“So?” He demanded, then something clicked. “Wait a minute—you mean that pain was the earthquake?”
She shook her head. “You must have sensed the aftershock from just a few minutes ago.”
“Oh, come on! That doesn’t make sense. You said you were singing about the morning. It’s mid-afternoon.”
“It is not part of the song.”
“Then why did I feel it?”
Again, they looked to Deryl, who shook his head, bewildered.
She looked from him to Joshua, her eyes wild and frightened. “This was a bad idea.” She stood up and ran down the field.
“Taz!” Joshua called, not sure what he planned to say next. It didn’t matter: A unicorn galloped up to her and in an easy motion, she swung onto his back and rode off.
Joshua rounded on Deryl. “Very smooth,” he snarled. “How is she supposed to trust us now?”
But Deryl just stared after her.
Chapter 14
Deryl whirled in circles through a star-strewn sky. Although he knew he was moving thousands of miles an hour, he did not feel the speed. It was a natural movement, a dance that brought coolness and warmth, darkness and light, night and day to those that made their home on him. It was good.
A grand menagerie of creatures called his body home. Sometimes, he felt the effects of their actions, mere tickles upon his skin. One, however, knew his needs and kept balance between them and the needs of those upon him. He knew her as Miscria. And it was also good.
But there were others, from the Intruder, the one who would pull him out of his perfect dance. They had killed their world—or had it already been dead? He did not know. He did know that they now sought him, like a virus seeks a new host. It was not good.
His Miscria and her kind fought to stop them. He felt their struggles, experienced the changes, mostly through his Miscria. His Miscria changed, too, though he did not understand why. It mattered not. As long as they kept the contagion at bay, he could concentrate on the dance, and on the ones that danced with him. Together they moved about the source of light. The interplay of distance and attraction between them flowed over him like a lover’s caress. It was very good.
—Deryl danced with Tasmae, his hand on the small of her back, moving in slow circles. The attraction between them tingled through every nerve of his body. There was distance between them, too. The barriers that protected him from the minds of others, even from the memories of the lunatic ravings that had often invaded his mind while at the asylum, also kept Tasmae at bay. It was comfortable and safe, yet the attraction between them was strong and, at the moment, it was more exciting than frightening.
He pulled her closer. To his body. To his mind. Like a ghostly spirit, she flowed through his barriers.
In his sleep he hummed with pleasure.
Then the voices came.
Ten or twelve, he couldn’t tell for certain. More than voices. Memories. Fantasies. Each lost in its own pain and delusion, unaware of him. Oh, but he was aware of them! They pulled at him, tearing him away from Tasmae, dragging him from sanity. He felt Tasmae pull back, lurch closer, then get swept away by the confusion.
—The Intruder comes too near. It pulls at Kanaan and the moons. The moons jerk away, lurch closer, wobble in their paths. Balance is lost. Where once there was comfort and caresses, now comes pain. He feels himself tearing from the inside. Miscria!
—Tasmae! He searched for Tasmae as the fears, desires, and needs of a legion pressed upon him. Then one thought sliced through them all, like a powerful spotlight in the murky dark. It caught Deryl, pinning him in its painful light.
DERYL. YOU DID NOT FOLLOW THROUGH.
The Master! He froze, transfixed with fear. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Tasmae caught in a similar beam. He wanted to scream for her to run, but his throat constricted, and all he could manage was a breathy whine.
WHY DO YOU FEAR ME, DERYL? I AM YOUR TEACHER. YOU ONCE TRUSTED ME.
Deryl couldn’t move. Where could he run? Outside the light, the insanities of others waited to devour him and Tasmae.
—Kanaan is pulled out of its path, struggles to regain balance. Deep beneath the ocean, its skin rips.
WHY ARE YOU IN SUCH FEAR, DERYL? DID I NOT TEACH YOU HOW TO DEAL WITH THESE CREATURES? WHY DO YOU HIDE BEHIND BARRIERS WHEN THE PERMANENT SOLUTION IS SO SIMPLE?
The insanities hissed at his mind, formed a new barrier between Tasmae and him. A sword lay at his feet, but he didn’t need it. He could cut a path to her with the power of his mind. With his thoughts, he could remove their threat permanently. Never again have anything, anyone, come between him and Tasmae, between him and anything he wanted.
A high breathy laugh escaped his lips. If only.
IT CAN BE, the Master hissed. LISTEN TO MY TEACHINGS. FOLLOW THROUGH. WIPE THEM OUT. HIDE NO LONGER. THEY ARE INSIGNIFICANT, AND THEY ARE BETWEEN YOU AND WHAT YOU WANT.
He focused. He knew them, knew each one’s weakness. The Master was right.
No!
—Kanaan resists the Intruder’s pull.
THEY ARE NOTHING, DERYL. THEY ARE THE MONSTERS. REMEMBER THE MONSTERS, DERYL?
Fighting in the Netherworld, hideous creatures coming at him, tearing at him. They hurt him again and again. He had to fight. He reached out with his mind.
The voices surged toward him.
No! I won’t do it!
—The Intruder tears at Kanaan. Brilliant flashes dot its surface. The contagion comes.
STOP THEM, DERYL. STOP THEM ALL. FOLLOW THROUGH.
Follow through.
Follow through.
—He was thirteen. He stood in the hallway outside the counselor’s office, betrayed, humiliated. Perry’s friends laughed at him while the high school senior spoke in reasonable tones.
“You didn’t think I’d let you get away with telling the counselor all those things, did you, Deryl? I had to defend myself.”
All Deryl wanted was for the teasing and the hurtful practical jokes to stop. How could Perry tell all those lies? How could the counselor believe him?
How? Why not? Perry was the charismatic senior, the good student, the leader. Deryl was the one with “psychosocial problems.”
The boys snickered. They’d keep at him. It’d be even worse now. His last chance for help had failed. The Master’s voice rang in his head, disparaging.
YOU NEED NO HELP. DEFEND YOURSELF. THEY ARE THE MONSTERS. THEY ARE DEMONS. THEY ARE NOTHING.
He glared at Perry through tears of anger. It would be easy…
DO IT. KILL.
Perry’s face, wide with shock, gasping, clutching at his chest, falling.
—A brilliant flash. Barin explodes into a million parts, falls.
—The voices and insanities between him and Tasmae are suddenly blown away by the force of his thoughts.
YES. FOLLOW THROUGH.
—A thousand meteors bombard Kanaan as the remains of Barin strike it.
—“Perry! Omigod! Is he dead?”
—Tasmae blown away with the demons.
no
NO!
NOOOO!
“No!”
Deryl bolted upright in his bed, his scream still tearing from his throat. The suddenness of his awakening had chased the dream away; it lay hidden from his conscious mind, though he still felt its effects. His heart hammered in his chest, and he trembled with fright and excess adrenalin. He flopped back against the pillow, fighting to control his breathing while frantically trying to remember what had terrified him so. It was important! He sat up, rested his head against his knees and willed himself to concentrate, despite the dread that coursed through him and made even his skin tremble. Something about Tasmae—and planets—and the voices—more than voices…
People out of control of their own minds. He could feel them, the pr
essure of a dozen personalities, some real and pleasing; others, imagined and desperate for dominance. Of them. Of him. They’d closed in, and he hadn’t been able to fight—
When he came back to himself, he was backed into the corner of his room. He remembered cowering this same way in the padded room of the high-intensity treatment ward at SK-Mental. With a cry of anguish, he stood and paced the room. Although it was large and sparsely furnished, he felt crowded and trapped. He ran to the window, shoved it open, and scrambled through it into the night.
He crossed the compound and had gotten halfway to the gate before he caught hold of his panic and slowed to a stop. The dry, churned-up soil of the practice yard felt rough under his bare feet. He had on only loose sleeping pants, and the air cooled his panic-fevered skin. He inhaled deeply, the strange scents of alien night flowers tickling his nose. A musky odor permeated the scent, as if the ground still held the sweat of the warriors who had spent so many hours in practice there. The stars were again brilliant, yet Barin outshone them all. He heard the warbling call of some creature he did not recognize. Psychically, everything was quiet. The very differentness of it all comforted him.
I’m not trapped, he reassured himself. I’m free. I can go anywhere I please. Do whatever I want. No one thinks I’m crazy, and no one has to know I was.
Funny how the thought came so easily. It was immediately followed by the thought of how someone would react to seeing him walking around in his pajamas. Maybe they’d think he was nuts after all.
I ought to change clothes. He made no effort to move. He couldn’t return to that room. Not yet. Besides, they’re not much different from sweats, and it’s not like anyone’s around to see me. Salgoud has all the warriors sleeping in the cliffs for practice. The night was warm enough, and he was wide awake. He turned in a slow circle, trying to decide where to go.
He was equally distant from the perimeter wall as from the main building, but he hesitated to wander outside the gates. He didn’t want to interfere with any nighttime exercises Salgoud might have planned, nor did he want to check. Even a psychic “peek” At the cliff area might alert Salgoud to him, and the general might invite him to join them.
Nonetheless, staying in the compound with the walls in front of him and the building behind didn’t appeal, either. Despite the differences, the closed-in courtyard reminded him of the one just outside his room at SK-Mental. Even now, he couldn’t shake off the feeling of being imprisoned against the world.
For a moment, he saw the familiar courtyard of SK-Mental, with its manicured lawns, resort-style umbrella’d tables and lawn chairs, and rows of trees and tall hedges that didn’t quite hide the wall beyond. He remembered the building itself, two-story and brick, with five single-story wings radiating from the main building like splayed fingers. He’d met Joshua in one of those wings, at that depressing birthday party his aunt had thrown for him: a banner with his name misspelled (Aunt Kate, at his grandfather’s urging, insisted it be spelled the conventional way), the disgusting chocolate cake that he’d choked down because “normal” people like chocolate, poor Isaac with him because he couldn’t stand leaving the old man alone to his terrifying memories and had caught him up in another fantasy of rescue and safety, his aunt and uncle watching him nervously as he played the part of freedom fighter and Isaac’s protector and thinking that he was just as crazy as Dr. Malachai had been telling them.
No wonder I was so hostile to Joshua Lawson, Star Intern. He’d circled him then, insulted him, sneered that Dr. Sellars had hired him to be Deryl’s Summer Buddy as a birthday present, and tried to intimidate him. With one remark, Joshua had put him in his place. Then he’d helped him deal with his psychic problems, coached him on ways to show the others that he wasn’t crazy, even told him that normal people could hate chocolate and put syrup in every hole of their waffle without being considered odd or obsessive.
He’s turned out to be a genuine friend. And what kind of friend have I been? I read his mind, snatched him away to a world where they don’t build their homes so much as weave them out of living trees, and expect him to cure an alien!
And he tried! Tried to talk to her, build a rapport—but I had to get too deep into her mind and ruin everything.
He wandered over to where the building branched out to a lookout tower. “Branch” Being literal in this case: a long, thick branch did stick out almost to the fence. Despite the low walls from which crouching archers could fire their arrows, it would feel more open than the large but high-walled courtyard. But how to get up? He couldn’t bring himself to go inside the building even to get to the lookout.
Could I levitate, maybe? He concentrated, thinking of his feet pushing away from the ground.
His feet slipped from under him and he fell hard on his behind. He rubbed it, hissing. It was still sore from the earlier insults of the day.
A vine dropped down in front of him.
Thanks, he teleped to the branch as he climbed up. He clambered over the wall, then stretched himself out on the floor, looking at the incredible majesty of the night sky. Wonder if Joshua has seen the stars? I should bring him, but not tonight, he told himself. Even if the thought of going inside didn’t give him the creeps, he had no desire to talk to his friend after the “counseling” He’d given him just before they’d gone to bed.
“If I were you, I’d be doing some serious apologizing to Tasmae for this afternoon,” he’d told him. “You knew how the thought of teleping scared her—knew it better than me—but you got into her mind big time.”
I didn’t consciously do it, he thought. I was just caught up in the music, in the dance…
Bits of his dream returned: dancing with Tasmae, wanting her, longing to pull her closer.
Joshua was right. I am in love.
The Intruder nears, bringing its contagion. His mind nears Tasmae’s, infecting her psyche…
“We have to get home,” he whispered to the starlight.
But then what? Where could he go? The moment he’d disappeared with Joshua, Malachai must have reported him as criminally insane. If he returned, would they arrest him or commit him? Would he end up back at SK-Mental or a prison institution? He shuddered at the kinds of personalities he’d be exposed to there.
So, don’t get caught. Find someplace safe, away from SK-Mental, to drop off Joshua, then run. Teleport away.
He couldn’t see it happening. He needed to be able to imagine the place in his mind to get there, or so he thought. He didn’t want to try otherwise—no telling where they’d end up. Maybe (if Joshua would let him get into his head again), he could try for Colorado. He grinned, imagining the intern trying to explain his presence halfway across the country, especially if they managed to time-travel and got back the day they’d left. They’d have to come up with a good cover story.
And find out what airports were nearby, Deryl thought to himself. Before he’d left, he’d gotten control of the remainder of his inheritance, thanks to a fellow client who at one time had been an embezzler for the Mafia. He had money enough to set himself up just about anywhere. Everything he needed was in the stuffing of his bear. Maybe he could go to South America. If Terry could pick up both English and Spanish from Joshua, he should be able to pick up Spanish—or maybe Portuguese. Spend his money on a little hacienda on the beach and lots of paints, just an American recluse. So maybe, if I can get Descartes…
Could he do it? Could he have a normal life? Joshua had helped him learn how to shield himself against the thoughts and emotions of others, and he could do it pretty well, provided he had time alone to “recharge” His psychic reserves. But what if he couldn’t? What if he got stuck near someone who projected too strongly? He still felt the horror of the weekend when Dr. Malachai had forced him to stay in a room next to a bipolar patient. He’d driven himself catatonic rather than let loose the violence the man projected upon him. There would be no Joshua to bail him out if
something like that happened again.
What if he got sick? He’d managed to keep most of the pain of the hospital patients around him at bay, but toward the end, especially when he was feverish from a post-op infection, he was pretty sure he’d said some things in his delirium. Fortunately, the orderly assigned to guard him was wrapped up in her novel. But there had been a man, just before they’d sedated him…He’d felt him dying…And he hadn’t said anything. He hadn’t wanted to ruin his one chance at a normal life. No one there would have believed him, and Joshua hadn’t been around to tell. The man had died. He knew it. He’d felt it.
He sat up and pulled his knees to his chest and rested his head against them, his arms wrapped around his legs in a tight ball of misery.
The authorities would go after him. Malachai had convinced nearly everyone that he was incurable and dangerous. His aunt and uncle feared him more than ever. He’d kidnapped his best friend in front of his fiancée, his only other friend.
Could he go back?
He lost track of time. His thoughts became disjointed and tangled, until he stopped thinking. Then he felt a presence behind him that forced him back into thought, and he had just enough time to get himself together before Tasmae sat down next to him. Even so, he didn’t feel ready to face her, though she had seated herself so that she faced his profile. Instead, he made sure his shields were up and tight and said, as casually as he could, “Lovely night.”
She reached out, cupped his cheek in one hand, and turned his face toward her. He clenched his jaw as she studied the tracks of the tears he hadn’t quite scrubbed off. She traced one with her thumb. He trembled slightly, torn between the desire to kiss her and the desire to lay his head on her shoulder and cry.
“I’m, I’m fine,” he managed to lie. He knew she didn’t believe him, so he tried something a little closer to the truth. “But I am so sorry.”
She dropped her hand and turned away from him, ducking her head. Her hair was in a loose bun, so that a great curve of it obscured her face. “I am the one who is sorry,” She whispered.
Mind Over Psyche Page 13
