Illusion Town

by Jayne Castle

  “So, when I tell you that some magic is real, you know I’m telling you the truth.”

  He kissed her then amid the glowing leaves and sparkling flowers. She opened her senses to the night and to the man who held her in his arms.

  He was right, she thought. Sometimes the magic was real, at least for a while.

  * * *

  Bernice walked out onto the balcony and joined Clara at the railing. Together they looked down into the radiant garden. Hannah and Elias were at the pond. They were silhouetted in the luminous energy of the glorious cascade of Magic Hannah orchids. The two were obviously lost in each other’s arms.

  Bernice gripped the railing with both hands and allowed herself to hope. But she was careful not to let herself go too far. There had been other men in Hannah’s life, including one or two she feared would break Hannah’s heart. But Clara had always been the one who saw the truth behind the brief moments of illusion. So now she waited for the verdict.

  “What’s your take on him?” she asked softly.

  Clara reached out and gripped Bernice’s hand. Their wedding rings gleamed in the soft night.

  “I think,” Clara said, “that he may be the first one to understand why we named the turquoise hybrid Magic Hannah.”

  Chapter 31

  “Whew,” Hannah said. “Sure glad that’s over. Thanks again for being so polite about the whole meet-the-in-laws thing, fake though it was.”

  Elias tightened his grip on her hand. “Do me a favor. Stop implying our marriage is a fake. It’s real. And stop apologizing for the fact that your aunts wanted to meet me. It’s natural under the circumstances.”

  “Sorry,” she mumbled.

  “Which reminds me, I got a call from Dad today.”

  They were walking home through the Dark Zone, which, in defiance of its name, was illuminated with the paranormal energy of the ruins. The narrow streets and lanes were infused with a light, gently swirling psi-infused fog. The small casinos and nightclubs were starting to come alive for the evening. Their bright signs and dark entrances promised cheap thrills and exotic mysteries that could not be matched anywhere else in town.

  “I suppose your father wanted an update on the situation here in Illusion,” she said.

  “Turns out he had one for me. The FPBI, working with Coppersmith Security, picked up the last pirate this morning. He still had the two Coppersmith keys so there’s plenty of evidence to link him to the murders.”

  “Your theory was that there was a third key—one created by a different lab. Did they find it?”

  “Yes. The third key is powered by quartz but it wasn’t as stable as the Coppersmith versions. Still, it was damn sophisticated. The suspicion is that it came out of a Vortex lab but there’s no real proof.”

  “But you didn’t find the Vortex tattoo on those two dead pirates.”

  “No. The murderer didn’t have the tat, either. Dad says the FBPI thinks that Vortex tried to farm out the operation in an effort to keep some distance from it. But they got double-crossed for their pains. The killer put together a team that included Hank Richman and the others, and then, when the job was done, he got rid of his partners. He planned to sell the two Coppersmith keys on the black market.”

  “Vortex wouldn’t have liked that.”

  “No,” Elias said. “If the FBPI hadn’t picked him up, the killer probably would be dead by now.”

  “Did your father have anything else to tell you?”

  “He gave me my new orders.”

  “Orders?”

  “He told me that it was time I introduced you to my side of the family.”

  “Oh, dear. This is getting complicated, isn’t it?”

  “I’ve heard that marriage can be complicated,” Elias said.

  “It’s just an—”

  “Don’t say it. Repeat after me—an MC is a legal marriage.”

  She took a deep breath. “An MC is a legal marriage.”

  Until it isn’t, she thought but she decided not to say it out loud. The night was too nice to spoil with an argument about the future of their relationship—especially now that she was allowing herself to hope that there would be a future of some sort. Don’t look behind the curtain. You don’t want to know if it’s all a trick of the light.

  “So, if Plan A doesn’t work out, what’s our next move going to be?” she asked.

  “I’ve been thinking about that. You said you filed a claim on the sector of the catacombs where you discovered the carnival.”

  “Right. Legally, that should protect me.”

  “And as I keep reminding you, there’s a long history of claim jumping in the mining world.”

  “Whoever is behind this would have to kill me to make me go away. And if he did that, what are the odds that he could find another dreamlight talent with a para-profile so close to mine that she could unlock the gate?”

  “I agree it’s unlikely but that doesn’t mean one can’t be found. After all, he found you, didn’t he?”

  “Okay, I get the point. But what else can I do to protect my claim?”

  “Sell the carnival to Arcane. Fast.”

  “I told you I need to do a complete inventory in order to establish the value of the find.”

  “Pick a number, any number. Make it sky-high. Arcane will pay whatever you ask. The sooner they take ownership of the carnival, the sooner you’ll be safe.”

  “All right. But I gotta tell you, the businesswoman in me really, really doesn’t like the idea.”

  “I understand, believe me,” Elias said. He tightened his fingers in warning and lowered his voice. “We’ve got company.”

  “Runner and his crew?”

  “No.”

  “Cops?”

  “Someone else.” Elias glanced at his ring. “I’m picking up some low-level psi frequencies. They’re being generated by some kind of para-tech. Guns, I think, and phones.”

  “You were right. The Soldiers of Fortune really are dumb enough to make another try to grab me right off the streets of my own neighborhood.”

  “Either dumb enough or so sure of themselves that they think they can outgun the local neighborhood watch.”

  “I don’t hear the motorcycles,” Hannah said.

  “So maybe they’ve figured out that it would be a little reckless to ride through the DZ again on those big Raleigh-Starks.”

  “That would indicate that they did learn something last time.”

  “All we need is one of those bastards,” Elias said.

  Hannah shot him a sidelong glance. She could tell that Elias was jacked; running hot. Her own senses were flaring in response to the danger.

  Fog-muffled footsteps sounded behind them. Up ahead a shadowy figure loomed in the mist.

  “They’re closing in now,” Elias said. “Two of them. One in front, one behind.”

  “Runner and his crew will have them marked by now,” Hannah said. “The cops will be on the way. It’s going down just like you planned.”

  “Maybe not.”

  “What do you mean? The bikers won’t make a move as long as we’re in this part of the DZ. Too many tourists.”

  “And a whole lot of psi fog. They’re going to try to use it for cover.”

  “We can duck into a nightclub or a tavern but if we disappear that way we’ll lose our chance to grab one of them tonight.”

  “I’ve got an idea.”

  He stopped abruptly and hauled her into a nearby alley. Hannah realized that the deep shadows and the fog effectively made them vanish.

  “Flat against the wall,” Elias said. He spoke directly into her ear.

  She flattened her back against the old stone wall.

  The deliberate footsteps suddenly shifted into a quick trot. And then the two assailants broke into a run.

  “Wh
ere’d they go?” The voice was male, harsh with temper and a flicker of alarm.

  “The alley,” the second man said. He sounded cooler and more in control.

  A flashlight beam speared straight down the alley, narrowly missing Hannah and Elias. The ray of light struck the wall at the far end.

  “It’s a dead end,” the coolheaded man announced. He sounded relieved. “They’re trapped.”

  “That’s what you said the last time when we ambushed them in that lane. It didn’t go well. I’m sure as hell not going into that alley blind. Coppersmith is going to be armed.”

  “There’s plenty of hot psi in the area, enough to pull a ghost. They’ll come running out in a minute.”

  Hannah felt energy heighten in the atmosphere. Cool Head was rezzing his talent, drawing the dissonance energy out of the ambient currents of Alien psi. A storm of green fire took shape midway down the alley.

  A brush with hot ghost light was more than enough to cause unconsciousness. Prolonged contact could damage the nerves and destroy the paranormal senses. A truly powerful ghost could kill. Ghost hunters were paid good money to clean the Unstable Dissonance Energy Manifestations out of the Underworld. But in addition to being able to destroy one, they had the ability to create the storms and use them as weapons.

  It was, of course, highly illegal to summon a ghost for the purpose of menacing innocent people, just as it was illegal to threaten someone with a mag-rez pistol. But stuff happened in the back alleys of every city, including Illusion Town.

  Ghosts were hard to manipulate; the result was that they moved slowly. It was relatively easy to outrun one. But in this case Hannah knew that she and Elias would run straight into the arms of the would-be kidnappers.

  Where were the cops? she wondered. Surely by now Runner had alerted them. The plan had been a simple one. But good plans had a way of going bad.

  The ghost drifted toward the alley entrance, singeing everything in its path. There was a sudden scurrying and rustling in the narrow space. Several pairs of eyes appeared in the mist. Rats, fleeing from the approaching energy storm, Hannah realized. It was all she could do not to scream when one ran over the toe of her evening sandal. It didn’t hang around. It rushed out of the alley together with its friends and neighbors.

  Another small creature appeared out of the fog. Four eyes, two of them hot amber, burned in the mist.

  “Virgil,” Hannah whispered.

  He vaulted up into her arms and then onto her shoulder.

  “Keep him out of the way,” Elias ordered. “I need to get a clear focus.”

  She reached up to touch Virgil, silently willing him to stay put. He seemed to get the message. He hunkered down, tense and ready to spring.

  She thought she heard a siren in the distance but she couldn’t be certain because the sparking, crackling ghost fire was so close now it was affecting her normal senses.

  In the next instant she felt a rush of energy. She saw Elias’s ring flash with dark fire.

  “Whatever you do, don’t move,” he said.

  Using normal vision, the two men at the entrance of the alley would have been little more than shadows in the fog. But the paranormal senses made it possible to see in other ways. She could make out the auras of the two bikers. She knew that Elias could see them, also.

  A narrow beam of paranormal radiation sparkled from Elias’s ring. It arrowed through the fog. There was a grunt from the target. An instant later the ghost winked out of existence.

  “Shit.” Harsh Voice sounded on the edge of panic. “Gage? What the hell happened—”

  The nervous biker broke off abruptly. The sirens were very loud now. Hannah saw the man’s aura move in the fog and knew that he was turning around to flee.

  But Elias was already in motion. He launched himself toward the shadow. There was a heavy thud. The biker landed hard on the sidewalk.

  Runner and his crew arrived first, breathless.

  “Hannah?” Runner called. “Where are you? You okay?”

  She peeled herself away from the wall and went toward the entrance of the alley.

  “I’m fine,” she said.

  Elias was crouched beside the two fallen bikers. He went swiftly through their pockets. The one he had taken down with his ring was starting to stir. The other man had been winded by the fall. He was struggling to catch his breath.

  “I called the cops when I saw that you and Coppersmith were being followed but we lost you for a bit when the fog started to get heavy,” Runner said. “Then I realized you’d gone into this alley. But it’s a dead end.”

  “We noticed,” Hannah said. “But it’s all right. You and your guys did great. Here come the cops. Thanks, Runner.” She looked at the four other young men hovering in the shadows. “Thanks to all of you.”

  “Yeah, sure, anytime, Finder,” Buddy said. He looked at Elias. “What’d you use on that guy?”

  “Some new experimental tech from a lab,” Elias said.

  “Worked pretty good,” Buddy allowed. “Nice. I don’t suppose—?”

  “Sorry. Not ready for market yet,” Elias said.

  Runner nodded. “Right. But when it is market ready you’re gonna need a delivery crew that knows how to deliver tech like that in the DZ. Keep us in mind.”

  “I’ll do that,” Elias said.

  Runner looked at Hannah.

  “Cops will be here in a minute,” he said. “Need anything else?”

  She looked at Elias. “Your call.”

  Elias got to his feet and looked at Runner and his crew. “We’re good. Thanks. Couldn’t have done it without you. I owe you. Pizza at Ollie’s is on me when this is all over.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Buzz said. He sounded like he didn’t expect to collect the pizza reward.

  “You gonna show up to eat it with us?” Sam asked. “Or just pay the tab?”

  It struck Hannah as an odd question. It was as if Sam was laying down a marker, daring Elias to show up at Ollie’s for pizza with Runner’s crew. And then she got it. Sam and the others weren’t used to hanging with men from Elias’s world. They didn’t expect him to actually break bread—or pizza—with them.

  “I’ll be there,” Elias said. “I’ll give you a full report on what we learn from these two.”

  “High-rez,” Sam said. “See ya.”

  The sirens grew louder.

  “We’d better get moving,” Runner said. “We’ve got what you might call an understanding with the cops but we try to stay out of each other’s way, if you know what I mean.”

  “Understood,” Elias said. “See you at Ollie’s.”

  The DZ Delivery Service crew disappeared into the fog.

  Hannah looked at Elias.

  “You used your ring to take down one of these men, didn’t you?” she asked.

  “Like I said, I’ve been on a steep learning curve with this crystal ever since you located it for me. I didn’t know what it could do until my intuition told me to try to generate some energy through it tonight.”

  “So, it’s a weapon of some kind?”

  “It’s power, Hannah. Power can be used in a lot of different ways. But yes, it looks like in this case it can be used as a psychic weapon.”

  Chapter 32

  The flash of knowing—the sense that they were closing in on the answers—shivered through Elias’s para-senses with such force, his physical senses reacted. His ring heated a little and his hand jerked ever so slightly, just enough to send a few drops of coffee over the rim of the delicate china cup.

  “What the hell?” he said very softly.

  “Elias?” Hannah looked at him, alarm in her eyes. “Everything okay?”

  The spilled coffee wasn’t the most awkward part about his reaction. His talent had flashed for a couple of beats and Hannah had sensed it. He knew Maxwell Smith and Detecti
ve Jensen had picked up some of the vibes, too.

  “We’re close,” Elias said. “I can feel it.”

  “How close?” Jensen asked.

  He was in his forties, with a sturdy, stocky build, thinning hair, and cop eyes. He also had some talent, enough that Elias could sense it in his energy field. Probably a hunter. They were naturals for police work. They also made very good criminals. The skill set required for success in both professions was virtually identical. The chief difference between the two professions was a sense of right and wrong, a conscience.

  It wasn’t entirely clear which career path Jensen had chosen. Maybe he had started out as an idealistic officer of the law, determined to serve and protect. But somewhere along the line he had seen a little too much of the worst of human nature. Or maybe he didn’t like knowing that he was a professional law enforcement officer in a city that was run by a consortium of powerful casino magnates who considered Illusion Town their personal fiefdom. That had to make for some difficult moments in police work. Whatever the case, Elias was pretty sure that Jensen was not a glass-half-full kind of guy. But he seemed to be a good cop.

  The call from Smith had come just as Hannah had opened Visions for the day. Elias, under Virgil’s supervision, had been repairing a broken display cabinet. Hannah had locked up the shop immediately and they had driven to the Amber Palace, where Detective Jensen had been waiting to brief them.

  Now they were gathered in Smith’s private office located on the executive-suite floor of the casino. On the way down the hall from the reception lobby Elias had glimpsed the usual array of corporate management departments—Accounting, Human Resources, Marketing, and all the rest of the divisions associated with any big business enterprise.

  There had also been an impressive amount of state-of-the-art security and communications equipment. Screen after screen displayed live video feeds from the countless cameras scattered throughout the hotel and casino.

  But Smith’s office was surprisingly old-fashioned. It looked more like a wealthy man’s private study. Like my father’s study, Elias thought.

  Smith glanced at the drops of coffee splashed across the papers spread out on his gleaming desk.