Tutuk smiled and looked the tribe over. There was a wealthy man in the back, a Maker by the looks of him. He would be the kind of man who napped spearheads from obsidian, or carved idols from the sacred oak. He was old, but not so old that Tutuk feared that he would die soon. He was the right age to craft weapons for the tribe, and to teach his apprentices his skills.
With a click of his tongue, Tutuk commanded his mammoth to kneel. Then he threw his left leg over the mammoth's neck and simply slid to the ground, slowing his descent by holding onto the beast's long hair.
The Neanderthals would want to know how to become mammoth riders, of course, but that was something that Tutuk could not teach them. He'd caught this mammoth as a calf, had touched its mind and trained it from birth, and though it might obey others now, Tutuk would not part with it.
Instead, he strode up to the Maker, hand raised to show what he was, and the old craftsman lifted his chin slightly.
Tutuk grasped his cranium, sent an arc of electricity through his hand, and showed the old man things. He showed how the Neanderthal arm was strong and powerful, the arm of a hunter, but it was too short to throw a spear far.
So Tutuk showed the old man how to make a spear thrower. Simply by carving a piece of wood, some two feet in length, he could make a base where the butt of a spear would sit. On the other end was a handle that could be gripped. By balancing the spear in the base, and then hurling with his might, Tutuk showed how other Neanderthals had been able to cast a spear for three hundred yards, making it easier to slay the wildebeests, mastodons, and tigers that roamed these hills.
By the time Tutuk finished, the old craftsman's jaw trembled as he fought back a sob. He teetered for a moment as the fall implications of what he had learned struck home.
With these new spear throwers, his tribe would prosper. His young men would hunt beasts from afar, and the vicious, gangly human cannibals might at last be vanquished.
As Tutuk pulled his hands away, the craftsman's eyes fluttered, and tears began to leak down his cheeks, tears of pure revelation, tears of astonishment and hope.
That is what Tutuk had desired: to bring these people hope. The world in his age had too little hope, with giant mastodons tearing down Neanderthal huts on sight, and tigers dragging children into the night, and humans encroaching on every front.
Suddenly the craftsman gave a shout of joy and grabbed Tutuk by the shoulders, then wrapped him in a powerful bear hug. Such affection was shown only to the closest of family members, and all of the Neanderthals shouted and danced, for the old man was telling them, "This stranger is as dear as a brother."
The vision ended. Bron could think of no other word to describe it, except as a vision. He'd been able to see as Tutuk had seen, smell what he'd smelled. He'd tasted the foul scent of Tutuk's teeth, felt the weariness that made his aching back sag.
For a moment, he had been another person, and he longed for more.
Monique pulled back her hands and smiled. "Tutuk was one of the greatest of our kind. He was a teacher who traveled the northern wastes through what we would now call Germany. He sought to save the Neanderthals, whom he saw as a noble people, and in time he brought peace between them and the humans. For many thousands of years they learned to live together in harmony. These people understood something that in our day we tend to forget. Wisdom is survival. Wisdom is hope, and peace, and kindness and love, all rolled into one. That is what we hope to share with the world, the wisdom to live together in peace."
For a long moment, Monique fell silent, and in that stillness Bron noticed the sound of small waves lapping the hull of the houseboat, and wind hissing through the rocks.
"How did the Neanderthals die out?" Bron asked. "I mean, they were so strong."
"And wise and kind," Monique said. "But they died by attrition. The humans, with their penchant for cannibalism, wiped them out."
"The humans ate them?" Bron asked. Astonishment seemed to cover him like a sheet.
Monique nodded.
"But humans aren't cannibals," Bron argued.
"Take a look at Wall Street," Monique laughed. "Humans have always been cannibals, looking for ways to put one another to use. Whether by slavery or usury or eating each other wholesale, what is the difference?"
Bron longed to know more, and he realized that Monique had sprung a trap. She'd given him a taste of wisdom, but only a taste. If he wanted more, he would have to bare himself to her.
"Will it hurt?" Bron asked.
"I will not lie," Monique replied. "It hurts more than words can say. That's why I can only lay bare your memories with your permission."
Bron weighed the proposal, and whispered softly, "Do it."
Monique drew close, smiled reassuringly into his eyes. Bron felt uncomfortable. The day was scorching outside, and her flimsy dress revealed almost as much as it hid. Bron didn't want to think about the possibility of being with her. He wanted to keep such desires hidden, but the fact that he feared them only made them stronger.
"Don't worry," she said.
She put her hands upon his head, and began slowly. She started with his last memory, his desire to reach out and touch her. It blossomed hot and fresh in his mind, and then other memories came—every nasty little thought, every vile fantasy that he'd ever had about every woman he'd ever met.
The feelings that they engendered were inexpressible. At first he thought that he might liken it to someone taking an ice pick to his brain, driving it deep and then twisting, in order to dislodge every objectionable thought that he'd ever had.
Shame struck him first, like a physical blow, turning his face hot and clenching his stomach. The memories flicked before his eyes, like pages in a graphic novel, bright and colorful, but they were accompanied by sounds—the voices of women and girls that he'd known.
But it wasn't like pages flashing before his eyes. It was more like little explosions in his head, as if landmines in his brain were going off, and these dark thoughts were just bits of shrapnel. Hundreds of them blossomed like mushroom clouds by the second. Bron was shocked and disgusted by the enormous quantity of them.
He tried to pull away, to retreat into some dark corner of his soul and hide, but Monique whispered soothingly, "Don't worry. Your mind is relatively clean when compared to those of other men."
She probed through his darkest fantasies and learned of the time when he was a child that he let a girl from next door touch him.
He relived watching one of his foster mothers as she stood naked before a mirror, and he recalled paging through a dirty magazine when he was eight, kissing the pictures and laughing inanely.
Bron squirmed, embarrassed to the core.
Bile rose up in his throat, and he fought the need to vomit. He gagged, seeking air.
Why is she just touching these thoughts? he wondered.
Your memories are tied to powerful emotions, Monique whispered in his mind. Then she said softly, "Fear, revulsion, lust. Those are some of the most powerful emotions. I explored your lust."
Suddenly it seemed that she had exhausted the pornographic content of his mind. "Don't be ashamed. All of us face temptations, but you have not given yourself over to them. In time, I can tell, you can master all of your desires. You have a strong will."
Now she pulled out other incidents—quarters that he'd stolen from his foster parent's couch as a child, money that he'd taken from the table in a neighbor's house. He recalled all of the times that he had stopped and looked longingly at the neighbor's boat and wondered what it would be like to be wealthy. He felt astonished at how often he'd coveted the nicer meals that others were eating at restaurants.
Every greedy impulse that he'd fought down came roaring back to life, and for a moment it was like a fresh wound, hot and bloody, as he longed for things that he would never have.
I am a worm of a person, Bron thought, and he shrank inside himself, wishing to die.
"Not much there," Monique said. "Steel yourself. I can already tel
l that this next one is going to hurt!"
Suddenly, she touched his anger, and hot wrath flooded into him as he was suddenly forced to relive every insult that had been spoken to him, see every scornful gaze, hear every cruel word.
As adrenaline gushed through his veins, his muscles knotted like cordwood and a scream of outrage tore from his throat—and that is where Monique struck pay dirt, for Bron's hate was strong and unrestrained, and often as a child he'd spent long hours fantasizing about how to get revenge on older children, imagining mutilations.
He remembered his fantasies about Mr. Golper—wanting to tie him in a bag and then stab it over and over, then throw his dying corpse into a river.
He thought of Mr. Lewis, and from deep inside he flashed upon an image of the man curled in a fetal position, dirty and naked beside a refrigerator.
When did that happen? he wondered.
In the memory he knew that Mr. Lewis was dying. His wife was calling the police, and Bron was wishing that she wouldn't, that she would just let him die.
Then there were the kids at school who had all offended him, and teachers and shopkeepers.
Over and over through the years, he'd told himself that he didn't care about the insults and cruelty, that he could ignore it all, but Monique seemed to throw open the shutters inside him, letting powerful beams of sunlight lay all of his secrets bare.
He'd quit fantasizing about revenge a couple years ago, and it seemed unfair that he should see these fantasies now, paraded before him in all their monstrous cruelty.
Bron screamed and fought, began trying to wrench his head free, until at last Monique pulled her hands away.
Bron opened his eyes and struggled against the rage. It seemed to be rolling over him in waves. His muscles were knotted, his neck swollen with it.
Monique was shaken and pale. Beads of sweat dotted her forehead and rivulets stole down her cheeks and neck. Her pupils were pinpoints, constricted in shock, and her breath came ragged.
Bron wondered at her reaction. He'd imagined murder before, lots of times, in ways that were horrific and brutal, but it was nothing worse than what you'd see at the movies.
"No more," Monique said. "No more for now." She pulled her hands away, as if she would quit for the day.
Bron stopped fighting her, relaxed for a fraction of a second, and then Monique gritted her teeth, grasped his skull, and sent a shock through him.
"Show me what you love," she whispered....
Chapter 25
Strange Relations
"At one time or another, each of us is confronted by the knowledge that someone who should be the closest to us, is in fact a stranger."
— Bron Jones
As darkness cloaked her, Olivia waited on the beach, crouching on the red sandstone like a gargoyle. Stars had filled the skies and begun to blow across the heavens on a wispy breeze.
The smell of lake came strong, and the dark boat sat quietly upon water as still as glass. Stars reflected like golden candlelight upon the lake's surface, and the horned moon was a sliver of platinum or pale, pale bone.
Olivia peered out at a line of hills, so peaceful in the moonlight, and she felt tense to the point of breaking.
It takes a long time to find the weight of a soul, Olivia knew. As Bron's foster mother, she was too close to him for this task. Besides, Monique was the only one trained to be a Weigher of Lost Souls. She had done this perhaps tens of thousands of times, peered into the mind of a Draghoul to see if it was fit to convert, or if it had to be destroyed.
Olivia's stomach felt taut from hunger, her mouth dry from thirst, but she just waited silently, knowing that this could take all night.
Monique must have hit a switch, for suddenly the houseboat lit up like a Christmas tree, with strings of golden lights all along its top and wrapped down every pillar, and running along the bottom near the water line. The lights twinkled in the heat, and reflected from still waters.
The forward living room lit up inside. A glass door slid open. "We're done for now," Monique said. She stood at the door, holding her stomach protectively, as if she might be sick.
"Already?" Olivia asked. It had only taken four hours. She got up, stepped lightly across the pontoon bridge. The golden lights extended across it, easing her way.
"He's not one of us," Monique whispered when she got near.
Olivia faltered. She had hoped that Bron would pass, that he'd be accepted. On some level, she'd convinced herself that he was worthy. She couldn't imagine the alternative.
Death? Olivia wondered. Are you going to put him down?
"You didn't tell me about the purple canjiti," Monique said, almost accusingly. Among the masaak, the colored electrical flashes that came out during transfers were called canjiti.
Olivia asked, "Don't all dream assassins give those off?"
Monique shook her head no. "I suppose that there's no way you could have known that, though. We haven't seen one in ages." Monique held the door open, glanced surreptitiously toward the kitchens. Olivia stepped into the boat, and Monique led her to a deep couch, opened a bottled water, and handed it to Olivia. Cold droplets had condensed on the exterior. Olivia drank greedily. She heard Bron moving about in the kitchen.
Monique sat near Olivia, and suddenly began sobbing.
"What's wrong?" Olivia asked.
Monique shook her head in dismay. "Can't you see?" she asked, then added, "Of course you can't. You're not trained to do an emotive profile."
Olivia tried to stall her. "What did you find?" She expected that Bron was a Draghoul, a purebred, and that with his powers, he might be too dangerous. She couldn't even honestly consider that possibility.
"He's a cold one," Monique answered. "He's been damaged. You've probed his amygdala? You know what I mean."
"It's not uncommon for someone in his situation," Olivia said gently. "He was raised by caregivers who gave no care, betrayed by the system that should have served him."
"I agree," Monique said. "He is a victim here, but you know what else he is: a danger."
Olivia fell silent for a moment. Yes, Bron had killed a foster father, but he hadn't meant to.
Was that what had rattled Monique?
Olivia glanced toward the kitchen. Bron was still inside the houseboat somewhere, though she could not see him. She risked speaking openly. "I've seen inside the mind of a Draghoul. Bron doesn't feel that cold inside. He doesn't fit in their world."
"Or in ours," Monique argued. "He's something we've never seen before."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean," Monique said, "he's a new branch on the evolutionary tree. There have been dream assassins before ... but he is different somehow. Those purple flashes that he gives off when he unleashes? They're unlike anything we've encountered. I know that you want to protect him, but you and I both know how dangerous he is."
Olivia didn't believe that she was being overprotective. She loved Bron the way that a mother loves her child. It was a new love, true, but it was powerful nonetheless. They'd been through a great deal together in just a week, and she had to believe that he felt something for her, too.
He wasn't Draghoul. He wasn't Ael.
"So what do you think we should do?"
Monique fell silent, considered. Bron walked into the room, carrying a cold can of soda.
Monique faced him. "Bron, before I teach you more, I want you to complete a quest."
"A quest?" Bron asked. "A quest for what?"
She peered into Bron's eyes. "Years ago, a woman was sent to me—a young mother who was forced to give up her son. She had abandoned the child, and she wanted me to erase her memory of him—obliterate it so deeply that no one would ever be able to learn what had happened to him. I was very young then, but I had generations of experience in such matters. Though years have passed, I still know how to contact that woman. Bron, I want you to meet your mother."
"My mother?" Bron said. His mouth opened in amazement. He'd given up hope of find
ing her years ago. "How do you know she's my mother?"
Monique said softly. "Before your mother left you, she bleached your hair, reddened it so that the Draghouls wouldn't realize what you were. She wrapped you in a blue blanket, and took you to the Happy Valley Inn. She laid a black-eyed Susan next to you. She pinned a note to you that said, 'Bron is free.' It wasn't a price tag. She wasn't offering to give you away. You were being hunted, both of you, and it was a prayer. She hoped that finally, someday, you would be free."
After their talk, Olivia joined Monique in the kitchen to help fix dinner. Olivia found a vegetarian lasagna that had been flown in from a fine restaurant in Vegas, rich with wine, sundried tomatoes, spinach leaves, fresh matsutake mushrooms, and exotic cheeses.
As she warmed it in the oven, Monique blended ice, sugar and fresh juice from lemons and limes to make a frappe. Olivia glanced out on the fore-deck, saw Bron sitting alone with his thoughts, staring at the starlight and the untroubled waters.
"I don't get it," Olivia whispered softly as Monique squeezed the juices. "Why do you want to bring his mother into this?"
In order to assure a level of privacy, Monique switched to ancient French. "Il me fait peur," Monique said simply. He scares me. "It is not the rage that bothered me. When I tried to look into his heart and find what he loved ... it was too empty. I'm thinking that Bron needs this. I'm sure that his mother needs it, too."
That stopped Olivia. She hadn't searched Bron's memories quite so thoroughly. "If we look deeply enough, we'll find some affection, somewhere."
"You don't see him for what he is. You haven't looked at his balance. Sure, there's love, but damned little of it. If he had a wealth of love in him, and rage in equal measure, it would only mean that he's passionate. But there's an imbalance here.
"Olivia, you're a loving person. You love everyone—the kids at your school, your husband, the teachers with whom you work...."
"They're good people," Olivia argued.
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