“That’s the question I want an answer to. That’s what I’m curious about. More than curious. Your predecessors never trapped more than one active at a time. Their first was always the one who had helped them through transition. They always needed help to get through transition. If I didn’t provide it, they died. On the other hand, if I did provide it, sooner or later they killed the person who had helped them. They never wanted to kill, and especially they didn’t want to kill that person. But they couldn’t help themselves. They got … hungry, and they killed. Then they latched onto another active, drew him to them, and went through the feeding process again. Unfortunately, they always killed other actives. I can’t afford that.”
“Did they … trade bodies the way you do?”
“No. They took what they needed and left the husk.”
I winced.
“And their patterns gave them an access to their victims that their victims couldn’t close off—as you already know.”
“Oh.” I felt almost guilty—as though he were telling me about things that I had already done. As though I had already killed the people in my pattern. People who hadn’t done anything to me.
“So you can see why I’m worried,” he said.
“Yes. But I can’t see why you’d want somebody like me around at all—why you’d breed somebody like me if all my kind can do is feed on other actives.”
“Not your kind, Mary. Your predecessors.”
“Right. They killed one at a time. I kill several at once. Progress.”
“But do you kill several at once?”
“I hope I don’t kill any at all—at least not unintentionally. But you don’t give me much to base that hope on. What am I for, Doro? What are you progressing toward?”
“You know the answer to that.”
“Your race, your empire, yes, but what place is there in it for me?”
“I’ll be able to tell you that after I’ve watched you for a while.”
“But—”
“The thing for you to do now is rest so that you’ll have a better chance of handling your people when they get here. Your transition was several hours longer than normal, so you’re probably still tired.”
I was tired. I had gotten only a couple of hours’ sleep. I wanted answers, though, more than I wanted rest. But he’d made it pretty clear that I wasn’t going to get them. Then I realized what he had just said. “My people?”
“Both you and Karl say you feel as though they’re yours.”
“And both Karl and I know that, if they really belong to anybody other than themselves, it’s you.”
“You belong to me,” he said. “So I’m not giving up anything when I give you charge of them. They’re yours as long as you can handle them without killing them.”
I stared at him in surprise. “One of the owners,” I muttered, remembering the bitter thoughts I’d had two weeks before. “How did I suddenly become one of the owners?”
“By surviving your transition. What you have to do now is to survive your new authority.”
I leaned back in my chair. “Thanks. Any pointers?”
“A few.”
“Speak up, then. I have the feeling I’m going to need all the help I can get.”
“Very likely. First you should realize that I’m delegating authority to you only because you’ll need it if you’re to have any chance at all of staying alive among these people. You’re going to have to accept your own proprietary feelings as legitimate and demand that your people accept you on your terms.” He paused, looked hard at me. “Keep them out of your mind as much as you can. Use your advantage. Always know more about them than they know about you. Intimidate them quietly.”
“The way you do?”
“If you can.”
“I have a feeling you’re rooting for me.”
“I am.”
“Well … I wouldn’t ask why, on a bet. I’d rather think it was because you really gave a damn about me.”
He just smiled.
Karl
Karl had never wanted quite as much as he did now to hurt something, to kill something, someone. He looked at Vivian sitting next to him, her mind ablaze with fear, her face carefully expressionless.
The blast of a horn behind him let him know that he was sitting through a green light. He restrained an impulse to lash back at the impatient driver. He could kill with his ability. He had, twice, accidentally, not long after his transition. He wondered why he refrained from doing it again. What difference would it make?
“Are we going back home?” Vivian asked.
Karl glanced at her, then looked around. He realized that he was heading back toward Palo Verde. He had left home heading nowhere in particular except away from Mary and Doro. Now he had made a large U and was heading back to them. And it wasn’t just an ordinary unconscious impulse driving him. It was Mary’s pattern.
He pulled over to the curb, stopped under a NO PARKING sign. He leaned back in the seat, his eyes closed.
“Will you tell me what’s the matter with you?” Vivian asked.
“No.”
She was doing all she could to keep calm. It was his silence that frightened her. His silence and his obvious anger.
He wondered why he had brought her with him. Then he remembered. “You’re not leaving me,” he said.
“But if Mary came through transition all right—”
“I said you’re not leaving!”
“All right.” She was almost crying with fear. “What are you going to do with me?”
He turned to glare at her in disgust.
“Karl, for heaven’s sake! Tell me what’s wrong.” Now she was crying.
“Be quiet.” Had he ever loved her, really? Had she ever been more than a pet—like all the rest of his women? “How was Doro last night?” he asked.
She looked startled. By mutual agreement, they did not discuss her nights with Doro. Or they hadn’t until now. “Doro?” she said.
“Doro.”
“Oh, now—” She sniffed, tried to compose herself. “Now, just a minute—”
“How was he?”
She frowned at him, disbelieving. “That can’t be what’s bothering you. Not after all this time. Not as though it was my fault, either!”
“That’s a pretty good body he’s wearing,” said Karl. “And I could see from the way you were hanging on him this morning that he must have given you a pretty good—”
“That’s enough!” Outrage was fast replacing her fear.
A pet, he thought. What difference did it make what you said or did to a pet?
“I’ll defy Doro when you do,” she said icily. “The moment you refuse to do what he tells you and stick to your refusal, I’ll stand with you!”
A pet. In pets, free will was tolerated only as long as the pet owner found it amusing.
“You’ve got your nerve complaining about Doro and me,” she muttered. “You’d climb into bed with him yourself if he told you to.”
Karl hit her. He had never done such a thing before, but it was easy.
She screamed, then foolishly tried to get out of the car. He caught her arm, pulled her back, hit her again, and again.
He was panting when he stopped. She was bloody and only half conscious, crumpled down on the seat, crying. He hadn’t controlled her. He had wanted to use his hands. Just his hands. And he wasn’t satisfied. He could have hurt her more. He could have killed her.
Yes, and then what? How many of his problems would her death erase? He would have to get rid of her body, and then still go back to his master, and now, by God, his mistress. Once he was there, at least Mary’s pattern would stop pulling at him, dragging at him, subverting his will as easily as he subverted Vivian’s. Nothing would be changed, though, except that Vivian would be gone.
Only a pet?
Who was he thinking about? Vivian or himself? Now that Doro had tricked him into putting on a leash, it could be either, or both.
He took Vivian by t
he shoulders and made her sit up. He had split her lip. That was where the blood came from. He took out a handkerchief and wiped away as much of it as he could. She looked at him first, vacillating between fear and anger; then she looked away.
Without a word, he drove her to Monroe Memorial Hospital. There he parked, took out his checkbook, and wrote a check. He tore it out and put it in her hands. “Go. Get away from me while you can.”
“I don’t need a doctor.”
“All right, don’t see one. But go!”
“This is a lot of money,” she said, looking at the check. “What’s it supposed to pay me for?”
“Not pay you,” he said. “God, you know better than that.”
“I know you don’t want me to go. Whatever you’re angry about, you still need me. I didn’t think you would, but you do.”
“For your own good, Vee, go!”
“I’ll decide what’s good for me.” Calmly she tore the check into small pieces. She looked at him. “If you really wanted me to go—if you want me to go now—you know how to make it happen. You do know.”
He looked at her for a long moment. “You’re making a mistake.”
“And you’re letting me make it.”
“If you stay, this might be the last time you’ll have the freedom to make your own mistakes.”
“You’re wrong to try so hard to frighten me away when you want me to stay so badly.”
He said nothing.
“And I am staying as long as you let me. Will you tell me what was wrong now?”
“No.”
She sighed. “All right,” she said, trying not to look hurt. “All right.”
Chapter Six
Doro
It occurred to Doro when Rachel Davidson arrived that she was the most subtly dangerous of his seven actives. Mary was the most dangerous period, though he doubted that she understood this yet. But there was nothing subtle about Mary. Rachel was, as Mary had said, related to Emma. She was the daughter of Emma’s most successful granddaughter, Catherine—a woman who could easily have outlived Emma if she had had better control of her mental shielding. As it was, she had spent too much of her time and energy trying to keep the mental noise of the rest of humanity out of her mind—as though she were a latent. But a latent would have been less sensitive. Catherine Davidson had simply decided at thirty-nine that she couldn’t stand any more. She had lain down and died. Every one of Doro’s previous healers had made similar decisions. But Rachel was only twenty-five, and her shielding was much better. Doro hoped that her decision, if she made it at all, was several years away. At any rate, she was very much alive now, and she would be more trouble than Mary could be expected to handle so quickly. But Doro decided to watch for a while before he warned Rachel. Before he gave Mary the help Mary did not know she needed. He sat by the fireplace and watched the two women meet.
Rachel was a full head taller, several shades darker, and from the look on her face, very puzzled. “Whoever you are,” she said, “you’re the one I’m looking for—the one who called me here.”
“Yes.”
“Why? Who are you? What do you want?”
“My name is Mary Larkin. Come on in and sit down.” Then, when Rachel was seated, “I’m an active, like you. Or not quite like you. I’m an experiment.” She looked at Doro. “One of his experiments that got out of hand.”
Rachel and Doro found themselves staring at each other, Doro almost as surprised as Rachel. Clearly, Mary was not going to let him be the observer that he had intended to be.
“Doro?” said Rachel tentatively.
“Yes.”
“Thank goodness. If you’re here, this must make sense somehow. I just walked out in the middle of a service in New York. I was so desperate to get here that I had to steal some poor person’s place on a plane.”
“What did you do with Eli?” Doro asked.
“Left him to handle the rest of the day’s services. No one will be healed, I know, but no doubt he’ll entertain them. Doro, what’s going on?”
“An experiment, as Mary said.”
“But it obviously isn’t out of hand yet. She’s still alive. Or is that temporary?”
“If it is, it’s none of your business,” said Mary quickly.
“It wouldn’t be if you hadn’t dragged me here,” said Rachel. “But since you did—”
“Since I did, Rachel, and since I am still alive, you’d better plan on my being around for a while.”
“Either plan on it or do something about it myself,” muttered Rachel. Then she frowned. “How do you know my name? I didn’t tell you.”
“Yes you did. This morning, when this whole damn thing started. When it was supposed to be ending for me.” Suddenly, Mary seemed to sag. She looked more than tired, Doro thought. She looked a little frightened. Doro had made her rest for a few hours before Rachel’s arrival. But how much real rest could she get thinking about what was in store for her? Thinking about it but not really knowing?
“What are you talking about?” demanded Rachel.
“I finished my transition this morning,” said Mary. “And then, as if that wasn’t enough, this other thing, this pattern, just sort of snapped into existence. Suddenly I was holding six other actives in a way that I didn’t understand. Holding them, and calling them here.”
Rachel was watching her, still frowning. “I thought there were others, but this whole thing was so insane I didn’t trust my own senses. Are the others coming here, then?”
“Yes. They’re on their way now.”
“Do you want us here?”
“No!” Mary’s vehemence startled Doro. Had she already decided that being “one of the owners” was so bad?
“Then, why don’t you let us go?” said Rachel.
“I’ve tried,” said Mary. “Karl has tried. My husband. He’s been an active for ten years and he couldn’t find a way out. As far as I can see, the only person who might have any helpful ideas is Doro.”
And both women looked at him. Mary’s whole attitude had changed. Suddenly she was edging away from the chance she had all but begged for earlier. And she kept passing the buck to Doro—kept saying in one way or another, “It’s his fault, not mine!” That was true enough, but it was going to hurt her if she didn’t stop emphasizing it. Rachel had already all but dismissed her as having no real importance. She was an irritant. No more. And healers were very efficient at getting rid of irritants.
“What kind of call did you receive, Rae?” he asked. “Was it like a verbal command, or like—”
“It was like getting hit with a club at first,” she said. “And the noise … mental static like the worst moments of transition. Maybe I was picking up the last of Mary’s transition. Then I was drawn here. There may have been words. I was only aware of images that let me see where I was going. Images, and that terrible planted compulsion to go. So here I am. I had to come. I had no choice at all.”
Doro nodded. “And now that you’re here, do you think you could leave if you wanted to?”
“I want to.”
“And you can’t?”
“I could, yes. But I wouldn’t be very comfortable. At the airport, I realized that I was only a few miles away from here. I wanted that to be enough. I wanted to get a hotel room and wait until whoever was calling me got tired and gave up. I went to a hotel and tried to register. My hand was shaking so much I couldn’t write.” She shrugged. “I had to come. Now that I’m here I have to stay—at least until someone figures out a way to make your little experiment let me go.”
“You’ll need a room here, then,” said Doro. “Mary.”
Mary looked at him, then at Rachel. “Upstairs,” she said tonelessly. “Come on.”
They were on their way out when Doro spoke again. “Just a moment, Rae.” Both women stopped. “It’s possible that in a few days you’ll need my help more than Mary will, but right now she is just out of transition.”
Rachel said nothing.
“S
he’d better not even catch a cold, healer.”
“Are you going to warn the others away from her too when they get here?”
“Of course. But since you’re here now, and since you’ve already made your feelings clear, I didn’t think I should wait to speak to you.”
She smiled a little in spite of herself. “All right, Doro, I won’t hurt her. But get me out of this, please. I feel like I’m wearing a damned leash.”
Doro said nothing to that. He spoke to Mary. “Come back when you’ve got Rachel settled. I want to talk to you.”
“Okay.” She must have read something of what he wanted to say in his tone. She looked apprehensive. It didn’t matter. She was an adult now, and on the verge of being a success. The first success of her kind. He would push her. She could stand it, and right now she needed it.
She came back a few minutes later and he motioned her into a chair opposite him.
“Are you shielded?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Can you tell by your pattern whether anyone else is near here—about to arrive?” His own ability had told him that no one was.
“No one is,” she said.
“Good. We won’t be interrupted.” He looked at her silently for a long moment. “What happened?”
Her eyes slid away from his. “I don’t know. I was just nervous, I guess.”
“Of course you were. The trick is not to tell everyone about it.”
She looked at him again, frowning, her small, expressive face a mask of concern. “Doro, I saw them in my mind and they didn’t scare me. I didn’t feel a thing. I had to keep reminding myself that they were probably dangerous, that I should be careful. And even when I was reminding myself, I don’t think I really believed it. But now … just meeting one of them …”
“You’re afraid of Rachel?”
“I sure as hell am.”
It was an unusual thing for her to admit. Rachel must have thoroughly shaken her. “What is it about her that frightens you?”
“I don’t know.”
“You should know.”
She thought for a moment. “It was just a feeling at first—like the feeling I ignored when I tried to read you this morning. A feeling of danger. A feeling that she could carry out those threats she kept not quite making.” She stopped, looked at Doro. He said nothing. She went on. “I guess the dangerous thing about her is the one you hinted at just before we went up. That if she can heal the sick, she can probably make people sick too.”
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