by John Farris
Twelve Caretakers have never been enough, particularly with the population of the medium-size and overburdened planet soaring to six billion. But twelve is a sacred number in celestial dynamics. Not to be trifled with. Because of attrition from overwork (even the hardiest of ancients eventually fray and lose their pep in service to the Little Souls), there always is a need for replacement council members. Leoncaro has trained his share. Zachary, an Echelon 3 in the hierarchy of prospective Caretakers, is one of them.
While he eats his broccoli and pasta and sips white tea for his digestion, Leoncaro says to Zach, who is seated on a small sofa in the study, “I’m reluctant to put you in the field again so soon. You’ve made your contribution as Rahim, and earned a holiday.”
“I should have seen it coming. Abdallah has the brains of a cabbage. I always thought it would be Fouad.”
“We move on,” Leoncaro says. “To Las Vegas.”
“From one desert paradise to another,” Zachary says. “From the Empty Quarter to empty pockets.”
“Good to know that being blown sky-high in the royal yacht didn’t vaporize your sense of humor.”
“What’s going on in Glitter Gulch?”
“By way of explanation,” Leoncaro says, passing a linen napkin edged in gold thread over his lips, “perhaps I should introduce you to someone.”
He holds the napkin away from himself and gives it a significant shake. From the loose cloth tumble spheres of sapphire and ruby light that, whirling giddily, arrange themselves into the fair figure of a young woman, the flame ruby of her hair slowly paling to strawberry blond. She turns when fully formed, smiles gracefully at her mentor, then turns again and, still smiling, acknowledges the shade of the late desert prince with a courteous nod. She remains facing him with an easeful radiance, steadfast as the evening star, hands folded at her waist.
“This is Eden Waring,” Leoncaro says. “The Avatar.”
“Beautiful,” Zachary, appropriately mesmerized, says to his boss. “But she is not one of us?”
“No. Eden is, however, a prodigy and a blessing, a soul enlightened through many incarnations; perhaps this will be her last stay on earth. We would like for it to be a long and useful stay.”
“What powers does she possess as the Avatar?”
“Eden is a prophetic dreamer. She has psychotronic capability and access to great stores of cosmic energy, employable through a little talisman that I provided her, accompanied by a portion of humbug and balderdash. But talismans require a story if they’re to be effective.”
“Oh, sure.”
The talisman that Leoncaro speaks of, a small twist of an unidentifiable metal that the vision of Eden wears mounted on a gold chain around her neck, exhibits pinpoints of twinkling light.
“Also Eden possesses the left-handed art: she can produce her doppelganger almost at will.”
“Two of them?” Zachary says with a perplexed smile. “An embarrassment of riches?”
“Hardly,” Leoncaro says, suddenly grim. “But we’ll come to that. You should understand that although Eden is well centered, mature and resourceful for her years and a born leader—she was captain of her basketball teams in high school and college—the suddenness with which the mantle of Avatar was thrust on her left Eden in a low state of emotional turmoil verging on morbidity. Adding to her problems was Mordaunt—in the persona of Lincoln Grayle at his most seductive.”
“An illusionist, isn’t he? I saw him one time on telly.”
“Was an illusionist.” Leoncaro permits himself a few moments of satisfaction at the thought. “Having seen Eden in action, I chose to put her at great risk once more, along with another gifted young psychic, Alberta Nkambe. I sent them after Mordaunt.”
The holographic Eden looks around at him. Leoncaro nods and she seats herself on a corner of his desk, gazing serenely at painted cherubs on the study’s ceiling.
“It didn’t go all that smoothly,” Leoncaro continues. “Miss Nkambe is recovering from gunshot wounds in a Las Vegas hospital, another of the Trickster’s machinations. But because he coveted Eden—or the monster off-spring he was confident she would bear him—Mordaunt apparently was a little careless. And Eden buried him. Rather, she buried a teratogenec nightmare, the shape Mordaunt had assumed in order to be able to mate with her, under half a ton of melted glass in the lobby of the Lincoln Grayle Theatre.”
“Nice going,” Zachary says with an admiring whistle. “She can deliver the goods. So Mordaunt is—”
“Entombed. But still immortal.”
“Then you would like me to—”
“No, no. I’ve already arranged for the necessary disposal through the good offices of the Crucis Aurea. Wouldn’t do for the beast’s remains to end up in a desert landfill with coffee grounds and unpaid bills, a Dumpster shrine for the Wicked of his Lasting Dark who flocked around Mordaunt in his prime.”
There is an interval during which the Holy Father sucks at a bit of broccoli stuck between two gold-crowned teeth. Finally he reaches in with a thumbnail to dislodge it.
“That would seem to be that,” Zachary says, certain that there must be a great deal more on Leoncaro’s mind.
“Following the Holocaust we succeeded in disciplining Mordaunt, reducing his power by half, by isolating the masculine and feminine halves of his black soul. That formidable effort cost us three Caretakers, and I’ve suffered for years with headaches like rock crushers.”
Zachary nods in respect for what had been a fabulous feat of will. First the council’s outrage; then the power of many suns, the purest light in the universe, had been channeled through a psychic prism of all the Caretakers to split the soul of the dark god Mordaunt in a supernova instant. Like taking a bright razor to a fat plum, by way of a mundane analogy. The masculine aspect of the Trickster’s would continue to be, as always, bad news for humankind, but the feminine soul had been consigned to a chain gang in rural Georgia in the 1920s, installed in a physical body whose punishing workday was destined to repeat metronomically, in that dusty little corner of a parallel universe, until the stars went blind. Or had something gone awry with the Caretakers’ scheme?
“I’m afraid so,” Leoncaro says, anticipating what the late Rahim’s question will be. “As I told you, one of Eden Waring’s talents is her ability to produce the doppelganger. A reverse-image replica in flesh, blood, and all-too-human longings. Subject to certain laws of physics. The dpg was nonetheless under full control of her homebody.”
“But all doppelgangers are devious in their desire to acquire identities of their own.”
“Only Eden, in the ancient tradition of the Eponym—the Name-giver—may grant her dpg independent life. Which, although she was inexperienced in occult matters, Eden knew instinctively not to do.”
“In spite of the wiles of her lookalike?”
“Because Eden was uncooperative, the doppelganger named herself—which doesn’t count, of course, except for vanity’s sake. She chose Guinevere—‘Gwen’ for short. The heart of the matter is, through no fault of Eden’s, Gwen has gone missing.”
“How can that be?” Zachary says, quietly amazed.
“While masquerading as Eden, Gwen attracted notice from Lincoln Grayle. He must have observed almost immediately that she was only a doppelganger. But he had a use for one of the dpg’s special talents, which is the ability to travel through time.”
“Oh-oh.”
“Yes.”
“But if Gwen is under Eden’s control—”
Leoncaro gestures with the hand that bears the papal ring that millions of the laity yearn to kiss while down on one knee in a holy place.
“She isn’t. Eden was here, in my study, four days ago. She told me that she had lost contact with her dpg.”
“How? That would violate physical law, not occult tradition.”
“Merely conjecture; but Mordaunt may have invented a means to disturb the electromagnetic synchronicity of homebody and dpg. If she were temporarily not subject t
o Eden’s volition, Gwen may have been persuaded to . . . do the Trickster a little favor.” Leoncaro makes a wry face. “Whether Eden can regain control of her doppelganger before serious mischief occurs is a problem Eden has lacked the time to devote herself to.”
Zachary studies the representation of Eden Waring, ever smiling, that waits attendance near him, trying to envision—through her astute good-natured eyes, the untiring but polite gaze now fixed on him—the rough were-beast she put paid to, damned to a stretch of time it could be hoped would equal that of a prehistoric insect drowsing in a hardened ooze of amber.
Mordaunt.
Or, more accurately, the masculine aspect of the entity. Cruelty suppressed, rage inhibited, his gross and evil powers reduced by the Avatar to the mildness of a baby’s fart.
“So it must be the other half of Mordaunt’s soul we need to be concerned about now,” Zachary says.
“It would be negligent and reckless of us to assume any less.” Leoncaro is grim in his concern.
“And you want me to help Eden Waring?”
“With Bertie Nkambe laid up for now, and Tom Sherard attending to a vital matter I am about to propose to him, she will be needing someone else she can count on.”
“I have your authority to do a Takeover?”
“Certainly. Time is of the essence. Because of her treatment of the so-called Great One, Las Vegas has become a dangerous place for Eden.”
“I haven’t had much experience with Takeovers,” Zachary muses. “I’ll be responsible for two human entities, not one.”
Leoncaro’s mouth turns down at the corners. “Do we need to have this conversation?”
“No, Holiness. But . . . I may have to shadow Eden for a while until I come across someone suitable for a Takeover.”
“ ‘These troublesome disguises which we wear,’ ” Leoncaro says, quoting from Paradise Lost. “Remember that you’re dealing with an Avatar. If Eden senses that she’s haunted, it will not be beneficial to her morale.”
LAS VEGAS • 8:55 A.M.
Tom Sherard and Eden Waring were permitted ten minutes with Bertie Nkambe in the critical-care unit of the hospital.
Bertie’s hair had been shaved from one side of her scalp and she had drains in her head. The swollen face would have been unrecognizable on any of the magazine covers where Bertie had been appearing since she was sixteen. Her brain was still edematous but the damage to her right temple, done by a bullet that had already passed through Charmaine Goferne’s body, had been repaired during five hours of surgery. Bertie was on a ventilator because a second bullet had collapsed a lung. The third shot had shattered her right wrist as she tumbled out of her chair to the floor of the terrace café at Bahìa, where she’d been lunching with Charmaine, a sad tense lunch for Bertie as she peeped the other girl’s mind and discovered that very little of humane intent or social consequence remained there, thanks to Mordaunt.
Bertie was conscious but, intubated, she couldn’t talk. Even subvocal conversation with Eden, a skill they had been practicing during the months Eden had spent at Shungwaya, came hard for Bertie.
—Lincoln Grayle? Mordaunt?
—Done for. It’s finished.
—How?
—Relax, I’ll show you.
Eden held Bertie’s left hand in her own hand, careful not to disturb the drip line inserted into the large vein below her middle finger. She gently massaged with a thumb the underside of Bertie’s wrist, exciting a current that rose as waves of imagery to Bertie’s brain and caused her own body to tremble.
—Awesome.
—Why, thanks.
—You okay?
Eden looked around the circular critical-care unit, which was crowded with flattened folk behind gauzy partitions, some as bad off as Bertie, others possibly worse: major coronaries, accident victims hung slackly in glistening graceful drip lines, cheating death to the whuff of ventilators and the ping of exotic medical monitors, lines of vital signs like unfolding waves across the screens. The nurses all had the serious faces of high calling.
—Guess so.
—No. You’re not. You’re running on empty. It’s like you’re thin skin and bone and I can see the light passing through you.
—Come to think of it, I probably could use a nap.
—Don’t go yet.
Bertie’s eyelids flickered. She looked at Tom, waiting at the foot of the bed, rangy and high shouldered, intently studying her, a little knob of muscle in one cheek the only indication of unhappiness.
—Tell Tom . . . I love him.
—I will. But he knows, Bertie.
—You’ve got the shakes.
—More like heebie-jeebies. I’ll be all right. Tom wants to be with you now, Bertie, and they didn’t give us much time to be in here.
The respirator chuffed and sighed.
—Wait . . . Eden. What about Gwen?
—Oh, don’t know. I have to find her. She’ll keep, wherever she is. Bertie, the whole world’s been calling. I’ll get back to some of your people for you, let them know how you’re doing—and Joseph, hey, didn’t I tell you? Joseph and Kieti are on the way to Las Vegas!
—Wonderful. Tell them . . . not to worry. But this is going to take a little time. I have a lot of work to do inside my brain. It’s like . . . an earthquake knocked everything off the shelves.
Eden gave up her seat beside the bed to Tom, smiled at Bertie, a smile that went flat against her teeth in an involuntary grimace. She kissed her fingertips and brushed them across Bertie’s humid brow, then fled the room.
In the bathroom down the hall Eden dropped clumsily to her knees and with a dismal quaking gave up her breakfast. Then she sat back nerveless and cold against a tiled wall, too worn out and sick with guilt to want to show her face to anyone ever again. Because she had seen in Bertie’s almond eyes recognition of what Eden had hoped to withhold—in spite of the fact that Tom was still all over her skin, a flushed erotic malady, and there was that chiming in her heart whenever she glanced his way. Even in the mummylike limbo provided by painkillers and massive hits of antibiotics and antiinflammatory drugs Bertie couldn’t have missed it.
To make the hell that she wanted, childishly, to writhe in more of a torment, Eden understood that the contempt and anger she wished Bertie to feel would never be forthcoming—the animus that only a spitting catfight, a howling siege of recriminations, might subdue. No, in her inevitable hurt Bertie would find the largeness of soul to forgive Eden. There was a simple truth here: Tom was Bertie’s one true love, always would be. Every truth enrages someone. It was Eden’s rage that had her in hell, not the presumption of guilt. She bumped the back of her head against the wall. Again and again, figuring this out.
Someone else wanted to use the bathroom. Eden was feeling pulses again from the head-banging exercise. A warm-up flow of blood. Her hands had almost stopped tingling. She felt cranky and slightly ridiculous sitting there, out of excuses. She wanted a drink of water.
It was Tom Sherard waiting outside. He smelled the lingering airs of her purging with a twitch of his mouth she couldn’t interpret either as sympathy or disgust. Well, all right then.
He left the door ajar, took Eden gently by one arm and led her away.
“Hold up your head, now.” She lifted her head with a tense smile. “And for all our sakes, Eden, stop beating yourself up.”
“I’ve stopped.”
9:38 A.M.
In his Moorish-style house of cool arcades and spacious windows framing blue water or desert hues of sage green and dusty rose, Bronc Skarbeck sat in his leather-paneled study running surveillance tapes from the Lincoln Grayle Theatre complex. Twenty-three different cameras that had recorded comings and goings during a two-hour period from ten p.m. to shortly after midnight of the present day.
Some of the cameras were stationary, others panned 180 degrees.
Fast-forward and it was like watching an old-time silent movie comedy, the jump and scurry of forms, disjointed zipalong actio
n, except there was no culmination, no merry slapstick finale to be savored.
Skarbeck was familiar with most of the area the cameras covered. Four different angles on the scimitar curve of the marbled lobby. Five angles inside the dinner theatre and on the stage, a multilevel marvel of technology and engineering by the whiz-kid illusion-design team of an imaginative showman. The old flea-flicker smoke-and-mirrors magic game elevated exponentially, combining circus with the pyrotechnics of a space-shuttle liftoff. Two hundred twenty-five dollars a ticket, no seniors’ discount or group rates, which price included a palatable three-course dinner with a choice of red or white wine before the show. They were serving mostly Aussie imports now; California vintages had become too pricey. The all-new Lincoln Grayle show, now indefinitely postponed, had sold out four months in advance.
Skarbeck flinched at the thought of refunding approximately thirty-two million dollars. Or, worse, permanently shutting down due to the loss of the star attraction.
While he sped through the tapes he was averaging a phone call every three minutes. What to do about this, say about that? The news trickling in ranged from hopeful to near calamitous, depending on whom he was talking to. Lincoln Grayle’s Shelby GTO had turned up in the garage of the only mechanic Grayle allowed to touch it, out by Nellis Air Force Base. So that somewhat lessened the chance that Grayle had perished in the gigantic rock slide. On the other hand, he could have called for a limo. It likely would take about three weeks to blast, bulldoze, and truck away all the debris from the base of the mountain to find out what or who might have been, lucklessly, beneath the roar and smash.
Skarbeck preferred to believe that the Magician had been resting up in his dressing room when the avalanche occurred. But nothing on the tapes he’d viewed so far supported this hope. Needless to say, Linc didn’t have surveillance cameras in the dressing suite.
But if he were still alive, why the hell couldn’t he at least let Skarbeck know?
The dress rehearsal for the new show had ended around eight o’clock. By ten thirty the theatre and support complex were nearly deserted. Late deliveries for the kitchen stores and wine cellar had ended. Meetings of zookeepers, the show’s cast and backstage crew, the tech people, the kitchen and wait staffs, were over. Four security guards, a couple of engineers, and the menagerie’s vets were still around: one of Lincoln Grayle’s snow leopards was about to deliver cubs. Elizabeth Ann Perkins also had lingered, should Grayle need her for something.