St Helens 01 Amaryllis

by Jayne Castle

  "Yes," Amaryllis said.

  "Congratulations."

  "Thank you." Amaryllis waited.

  Other than the soft hum of the mantle clock, there was no sound in the vast, elaborately draped and carpeted living room. The atmosphere was heavy and oppressive. Amaryllis had to resist a strong urge to open a window. It felt as if there had been no fresh air in this house for years.

  "I requested this meeting so that I could give you something," Elizabeth said after a moment.

  Amaryllis barely managed to conceal her surprise. "That's not necessary. I don't want anything from you."

  "Yes, I know." Elizabeth's smile was bitter. "Your mother's family has given you everything you've needed."

  "Yes, they did." Amaryllis put down her untouched cup of coff-tea. She glanced at Lucas. "I've been very lucky."

  "I have not been lucky at all," Elizabeth said. "But it is only now that I see the woman you have become that I realize the true extent of my misfortune."

  Amaryllis stilled. "I don't understand."

  "No, I don't suppose you do. Well, that is not important any longer. I am responsible for most of my own ill luck, and I have no one to blame but myself."

  Amaryllis thought of what Sophy had said about Elizabeth assuming the guilt for what had happened in the past. She smiled in spite of herself. "My great-aunt once said that you had a talent for drama. She thinks it's a shame that you didn't go into the theater."

  Elizabeth looked briefly disconcerted. "Am I being melodramatic?"

  "A little, but that's all right." Amaryllis felt herself begin to relax for some inexplicable reason. "It's a somewhat melodramatic occasion, isn't it?"

  "It certainly strikes me that way." Elizabeth picked up a small box that had been sitting on the table beside her chair. "Well, I mustn't keep you. This is for you."

  Warily, Amaryllis took the box from Elizabeth's hand. She opened it slowly and looked inside. A heavy, masculine ring set with a large, brilliant fire crystal rested on a small, white satin pillow. Amaryllis knew little about jewelry, but everyone knew the value of fire crystal. She hurriedly closed the lid.

  "I can't possibly accept this." She held the box out to Elizabeth. "It's much too valuable."

  Pain flared in Elizabeth's eyes. "It belonged to my son Matthew. Your father. I want you to have it."

  "My father." Amaryllis clutched at the small box. "This was his ring?"

  "Yes. He would have been very proud of you, Amaryllis. Any parent would have been proud of such a fine daughter."

  Amaryllis stared at the ring box. "I don't know what to say."

  "Many years ago you asked me a question."

  Amaryllis raised her gaze from the ring box to Elizabeth's face. The anger and the pain still stood there between them, an impossible wall that could never be climbed.

  But there are other ways to get past a wall, Amaryllis realized. If one felt strong enough, one could walk around the far end of it and find oneself on the other side. It didn't mean that the wall suddenly ceased to exist. It simply meant that there were methods of dealing with walls.

  "Are you really my grandmother?" Amaryllis asked.

  The gleam of hope in Elizabeth's eyes warmed the cold room.

  "Yes," she said. "I am."

  Chapter 19

  "I've been dreading that visit to Elizabeth Bailey." Amaryllis watched the scenery flash past the Icer's window. "But in the end, after all was said and done, I realized that, although I'm never going to actually learn to like the woman, mostly I just felt sorry for her."

  Lucas flexed his hands on the steering bar. "She screwed up a lot of lives."

  "She believed that she was doing the right thing. But she was rigid, inflexible, and proud."

  Lucas said nothing.

  Amaryllis grimaced. "I know, I know. I have a lot in common with her. What can I say? She's my grandmother."

  "She's your grandmother, all right, but you don't have very much in common with her. Elizabeth Bailey is one cold eel-fish. Five seconds after meeting her this afternoon, I could have told you that she's spent a lifetime coercing others into doing what she thought they should do."

  "I'm sure she had her motives."

  "Yeah, right. Motives like trying to control everyone and everything around her."

  "Is that a fact?" Amaryllis smiled blandly. "What about me? What would you say motivates my actions?"

  Lucas did not hesitate. "Loyalty. A sense of justice. Family."

  "Elizabeth Bailey could claim that her actions were based on those same three principles."

  "I have a hunch that for Elizabeth, her principles stand alone in a vacuum. There is no place in her rigid little world for friendship, compassion, and love. Your values, on the other hand, are sunk deep in that kind of bedrock."

  "Hmm. Well, in that case, I guess you and I have a few things in common, after all, don't we?"

  Lucas shot her a derisive glance. "Oh, no, you don't. I'm no modern-day version of one of your idealized founders. Don't you dare try to pin a halo and some wings on me."

  "Nobody ever said the founders were angels. But I do think that you work much too hard at concealing your own virtues."

  "Amaryllis, I'm warning you."

  "Just look at all the fine, altruistic things you've done since we met." Amaryllis held up one hand and ticked her points off on her fingers. "You let that thieving vice president, Miranda Locking, get away with her crimes because you felt sorry for her. You helped Dillon Rye out of the mess he got himself into because he was your disloyal ex-partner's kid brother. You helped me track down a murderer because you wanted to protect me."

  "Funny how hard it is to distinguish between my virtues and my weaknesses," Lucas muttered.

  "Oh, I don't know. Most of the time the distinction is as clear as prism crystal to me."

  "Yeah?" Lucas glanced at her. "What about those occasions when it's not quite that clear?"

  "I'm learning not to worry too much about the vague stuff." Amaryllis grew thoughtful. "But there are a couple of things I'd like to see cleared up."

  "About me?"

  "No. About Professor Landreth's death."

  "Damn. You never give up, do you? Now what?"

  "I'd still like to know how Madison Sheffield discovered that he was the subject of Professor Landreth's hot file."

  Lucas exhaled deeply. "Just so you'll know in the future, tenacity is one of those vague virtues you mentioned a minute ago. It's not always a good thing."

  An hour and a half later, Lucas drove into the night-darkened city. It was raining. The light from the streetlamps glimmered on the wet pavement and reflected in the shop windows.

  Amaryllis roused herself from thoughts of the meeting with Elizabeth Bailey just as Lucas turned a corner and drove slowly down the quiet street to her house. The answer to the problem that she had been mulling over during the long drive suddenly crystallized.

  "Irene Dunley," Amaryllis said.

  "Huh?"

  "I've been thinking about my grandmother."

  "What's Elizabeth Bailey got to do with Irene Dunley?" Lucas asked as he brought the Icer to a stop at the curb.

  "There's something about my grandmother that reminds me of Irene."

  "What?"

  "It's hard to explain." The excitement of intuitive discovery hummed through Amaryllis. She was suddenly seething with impatience. "They've both spent a lifetime controlling everything around them."

  "I'll go along with that conclusion." Lucas deactivated the ignition and turned slightly in the seat. He rested one arm on the steering bar and watched Amaryllis from the shadows. "Where does it lead?"

  "I'm not sure." Amaryllis tapped one finger on the seat. "To tell you the truth, I'm almost afraid to think about it. Irene was one of Madison Sheffield's staunchest supporters. She believed in him. Lucas, what if Irene was the person who told Madison Sheffield about Professor Landreth's file?"

  Lucas thought that over. "Okay, it's a possibility. But so what?
We've already decided that the person who told Sheffield about the file was probably connected to the Department of Focus Studies."

  "Of all the people in the department, Irene would have been the one most likely to know about the contents of the file. She had worked with Professor Landreth forever, and he trusted her more than anyone else. She was fiercely loyal to him. I think she even loved him. But what if she learned about the file and was torn between what she felt was her duty to the future of New Seattle city-state and her loyalty to Professor Landreth?"

  "Hard to tell what she would do."

  Amaryllis shook her head. "No. I think I know Irene Dunley well enough to believe that in a situation like that, she might very easily have concluded that she had a responsibility to inform Sheffield about the threat to his campaign."

  "And then what?"

  "Why, she would have felt guilty for having betrayed Professor Landreth, of course. Just as Elizabeth Bailey felt guilty for having ruined her son's chance of happiness. That kind of guilt would have eaten at Irene. Tormented her. Even though she knew she had done what she felt was the right thing."

  "You think that's why she tried to help you when you decided to solve the mystery of Landreth's death?"

  "Yes." Amaryllis watched the rain fall on the Gifford's windshield. "I think she must have begun to wonder if she had inadvertently signed Professor Landreth's death warrant when she told Sheffield about the file."

  "She did sign it. But it's over now. She'll have to live with it." Lucas opened his door. "Come on, let's get the luggage inside."

  Amaryllis tugged the hood of her raincoat up over her head and got out of the car. Lucas hauled the suitcases out of the trunk and joined her on the sidewalk.

  Together, they hurried to the shelter of the small overhang above the front steps. Amaryllis unsealed the lock, pushed open the front door, and stepped inside the darkened hall.

  The whisper of talent brushed against her senses and raised the fine hairs on the back of her neck.

  Someone was inside the house.

  "Lucas."

  "I felt it." He dropped the suitcases and clamped a hand

  around her arm. "Let's get out of here." He started to pull her back out onto the steps.

  Amaryllis did not resist. She swung around, ready to run. There was a familiar tingling on the psychic plane. Lucas was reaching for a focus link even as he drew her to safety. He no doubt wanted to use his detector-talent to try to learn something about the intruder.

  Amaryllis opened herself to the link. Felt the instant of disorientation, the jarring seconds of complete vulnerability as her mind constructed a prism . . .

  . . . And then she staggered and nearly fell as an impossible surge of talent seized her in an iron fist. Alien, powerful, and brutal.

  This was not Lucas. Amaryllis panicked. Not Lucas.

  She tried to pull back but she was trapped. To her horror, the prism took shape on the psychic plane.

  Someone or something else took control of the energy construct. Power poured through it. Torrents of dark power.

  Amaryllis screamed. She clutched her head with both hands and tried to cut off her own flow of psychic energy. "No. Stop it. Stop it."

  Nothing happened. She could not shut down the link. Lucas had her outside on the steps. Rain whipped at her coat. Frantically she tried to blank her mind. The link held strong.

  "What is it?" Lucas pulled her to him. "What the hell is going on?"

  "Another talent." Amaryllis collapsed against him.

  "Five hells." He caught her. "I can feel the bastard."

  "Strong. So strong." If she did not get free, she would go insane, Amaryllis thought. A fresh wave of panic crashed through her.

  Lucas picked her up in his arms. "Break the link. Destroy the prism."

  "I can't. Lucas, I can't release the focus. I'm trapped." Distance would help, Amaryllis knew. The strength of any talent was directly affected by proximity. "Get me away from here."

  "As fast as I can," Lucas vowed. He started toward the car with Amaryllis in his arms.

  Talent slammed through the prism. Amaryllis looked fearfully back over Lucas's shoulder toward the open doorway of her house. She expected to see a monster lumber into view.

  Instead, a familiar figure emerged from the shadows of the hall and moved out onto the front step.

  The weak light from the jelly-lamp above the door gleamed on the gun in Irene Dunley's hand.

  "Come back inside at once," Irene said in the same tone of voice that she used to give instructions to student assistants. "Really, some people don't know enough to come in out of the rain."

  "Lucas, she's got a gun."

  "Stop right where you are, Mr. Trent, or I shall be forced to shoot."

  Lucas halted halfway down the walk. He turned slowly to face Irene. Amaryllis sensed that he was weighing the odds of getting her to safety before Irene could pull the trigger. She felt the precise instant when he accepted the fact that he could not outrun a bullet.

  "Come here," Irene said.

  Lucas carried Amaryllis slowly back up the steps and into the house. Irene rewarded him with a smile of cold approval.

  "That's better. Now, kindly sit down." Irene trained the nose of the gun on Amaryllis as she gave the order. "Over there on the sofa will do."

  Lucas said nothing. He carried Amaryllis into the living room and set her carefully on her feet. He searched her face.

  "Are you all right?" he asked.

  There was no trace of emotion in his voice, but the bleak chill in his eyes frightened Amaryllis almost as much as the assault on her sanity that was taking place on the psychic plane.

  "No." Amaryllis reached for the arm of the sofa to steady herself. "I'm not all right. I can't get free." She lowered herself gingerly down onto the cushions. "Lucas, I'm going crazy."

  Lucas looked at Irene. "Let her go."

  "I don't think that would be wise." Irene moved slowly toward them. "She would be free to link with you, then, Mr. Trent and I suspect that you are a very strong talent. As I am uncertain about the exact nature of your psychic abilities, however, I would prefer to keep them neutralized by restricting your access to a powerful prism."

  Lucas shrugged as if the matter were not all that important, but he never took his eyes off Irene's face as he lowered himself to the arm of the sofa.

  "Don't worry," Irene said pleasantly. "I expect she'll burn out any second. No prism is strong enough to handle my full range of power. Even Jonathan burned out when I used the complete spectrum of my talent."

  Amaryllis sagged on the sofa cushion. She held her head in her hands and fought for her sanity. She'd never been trained for anything like this. What Irene was doing was supposed to be impossible.

  Nothing she did seemed to alter the flow of talent that roared through the prism. As far as she could tell, Irene was not using the thundering flow of energy for any purpose other than to chain the focus so that Lucas could not seize it. She wondered fleetingly what sort of talent Irene possessed.

  "You murdered Landreth, didn't you?" Lucas said casually to Irene.

  Amaryllis felt the whisper of a cold, motionless wind. She lifted her head, fighting back waves of psychic pain to stare at Lucas. Then she turned toward Irene. "You killed Professor Landreth?"

  "I had to kill him." Irene sounded vaguely regretful. "In the end, I realized that it had to be done. There was no choice."

  "Was it because Landreth had figured out that you were capable of doing this to a prism?" Lucas touched Amaryllis's shoulder.

  Pain exploded through her confused senses. Her seared nerve endings did not know how to interpret the feel of Lucas's hand. He withdrew his fingers instantly when Amaryllis cried out. She huddled on the edge of the sofa.

  "Oh, no, you don't understand." Irene's expression was one of modest pride. "Jonathan was very respectful of my power. He worked with me for many years, teaching me to control it. We were always testing, training, and exploring the poss
ibilities of my talent together. He said he'd never encountered anything like it. Those were glorious hours. I shall treasure them forever."

  "He served as your prism, didn't he?" Amaryllis managed to ask.

  "Yes, indeed. He was my only prism after my husband died. Jonathan did not want to use anyone else to provide a focus for me because he said it was too dangerous."

  "For the prism?" Lucas asked.

  "No, no. For me." Irene chuckled. "Jonathan felt that for my own safety, no one should know the extent of my talent. It was our little secret, he said. It bound us together more surely than any wedding license."

  "So why did you kill him?" Lucas asked. "Because you didn't want him to know about your little secret any longer?"

  "Oh, no, that wasn't the reason."

  "Why?" Amaryllis got out hoarsely. "Why did you murder him?"

  "Because he was not the man I had believed him to be." Irene's mouth tightened. "I thought he was made of the very stuff of our founders. Instead, I discovered that he was perverted and corrupt. He betrayed me."

  "Oh lord," Amaryllis whispered. "This had nothing to do with politics or Gifford. You killed Professor Landreth because of those standing appointments with Vivien, didn't you?"

  "Jonathan proved to be just as weak as my husband had been. No moral fiber at all. It was very disappointing."

  Pain flared on the psychic plane. Amaryllis flinched and tried not to move. "He left that Friday to go to his mountain cabin. You met him there and pushed him off the cliff."

  "We often went to the mountains together," Irene said. "No one else knew of our weekend rendezvous at his cabin, naturally."

  "Another one of your little secrets," Lucas said.

  Another eddy of cold wind moved in the room. Amaryllis took heart. She probed cautiously, trying to dampen the clarity of the prism. It stayed sharp and precise, providing a focus for Irene's raging talent.

  "Jonathan and I were always very discreet." Irene sighed. "But on that last occasion, I was obliged to end our relationship. We took a walk along the cliff path after dinner as usual. Formed a last prism link. I took him to his psychic limits and then, just as he was about to burn out, pushed him over the edge. I don't think he even knew what had happened."