The Keeper

by Natasha Mostert

  But first he would get to know all of her, even her secret places: the delicate dent behind her ear lobe, the hollow at the bottom of her spine, the slender arch of her foot…

  And he would discover her dreams.

  Was she dreaming?

  He closed his eyes, letting time slip away from him. One part of his brain still registered the dripping of rainwater, the rushing gutters, the sound of a woman’s laughter in the distance. But he was stilling his mind. At this moment the amplitude of his delta brain waves would be heightening as the energy flowed smoothly through his body. He could feel it drawing upwards from the soles of his feet, moving to the point behind his knees, pushing on through his legs and thighs and on and upwards, rushing from one chakra point to the other. He pushed his hands closer together and felt the energy of the magnetic field hot between his palms.

  The texture of her dreams: their shape, vibration. He stood with eyes closed, swaying slightly, his mind filling with the shadow thoughts washing across the ceiling of her room. Dreams hanging in the darkness like unspoken wishes, floating like stars across a windswept sky.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Dragonfly had posted another comment on Kime’s discussion board.

  It looked as though the guy was going to become a regular, Nick thought. He noticed that Dragonfly had added a number of icons next to his name as part of his call sign and that the symbols looked like Japanese or Chinese ideograms. Which probably meant the man was a vogue: vogues loved that kind of thing. Grunts, on the other hand, tended to post pictures of themselves striking a heroic pose or celebrating victory in the ring.

  Nick turned his eyes away from the screen for a moment and speared a salad leaf. God, he hated this part of his training. He could handle the five o’clock runs and JC’s hammering but the food thing broke his spirit. He looked up just in time to see Flash bite into a thick, squelchy sandwich filled with gooey something or other. Probably a thousand calories in one bite. And the kid was as thin as a rake.

  Nick sighed. He had only himself to blame, of course. It was perfectly within his power to end all this agony right now: he could simply hang up his gloves. He had received his first pair when he was six years old and since then he had never stopped fighting—not even when he was living in New York. But thirty was in sight. Why the hell was he still putting himself through the pain? Certainly not for the money, which he didn’t need and which was pitiful anyway. Why, then?

  He sighed again and turned back to the computer.

  The modern world, despite its superficially exciting technological advances, is not what we were built for. Our emotions and our wants evolved in a world without keyboards and screens. The modern world has little heroic content and it fills us with a deep malaise. It drains us of our vital energy. It makes us behave in unnatural ways.

  This is why fighters are blessed and cursed in a way outsiders can never understand. Locked body to body with your adversary, you spring to life: vital energy fills your heart. You smell your opponent’s body odour—it sticks to your skin, enters your nose, clings to your tongue; the tang of his breath is in your face. Like a coma victim prodded to consciousness by the voice of his beloved, you wake up. Desire runs through you like quicksilver.

  Huh? Nick lowered his fork, bemused. Maybe Dragonfly was a ring fighter, after all. And maybe he was a total nutcase.

  But the fighter is cursed as well. Vulnerability, pain, grace: for the fighter they are inextricably bound together. You look into your opponent’s eyes to see who he is—and to know who you are. In his eyes you find the truth.

  A nutcase, definitely. Nick wondered what Kime’s grunts would make of this.

  But as he looked across the room at Flash, who was still munching away happily, he couldn’t help but wonder if Dragonfly didn’t have a point. In Flash’s world, social interaction was masked. Drago of the Deep, say hi to Cassandra, Queen of Shadows. Drago likes underwater basket-weaving; Cassandra is an urban witch. A beautiful friendship was sure to follow in make-believe land. Looking into someone’s eyes was pretty much becoming a redundant activity these days. Not to mention finding out what someone smelled like.

  His thoughts were interrupted by Flash, who was still chewing but now also trying to speak at the same time. ‘I meant to tell you,’ Flash swallowed deeply, ‘that friend of yours called again—what’s ’is name?—the sports writer.’

  ‘Lee?’

  ‘That’s the one.’

  ‘Did he say what it was about?’

  ‘Hmm. Mmm.’ Flash opened a carton and took out a slice of chocolate cake.

  This was too much. Nick picked up the phone and faced the window so that his back was turned to Flash.

  Lee sounded rushed. ‘Listen, I’m not sure if this means anything, but I thought you might want to check it out in light of your personal interest.’

  ‘Check what out?’

  ‘Four other fighters have died in the UK over the past five years. All of them died outside the ring.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Their hearts stopped. For no reason.’

  ‘You mean… like with Valentine?’

  ‘I don’t know all the details, but I have the names here somewhere…’ Lee paused and Nick could hear paper rustling. ‘OK, I’ve got them. Have you got a pen?’

  Nick grabbed a pen and started writing as Lee rattled off the names.

  ‘Could be something, could be nothing,’ Lee said, sounding distracted. ‘Have to run. Keep me posted.’

  Nick replaced the receiver and looked at the names. He didn’t recognise any of them. But something reeked: five healthy blokes, fighters all, dropping as though someone had pulled their plug. What was it Lee had said? Might be something, might be nothing.

  Something, Nick thought. Something.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  In 1844, the French missionary Aimable Petithomme came upon the widow of the great Polynesian chieftain Latete. It was thirty days after the chieftain’s death and the queen was busy removing her husband’s skin with her fingers. If the goddess Oapu was to accept the chieftain into the afterlife, the queen knew she needed to purge certain tattoos from her consort’s body.

  Molly had told this story to Mia many years ago as a cautionary tale. A tattoo is not just for life, Molly warned, it follows you into death. A tattoo can be a blessing… but it can also be a curse.

  Tim’s skin was angry. The blood welled underneath Mia’s fingers as she pressed Angelique to his shoulder. But the outline of the swastika was finally softening—a curve was replacing a hook.

  ‘I was only eighteen,’ Tim explained to Mia the first time he walked into her studio. ‘I was a stupid kid, full of rage. I hung out with some vile people. This was my first tattoo and I wanted to show I belonged. But now it feels like I’m carrying around bad luck. Can you help?’

  Covering up an unwanted tattoo with another design was one of the most demanding things a tattooist could be asked to do. If the offending image was black and bold, like this one, it took some seriously creative thinking.

  And it took time. Mia straightened. Her back was aching from sitting in one position for so long.

  She reached out and gave the hand mirror to Tim.

  ‘Oh.’ He stared. ‘It’s great. It’s really beautiful, Mia.’

  She smiled. ‘It works.’

  She had submerged the swastika into a larger, more flowing image and had softened the unrelenting black with blue and green. The design now seemed whimsical.

  She started applying A+D ointment to the skin. ‘And mind you take care when you take off the dressing,’ she told him as he got ready to leave. ‘Be gentle—use cold water—otherwise you’ll yank the colour right out.’

  ‘I’ll remember. And thanks again, Mia. Rosemary’s going to love this. You’re invited to the wedding, OK?’

  Mia removed her gloves and yawned. For the third night in a row she hadn’t slept well. No nightmares this time, but she kept waking up, as though someone was constantly to
uching her shoulder. And at one stage the room had felt bizarrely cold and she had even left her bed to close the window.

  The studio seemed very quiet now that Tim had left and Angelique was no longer humming. Lisa was still at the dentist.

  Maybe she should use this time to call Amy. Mia looked at the phone, debating. She had left two messages already and Amy hadn’t called back. Best to face facts: Amy still hadn’t softened to her, even though Valentine was dead.

  An email might have more success than a phone call. She didn’t want to pester Amy, but she needed to know. Why had Valentine not told her he was returning to the ring?

  After a moment’s hesitation, Mia walked over to the keyboard.

  Dear Amy,

  I was so very sorry to hear of your loss. Please know…

  A shadow fell across the threshold and she looked up.

  It was a man. He stood in the doorway and with the sunlight behind him he was at first only a tall, dark shape. But then he stepped fully into the room.

  For a moment they looked at each other, not speaking. And in his eyes came a look, if not of recognition, then, surely, of acknowledgement. But she had never seen this man before, had she? How disconcerting, then, when he smiled at her slowly as if they shared a secret.

  ‘Can I help you?’

  He smiled again. His face was exceptionally attractive with its light-grey eyes set under sweeping brows, long mobile mouth and strong, almost beak-like nose. His hair was dark blond, the exact shade of her own. He was wearing a crisp white shirt, blue blazer and understated silk tie, but he moved with a kind of whippy strength that seemed at odds with the formal clothes. Not that the clothes meant anything: body art had lost its street-cred, blue-collar exclusivity years ago. Everyone from models to dentists to Dame Helen Mirren had tattoos these days. But somehow she doubted this guy was interested in having his sweetheart’s initials inked into his pecs.

  But maybe she was wrong. He gestured at the thick albums filled with designs. ‘Do you mind if I browse?’

  ‘Please do. Anything you’re looking for in particular?’

  ‘I’ll know it when I see it.’

  That’s when she noticed it: the calluses on his fingers. The kind of calluses you develop only from gripping the lapels of the stiff dogi worn by martial-arts practitioners in judo or aikido. The man might look like a banker, but he was a fighter.

  He opened one of the albums and started leafing through. She looked back at the screen in front of her but found it difficult to concentrate. She was acutely aware of his presence. Some people’s energy filled a room without their even trying: Valentine had possessed this quality as well. He would enter a room crowded with others more attractive, more articulate, more powerful, but still he was the one to whom you paid attention.

  She glanced over her shoulder and found her visitor watching her. The album was open in front of him but he was looking in her direction, hands in his pockets, rocking almost imperceptibly on his feet. A tiny movement, but it managed to convey explosive power.

  He nodded at the open book. ‘This is lovely work. Are they all your own designs?’

  ‘Some are my mother’s. But I can replicate them.’

  ‘There’s one here that caught my eye.’

  She slid off the stool and walked over. When she reached the bench he pushed the book across. He made no movement to touch her, but his gaze was so hot and intense, she hesitated. There was something here she didn’t understand.

  He tapped his finger on the page. ‘This one.’

  ‘Oh, yes.’ Mia nodded. ‘It’s a one-off I did for a girl who brought me a drawing she made of a dream.’ A very rough drawing, she remembered. It had not been easy translating those hesitant pencil outlines into ink on skin.

  ‘Dream?’ His eyes were keen.

  ‘Yes. She kept having the same dream again and again. Every night she’d fall asleep and this image would appear in her mind like clockwork. And then she’d wake up. It always happened only a few minutes after she switched off the light.’

  ‘Hypnagogic sleep.’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Hypnagogic or sleep-onset dreams. We all have them. They can be highly coherent, if completely surreal. They come to you in your pre-sleep phase before you slip fully into the sleep cycle and only last about ten to fifteen seconds. At that point your brain is closer to a meditative than a sleep state.’

  ‘Oh… right.’ A banker who did judo and watched the Discovery channel.

  His lips curved. ‘I’m a chronobiologist.’

  She did not like the creeping amusement in his eyes. Did he think she would be intimidated by a big word?

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, keeping her voice cool, ‘I don’t know what that is.’

  ‘Something not as boring as it sounds.’ But he didn’t elaborate.

  She stared at him, still feeling slightly hostile. But he really was impossibly good-looking—beautiful, even. Not that there was anything remotely effete about the regularity of his features… and there was just something in the set of his mouth and the way he carried himself that warned he might be an ugly opponent in a fight.

  He looked up and into her eyes and she felt herself blush. Damn it.

  But his voice was casual. ‘Maybe you can help me out with something else? I’m looking for a good gym in this area.’

  ‘There’s Horton’s…’

  He shook his head. ‘I’ve already looked at that one.’

  ‘And then there’s Scorpio.’ Why did she feel as though she shouldn’t have mentioned it?

  ‘That sounds more my thing.’

  ‘It’s not swish.’

  ‘I’m not looking for swish.’

  With a leisurely movement he reached out and touched the tattooed symbols encircling her wrist. A small shock ran through her.

  ‘These are Usui Reiki symbols, aren’t they?’

  She didn’t answer.

  ‘You’re a healer.’

  Still she didn’t respond. She was so aware of the warmth of his fingers.

  He smiled and drew his hand away. She looked down at her wrist as though she expected him to have left a visible imprint.

  There was a sound at the door and his eyes looked past her shoulder. Mia glanced behind her. It was Lisa, back from the dentist.

  ‘I’m running late, I’m afraid.’ He nodded at Lisa, who was looking at him with undisguised interest. ‘I’ll have to drop in again another time.’

  At the doorway he paused. His eyes met Mia’s and she felt her breath catch. There it was again—that flame of recognition. The next moment he had turned away and the doorway was empty.

  Lisa stared at Mia, eyebrows raised. ‘Who was that?’

  ‘A potential client.’

  ‘Well, I’m booking my seat when you do that one. Can you imagine him without a shirt?’

  Mia pulled a face. ‘Don’t forget the popcorn.’

  She walked to the computer and moved the cursor to her favourites list, then clicked the mouse on the entry for Wikipedia. When she entered the search term, she hesitated a little over the spelling, but she was spot-on.

  Chronobiology: the field of science that examines periodic (cyclic) phenomena in living organisms. ‘Chrono’ pertains to time and ‘biology’ pertains to the study, or science, of life. The related terms chronomics and chronome have been used in some cases to describe either the molecular mechanisms involved in chronobiological phenomena or the more quantitative aspects of chronobiology, particularly where the comparison of cycles between organisms is required.

  There followed a paragraph about infradian, ultradian and tidal rhythms, which seemed to cover everything from sleep cycles to menstrual cycles to the behaviour of oceans. And who knew there was a four-hour nasal cycle or that growth hormone was produced every three hours?

  All interesting, but hardly illuminating. She still didn’t really understand what the guy did for a living.

  She sighed, irritated with herself. He was just a
nother scientist. Why was she so interested? Not that she met that many scientists in the course of her day, admittedly, and he certainly did not look like the stereotypical image of a stoop-shouldered beaker-carrier. But it didn’t matter: she would probably never see him again.

  She thought back, recalling the look in his eyes. No… she would see him again.

  As she turned away from the computer she realised he had not told her his name.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  THE BOOK OF LIGHT AND DUST

  FOR ROSALIA

  XXXI

  Electric world. Its energy runs through the veins of us all. My energy signature—singular to me alone. Yours too—a unique marker. Billions of beings, each with our own energy signatures, as distinctive as a fingerprint.

  We are all aware of one another’s energy and react to it intuitively and without conscious thought. Is your energy strong, is it weak? Does it drain me, does it replenish me?

  Vital energy flows sluggishly in most of us. We walk and our footprints leave uneven imprints in the dust. We list. We are out of balance.

  But there are those in whom the flow of energy is a sword of light. They walk with power.

  We are drawn to them. We seek them out. Dimly we realise that they hold within them the one answer to many questions.

  I looked into her eyes today and I saw labyrinths and mysterious things. I told myself: pay attention. She is the most important person you will ever meet.

  THE WAY: EYE GATE

  BLACKLIGHT: DIR: GB13 GB19, FRC: 2, TIME: 9, SUs: GB14 GB18

  WHITELIGHT: no whitelight possible

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  When Nick entered Scorpio’s changing room he wrinkled his nose. The air in here was ripe: damp socks, damp wraps, malodorous gloves. And there was no excuse, really. He bet it didn’t smell like this in the female changing room.

  He was tired. For most of the day he had been on the receiving end of a barrage of phone calls from an irate parent berating him for allowing the man’s son to sign up to Kime. The son was fifteen and, according to the father, too young to become a member of a social networking site that ‘celebrated violence’. Considering that the kid probably played Grand Theft Auto on the sly and had a merry old time decapitating and torturing virtual opponents, Nick found this a little rich. But the parent was a big shot in a sports goods company that paid a hefty sum to advertise on Kime, and Nick had had to choose his words carefully.