The Society

by Lilith Saintcrow

  A flash of surprise crossed her face. Oh, no, I'm not going to let you off easy, angel. I'm going to have to be twice as harsh as anything you're likely to find out there—and they won't stop because you're tired and bloody and hungry. “Heavy bag,” she echoed, and her face closed like a door. She couldn't keep him out of her head—not completely, not with them sharing a bed every night. But both of them avoided contact, and it was almost as good.

  "What are you standing around for?” he barked. “Move, girl!"

  Her eyes flared. “Make me,” she flung back at him, her hands on her hips. “What is wrong with you?"

  He took two steps and had her in an armlock, ignoring the sudden gasps from their audience, marched her across the dojo to the line of heavy bags, then shook her a little before letting her loose. “Let's see you do the standard, operative,” he said crisply. “And the longer you fight me, the longer you'll be here."

  Her nostrils flared and her chin lifted. She wiped at the blood on her face, smearing it across one cheek. Delgado's heart began to ache.

  Without another word, she spun on her heel and attacked the heavy bag. Delgado looked up, seeing shocked faces and slack jaws. He narrowed his eyes.

  People scurried back to what they had been doing, except for Ellis, who watched Rowan as she worked the heavy bag. He looked shocked, eyeing her as if she was a new species, one he wasn't quite sure was poisonous or not. Del looked back at her and saw, without much surprise, that her face was set and flushed. Her training held, though—she wasn't emitting waves of anger or distress.

  "Is that the best you can do?” he snarled, hating himself.

  The skin over her knuckles on both hands left bloody prints on the bag. Her hands were almost blurring, she cursed at him with an inventiveness he found grimly amusing right before he decided to stop this. It had gone far enough. He'd made his point.

  "Rowan—” he began, and she whirled away from the bag, her ponytail whipping.

  "I hate you!” she screamed, her voice bouncing off the mats and the ceiling, drilling through the whispers. “I wish I'd never seen you!"

  He stood rooted to the spot while she gave the heavy bag one last kick—good solid contact, her boot thudding onto heavy vinyl and the entire bag shuddering like a side of beef on a conveyer belt—and stalked past him, her hands and face bloody, and her head held high.

  Well, the little voice in his head said clinically, looks like it's no warm bed for you tonight, Del. Straight to the doghouse. What the hell's gotten into you?

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Her hands ached, but they were steady. Rowan dabbed at her lacerated knuckles with a cotton ball soaked in antiseptic, hissing softly. “That stings.” Her eyes watered, and she set her jaw. A single tear from the stinging rolled down her cheek.

  "Bet it does.” Catherine popped her bubble-gum. She leaned against the bathroom door, electric light glowing off her vinyl pants and skintight Ambrixes T-shirt. Her nose-ring glittered. “You're serious? Del did that?"

  "I did it. On the heavy bag. But he kind of pushed me into it.” Rowan sighed, tossed the bloody cotton ball into the wastebasket, and picked a fresh one, dipping it in the antiseptic. “I've never seen him like that before. He saw me sparring with Ellis and just kind of went..."

  "Was that before you got your nose socked or after?"

  "After. Ellis accidentally got me in the face."

  Cath and Zeke's bathroom was cluttered with different kinds of scented soap, and towels hung everywhere, not to mention bits of hand-washing hung up. It was messy, but comforting.

  "Oh, God.” Catherine rolled her eyes. “Ellis popped you on the nose and Del saw it?"

  "He might have.” Rowan dabbed gently. Another tear trickled down her cheek, her eyes watering from the stinging. “My nose isn't broken though, just bloody. Thanks for asking."

  "What did he do? Is Ellis in the infirmary? How many punches?” Catherine's Mohawk nodded cheerfully as she eyed the pile of cotton balls. “Wow."

  "He didn't do anything to Ellis, he just sparred with me—ran me ragged. Then he set me to the heavy bag. I think I lost my temper."

  "So what happened? Talking to you is like pulling teeth.” Cath rolled her eyes again dramatically, doing her best to look like a sarcastic teenager—and succeeding pretty well, since she was under twenty and her tone was heavily weighted with irony.

  "If you'd quit interrupting, I could tell you.” Rowan finished dabbing at her knuckles. “There, that's the best I can do for right now. Anyway, I kicked the heavy bag, shouted something not very nice, and left."

  "That's it?” Cath's jaw dropped. “That's all? You didn't throw anything? Zap him? Anything?"

  "I kind of doubt ‘zapping’ Justin would be a good idea. I did shock him while we were sparring.” Rowan's tone was dry and unamused. “I need some advice here, Cath, and I have to admit I'm not getting any.” You're as bad as Hilary, she thought, and stopped, waiting for the burst of pain. It came, but it was strangely muted.

  "Personally I think you're crazy for dating him anyway, but that's just me.” Cath popped her gum again. Rowan swept the bloody cotton balls together tossed them into the trash. Bandaging would do no good. She'd heal quickly anyway; she always did.

  "Why does everyone assume I'm dating him?” Rowan capped the antiseptic and hauled herself up off the toilet lid to put the bottle away in the mirrored cabinet. Catherine's bathroom was, of course, decorated with a lava lamp and a print of Frankenstein. Half-empty bottles of nail polish in different shades scattered over the counter, and an ammo belt hung by the door.

  "Maybe because you're sleeping with him?” Cath said sweetly.

  "Oh, for God's sake.” Rowan sighed. “When did everyone get so interested in my life?"

  "You're a very interesting girl, sweetie. Here's a shirt.” Catherine held up a green-and-white lump of material. “Need some pants?"

  "No, there's not much blood on these, I'll wear them. I'm starving.” Rowan examined her sports bra in the mirror—one or two spots of blood, that was all. She took the shirt and held it up. “Good God. Where did you get a Lucky Care Bear T-shirt?"

  "Oh, around and about. Let's see how it looks.” Catherine's eyes were sparkling under their heavy coat of eyeliner. “Yum. Makes your tits look cute and perky."

  "It's too small,” Rowan complained, then had to grab at the counter as a wave of dizziness swept her.

  "Ro? You okay?” The younger woman's voice sounded very far away. “Ro?"

  "I'm fine,” Rowan said dreamily. “Fine. I promise I'm fine. Just tired and hungry, that's all.” When Rowan opened her eyes, she saw Catherine examining her, eyes narrowed and cherry-painted mouth pursed.

  "You look like you've just seen a ghost. And believe me, I should know."

  Rowan shrugged. Catherine and Zeke's suite had two bathrooms, a long brown velvet couch, and psychedelic posters on each wall. No plants except for a cactus on Zeke's bedside table. Magazines and dirty clothes were scattered everywhere. A stick of strawberry incense fumed in a holder on Catherine's worktable.

  For someone with such a precise, detail-oriented mind, she certainly is messy. Rowan caught herself smiling as she scanned the room. It was full of life and the stamp of Catherine's personality. “I suppose I'm just a little surprised. I didn't expect Justin to act that way."

  "What way? Like a jerk with a jealous streak?” Cath rested one hand on a cocked hip and regarded Rowan with a very adult and bitter half-smile.

  "Jealous?” Rowan touched her nose delicately with her fingertips. It wasn't swelling much. Catherine had insisted on applying ice and dosing Rowan with ibuprofen. “I don't think he's ever—"

  "Oh, yeah. He's jealous. Come on, Price, he doesn't let you go anywhere alone. I'm surprised you can visit the bathroom by yourself. Del probably saw Ellis getting sweaty with you and went into he-man mode. It happens."

  "I'm sure it does.” Rowan pulled the hem of the T-shirt down and gave herself a final once-over in the fu
ll-length mirror Catherine had draped a black feather boa over. “I just don't see Justin as the jealous type."

  "You're dense.” Catherine padded over to the unmade king-size bed, dropped down, and began working her feet into her boots.

  I look like I've been in a fight, Rowan thought, leaning close to the mirror. She had a raccoon-mask of bruising around both eyes, and her nose was a little swollen. It had been a good hit, but the swelling was already beginning to go down. It smarted, though. The only problem with healing rapidly was that most of the pain was compressed into a shorter time. Well, what do you know? I was in a fight. Me, the sissy girl who ran away from every schoolyard brawl. Imagine that.

  "I probably am,” she murmured, touching her split lower lip. “Ellis got me a good one, but I won the fight."

  "I was talking about Delgado, Rowan.” Catherine couldn't have sounded any more sarcastic if she'd tried, which was in and of itself a compliment. “You're hopeless."

  "Catherine ... how did you get into the Society?” It wasn't the right time to ask, but Rowan was curious.

  The younger girl paused, her fingers tangled in a boot lace. “Sigma snatched me from the playground at Sacred Heart,” she said finally, tonelessly, tossing her head slightly. Like she's tossing a ponytail, Rowan realized, and shuddered. Sometimes Catherine seemed no more than a very scared child, for all her toughness. “They nabbed me and put me in a holding tank. They ever tell you about Sig holding tanks? They're padded and circular, with a drain in one corner so you can piss. But the top is Plexiglass and always dark. You can't tell if you're being observed or not. The lights are fluorescent, and they never go off. I was in there for about sixteen hours before the door was blown and Del and Henderson came in. They got me out. On the way out we passed the Sig who was coming to shoot me full of Zed. He had forty hypodermics. Someone had broken his neck. Probably Del.” She paused, yanked the boot lace tight, and tied it swiftly. “Guess why they wanted me."

  "Probably something to do with your telekinesis,” Rowan guessed.

  "Yeah. I used to make pebbles and rocks rise up off the playground and smack the other kids. Wasn't very nice. And the nuns reported it to the priest, who reported it to Rome, but somehow Sigma found out about it.” She shook her head, her Mohawk—now tipped with crimson—shivering. “Del was first in the door. I threw myself on him, and he put me in an armlock and said, ‘If you want to get out of here, come with me'."

  Rowan let out a soft breath. Cath shivered. She bounced up from the bed, her booted feet hitting the floor with a thud. “Grab a coat. I want to smoke a cig topside, okay?"

  Rowan shook her head. “What an awful habit,” she said, but she found her camel coat hanging on the rack by the door. “What's my coat doing here?"

  "You left it that afternoon we played pinochle, remember? Hand me my scarf. I'm hungry too, so let's hurry. Wonder what's for dinner tonight?"

  "Probably spaghetti.” Rowan handed over the long, striped Dr. Who scarf and shrugged into her coat, wincing as a few more bruises made themselves apparent. Justin hadn't been kind.

  Neither was I, she thought, and sighed. At least he'd been smart enough to leave her alone. She was a lot calmer now. Calm enough to feel a little guilty over the way she'd screamed at him.

  Catherine chattered the entire way up to the surface, her silver jewelry flashing and hoop earrings shivering. Rowan made the appropriate noises, feeling her mood lighten. The girl meant well. For all her punk bravado she was actually a very sensitive, intelligent young lady. And she was trying to make Rowan feel better.

  Hilary would have snorted and dragged Rowan out for a night on the town, dancing and drinking and overriding Rowan's good-natured complaints. Thinking about Hilary sent the usual pain through her chest; a pain that seemed to be getting ... if not less sharp, then at least easier to bear.

  Hil would have chided Rowan into calling Delgado, and she would have bought a carton of ice cream and raged against jealous men and insisted Rowan tell her every detail.

  Rowan shook her head, dislodging the thought. Catherine, busy talking about parallel processing and gigs of RAM, didn't notice.

  When they stepped out through the steel-reinforced doors, dusk was beginning to creep into the sky and between the buildings. Catherine flicked her cigarette lighter and lit her smoke, taking a long drag. “God, I've been dying for this,” she said. “You want one?"

  Rowan shook her head. It was late March but still chilly, the sky clear, though the grass was wet from this morning's rainfall. Pockets of snow still held on in deeply shaded corners, eroded from the rain and the ground slowly warming up. Venus glimmered in the sky. Rowan could still hear her father's voice telling her about the stars. “No thanks.” Her breath plumed in the air, as if she was smoking too.

  "How about you? How did you get here?” Catherine's eyes glinted. She hopped down the steps, then wrestled herself up to sit on the low stone wall next to the carved lion. The lion's paw rested on a stone urn frothing with ivy. “I only heard about half of the story from Del."

  Rowan shrugged. “I saw a light in an abandoned house and thought it was kids playing around for Halloween,” she said slowly. “Then I ran across Justin. When he said you were parapsychology investigators, I freaked out. I couldn't have anyone suspecting what I was."

  "You blew out the instruments, you know. Without even trying. It was weird.” Catherine frowned and took another drag. “We weren't sure if you were government or not. Del looked like he'd been hit with a two-by-four. I think he already had a case for you."

  "Well, the next time I saw him two Sigs were trying to kidnap me in a parking lot. He chased them off and got invited to dinner.” He probably ‘pushed’ Dad, Rowan realized, remembering her father's odd insistence. “Then he came to dinner—and so did Sigma. They shot my father and my best friend."

  "God, I'm sorry.” Catherine looked aghast. “I didn't hear that part. I just heard Del snatched you from a Sig team and dragged you halfway across the country before it was safe to bring you in."

  Rowan shrugged, crossing her arms over her breasts and hugging herself. Her left arm twinged—she had a bruise on her bicep. As gentle as he'd tried to be, Justin had still hurt her.

  Maybe that's a lesson.

  "I hate those fucking Sigs.” Catherine blew out a long jet stream of smoke. “Brew says they're just guys doing their jobs, most of ‘em. I say, so were the Nazis. It doesn't make them any better."

  Rowan leaned against the stone lion, ignoring the chill seeping through her coat. Nausea rose briefly under her breastbone. She took a deep breath, the back of her neck prickling. “I agree."

  "You okay?” Catherine stubbed her cigarette on the lion's paw and tossed the remainder into a coffee can set to the side. “You look kind of pale."

  "I'm always pale.” Rowan attempted a cheerful tone. “I think my blood sugar's bottoming out. Let's go eat."

  Catherine slid her arm through Rowan's and grinned down at her. “Good idea, sistah. If it's spaghetti, I want tons of garlic bread."

  "Meatballs,” Rowan agreed, good-naturedly. “Sounds great."

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  He stood in the dark, staring out through the French doors, listening to the subliminal sounds of Headquarters. He'd chosen this room because it was far away from the bustle of others, and he wasn't immersed in the chatter of other minds out here. And the light from the windows, light any time he wanted it, a room where he could shut and lock the door at any moment, a bathroom to himself—all these things had been more precious than he had ever dreamed. Just being able to lock a door was like every Christmas he'd ever had rolled into one.

  His memory of the first year at Headquarters was a blur of prowling the corridors fighting the burning need for Zed, sometimes holing up in a faraway lonely spot to curl in a ball and sob while the agony of breaking the addiction tore through him. When he had finally recovered enough to be useful, Henderson had suggested he find some rooms he liked; Delgado had used t
hem sparingly in the years since, not bothering to hang anything on the walls, not daring to make anything about them personal.

  Now the room was alive with reminders of Rowan. Plants and bookcases, one of her fluttering blue scarves wrapped around the bedstead, a stack of art books she'd bought at the used bookstore in town holding up a terra cotta pot with a blooming blue orchid. More than that, though, was the smell of her clinging to the air; a scent so faint he doubted anyone else would recognize it.

  Delgado filled his lungs with that subliminal smell. Sooner or later she'd come back, unless she was going to abandon everything in here.

  His conscience pricked him. He should be standing guard, watching over her. He'd promised she wasn't going anywhere alone. But nothing had happened, and Delgado, for all his quiet snooping, hadn't found anything to make him think Jilssen was anything more than simply obsessed with Rowan's talents. And besides, she was angry; she wouldn't appreciate him following her around.

  I hate you! I wish I'd never seen you! Her voice echoed down into the dark well of his brain. Had he ever thought she would understand?

  She'll come back eventually, he told himself. Then you can apologize. Apologize? Hell, you can get down on your knees and beg. She's got a soft spot; you can use that. You're an idiot, Delgado, the biggest idiot on the face of the Earth.

  "I don't care,” he muttered, his breath fogging the glass. “Don't care. If I'm cruel here, she'll be ready for out there. Facing them."

  That wasn't training, the sharp calculating voice he hated echoed inside his head. You were jealous. You saw her sparring with Ellis, and you're jealous of anyone who gets that much of her time. Hell, you're even jealous of her patients. You're obsessed, Del, and you miscalculated bigtime.

  "She'll forgive me.” He didn't care that he was talking to himself; here at Headquarters it was practically required to mutter to yourself and look grim. Some of the telepaths had to subvocalize to make their talents work.

  What if she doesn't? She's never yelled at anyone like that before. She told you she hated you.