by Lisa Eskra
A young, raven-haired woman sidled up next to him at the bar. Her coffee eyes and long, wavy hair made her a ravishing sight to look upon. She wore a low-cut burgundy dress with a slit running up the entire length of her slender leg. The courtesans here provided an entertaining nightlife since they'd do anything for a bit of money.
"Hello." Her melodic voice washed over his senses like soft velvet. "What's a handsome guy like you doing in a place like this?"
He offered her a weak smile. "Enjoying a drink."
In his current mental capacity, she could probably read his mind like an open book. With sex the last thing he wanted right now, he turned back toward the bar and studied his fingernails. He couldn't afford to make any sort of connection Tiyuri could trace in order to protect others. Thanks to his deep-seeded resentment toward humanity, the man had no qualms about leaving a trail of bodies in his wake to bring Magnius back alive.
She pressed her chest against him and put her hand on his leg. "And afterwards? Could I interest you in a dance? Or a massage?"
"That depends how good you are with your hands. I hope they're better than your overused pick-up lines."
She pursed her lips in a fake display of wounded pride. "Well, I do know how to relax and please a man. After all, I'm telepathic. I know all your wants and desires."
"And what do you think I want?" he asked, toying with her.
"Me…" The purple flash of her sclera cut through the darkness. Although the visual effect blinded him, his night vision returned after several moments. The woman no longer stood next to him—Amii did.
He jumped in shock and his rapid heartbeat made it difficult to breathe. He'd almost forgotten about her. Aside from a few sexually charged dreams, she didn't cross his mind anymore. And now, she was next to him…as real as his memory of her had ever been. Of all the women in his past for the telepath to draw upon, she'd chosen Amii.
She leaned to his ear and ground her hips provocatively against him. "Tell me what I can do to make you happy, Magnius." Even her voice sounded the way he remembered it.
Her advances would've been hard for a priest to resist. It took concerted effort to pull himself back from falling into her. The fabricated illusion offered no warmth. No compassion. He pushed her away. "I thought you said you were a telepath. I shouldn't have to tell you I'm not in the mood for a whore right now."
She narrowed her eyes in bitter frustration and her true appearance rematerialized. "I don't blame your wife for walking out on you, asshole. Have a nice life."
As she sauntered away, he returned his attention to the bar. After several moments, he managed to shut out all lingering thoughts of Amii from his head. He didn't need that kind of distraction with his life hanging in the balance from day to day. For all her uniqueness she represented the past, and he had to look forward without regret.
Someone in a dark trench coat claimed the stool next to him. He noticed a glint of light from a pair of patent leather boots when the figure moved toward the bar. Judging by the dark skin and ripped chest, Tiyuri had found him at last. He didn't even have to see the giant's face. He caught his breath and his head started to throb with anxiety.
"Magnius…don't run or I'll take you down before you reach the door."
He forced himself to swallow the dry lump in his throat. "You don't need to do anything rash. I'm tired of this. I won't give you any trouble." He wondered if everyone else could see Tiyuri or if they thought he'd become a spontaneous schizophrenic.
"Surely you don't take me for a fool. Would you like to do this the easy way or should I break your legs this time so you can't run on me?"
"Let's just get this over with."
"Good." He nodded toward the floor. "After you."
Magnius led the way through the crowd at a measured pace. By staying behind him, Tiyuri held the advantage. The surge of blood in his head drowned out the heavy music of the club. He stuck his sweaty hands into his pants pockets and almost tripped over his own feet on the way to the door.
His mind raced to find a way out of this predicament, but he didn't have any options. Since he needed to see an object to move it, he couldn't guarantee success against Tiyuri, and everything else was as likely to hit him as the man behind him. In his stupor he doubted taking on Tiyuri here would be in his best interests. Linking him to Aliane might cause a stir, but if he looked as drunk as he felt, no one would believe him. He could get out of this mess but his resignation to fate squelched all hope.
Once they got outside, he noticed a foggy haze had descended onto the dark streets. Moisture saturated the humid air. The wet, metallic asphalt left a bloody taste in his mouth.
"Left," Tiyuri said. After they turned, he pushed Magnius to quicken the pace. "Let's get moving. I put something in your last drink. A paralytic. In a few minutes you'll be a mumbling fool, and I'd like to get back to the car before it happens."
Magnius grabbed his throat. Tiyuri was many things but he was not a liar. In that moment his incentive to escape shot through the roof.
Both sides of Westminster Avenue were lined with high-scale shops. Most sold luxurious clothing or jewelry, but a fat lot of good throwing a bunch of dresses at Tiyuri would do him. In the window of the next store he saw dozens of shoes on display: designer Manaboutins with five-inch heels and metal buckles. Perfect.
He staggered and doubled over to feign symptoms of whatever drug had been used on him. Tiyuri stopped in his tracks several paces back out of caution. Fortunately, his proximity wouldn't matter. Magnius glanced at the shoes for an instant—just long enough to use his telekinetic power. As he turned his head the opposite direction, the entire display window shattered on his left sending shards of high-speed glass into the air. When the shoes hit Tiyuri, they knocked him off balance. Magnius spun around and hit Tiyuri with a strong concussive blast, and the assassin sailed into the street.
Due to either his drunkenness or the paralytic, he hit Tiyuri with more force than he wanted to, but he didn't have time to worry about it. He needed to get away before whatever he'd been drugged with kicked in. Magnius turned and bounded down the street as fast as his current state would allow. Behind him, he heard the clean crunch of breaking plastic and a scream of horror. His heart sank but he couldn't look back.
While an obvious means of escape, an alley on the left provided his only option. The faster he could reach the next street over, the better his chance would be of success. He stumbled over boxes, over the homeless, and over nothing. He felt the poison working its way through his system. If he wasn't in such a panicked state, he could try to fight it off. Right now, getting to safety concerned him most.
He didn't see a raised pipe until he fell over it face first into the muck. He tried his best to get up, but his strength was gone. The garbage bin next to him provided the leverage he needed to stand, but he'd wasted too much time. The sound of quick footsteps echoed between the buildings, and he didn't need to look back to know Tiyuri had found his trail.
As he jogged toward the far end of the alley, Magnius' toes started to tingle. His legs wobbled like he ran on stilts. Making it to the street wouldn't save him, but in his heart he needed to make it to know he'd done everything he could to get away even if he lost in the end. His pulse raced as the footfall closed on him. He didn't plan to surrender yet. Every fiber of his being forced him to keep going. He couldn't feel his legs anymore but he was almost there. Just a few strides more…
When he reached the street, he took a sharp right. A vague sense of vertigo clouded his vision from the sudden change in direction. He slammed into a woman and knocked both of them to the ground. After his momentary daze subsided, he realized he couldn't move. He caught sight of Nadine's hardened face hovering over him, and seeing her almost made him believe in fate.
She clamped onto him and pulled him into the alcove of a bakery. An unusual psionic energy flowed between them, enough to make him feel faint for a moment before the sensation eased. Her cool hands would've made him shiver i
f he could have.
<
Tiyuri vaulted around the corner after him and came to a stop a few yards away from them. He searched for his intended victim with deliberate care. Magnius panted breathlessly while the assassin's gaze searched their hiding spot and eyed the bakery for signs of forced entry, but he gave no indication that he'd seen them. He exhaled in frustration and continued to jog down the street.
The second lady watched him for almost a minute. She couldn't have seen him through the mist but she tracked him with her mind. Once her attention returned to Magnius, he had a hard time meeting her stare. When she snapped her fingers in front of his face, his ears rang.
"XTX. Dammit." Nadine threaded her arms around his shoulders and helped him to his feet. "My car is a block away. Let's go."
His mind willed his body to move, but the connection to his skeletal muscles no longer existed. Between legs that felt like jelly and a head that wanted to explode, he was amazed the two of them made it down the street at all. His muscles felt weak and atrophied, unable to assist her whatsoever, and wondered how such a petite woman managed to move him. Adrenaline could work miracles when it needed to.
Neither of them said a word while they headed in the direction of her vehicle. The vapor in the air descended in a dense cloud on the city for the night. The lights of passing hovercars made bright halos that hurt his eyes since he could not squint to block out the brightness.
How could I have been such an idiot, he thought. I walked right into his trap.
"Don't blame yourself," she said. She unlocked her silver commuter and strained to open the rear driver's side door. "That's what he does. And what he failed to realize is you can't just give someone a less-than-lethal dose of the same junk he kills people with to knock them out." She tried her best to ease him inside, but he fell over and his head smacked into the seat and jarred his senses. "Sorry."
From where he lay horizontally, he heard the door shut and a front door open a second later. She sunk into the seat, turned the key, and drove down Lancaster Boulevard. She wore none of her usual arsenal of make-up, and her conservative clothing belonged on someone else. Her black hair had none of its typical sleekness and instead hung disheveled around her shoulders.
His breathing began to feel labored like his lungs were ready to shut down. As he gasped for air, she took her eyes off the road to glance back at him. "Shit," she whispered. "Stay with me, Magnius. Just a little bit longer. You're going to be okay…"
Her voice was the last thing on his mind before he passed out.
***
Magnius woke to the raw soreness of his throat, and the pain intensified by the second. His eyelids might as well have been made of lead because of the effort it took to open them. The brightness of the room blinded him and he immediately shut it out. If he could've furrowed his brow, he would have. He wanted to speak but the muscles of his jaw did not respond.
If he hadn't found Nadine, he had no doubt he'd be dead right now.
He felt a hand on top of his head. Nadine, is that you?
"I'm here," she said quietly. "You're going to be okay. You're at Clairview Hospital. They had to pump your stomach and can't do much about the pain without interfering with the drug cocktail they gave you for the XTX."
He forced open his eyes again and gazed up at her. An oversized pair of black sunglasses shrouded her stare, but he could see the faint glow of her sclera behind them. Her makeup and hair looked impeccable, as usual. How long have I been here?
"Almost twelve hours. It may take another day or two for the effect of the XTX to wear off. Don't worry—Tiyuri will never know you were here. It's where we come when we want to keep visits out of the news. You're safe. I realize it won't feel that way, but you have to trust me."
You saved my life. Of course I trust you.
"If the Xuranians extend an invitation for us to go to Xur, I'd like you to come with me. Don't ask why. Just say yes."
He was too out of it to wonder anything, but it sounded important. I can do that.
"I'll stop by to see you tomorrow morning. In the meantime relax and have some wonderful dreams." She dug a lip gloss out of her purse and dabbed some onto her lips. "No more fretting about Lyneea. It's over between the two of you. But don't despair. The right woman's going to drop into your life sooner or later. Not all of us can be lucky enough to get it right the first time, but don't ever give up hope. The only person you're shortchanging is yourself."
With one last fatal smile, she spun around and marched away. The echo of her high heels continued long after she'd vanished out the door.
He wondered how much of what she said she'd seen in a prophecy. Nothing suggested any of it had been a vision of the future. She chose her words with such care that it came out like words of wisdom, not the voice of a Seer. He envied her in so many ways. Nadine had it all—fame, power, and money—yet none of it went to her head because she knew what it was like to have nothing.
Only time would tell what she was up to. For now, the wonderful dreams would do.
Chapter Ten
March 28th marked the day of the Chara Peace Summit. Spring emerged from the remains of the unseasonably cold winter with vigor. Young leaves began to unfurl on the trees, and a crop of early tulips around the capitol flowered on cue as if they'd been commanded to by heaven. The clean smell of morning dew lingered in the air, and patriotic music echoed through the streets. All to honor the Xuranians.
Aliane had not been to Northampton since the erection of the City of Dreams. She often missed the sight of a normal sun like she'd grown up with on Earth, where everything wasn't tinted red and nights were dark. Many of the streets in the city had been shut down in order to keep excessive traffic away from the Xuranian visitors, and security had been tightened. Sensible precautions but not ones that could keep her and her confidante out.
"Look," Aliane instructed as she pointed west down the street. A gang of heated protesters waved orange flags near a group of wary police officers. "That kind of madness makes me glad I'm not a normal anymore. Idiots, the whole lot of them." She spat on the sidewalk because the words left a dirty taste in her mouth.
They continued on toward the Capitol. Even though she mocked them, she understood their fear. By nature, humans were intolerant—of both the unknown and the different. News of contact with the Xuranians filled her with anxiety, but in a brief glimpse of clarity, she welcomed the news she'd been waiting to hear her entire life.
A week ago, she'd asked Zingeri how he felt about a potential alliance between the Xuranians and the psions.
"I've been up all night thinking about it," she'd said to him while he rubbed his eyes and tried to regain some semblance of consciousness. "It would finally give us the chance to be something more than the black sheep of humanity."
"You're serious."
"Yes, I'm damned serious. We've been stuck here for over a hundred years because nobody wants us. The Xuranians could provide us with a way out and the means to live a better life."
"That's not the whole reason though, is it…?"
She'd always promised they would have their revenge on the normals who'd ostracized them for so long. She never used to feel that way. Back then, she dreamed of a home where she didn't have to worry about being on the wrong side of the law. After a century of having everything she wanted, she began to yearn for even more.
"I want to be on the right side if they attack," she said with a wicked gleam in her eyes. "And they will attack."
"Is there something in the prophecy?"
She flipped her hand to the side. "Oh, I don't know. I've given up trying to understand it. They are going to attack because we are going to make them."
And that was how she'd left it. The mere idea exemplified evil. Normals deserved the comeuppance in exchange for how they'd treated psions over the years, and instigating war might be the perfect way to spell revenge. To their credit the Xuranians wanted peace and were
actively helping humans in that regard. But her motivations, her desires trumped all others.
Zingeri never agreed with her wanton desire for payback. Before she came along, he'd been a spineless loser floundering through life without purpose. She'd opened his eyes to the wonders of telepathy. At the end of the day, he'd follow her because he had no one else.
<
She rolled her eyes as the two of them climbed the steps of the Capitol Building. "Get off of your high horse, already. And stop broadcasting your thoughts like you're screaming or the Vice President's wife will hear everything."
They headed inside and followed the signs pointing to the grand ballroom. An afternoon reception had been scheduled for the delegates there, and Aliane decided this would be the best time to have a word with one of the Xuranians. A throng of security outside the ballroom patted everyone down and searched their bags for any illicit items.
<
Aliane's eyes started to sting when she forced her will upon the crowd nearby. Through her strong domination aura, she made both security and the guests waiting to enter ignore both of them. She'd sharpened her gift of compulsion to perfect execution in a way no normals could resist, enabling them to step past the guards and head inside like the two of them were invisible.
He put his hand on her shoulder. "You don't have to conceal me. These people don't know me."
She nodded and released his mind from her spell. Due to her status as a criminal, Aliane needed to maintain the power, which would drain her mental energy. As a Tier-9 telepath, Zingeri didn't need her to shield him should the necessity arise, though it wouldn't be long before Nadine sensed an outpouring of psionics nearby.