“The afterimage of those thrills never left you,” I said. “Hiroshima and Nagasaki got burned into your soul. You’re forever trying to re-create them.”
“So I am. So what?” Syn mocked me. “If you don’t approve, then release Anna and let her die. Oh, wait, I see you hesitate. Are you afraid your pleasure might stop?”
It was harder this time to let go. Syn’s grief was greater than before, and as a result, so was the pleasure the inhabitants of the red realm were bestowing on me. It seemed perverse to drink nectar because the person beside me was sweating blood. Yet so it was. Anna was dying in her grandmother’s hands, and Syn’s daughter, Era, and her grandson, Theo, were coughing in the next room. The Syn of my vision knew it was only a matter of time before she lost all her offspring. Yet her pain only magnified my delight. It was as if every cell in my body were having an orgasm.
Somehow, though, I managed to let go. The sight of Syn’s agony gave me the strength. I was too disgusted with myself to hold on.
I expected red-robed Syn to react with anger.
She only laughed. It was like she knew she had me.
Syn took me forward in time to the Syn of the eighteenth century, to the days when she ran every morning to the letter box to see if there was a message from Herme from the New World. But Herme never wrote, and every day she read in the papers how the war between England and the colonies was causing more casualties. She knew in her heart her son must be one of them.
Red-robed Syn forced me to fix on a vision of her younger self as she knelt, weeping, beside the empty letter box. Once more, with the pain came the pleasure, because I instinctively redirected her suffering toward those who inhabited the red realm. It was as if I offered it to them, like a sacrifice.
In my vision I saw a tall man with a long white beard appear beside the weeping Syn. He looked like a wizard and I didn’t have to be told that I was gazing at the infamous Alchemist. So he was alive during those days, even though Kendor swore he had killed him more than two thousand years earlier.
This time Syn pulled my hands away.
The pleasure ceased. The vision faded.
“You’re not ready to know what he taught me,” Syn said.
It was the first time since I had entered the red realm that I had seen her rattled. “Afraid I might become more powerful than you?” I teased her.
She slapped my face, and it stung, and I didn’t even have a physical body. “Don’t forget who’s the master here!” she cried.
I fought to act unmoved. “Strange, I don’t remember ever agreeing to be your student.”
Syn appeared to welcome my bravura. Again she came near and seemed to speak in either my ear or my mind. “I asked if you believed in God. Even though it’s a work of fiction, the Bible contains traces of secret wisdom. Do you remember when Jesus told his disciples, ‘In my Father’s house are many mansions’?”
“Sure,” I said.
“Well, this is my mansion! And this is your room!” Syn exclaimed as she raised her arms and in a flash we were in the hospital, in the morgue, when Dr. Dave was alone with me, feeling me up. I watched as I finally tapped into my power, the fire in my solar plexus, and my body suddenly warmed and I was able to sit upright.
“You goddamn pervert! Touch me again and I’ll cut off your dick!”
Of course the shock was what initiated the man’s heart attack, even though he probably would have had one soon enough. Syn, however, didn’t care about that. From her side she was trying to prove to me that I was already a murderer. I was getting used to her methods. That’s why she was taking me to my first victim, almost as if to shout, See what you did to my friend! I watched as the coroner sagged to the floor and gasped for breath.
“Put your hand on his heart,” Syn ordered.
“No.”
“I promise you will be pleased.”
“No,” I said.
“Very pleased, Jessica. Or should I call you Jessie? Are you not a killer in both worlds?”
“I’m not a killer at all! I’m not like you!”
She grabbed my arm. “You wouldn’t be here if you were not ready to follow me. Notice how none of the others were able to cross over to the red sphere. Only you came.” She released my arm but shoved me in the back toward Dr. Dave.
“Wait,” I said, sensing she wasn’t telling me the whole truth. That was one positive quality of the red realm. Thoughts appeared as physical objects, they had substance, which made it difficult for her to hide her agenda from me.
“Why?” Syn demanded.
“In witch world, in the house, I’m holding Lara.”
Syn paused. “So you noticed.”
I nodded. “There’s a connection. She’s another reason I’m here with you. But . . . she’s not like you.”
“She’s not like anyone! She’s an infant! You’ve said these words yourself. To me, and to you, she’s pure potentiality. She’s like atomic energy. Is it good? Is it bad? It can be used to heat a million homes. Or it can flatten the same homes. Lara sits in the same position. She’s raw power, and yes, that power has helped bring you to this realm ahead of your time. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that we can mold her to our own design.”
“You brought me here to get to her.”
“I brought you here to get to both of you.” She poked my arm sharply. “Now touch him, drink of his pain, reap what you have sown. I promise, you won’t be disappointed.”
I don’t know why I did it. Curiosity, perhaps.
Lies. How easy it is to lie inside one’s own mind.
I was like an addict mentally rationalizing his next fix.
I did it for the pleasure I knew he would give me.
I put my hand on Dr. Dave’s dying heart. Even when the real Syn, dressed in blue scrubs, reentered the morgue and spoke to the man, I kept my hand in place. And I knew Dr. Susan Wheeler had seen me even then, as I saw her now, in a vision.
The pleasure was pure and irresistible.
If there was no God, then this wasn’t a bad substitute.
I was only able to let go when Syn offered me a greater taste. A snap of her fingers brought us forward in time into another room. To where Russell burned to death in the fire I had thrust into his chest. Oh, Lord, such pain, such pleasure—his screams actually made me giggle. I knew my reaction was sick, and I didn’t care.
Then, finally, the culmination arrived, when Syn led me out into the desert to my most recent victim. I had kidnapped Kari to protect Jimmy and Huck. I hadn’t intended to kill her. It was a fact I’d had no idea about her secret abilities.
Yet that was nothing but another set of lies. The two of us, we had a history. From the time she had stolen Jimmy away from me, I had been itching to kill the bitch.
Touching Kari’s head, as I choked the breath from her body, grinding the back of her head in the gravel I would use to bury her, I was suddenly filled with a euphoria the gods would have envied. And this time I didn’t have to pause and direct her pain to the red realm. I did it automatically, and with, of course, pleasure.
I had to drop to my knees to stay in contact with Kari, just as I had done earlier in the day when I had crushed her trachea. And when I looked up, drunk with the sparks flying between the synapses of my spirit brain, I saw that Syn was not only wearing a red robe but a gold crown. From my place on the ground—out of gratitude to the thrill she had given me—I bowed to her. For the first time I actually felt grateful to her.
“You’re the red queen,” I said, finally understanding the hidden meaning in the game of twenty-two. It was no wonder the Alchemist had created it, and that he collected the profits from it. He was the one who had shown the world the opening to the red world, which stood above witch world, not to mention the real world. It was odd but it no longer bothered me that my own world should seem like a place of shadows. I felt I owed Syn an apology.
“Save it,” she said as she read my mind once more. “Pay me back with blood. Pay them back with
pain.”
“Them?” I said.
She put her hands on my shoulders and leaned over and kissed my forehead. “You’re one of us now, Jessica,” she said.
I let go of Kari and stood. The loss of the pleasure she gave me caused me no grief. Because I knew what was to come next would be even better. Yes, I told myself, it would just keep getting better.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
I WAS WRONG. A MOMENT later we exited the red sphere and nothing had changed. “Nothing” meant the players in the drama were still the same. They were even in the same place as when I had left the room. The reason was because I had never really gone anywhere. No time had even gone by, as far as I could tell.
Yet something inside of me had changed.
I was hungry now. Hungry for the pleasure.
It was not as if I had lost my mind. I still knew that Syn was evil, just as any intelligent heroin addict knows that his drug of choice is evil. But that doesn’t lessen his desire for the needle. In fact, it probably increases it. And Syn was offering me the most forbidden fruit of all. A straightforward exchange. Give me pain and I’ll give you pleasure. That was her message. That was her power.
I trembled as I held Lara in my hands. I felt unworthy of holding her, at least until I had proven I was worthy of being her mother. Because I suddenly realized that might not be the case.
For that reason I handed her to James.
But that was not the only reason I gave her up.
I needed both my hands free.
From nearby, Syn looked at me and nodded.
We had exited the red sphere but I could still read her mind. She didn’t have to speak the words. For the moment, the fusion had halted, and Herme and Kendor had reopened their eyes. They had failed to strike Syn down but their effort had not been in vain because even though Syn’s bafflement had protected her, it had failed to destroy her enemies.
A stalemate had been reached. Something was needed to tilt the scale. Syn believed she possessed that something because she was confident she now had me on her side. On the surface that was absurd. Intellectually, I still knew what she was capable of doing to the world. But emotionally, physically even, she was right—I was with her. My body ached for the pleasure. I didn’t just want it, I needed it. Worse, I knew if I disobeyed, she would give me the opposite.
Absolute agony.
That was how she kept her dog on her leash.
Kendor raised his sword, seeing an opening. He was the oldest in the room. He had seen civilizations rise and fall. He had loved Syn for two thousand years and knew her better than she knew herself. And he hadn’t survived the rising onslaught of the Lapras without being bold.
To Kendor a stalemate was equal to an opportunity.
He took a step toward Syn.
Syn twisted her head and stared at me.
I understood what she wanted me to do. It was mostly a function of our positioning, and of who trusted whom. James was to my right, Herme was on my left. Both knew me and trusted me. Because neither understood what I had experienced inside the red realm.
While contributing to the fusion, Herme had thrust the pistol in his belt before closing his eyes. His eyes were open now but that didn’t change the fact the gun was only inches from my left hand. If I reached for it, would he stop me? I didn’t think so. After all, I was supposed to be one of the good guys.
I didn’t want to but I did it anyway.
I grabbed the gun and Herme let me take it. Probably he thought I would use it to protect Kendor. Perhaps he realized he was the wrong person to shoot his mother. Whatever the reason, I quickly transferred the weapon from my left hand to my right and lifted the gun.
Kendor paid me no heed. Raising his bloody sword, he took another step toward Syn. His face was a mask of concentration. If he was reluctant to slay the love of his extraordinary life, he didn’t show it. Yet he didn’t hurry, he didn’t have to. I had seen him in action. I had no doubt he would take her head.
Then it would all be over. We would all be safe.
But the pleasure would be over as well.
“Do it,” Syn hissed at me, finally showing her fear. She did not say it but I heard “or else” in her voice. God, how I hated her then, even though I had just bowed to her. But I think it was that last act that made me feel so helpless in her hands. My heart told me she was a monster, my head said to shoot her, but a part of me I had no name for ordered me to obey her.
I pointed the gun at Kendor’s chest.
“Stop!” I cried.
Kendor stopped in midstride. His gaze swept back and forth between Syn and me, then he nodded sympathetically, as if to tell me he understood my problem. He was the only one. James and Herme both shouted out.
“Jessie!” James yelled. “What are you doing?”
“She’s put a spell on you,” Herme warned.
“It’s all right,” Kendor said quietly, lowering his sword and looking at me with such compassion I felt ashamed. “We can talk about this. We’re friends, aren’t we, Jessica? And we’re here for Lara. Focus on your daughter. She’s the one who can help you now.”
I shook my head, too confused to even look at Lara. “You don’t understand,” I mumbled. “I don’t want to do this. But I have to. I have to stop you.”
“I’ve stopped,” Kendor replied, letting the tip of his sword touch the wooden floor. “But you must realize what Herme says is true. You’re a young witch who’s been bewitched. That’s what Syn does. I know, she did it to me. That’s why I took so long to tell the Council who she was. I made a mistake, and now you’re making the same mistake.”
I struggled to speak. “I have to shoot you.”
Kendor shook his head. “That’s Syn talking, not you.”
I swallowed. “But the pleasure, I can’t feel it anymore.”
“Because it’s not real,” Kendor said. “Nothing she has shown you is real. Only your daughter matters. Look at your daughter, Jessica, look at Lara.”
I heard Lara make a cooing sound beside me. I began to turn toward her. Then I heard a sharp hissing noise—Syn ordering me once more. I froze.
“Kill him,” Syn whispered.
“Yes,” I heard my body reply. It was not me that spoke, it was not my soul, it was just a lump of flesh that was aching to feel what it had felt inside the red realm. How a base physical longing could override everything I believed in made no sense. Nor did it have to. What had Syn told me? It was not a question of why I should shoot Kendor, the issue was why not?
“I’m sorry,” I said softly as I cocked the hammer. The man in the pawnshop had demonstrated how sensitive the trigger was once the hammer had been pulled. It took less than a pound of pressure to fire the semiautomatic, a few ounces, and already I was stroking the trigger with my sweaty finger. Kendor sighed as he looked at my face.
“You’re not like her,” he said calmly, and in that same instant he launched himself toward Syn, his sword coming up like a cobra ready to bite. He was fast, ten times faster than me, but he had to travel fifteen feet, whereas my finger only had to move a fraction of an inch.
“Jessie, no!” James cried, reaching for the gun.
I pulled the trigger. The shot sounded like thunder in my ears. But heaven only knew where the bullet was headed. For at the last second James had hit my hand and skewed my aim.
Kendor seemed to skip a step and then stumble. The round had struck him inside the right shoulder, a nasty place because the nerves that controlled his arm and hand were centered there. He didn’t drop his sword but his grip on it weakened and it bobbled in his hand.
That was all the opening Syn required. Stepping toward him, she kicked the blade from Kendor’s hand. As it flew through the air, she pulled a knife from her own back belt. The blade was long and serrated, and it was obvious she knew how to use it. Sure, her husband had taught her. She had it to his neck in the blink of an eye.
It was Kendor’s turn to freeze. Not out of fear, though. I don’t thin
k the man knew fear. He smiled at his old love.
“You told me the day we met you’d kill me,” he said.
“I was joking.”
“Perhaps.”
She nodded. “I’m sorry.”
He shook his head. “It is I who am sorry. Herme explained what has happened to you. I know you can’t help yourself.”
“Herme,” she repeated, although she didn’t look in the direction of her son. Not even when he spoke up.
“No, Mother,” Herme called.
Syn pressed the blade closer. A line of red appeared on Kendor’s throat. He didn’t back up, he refused to even move his head.
“We cannot both live,” she told him. “Not in this world or the other. You know that.”
He nodded faintly. “It’s all right, Syn.”
Strange, how she smiled right then, I actually glimpsed joy in her face. “You always used to say that,” she said.
“I meant it.”
“Kendor,” she said softly, and suddenly lowered the knife, and for a moment it seemed she would let him go. But then she yanked the blade upward, into his heart, a single quick thrust, before pulling it free. Without crying out, without any sound, Kendor fell to the floor.
Syn turned on us, Kendor’s blood dripping from her knife. Her purpose was obvious. All her enemies would die tonight. But whether she considered Lara and me to be among them wasn’t clear.
Herme took the gun from my hand and pointed it at Syn. “You’ve done enough,” he said.
She was unmoved. “You should have stayed in the shadows, Herme.”
“I can’t let you hurt these people,” he said.
Syn flicked her empty hand and the gun flew from her son’s grasp. “You possess no weapon that can harm me. Kendor knew that, and so does your accursed Council.”
Herme stepped in front of James and me.
“You’ll have to kill me first,” he said.
“You think I can’t, dear son?”
“No.”
“Then you misunderstand me. I will kill you. It won’t be so hard. Because years ago you forced me to kill you and bury you in my mind.”