Shield of Winter

by Nalini Singh

  However, that was a factor that could be replicated elsewhere.

  Which left a single critical element that could only be found in the changeling-held territory. "Sascha Duncan." Access to the only active E in the world no doubt played a crucial part in Krychek's plans.

  "There's no infection in that section of the Net," Aden said, instead of nodding to confirm what they both knew must be true. "However Krychek has the ability to shift the infection in that direction, or seed the area with it. He says he can't control it beyond that, but I haven't yet decided if he's lying." The other Arrow turned to acknowledge another member of the squad who'd just entered, walking over to her when she indicated she needed to speak to him.

  Alone, Vasic considered the misleading simplicity of Krychek's proposed experiment. An isolated group of empaths surrounded on the Net by the infection. If the experiment failed and the infection threatened to overwhelm them in a wave of murderous madness or more subtle mental degradation, it would be relatively easy to relocate all ten men and women at short notice. As well, the deterioration of an empty part of the Net would cause few ripples.

  In that sense, it was a clean plan, with no threat of major losses.

  Of course, no one could predict how the infection would move, what it would do to the empaths. "I can't, Aden," he said when the other man returned to his side, their fellow Arrow having left the room.

  Aden waited.

  "You know what happened when I had cause to pass near Sascha Duncan prior to her defection. It was a deeply . . . uncomfortable experience." Councilor Nikita Duncan's daughter had been pretending to be Silent at the time, but even then, there'd been something about her that had made his instincts bristle.

  It was one of the few times he'd felt true pain as an adult--at first, he'd thought he was under attack, only to realize it was Sascha's simple presence in a room separated from the one where he stood by a solid wall, that was sandpaper along the insides of his skin. As if some part of him knew she was the antithesis to everything he had ever been taught to be, the rejection primal.

  It wasn't until her defection and the resulting revelation of her empathy that he'd realized the reason behind the strange effect; the knowledge had made him recall the numerous other times he'd felt a faint irritation against his skin as he moved through the shadows in populated areas. Sleeping empaths, their conditioning not as badly degraded as Sascha's must have been.

  He also knew he was an anomaly in sensing them in such a way--according to Aden, no one else in the squad had ever reported the same. Vasic had a theory that the awareness was an undocumented adjunct of being a Tk-V, a born teleporter. Patton, the only other Tk-V Vasic had ever met, had often complained about an "itch" under his skin when he was in the outside world.

  Regardless of whether that was true or not, the effect continued unchecked for Vasic, causing deeper and more frequent serrated scrapes over his skin as the conditioning of the Es in the Net fractured further with each passing day.

  Aden took several minutes to reply. "Uncomfortable, not debilitating." The words of a leader evaluating one of his men. "The empaths will need a protection squad--their designation has never been aggressive according to the historical records I've been able to unearth so far, and none of this group are, either."

  The telepath's tone remained even as he added, "I want you to run it. You're the only man I trust to get them all out of danger if there's a sudden spike in the infection, or if the pro-Silence elements in the Net seek to do them harm."

  Vasic knew that wasn't quite the truth--the squad had other teleport-capable operatives in its ranks. No one as fast as Vasic, but fast enough. None of them, however, stood so close to an irrevocable and final descent into the abyss. "Are you trying to put me on soft duty?"

  "Yes." Eyes on the greenery outside, but his attention on Vasic, Aden continued to speak. "You don't see it, but you're one of the core members of the squad, the one we all rely on when things go to hell. Outside emergency situations, the younger Arrows turn to you for guidance; the older ones use you as a sounding board. Your loss would be a staggering blow to the group . . . to me."

  "I won't snap." Even though he knew the oblivion of death was the only peace he'd ever find. "I have things to do yet." And it didn't only have to do with helping to save those Arrows who might still have the chance to live some kind of a real life.

  You don't have the right to be tired. When you can write her name on a memorial, when you can honor her blood, then you'll have earned the right.

  A leopard changeling had said that to him over the broken body of a woman whose death Vasic had been sent to erase. The leopard couldn't know how many names Vasic needed to write, how many deaths he'd covered up when he'd believed that what he was doing was for the good of his people . . . and later, when he'd known it was too early for any revolution to succeed. Each and every name had a claim on his soul.

  "Nevertheless, I want you away from the violence, at least for a short period." Again, Aden's voice was that of the leader he was, and yet it was no order, their relationship far too old to need any such trappings. "There's another reason I want you on this detail--and why I'm going to ask you to consider certain others for your team. Being near empaths may be uncomfortable for you, but it will likely be soothing for the Es."

  Because, Vasic realized, he and the others like him, were ice-cold, permanently cut off from their emotions. Unlike the fractured, they would leak neither fear nor pain, eliminating one source of stress on the newly awakened Es. "How does that tie in with being so close to the changelings?" The shapeshifting race was as rawly emotional as the Psy were not, their world painted in vivid shades of passion.

  "If Krychek manages to negotiate access to part of their land, he intends to agree to full satellite and remote surveillance, while asking them to keep a physical distance the majority of the time." Aden paused as a butterfly flew from the lush green of the trees to flutter its scarlet wings against the glass before returning to more hospitable climes. "It'll take time for negotiations to be concluded, a location to be settled on, whether it's in changeling territory or elsewhere. Take the invitation to your nominated E, gauge whether you could remain in her proximity for the duration."

  "You've already decided who I'm to approach."

  "According to Krychek, all the empaths on the list but one have already begun to wake to their abilities, even if they aren't cognizant of it."

  Vasic didn't ask how Krychek could've known that, aware the cardinal telekinetic had an intimate link with the NetMind, the vast neosentience that was the librarian and guardian of the Net. The NetMind had no doubt informed Krychek of the Es who were coming to an awareness of their true designation.

  "Your retrieval, however, first broke conditioning at sixteen and was given aggressive reconditioning to wrench her abilities back under. Two months later, she and her parents quietly disappeared."

  It was the second surprise of the conversation. "The NetMind can't locate the family unit?"

  "Not that type of disappearance," Aden clarified. "We know where they are geographically, but they've done an impeccable job of making themselves of no interest to anyone. Her mother was a systems analyst for a cutting-edge computronic firm in Washington; her father held a senior position in a bank. Now they run a large but only moderately successful farm in North Dakota, in cooperation with a number of other Psy."

  Psy preferred to live in cities, near others of their kind, but that wasn't to say none of their race ever chose outdoor occupations. Like humans and changelings, Psy needed to eat, to put a roof over their heads, and work was work. Such a massive career change, however, was an indication of a conscious decision. "Protecting their child?" It wasn't impossible, the parental instinct a driving force even in many of the Silent, though Vasic had no personal experience of such.

  "Possible but unconfirmed."

  Vasic knew there was more to come.

  "What's also unconfirmed is if she still has access to her abili
ties--or if they were terminally damaged by the reconditioning process." Aden stared unblinking through the glass. "I watched the recording, and it was one of the most brutal sessions I've ever seen, a hairsbreadth from a rehabilitation."

  "Then why is she on the list?" The ugliness of rehabilitation erased the personality, left the individual a drooling vegetable, and if this E had come so close to it, she had to bear major mental scars.

  "To be valid, the experiment needs not only Psy who have never been reconditioned, but those who've been through the process. She's one of six in the group who have, but the others underwent only a minor reset."

  It made absolute sense . . . because the majority of empaths in the Net would've undergone reconditioning at some stage, the process designed to force their minds back into the accepted norm, in denial of the fact those minds had never been meant to be emotionless constructs. Which meant the PsyNet had to deal not only with Es who didn't have any idea of how to utilize their abilities, but also ones damaged on a fundamental level.

  "The flip side to their problematic conditioning," Aden added, faultlessly following Vasic's line of thought, "is that they'll suffer no pain breaking it."

  "Of course." The process known as dissonance was designed to reinforce Silence by punishing any unacceptable emotional deviation with pain, but clearly that approach wouldn't work on an individual whose mental pathways were structured with emotion as the core. It would simply kill. "The details of the retrieval."

  Aden handed Vasic an envelope. "A letter to her directly from Krychek, setting out the parameters of her engagement, as well as the payment schedule."

  "He's offering them jobs?" The Council had always just taken.

  "We both know how intelligent he is. Why coerce when you can contract?" With that cool statement that perfectly described the way Krychek's mind worked, Aden sent Vasic a telepathic image.

  It was of a small female with black hair to her shoulders, the strands shaping themselves into soft natural curls, and eyes so unusual, he took a second look. The pupils were jet-black against irises of translucent copper ringed by a fine rim of gold. They stood out against the golden cream of her skin, somehow too old, too perceptive.

  As if she saw beneath the skin.

  Storing the photograph in a mental vault after imprinting a geographic location on his mind using her appearance as a lock, he looked down at the envelope. Her name was hand-written across it in black ink: Ivy Jane.

  He wondered what Ivy Jane would think of the Arrow about to enter her life, a man who could never again feel anything. Even were it physiologically possible, Vasic had no intention of allowing his Silence to fragment . . . because behind it lay only a howling madness created of blood and death and endless horror.

  Chapter 2

  Ruling Coalition or not, Kaleb Krychek is now the effective leader of the Psy race. It remains to be seen where he will take us.

  Editorial, PsyNet Beacon

  KALEB CAME TO a halt, his upper body gleaming from the martial arts drill he'd been doing in the cleared living room of his and Sahara's home on the outskirts of Moscow. The terrace, his usual practice ground, was currently under several inches of snow and being pounded by screaming hail.

  That had never before stopped him, but Sahara would follow if he went out there now, and she had a tendency to shiver even under a telekinetic shield. So he'd temporarily teleported the living room furniture into another part of the house instead.

  Seated not far from him, her legs stretched out over the carpet as she bent over in a toning exercise she'd learned as a dancer, she said, "What is it?"

  Kaleb watched her rise back into a sitting position, then get lithely to her feet, her body clad in black tights paired with a white T-shirt, and felt a deep sense of possession in his blood. She was here. Safe. No one would ever again cause her harm. He considered whether the news he'd just received from the NetMind would disturb her, thought about how much to share.

  Her lips quirked as she redid the tie that held back the silky dark of her hair, the hidden strands of red-gold not apparent in this light. "You do realize I know you?"

  Yes, she knew him, saw him, and still she loved him.

  And he'd made her a promise that he'd never hide anything. "Subject 8-91 is dead." Sahara didn't agree with the way he'd left the man to slowly sicken, oblivious of the infection in his brain, but Kaleb didn't see the point in informing the male of his certain demise--because there was no cure.

  Subject 8-91 had functioned as a barometer of the infection that was crawling into countless minds in the Net. It would torture and kill millions if left unchecked. Not only was the biofeedback toxic in affected parts of the Net, the infection had begun to corrode the actual fabric of the psychic landscape itself in the worst-hit sections. If--when--any of the heavily populated sections collapsed, the death toll would be in the thousands each time.

  "Calling it an infection," he said to Sahara now, "is useful shorthand, but inaccurate."

  A slow nod. "It's a corruption, isn't it?" The dark blue of her eyes filled with sadness. "It's risen from within, no bacteria or virus or other outside source involved."

  Kaleb cupped her jaw, rubbed his thumb over her lower lip. "Subject 8-91 was the most deeply infected. If he's dead, we're now on a countdown."

  Kissing his thumb, Sahara broke contact to walk to the corner where he'd discarded his T-shirt, and picked it up. "You need to go check the scene," she guessed, returning with the camouflage green cotton in her grasp, frown lines marring her brow. "You'll be careful." It was an order.

  He nodded after pulling on the T-shirt, still unused to the fact that he once again had her in his life--the one person who cared about him. Every time she showed that care, whether through her words or her actions, it curled around the dark part of him that lived in the void, a petting caress.

  "I'll be home soon," he said. "Don't link telepathically." She was always with him, but he didn't want her seeing what he was sure awaited in 8-91's home. Since he'd never reject her psychic touch, he had to have her promise.

  Rising on tiptoe, she kissed him sweet and soft, the way she had of doing sometimes--as if he was the vulnerable one. It was true. But only when it came to Sahara, his obsidian shields mist against her touch; her slender fingers could cage him more effectively than any chain or prison.

  "I won't," she promised. "We'll talk about it afterward." Her gaze held his own in a trust he'd never break, the charm bracelet on her wrist catching the light. "Take care, Kaleb," she repeated. "You belong to me."

  He teleported out with the warmth of her a lingering kiss against his skin, and into a bloody hell. Subject 8-91 hadn't simply died. He'd gone critical. And he'd taken someone with him. Crouching by the body that lay just inside the closed doorway, Kaleb attempted to count the stab marks that had sliced through the man's pin-striped shirt, got to nineteen before it became impossible to separate the wounds.

  The flicker came to the right of him a second later. "We have a situation," he said to the two Arrows he'd telepathed on arrival. "Subject 8-91"--he pointed to the slender male who sat slumped against the opposing wall, his face bruised and cut, a streak of red behind his head, as if he'd slid down the wall after being thrown onto it--"was infected. The most advanced case in the Net."

  Vasic stayed in place as Aden stepped over the nearest body, skirting the blood that splattered the room to scan 8-91 using a small medical device. "He suffered blunt force injuries to the face as well as a cracked skull, but my initial judgment is that he died of an implosion in his brain."

  Rising to a standing position, Kaleb considered the facts. "Sunshine Station," he said, dead certain both Arrows knew of the remote Alaskan science station where the disease had first claimed Psy lives. "The infected didn't die that way."

  "No." Aden came across to scan the stabbing victim. "The staff of the science station went mad, bludgeoned, stabbed, and otherwise assaulted one another. The survivors were weak but still psychotic by the time we
arrived. A number were so aggressive they died during the containment process; the remainder were put into involuntary comas."

  Aden's first-person account jibed with the details Kaleb had been able to dig up, though former Councilor Ming LeBon had done his best to conceal the scale and nature of the deaths. As a result, Kaleb knew that none of the comatose victims had ever woken up. Brain death had followed within a week of the incident. "Does 8-91's mode of death mean the infection's become more virulent?"

  The Arrow medic got to his feet. "Possible--but it's also possible he had a genetic vulnerability that coincided with the final stages of the infection. A full autopsy will be necessary to know for certain." Aden held Kaleb's eyes. "You have his history?"

  Kaleb telepathed across the detailed files he'd kept on 8-91's disintegration, even as he stared at the room, analyzed the damage, then returned his gaze to the stabbed male. "It's possible 8-91's victim was also infected. I recognize him as 8-91's closest neighbor." Meaning there was a high chance they'd been next to each other on the psychic plane as well.

  "Do we need to evacuate this region of the PsyNet?"

  "I'll quarantine the area for the time being, but it's a stopgap measure." The oily black of the infection was crawling across vast swathes of the Net.

  Vasic spoke for the first time. "I'll teleport the bodies to the secure morgue where they can be autopsied, clean up this room."

  He's so close to the edge; I don't know if anything can save him.

  Words Sahara had spoken about Vasic, hurt in her voice for a man she saw as kin to Kaleb. He didn't disagree. He might've been trained by a sociopath, but the same was true of many Arrows; the only difference was that Kaleb's trainer had slipped the leash into unsanctioned murder. In the end, they'd all grown up under a regime that attempted to turn them into tools for the use of others--tools meant to be discarded once they passed their use-by date.

  Kaleb had no illusions about himself, knew he'd use anyone and everyone if it would keep the world safe for Sahara, but he also had no intention of becoming the Council he'd destroyed. "No," he said in response to Vasic's offer. "Let Enforcement handle this scene as a murder.