Chapter 41
Catch Up Fast
The smoke was from Canadian wildfires, pouring over the plains and tangling in the mountains but already beginning to disperse as early autumn rains spread the north and the winds shifted. Somehow a balance had tipped, summer moving imperceptibly over the crest and downhill, sliding towards fall.
Cheyenne spread in orderly blocks under a gigantic sky regaining more of its usual color every day.
It was weird to be in a city and not feel the pressure of so many minds and emotions battering at her.
Cass could even walk in the rigidly clipped ornamental gardens of the sprawling stone ‘temple’ with its three round towers—for all the world like a Disneyland architectural folly plonked down in a quiet suburb—and try to get a little peace.
Except wherever she went, a cortege of grim-faced dudes followed, like a cell’s structures around its nucleus.
She was used to living in a unit, but this was something else.
It was just like Nigel had told her: Fathers, Elders, and Youngers, always watching each other, heavily armed and eerily graceful.
The weird thing was how quiet and almost-shy they were around her, Jack, or Mary-Alice.
Jack Weston III was the platinum-haired kid; he looked younger than Apoc though he’d informed her cheerfully he was at least six times her age.
I was betrayed to the Flame when I was eighteen—unless we hit it before mid-puberty, we kind of stop where we are.
You were lucky, getting dunked so early. Gave you time to adjust, maybe.
Mary-Alice Saboutine, the other Dreamer, was a wan, soft-spoken brunette fond of painting and soap operas, who claimed to be around seventy or so, but who’s counting?
It was the closest she ever came to joking; her usual expression was pained concentration very much like Grik when he first signed up.
She’d been with the Sons on the other side of the bridge, taking on the whole mess of bogeys attempting to kill both Nigel and Cass before covering the retreat back to the city.
Not nearly so strong as you, but I’ve got practice, she remarked, with a thin tight ghost of a grin.
It was an expression Cass had seen on more than a few soldiers, and spoke volumes.
They were both thrilled to have another lirai at the ‘temple’, took every opportunity to tell her how lucky she was to have survived, and she had to admit being around people who had the same kind of freakshow talents… well, it wasn’t the worst thing in the world.
But it was deeply unsettling. She was used to being one of a kind.
They were pretty excited about getting Ed back, too.
Apparently Cass had done something remarkable, evicting the big kahuna from the Elder while also channeling through Nigel.
Not that she remembered exactly how, since the fight on the bridge was a collage of nasty flashbacks hitting at odd moments.
Lying in wait, sneaking up to pounce like memories of the worst operations always did—but the important thing was that they’d held out long enough for evac.
She kept telling them it was due to Nigel, but Jack in particular was more interested in how she’d done two things at once.
And you without an oneiros, too, he kept saying.
Jack and Alice had one of those apiece, a big opalescent stone supposedly brought back from the Dreaming Lands, set in meteorite iron and apparently pretty useful though they wouldn’t say how precisely one went about getting their hands on such a thing.
It was like talking about ‘sealing’—Mary-Alice said both she and Jack sealed their guards, all of them, but it was an individual decision.
Try to think of it like going to the dentist, she added with one of those soft, strained smiles, magnanimously ignoring Cass’s furious blushing.
Or the gyno. It’s just something that has to be done.
Which was even more awkward than the time Bern had taken it into his curly head to give her the birds-and-bees talk, as if she hadn’t had more than enough experience in that area by the time she met him.
The memory tipped her into a sobbing fit and she’d had to hide in the bathroom for a half-hour, trying to ignore the fact that Sons were waiting right outside.
Cass frequently had to stop and suck in a deep breath, trying to adjust to the lingo, the new protocols, the overwhelming weirdness.
Both Dreamers talked about spooky psychic shit like it was old hat—was this what Bern and others had felt when she tried to explain running scenarios, doing recons, or using a pendulum?
Neither Jack nor Mary-Alice needed bumps or nods to use their talents; both knew what the hell they were doing and left on alternate nights to ‘cleanse the city’.
Cass had to catch up, and fast.
They kept telling her to recover, and that she’d have plenty of time to learn. The important thing was to not burn out, which apparently she’d been pretty close to. That pale, transparent feeling had been her body lacking the energy to keep internal processes going.
Which was terrifying, if Cass stopped to think about it. So she tried like hell not to.
Ed was pale, and very quiet when he wasn’t mumbling apologies for being taken over by the big kahuna and tracking them down.
Each time he did, she had to attempt an I’m sorry of her own for him being left behind in the first place.
Then Ed would say that was his job, and the excruciatingly awkward silence would overwhelm them both until she found something else she needed to be doing at the moment.
The shakes hit her at odd moments, her entire body jittering with trauma leftovers—most often when she sat beside a cot in the infirmary, watching Nigel.
Who lay on his back, pale and barely breathing.
The infirmary was a sterile, deserted place built like a hospital ward except for the stone walls; normally, Sons were either up and moving around—or dead.
Very few of them spent any serious time in recovery, because of the healing factor from the mark.
All the other cots or beds were empty, bleached curtains drawn back, and though not often used it was well-stocked, crash carts and other medical paraphernalia throughout ready for all sorts of disasters.
Trille would have loved that part. Cass’s own feelings were unrepeatable, but waiting there was better than in the suite.
The liraim, all royal blue with gold accents, stuffed with antique furniture.
Which was fine, she supposed, even if it was big enough to echo.
True to Nigel’s word, there was a bathroom all her own with a clawfoot iron tub and a glassed-in shower as well.
Anything she needed was brought, including clothes and toiletries—but no weapons.
Even Jack gave her a funny look when she asked about carrying a gun for personal defense. That’s what the Sons are for, Cass.
They kept asking what she preferred, telling her remodeling could be done in a hurry, offering her food, attempting to get her to talk more, reassuring her she was safe.
But the one person she wanted to hear from was out cold, pulling a real Sleeping Beauty maneuver.
And she couldn’t help but think that when he woke up, he wouldn’t want anything to do with her dumb, sorry ass now that his job was done.
So when she had finished yet another session of debrief with Mary-Alice—going over the different hunting groups in Nevada, how they funded themselves, anything she could remember Steve saying about ‘the cult’ in law enforcement, which had to be the Mad God’s infiltration—and was shepherded back to the infirmary, she had on some level expected to find Nigel’s bed empty and remade, standing silently ready for the next patient.
The way her heart dropped was still a surprise.