your daughter should have another dose of medication. I’m not certain this is a good time for a stranger to go into the room.”

“I won’t stay long,” Marlowe said. “I’ll just take a quick look. If I see that I can’t do anything helpful, I’ll leave immediately.”

“It’s all right, Tina,” Sam Winters said.

The sitter said nothing more, but she got out of the way. Adam and the others waited outside in the hall, as promised. Marlowe walked into the shadowed room and stopped next to the crisply made bed. She opened her senses slowly. Gibson muttered. She felt his small paws tighten on her shoulder. Animals had their own psychic natures. They usually responded to subtle changes in the atmosphere before humans picked up the currents.

In this case, however, there was nothing subtle about the dark, chaotic currents of dreamlight that roared and crashed around the sleeping figure on the bed. Vickie Winters was locked in a world of nightmares. Her eyes were closed, but her lashes twitched and her fingers trembled. Small but spasmodic shudders swept through her thin frame. Her hands were clenched.

Marlowe fought her instinctive urge to shut down her talent in order to protect herself. Instead, she deliberately went hotter, focusing on the seething, churning energy pouring from Vickie’s aura. The currents were coming from the darkest end of the spectrum, and they were fluctuating wildly. The underlying pulses appeared strong at the source, but the rogue waves slamming through them destabilized the patterns so that they failed to oscillate properly.

The damage was bad and ongoing, but the fact that Vickie’s own powerful energy field was still generating a steady, stable pattern meant that there was hope. Deep down, Vickie was fighting the battle for her own sanity. Thus far she had held the line, but she was weakening. She needed backup.

“It’s okay, Vickie,” Marlowe said. “I’m here. We’ll get through this together.”

Gibson hopped down onto the bed. His second set of eyes opened, glowing amber in the shadows, but he did not go into full hunting mode. He hovered next to Vickie’s hand.