beats per minute

by Alex Mae

  Raegan’s tired eyes seemed to look right through Bree.

  ‘How about starting from when the storm started?’ Bree coaxed, when Raegan made no move to speak. ‘Facing the Fay mirage was tough, I understand that - but it’s over now. Don’t let it trouble you. So what else do you remember?’

  By the time Raegan finally replied her face was nearly as white as the pillow, strained with the concentration. ‘The race was nearly over, but the weather got really bad. I was freaking out. When I reached the top of the hill, Declan wasn’t far behind me, and he gained more ground on the zip wires. We swung down into the valley at nearly the same time, but the mud down there was so thick we both fell on landing. It was hard to see, but I kept running. I wanted to beat him. And then...’ She flushed slightly.

  ‘What?’ Bree prompted, gently.

  ‘I switched lanes.’ Her cheeks were flaming now. ‘I know, it was out of order – but Declan wasn’t meant to be running in lane one, that was the lot I’d drawn! He’d just taken my lane to try and freak me out. So, because I was ahead, I cut across him. He was shouting, but I just ignored it. There was thunder and lightning, and trees started to fall around us. I wanted to win, but mostly I just wanted to get to higher ground. The last obstacle was ahead. I headed for the rope and...’ She frowned. ‘That’s all I remember.’

  Bree looked steadily at her.

  ‘Is that where I fell? From the rope?’

  ‘You were nearly at the top, as far as we could tell.’ Bree tried to make light of it. ‘This is where being a superhero really comes in handy. That fall would have been much more serious for the lesser mortals.’

  ‘How serious?’ Raegan had slid down her knees and now only a thick fringe of red hair and two shocked eyes peeped out over the top. ‘Could I have... died?’

  ‘Best not to think of it.’

  ‘Please.’ At first Raegan tried to appear nonchalant. Inside, she felt sick. Maybe she should have been angry at the Unit for making her run the course in the first place, but she wasn’t. Instead she was furious with herself. Not to mention totally embarrassed.The truth was she had gotten so competitive that she had not concentrated as she should have. As she had been taught to.

  She could have died.

  All at once she got that feeling, that feeling she hated, where her mouth dragged down at the corners, and she knew the tears were coming.

  ‘Are you – Raegan, do you want me to-‘

  ‘I’m fine,’ she said hoarsely, biting her lip to keep from crying. ‘Just being stupid. Please, tell me.’ She took a deep breath; blinked the tears back. There was no mummy to boohoo to anymore. She wasn’t a kid – couldn’t be, if she wanted to stay alive. ‘I need to hear this.’

  ‘If you want me to be candid, I will.’ Bree regarded her squarely. ‘It was nasty. You fell from a great height and at an awkward angle. You were unconscious by the time we got to you and there was a great big gash on the back of your head. Blood everywhere. That alone might have meant serious head trauma, a coma.’ Raegan felt for stitches. There were none. ‘It’s already healed, poppet. The Awakening means that your healing powers are already much stronger than they were a few weeks ago, and as you gain more control over your abilities it’ll increase. You wouldn’t believe the healing rate of some of the Masters. I nicked Robert with a sword once when we were fencing – which is difficult enough in itself, his hide is tougher than leather – and before my eyes, the cut closed up. And I mean, within a matter of moments. Pretty incredible.’

  To Raegan, being a Regent had seemed an exciting and challenging job – but still a job: something to put up with and work at. A lifelong duty she was born into. She had never thought of her powers as a blessing.

  Suddenly she felt very small. ‘I’ve been really lucky.’

  ‘Yes. And we still don’t know why you fell; you might have screwed up there. That aside, you’ve got some fire in your belly, lady. Your injuries were relatively minor – don’t look like that, Raegan, you’ve got a broken arm, big whoop, it could have been a broken back or spinal damage! Yes, relatively minor, which means your natural strength is excellent, not to mention your healing rate: very impressive for this stage in the training. You’re only a newbie for Christ’s sake. Don’t be too self-effacing.’

  Her face was impassive but her tone was not unkind. Raegan knew that Bree was glad to see her awake. She was surprised how glad she was to see her, too. The days of training, with Bree by her side, bossing her about, making her laugh just when she thought she might cry, had cemented a bond. She realised now that this fierce, glamorous Regent was becoming a real friend.

  The realisation cheered her up. Bree read Raegan’s expression as a response to her blunt words.

  ‘Good. That’s the closest you’ll get to a pep-talk from me.’

  ‘Gosh.’ Raegan lay back and grinned. ‘Who needs enemies, huh?’

  ‘You better believe it. I’m not one for sugarcoating.’ Bree retorted smoothly. Her hazel eyes glinted in the morning light. ‘I’ll tell you something, though – you’re certainly one to watch.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean, as a Regent. Either you’ve got friends in high places or they’ve got very high hopes for you. I’ve never seen such a rally to come to your aid.’

  ‘I thought you said you found me?’

  She shook her glossy head. ‘No. Everything I’ve told you I’ve learnt through hearsay. Yali found you.’

  ‘Yali came to get me?’ Raegan pushed her fringe out of her eyes, incredulous. ‘But it wasn’t his test! I didn’t think he even knew it was happening.’

  ‘I’ve never seen anything like it.’ It was peculiar to hear Bree, habitually blasé, sounding awestruck. ‘Rather, I’ve never felt anything like it. Yali was in Centurion House, watching you two run the course with Robert. Warwick was monitoring the camera feed from one of the towers – yes, obviously we had cameras on you – and saw you fall. The storm had knocked the feed out for us by then. He ran to Centurion House, sharpish, to update us. Truthfully, after that it’s a little fuzzy. One minute I was standing up, and then I was on the floor, and Yali had zoomed past us.’

  The confusion on Raegan’s face was enough to prompt Bree to continue. ‘He traversed, Raegan, but the jolt was huge: in a split-second, he slowed time to a virtual stand-still.’

  Raegan thought of the crystals scattered around the compound. ‘But I thought you couldn’t just traverse here? Only in controlled areas, areas we practice in – and only if the teachers remove the restrictions, which takes a while?’

  ‘That’s what I thought. And while I always suspected that there must be shortcuts they could take, I’ve never seen it happen before. And I’ve seen a lot of injuries Raegan, particularly in the Lab. It’s unpleasant but,’ Bree shrugged. ‘It happens. Often.’

  The unspoken question, why make an exception for one very new, very junior cadet? tingled in the silence between them, but Raegan wasn’t bold enough to voice it. Instead, she asked, ‘So what was the shortcut?’

  ‘A fairly enormous crystal was smashed, at Yali’s command. Robert did it. Again, I’ve never seen the like before. It was black. Ugly. Not like the protective crystals we have around the Unit. Some sort of magickal antithesis, perhaps.’ Bree mused. ‘Something about the law of opposites. Well. Whatever it was, it worked. Robert broke that thing and then Yali was gone. Seconds later – less, maybe – you were in the hospital wing. Declan got quite the fright; you were there, and then you weren’t. He didn’t even see Yali.’

  Raegan was too shocked by everything else to feel surprised that Declan had been watching over her. ‘This is... unbelievable.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘No – well, yeah, the fact that he rescued me is unbelievable, I can’t get over that. But also – I mean, I know Yali is powerful , so powerful – but how did he do that? We can’t stop time.’

  ‘Very true.’ Bree nodded soberly. ‘I remember that class with Ingmar. Scary, isn’t it?
’

  Raegan shuddered, fuzzily remembering the tales of Regents who had been carried away by their own brilliance, pushing and pushing the limits of time control – until it killed them. ‘Terrifying.’

  ‘To stop time is to stop our own time: our own heart. Perfectly logical. But the more skilled a Regent gets, the more control a Regent has over bpm... it appears that you can get pretty damn close. Particularly when you can move as fast as Yali.’ The admiration was clear in Bree’s voice. ‘He’s Brain, through and through, but he could easily teach Body if he wanted. He could teach all three.’

  The excitement and shock, for Raegan, was beginning to ebb into weariness. Her head was suddenly complaining of information overload. Her words came out in a tired stream, uncensored for user-friendliness. ‘The whole thing about two hearts, though. I find it so confusing. I don’t feel I’ll ever manage it. To move quickly while slowing your heart down...’

  Bree didn’t notice her companion’s soporific state. ‘You simply must get your head around it, duckie.’ Rising off the bed elegantly, she walked over to where her handbag was sitting on the chest of drawers and began rooting about in it. ‘Okay, I’m sorry - you’re not well, so I suppose I’ll have to humour you. While I tidy my nails I will remind you of one of your first lessons. Yes, I will quote from the great man, Yali Nureyev, himself. Are you sitting comfortably?’

  Without waiting for a reply, she launched into it, sounding as if she had swallowed Regent Textbook 101: ‘Your heart can do two things simultaneously. In fact, for a Regent, it is two things. It is both a muscle that fuels the Body and your clock. The Body’s organ, the Heart’s clock, and the Brain drives both: that makes three.’ She finished speaking with a flourish, frowning at the fourth cuticle on her left hand. ‘Well remembered, n’est-ce pas? But you have to learn to separate it. That’s the whole point of the training, to allow you to command different powers at the same time. That’s the only way to completely control your traverse; to slow your heartbeat and slow the clock, but still be able to move quickly through the altered time plane if you need to. The Brain oversees all.

  ‘Though of course, we’re likely to be stronger at one discipline than another – that’s why I’m Tesserarius of Body alone.’ Raegan did not respond, and so she continued to saw at the offending cuticle, suddenly contemplative. ‘Max is so boringly evasive when anyone asks what he specialises in. I think he wants us to believe he’s a true Master, a commander of the triumvirate. He wishes. Truth is most of us wonder why Yali isn’t the Praetor. Max would be furious if he heard that little bit of cadet chatter! But I very much doubt he could have done what Yali did for you.’

  Satisfied with her nails, she put the little file away, and turned back to her companion. The questioning forming on her lips fizzled as she took in Raegan’s peaceful expression and tightly shut eyelids. The girl was in such deep slumber, she even let out a little snortle. Tiptoeing over, Bree pulled the blanket more snugly around the bed, which rose and fell steadily with the movements of Raegan’s chest as it settled around her.

  ‘I’ll tell you my theory another time,’ she whispered. ‘Snooze on, little one.’ Raegan did not stir.

  Satisfied that her friend would not wake for at least a few hours, Bree headed for the door, grinning as she noticed the position of the hands on the infirmary wall clock. She waited until she was outside to pull out her mobile phone. The call was answered almost immediately.

  ‘I find myself unexpectedly available. Can you be at my room in five minutes? I’ll make it worth your while...’

  The sound of her quiet laughter followed her down the hall. She was so engrossed that the young man felt confident enough to step out of the shadows.

  Bree did not notice.

  Moving with swift immediacy when the passage was clear, he resumed his post in front of the slitted window in the infirmary door. A statue could not have been stiller. All senses were focused and unwavering: eyes fixated on the object while the ears remained alert, keened for any sounds of approach.

  Raegan, oblivious to his watchful presence, slept on.

  Chapter Ten: Pawn

  It was a crisp, bright Monday morning at Unit Prime – quite cool for this time in April – and Max Savage was not feeling as perky as usual. Usually, he liked Mondays. Unlike many others, he saw the new week ahead not as a chasm, an obstacle to be navigated, but as an opportunity; it was a clean slate, and offered seven days of new possibilities. Seven chances for good luck.

  He was certainly in need of some luck. That disastrous incident with Raegan O’Roarke had not gone down well with the Sentinel; he winced slightly as he remembered standing before them, being reprimanded like a naughty school boy. The Praetor of Unit Prime and Magister Militum, in charge of all active Regents throughout the globe, dressed down like a child! What more could he have done? It was hardly his fault that the girl had been injured on the one day he had chosen to fly to Russia to check on the rest of the Unit. On hearing the news, he had moved as quickly as possible. It was no small feat to traverse not only yourself but also the vehicle you were travelling in. The Sentinel was perfectly aware of this. And yet they continued to plague him, repeatedly in contact; and for the first time since his appointment as Praetor they were threatening to visit. To add insult to injury, they had personally commended Yali Nureyev for his efforts in rescuing the girl. His second-in-command, his Tribune, lauded while he was derided.

  Sipping strong black coffee, thinking how much better it would taste if he had stirred in the two sugars he had given up for Lent, he scowled when the phone rang. He knew who it would be.

  Pressing the loudspeaker button, his response was brusque. ‘What?’

  His PA was used to his moods. ‘Sorry to disturb you, sir. His Lordship, the Censor, is on the line.’

  Max’s scowl deepened. The Censor was probably his least favourite of all the senior Sentinel members. Though in name the Censor was the most superior authority over judicial matters in the Sentinel court, in reality he spent the majority of his time golfing and hunting with his cronies, all the while drinking vast quantities of port. He had once been a powerful Regent, this was true, but had never been fond of active duty, preferring instead to be cosseted in the Sentinel’s bureaucratic embrace.

  He also had terrible halitosis, and so Max was very grateful to be talking to him by the telephone rather than face to face.

  None of this was betrayed in the warmth of Max’s greeting. ‘Your Lordship, what a pleasant surprise. How’s the weather in Derbyshire?’

  ‘Good morning, Savage,’ came his reedy, wavering tones. ‘Oh splendid, splendid, not a cloud in the sky. Now, haven’t got long, m’boy,’ Max resented the fondness the Brits displayed for this patronising term of address. ‘So I’ll have to crack on. Got to dash to an important, ah, meeting. You know how it is, dreadful bore, take up the whole morning.’

  A meeting with your drinks trolley, more like, Max thought acidly.

  ‘I see,’ he replied smoothly. ‘In that case please do fire away.’

  ‘We’ve received the reports you sent regarding the girl and all that ghastly business – she looks to have done rather well.’ There was a pause while the Censor rustled several sheafs of paper and muttered to himself. Max looked at his watch. ‘Ah, here it is. The last healer’s report notes that the girl was rather confused when her temperature was up, and kept referring to old injuries. Marks and bruises that were no longer there, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Yes.’ Max knew what he was going to say, but didn’t know why he felt the need to bring this up – they had all been aware of this all along. The healers had gleaned nothing that would shock the Sentinel.

  ‘Well. Rather good, isn’t it? Might finally have Tracers within our midst again. This is how it starts, y’know. Nearly always a human wound that gives the game away.’

  ‘Yes. The Sentinel’s early suspicions seem more and more probable.’

  ‘It’s been centuries, Savage.’ The Censor was
perturbed by his lack of enthusiasm. ‘Don’t you know what this means? Tracers are invaluable to the Cause.’

  ‘I’m well aware of that. Is there anything else you need to discuss?’

  ‘Now see here, Savage.’ Annoyed, now. ‘It might be difficult for you to grasp, but we’re fighting a war here. We’ve been waging it for millennia but the threat is getting stronger. What about the recent attacks in Ireland, eh? The enemy are closing in. You distance yourself from it all, up there playing toy soldiers, but we have to look at the bigger picture.’

  Max gritted his teeth. ‘I understand. How can I be of service?’

  The Censor was spluttering with indignation. ‘How? How? Don’t be daft, man! The Trace! How are you going to monitor it? Progress can’t be impeded while the three disciplines are being mastered – no sense this information getting out. The Trace is very delicate, y’know. It must be allowed to bloom, unhindered.’

  ‘I see no need to make any changes to the routine, or to make this suspicion public. If the Sentinel permits me, what I’d like to do if ask one of my most trusted cadets – a Tesserarius – to keep an eye on this potential, and report back to me regularly.’

  ‘Information that you’ll pass onto us, post-haste.’

  ‘Without question.’

  ‘Hmm.’ The Censor made a satisfied grunt, apparently appeased. ‘See that you do. Don’t want to have to give you a talking to again. Keep thinking of that big picture, Savage. You’ll get there in the end.’

  Max bit back the sour reply that was forming on his tongue, instead managing, ‘Thank you for setting me straight. I will let you get to your meeting now. Take care.’