by Jayne Castle
Marlowe had never seen blue ghost light before, but she recognized it from the descriptions in the old files. It was deadly. Stronger and more easily manipulated that standard ghost energy, it could be wielded like some demonic flaming sword. In certain quarters it was called assassin’s fire.
Adam responded with a second wave of raw power. The whirlpool of blue ghost light weakened, but it did not disappear. Infuriated, Fortner forged sapphire lightning bolts and sent them hurtling toward Adam.
The bolts splintered and sparked against the invisible barrier of dreamlight that Adam had erected around himself. Marlowe knew that the self-defense tactic, while astonishingly effective, had cost him dearly in terms of energy.
When the last shaft of lightning disintegrated against the dreamlight shield, Adam did not even try to pull another wave of power from the ultradark end of the spectrum. Instead, he launched himself across the chamber.
It was clear immediately that a straightforward physical attack was the last thing Fortner had expected. He had relied on his paranormal talents for so long that he had forgotten there were other, more primitive ways that a man could be attacked, Marlowe thought.
“Stay away from me,” Fortner shouted.
He scrambled to evade Adam’s rush. Marlowe realized that the shock of the assault had distracted him for a couple of precious seconds. Before he could pull himself together and concentrate hard enough to focus his talent, Adam slammed into him.
Both men fell hard on the unforgiving quartz. Fierce energy flared again in the atmosphere. Marlowe knew that by now the men had to be pulling on the last of their reserves. The pair rolled across the floor of the chamber and came up hard against the wall. Fortner landed on top, but he suddenly stiffened.
His eyes opened wide. He stared down at Adam with an unholy mix of fury and disbelief.
“Not you,” he got out. “No. I’m the true Cerberus.”
He screamed once. The horrifying sound ended abruptly. He crumpled. Marlowe watched his dreamlight fade to a weak glow. It winked out altogether.
A crystalline silence gripped the chamber.
Adam moved, pushing the body aside. He got to his feet. The knife in his hand dripped blood on the psi green floor.
He leaned down to check for a pulse. Marlowe knew that he would not find one.
He stood and turned to her, his eyes still hot with psi.
“Marlowe,” he said.
He did not say anything else. There was no need. It was all there in that one word, her name. She sensed the anguished fear and the rage that had driven him; sensed, too, the mag-steel control he had used to focus and channel his energy so that he could get to her.
She managed a shaky smile. “I love you, too. Why didn’t you answer your phone? You said you always answer your private line.”
“I didn’t get your call because I was underground interrogating Joey the broker when you tried to get hold of me. No reception in the tunnels. Joey told me the identity of the client who had commissioned the crystal guns.”
Marlowe glanced at the body on the floor. “Did the news come as a big surprise?”
“No. I’d come to the conclusion that Fortner had to be involved. It was the only explanation for the leaks. When I got back to the surface, Fortner called me himself, telling me that he had you.”
“How did you find me? Gibson?”
“When I got to your office, Gibson was still unconscious,” Adam said. “He didn’t wake up until a few minutes ago. I couldn’t afford to wait. I knew where Fortner’s bolt-hole was. It gave me a starting point. So I called in backup to help track the two of you through the tunnels.”
“Backup?”
Adam looked toward the doorway. Marlowe turned and saw Charlotte Deene. Tucker and Keith were with her.
“Of course,” Marlowe said. “You called in a strong dreamlight talent. Good thinking, Guild boss.”
“This family owed you,” Charlotte said. “You may not approve of the way we make our living, but we have our rules, just like the Joneses and the Winters do. We always pay our debts.”
“You know,” Marlowe said, “the more I think about it, the more I’m convinced that J&J really could use the three of you. Why don’t you come to my office soon? We’ll talk.”
Charlotte, Tucker, and Keith looked at each other. None of them spoke, but they seemed to come to a silent consensus.
“We’ll think about it,” Charlotte said.
Chapter 42
THEY GATHERED IN MARLOWE’S OFFICE THE FOLLOWING afternoon. She sat behind her desk, Gibson perched on the back of her chair. The Burning Lamp stood on the desk in front of her.
Adam lounged against the window ledge, arms folded across his chest. The others occupied the two office chairs and the folding chairs that Rick had magically produced.
They had all come to the debriefing: her parents, Ben and Elizabeth; her uncle Zeke; together with Diana and Sam Winters. Vickie Winters was also present. She looked surprisingly rested, given what she had been through, Marlowe thought. Like the Joneses, the Winters family was resilient.
Marlowe sat forward. The chair squeaked. She folded her hands on her desk and tried to look like a professional investigator.
“Everything started to go wrong for Elliott Fortner after the Chamber voted to put Adam in charge of cleaning up the Frequency Guild,” she said. “As the head of the Bureau, Fortner could have argued against the decision, but he didn’t dare.”
“Adam was the obvious choice,” Sam said. “Fortner knew that if he made any objection, there would be too many questions from the powerful Guild chiefs who rule the Chamber.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “Fortner had a very good reason for not wanting the Frequency Guild cleaned up. He was raking in a fortune from various illegal operations, all Guild-related, all managed by Hubert O’Conner and Douglas Drake.”
Adam looked at the group. “Afraid of having his business activities exposed by the kind of sweeping investigation he knew I would conduct, Fortner devised a plan with Drake and O’Conner to get rid of me. But just as it was all coming together, I discovered the mirror maze.”
“Adam went straight to Fortner with the news, of course,” Marlowe said. “He also told Fortner that he thought the artifact known as the Burning Lamp might be the key to fixing the dissonance energy in the maze. But first he had to find the lamp.”
Ben frowned. “Fortner must have been stunned.”
“He knew the legend,” Elizabeth said. “The lamp is said to have the power to save a man who was in danger of becoming a true Cerberus.”
“And as it happened,” Marlowe continued, “Fortner had just begun to fear that he might be deteriorating psychically. He had been able to handle his three talents surprisingly well until recently, thanks to the genetic advantages of having been born on Harmony. But his condition had always been extremely fragile.”
Vickie looked thoughtful. “Using the crystal guns that Keith had forged was probably what pushed him over the edge.”
“Yes,” Marlowe said.
“He hadn’t made the connection with the crystal guns,” Adam said. “But he was starting to realize that he was failing. He was getting scared. When I told him that I was going after the Burning Lamp, it dawned on him that if I found it, he might be able to use it to save himself.”
There was a squeak as Marlowe leaned back in her chair. Gibson fluttered briefly, adjusting to the lurch.
“Fortner tried to call off O’Conner and Drake, but that proved impossible,” Marlowe said. “In the end, he took care of both of them, himself. Among other things, Fortner was a chameleon talent. He left the prints of one of O’Conner’s men at the scene of the fire.”
“Did he know that the lamp in the Arcane Museum was a fake?” Ben asked.
“Yes,” Adam said. “Because I told him.”
“But no one told the Deene triplets,” Marlowe added. “So when Keith became seriously ill a few weeks ago, Charlotte and Tucker hatched the idea to
find and steal the lamp. They located the fake and went after it.”
Zeke got a knowing expression. “That, of course, set you on a collision course with Adam. Once you two teamed up, you were able to find the lamp and work it.”
Marlowe cleared her throat. “To save the underworld,” she said very deliberately. “We were able to work it to save the underworld.”
Diana smiled. “And to fix Adam’s little dreamlight pattern problems. We understand.”
“Just to clarify, Adam didn’t have any serious dreamlight issues,” Marlowe said.
Adam was amused. “It’s all right, Marlowe. My family knows, and yours, obviously, has figured it out as well. No need to play any games.”
Marlowe glared at her small audience. “Adam does not possess multiple talents. I have reviewed the historical archives and his dreamlight patterns. He has a single, very powerful talent that developed in stages.”
Zeke snorted. “The Cerberus part of the Burning Lamp legend is just another Arcane Society myth, along with that nonsense about Nicholas having somehow infused the Midnight Crystal with a dangerous hypnotic command.”
Ben nodded. “Obviously, the fact that Adam brought Marlowe safely out of the mirror maze and we are all sitting around chatting is proof that he was not overcome with a sudden urge to kill off the entire Jones line.”
Zeke made a face. “I’m a chaos-theory talent. Hell, I was born to see conspiracies everywhere, and even I never believed that part of the legend.”
Adam looked at Marlowe. “You see? No need for any secrets in this room.”
“That’s good to know,” she said. She returned his smile.
In that moment she knew that neither of them was ever going to mention that the psychical hypnotic command infused in the Midnight Crystal had functioned precisely as Nicholas Winters had intended.
“No one is concerned with the Midnight Crystal,” Elizabeth said. “But what about the Deenes’ decision to steal the fake lamp, the action that we all agree threw you and Adam together so that you could save the underworld? Was that pure coincidence?”
Zeke scowled. “There are no coincidences. I’ve told Marlowe that a thousand times.”
“Hmm,” Marlowe said.
Everyone looked at her.
Marlowe looked at the Burning Lamp. “I’m no crystal talent expert, and for obvious reasons I won’t be handing the lamp over to the Arcane labs. But it’s clear that the artifact has a long history of drawing together the Winters male who needs it and a dreamlight talent strong enough to work the energy in it.”
“Surely you don’t believe that the artifact has some supernatural influence,” Vickie scoffed. “No one in Arcane believes in magic.”
“No magic involved here,” Marlowe said. “Just the laws of para-physics. I think that when a man of the Winters bloodline starts to develop the second stage of his talent, the violent energy of the change activates the lamp.”
“You’re talking about the nightmares and hallucinations?” Adam asked.
“Right,” she said. “It takes a lot of extremely powerful energy from the dark end of the spectrum to produce severe nightmares and visions for weeks on end.”
“Makes sense,” Vickie agreed. “But humans can’t project psychic energy much beyond a radius of fifteen or twenty feet.”
Sam grew very thoughtful. “That doesn’t mean the psi currents don’t keep going.”
Marlowe sat forward again in her chair. There was another squeak. Gibson chortled, struggling to keep his balance.
“Exactly,” Marlowe said. “Psychic energy waves obey the laws of physics just like radio waves or light waves or sound waves. They come from a different end of the spectrum, that’s all. We can’t hear sound or see light beyond a certain range, but various kinds of instruments and machines can pick up that kind of energy at great distances. They can also transmit it.”
Her father nodded. “Radios, cell phones, and rezscreens do it all the time.”
“When you think about it,” Marlowe said, “the Burning Lamp is just a machine that generates dreamlight. I think that it was originally tuned to detect a very unique frequency of psi, the precise frequency produced by the Winters male who inherited Nicholas’s type of talent. The powerful energy of the nightmares and hallucinations activate the device, even over long distances.”
Vickie looked intrigued. “Once activated, the machine responds by sending out a signal to any dreamlight reader who is strong enough to sense it unconsciously.”
“Meanwhile, the Winters male who is going through the change wisely starts looking for said dreamlight reader,” Adam said. “I’d identified half a dozen in the Arcane computer files, but none of them were strong enough. Marlowe, of course, was not listed.” He smiled politely. “Being a Jones and all.”
“But I had begun to sense the lamp’s pull,” Marlowe said. “There was no giant red psychic sign, just a general sense of restlessness. I was searching for something, but I didn’t know what. I assumed that what I was experiencing was nothing more than the normal reaction anyone would have after taking over a legendary firm with the kind of history that J&J has.”
“And the self-doubts that plagued you after you discovered that you had been deceived by Tucker Deene didn’t help,” Elizabeth added gently.
“No,” Marlowe said. “But here’s the really interesting part. I don’t think that I was the only one who sensed the lamp’s energy unconsciously. I think Charlotte Deene picked up some of the vibes, as well.”
They all looked a bit startled.
“Really?” Vickie asked.
“Yes,” Marlowe continued. “Like I said, the lamp is a machine. The signal it sends out is designed to attract a powerful dreamlight talent, any powerful talent. Charlotte wasn’t quite strong enough to locate the lamp or to work it, even if she had found it, but because she was looking for a way to save her brother, she focused on the artifact much sooner than I did.”
“That resulted in the theft of the fake,” Zeke said. “Which, in turn, caused you to focus on the lamp. Once that happened, you and Adam found each other almost immediately.”
Marlowe tapped the end of her pen on the desk. “I’m certain that Adam and I would have connected sooner or later, because his search for the lamp had created rumors among the antiquities dealers in the Quarter. Some of those rumors had reached this office, and I was intrigued by them. I was planning to investigate. But, yes, I think it’s safe to say that Charlotte’s search and the theft of the lamp speeded up the process.”
Diana looked at Adam. “In other words, you and Marlowe would have been drawn together one way or another, regardless of the triggering incident.”
Adam smiled at Marlowe, energy shimmering in the atmosphere around him. “No question about it.”
Mischief sparkled in Vickie’s eyes. “In other words, any powerful dreamlight reader could have done the job?”
“No,” Adam said. Absolute certainty rang in the single word. “Only Marlowe.”
Marlowe pursed her lips, “Well, as long as there was a strong bond between—”
He stopped her with a look. “Only you.”
She smiled. “Okay.”
Sam’s brows bunched together. “Something else I’ve been wondering about. How did those early notes of Nicholas Winters fall into Keith Deene’s hands?”
“I found a journal in Fortner’s office,” Adam said. “He had kept an eye on the triplets over the years because he was curious to see if any of them would inherit his Cerberus talent. He was well aware that Keith was a strong crystal talent. He arranged for his son to find the notes, guessing that Keith would be unable to resist the challenge of trying to forge the enhancing crystals.”
Ben looked at Marlowe. “But how did Fortner come across Nicholas’s notes in the first place?”
“He inherited them,” Marlowe said.
“How, for heaven’s sake?” Elizabeth asked.
“The usual way,” Marlowe said. “They came down t
hrough his family. When I discovered that Fortner was the Deenes’ father, I did a little more research and found out that Fortner is a descendant of Samuel Lodge.”
“That name rings a bell,” Zeke said. He snapped his fingers. “Now I remember. Lodge figured in a very old case that involved the lamp and a nineteenth-century crime lord, Griffin Winters.”
“Lodge had some of Nicholas’s notes,” Adam said. “They descended down through his family.”
“Amazing how difficult it is to keep secrets in the Society,” Zeke mused.
Diana looked at Marlowe. “Are you going to tell the Deenes the truth about their father?”
“I did that last night after we got out of the tunnels,” Marlowe said quietly. “I felt they had a right to know the truth. They were shocked but not totally surprised. Charlotte told me that she and her brothers had suspected for years that the ghost hunter named as their father in the Society’s files was probably not their real father.”
Zeke looked thoughtful. “Think they’ll show up here to talk about becoming J&J agents?”
“Yes,” Marlowe said. “I think they will.”
Vickie frowned. “Why would they do that?”
“Because I made it clear that as far as Arcane is concerned, they are full-fledged members of the Society,” Marlowe said. “The Deenes have never had a family. Arcane can provide them with a sense of connection.”
Elizabeth smiled. “You may be right.”
“At the very least, J&J will be able to keep an eye on them,” Zeke said.
Marlowe smiled. “That thought did occur to me.” She got to her feet and crossed the room to pick up the coffeepot. “Being the head of J&J, I don’t believe in coincidence, of course. But at times like this, I do sort of wonder about karma.” She poured coffee into a cup. “The old reap-what-you-sow thing.”
Vickie understood. “What goes around, comes around,” she said softly.
Diana frowned. “What are you two talking about?”