A Dream of Ice (30 page)

But Mikel had enough of a head start to get his gloved fingers around it and tug up. The door opened and with a momentary sense of weightlessness, he and Siem flew into space, hit the ground, and the truck and its module swerved dangerously as Bundy tried to brake, but collision was inevitable.

When it came, the module hit the truck hard, sending it forward with a jolt, the two coming to a stop at jagged angles in front of the two former occupants.

“You've killed us!” Siem roared. “If that truck is damaged—”

“It won't matter,” Mikel said, painfully climbing to his knees and reaching under the harness to where his radio was belted to his waist. His face frozen, lips numb, he tried to steady his trembling fingers to punch in the Group's radio-phone link.

Before he could do so, he felt the ground heave. Ahead, miles away, he saw flame shoot through the ice, a burning pillar that was as incongruous as it was biblical. Raising himself on one aching hand, Mikel watched as it reached for the sky like the straight, superhot issue of a burning oil well.

Beside him, Siem also watched as he raised his bloodied face from the ice. He was dazed but his eyes found the fire and stayed.

“Now . . . what?”

Behind them, Bundy had left the cab and run over. He crouched behind them, watching as the fire spread into a familiar shape.

“It's the same thing we saw before,” Bundy said as a face appeared within it.

“No,” Mikel said.

“How do
you
know?” the man asked—and then his question was answered.

The fire suddenly spread like a fan, dissipating as it expanded.

“What is it?” Bundy asked.

“That, I believe,” Mikel said weakly, “is what a soul looks like when it is sent back to hell.”

“But it's going—up!” Siem said in a rasping voice.

“Hell is where you make it,” Mikel replied.

Bundy put his overwhelming disgust for Mikel into one powerful, “What the
hell
are
you
talking about, you lunatic?”

“Salvation,” Mikel replied quietly. “At least, I hope that's what it is. I'm going to try to find out.”

Bundy snorted. “Good for all of us.
You
may have wrecked our module.”

Ignoring the pain and the risk of frostbite, Mikel resumed his dialing. “I am very, very sorry,” he said. “I am calling some people who will buy you a new one.”

F
lora stalked back into the room, stowing her phone in her pocket.

“No more shallow pickings,” the woman said. “I need to know everything you know, Dr. O'Hara.”

Caitlin looked at the woman sideways. “Who was that?”

“Someone who informed me, Dr. O'Hara, that you are far, far more connected to Galderkhaan than you're letting on. Possibly more than you know.”

“Oh, I know how connected I am,” Caitlin admitted, looking up at her and feeling rage for the first time since coming here. “And that makes me powerful in ways I don't think
you
understand. It's time you talked to me, Madame Director. Respectfully, and now.”

“Or else?”

“How about a simple, mundane fact, for starters,” Caitlin said. “Your employee's body was not removed by any authority approaching the word ‘proper' and I guarantee there's surveillance video.”

“You're being irrational now.”

“You bet,” Caitlin said. “Talk to me, Flora.”

Flora weighed the request but briefly. “That call was from my colleague in Antarctica.”

“Antarctica,” Caitlin breathed. “I see. So you're fairly well connected too.”

“Our reach is global,” Flora replied. “He's just as worried as you are, so I strongly suggest we start treating each other as resources and not as enemies. He knows who you are.”

“He does? How?”

“He also saw the video from Haiti,” Flora admitted. “He is concerned for your well-being.”

“That's refreshing,” Caitlin said.

“He's a good, good man,” Flora admitted. “We are not voyeurs or spies or blackmailers, I assure you.”

“All right,” Caitlin said, not sure she believed any of that. “Who is this associate?”

“His name is Mikel. Why?”

“Mediterranean?”

“Basque,” Flora said.

Caitlin touched her head. “I've seen him. Here, in this room. Why is he concerned?”

Flora paused, marginally impressed. “He found a tunnel and ruins and spoke with the dead of Galderkhaan. You'll never guess what they're looking for.”

Caitlin took her at her word and didn't try.

“They are looking for you, Dr. Caitlin O'Hara. They are very specifically looking for you. Mikel told me to protect you.”

Caitlin shrunk in horror, not just at the news that she was being targeted by some ancient force, but the fact that they got Jacob in the bargain. She had to make it stop, to separate them both from whatever the Galderkhaani wanted.

“You look unwell,” Flora said with the slimmest hint of compassion. “Perhaps we should continue this in my office?”

Caitlin forced herself to stand. “No. I have to go.”

Everything else be damned, Caitlin had to make sure he was okay, serve herself up if necessary.

“That's not a good idea,” Flora said.

“This is not a discussion,” Caitlin said, literally pushing past her.

“You should not face this alone!” Flora said, grabbing her.

Caitlin wrested her arm free and pinned Flora with a glare. “Forgive me, but I believe that I am safer watching my own back. Please don't try to stop me.”

Caitlin's fury propelled her to the top of the basement stairs where she stopped in her tracks from sudden indecision.

Goddamn it
, she thought.

She had an increasing, hideous sense that whatever she did next, someone would suffer. The lodestone of her life had always been helping and protecting the innocent, and obviously, right now she needed to get to Jacob. But she could not forget that last time dogs howling, the news reports of suffering animals, and similar events had heralded the crises of Maanik, Gaelle, Atash, and who knew how many other young people.

This is different, of course
, Caitlin reminded herself.
It's worse.

If Yokane was correct, something was coming loose in the South Pole—something big and old and ferocious. And there was every reason to believe she was right, especially since Flora's man Mikel had corroborated enough of her story.

Caitlin was increasingly convinced that something bigger was happening than what even Yokane had known, and that Azha and Dovit were trying to tell her what it was. This was part of what was impacting the stones and was not likely to stop of its own accord. Whether she wanted to or not, she had to intervene—or, at least, try to find out what was happening.

Caitlin turned to go down the stairs but Flora Davies was standing just behind her.

“I thought you might reconsider,” Flora said with a self-satisfied smile.

“You've got it wrong,” Caitlin said. “There's something I have to do.”

“You promised to share.”

“There isn't time.”

“
Make
time,” Flora said, blocking her way.

Without thought, Caitlin pointed the two forefingers of her right hand directly at Davies's neck. The connection was immediate. She saw the woman's irises widen and, again on instinct, Caitlin moved her hand to the right in the “shut down” gesture. The conduit closed and Flora staggered and slumped against the wall. Caitlin leaned close and checked that the woman was breathing normally; she was.

“Dr. Davies!” Caitlin said, and snapped her fingers. Flora's eyes tracked over to them. Then she looked up at Caitlin. It was enough to satisfy Caitlin that she hadn't harmed the woman. “That's how connected I am to Galderkhaan,” Caitlin said. “From now on, you will not interfere with me.”

Caitlin resumed her descent and on reaching the hallway, turned toward the room at the far end. The younger woman was perched on a stool just outside its doorway. As Caitlin came closer the stone shot visions of the past through her brain. Adrienne rose to her feet as Caitlin approached with wobbling steps.

But Flora, still slumped at the bottom of the stairs, gestured to Adrienne to let the woman go. So Adrienne remained on her feet but did not prevent Caitlin from looking into the room at the glowing, levitating stone.

The power of the artifact hit Caitlin so hard she quickly repeated the “shut down” gesture. It didn't cancel out the overwhelming presence of the stone, but it did take the edge off. The present shimmered like a mirage, showing the stone only vibrating, without the sequence of lights.

Caitlin speared Adrienne with a look. “What's holding it up, magnets?”

“Acoustic waves.”

“Is it safe to go in?”

“That depends on what you're going to do and how long you'll be in there.”

Caitlin started to take a step into the room. Adrienne put a hand on her arm.

“I don't recommend it,” she said. Her grip wasn't a restraint but a gesture of concern.

Caitlin thanked her with a nod and stayed in the doorway. And suddenly, the past vision came to a rest. Before the stone was brought here the room apparently had been used for storage. Nothing was moving in it anymore.

Caitlin inhaled what felt like her first full breath since she'd entered the mansion. Then, before she could pay attention to her lingering fears, she did what she always did: put one proverbial foot in front of the other.

She had to challenge, expand, and master the new abilities she possessed. She had to obtain a bigger, clearer picture of everything that was happening.

Caitlin saw nothing in the room to hook into visually so she took a different approach: she used sense memory, the sound of Jacob's fingers drumming on the wall that separated their rooms at home. First she remembered just the small sound—then she remembered the awful, pounding amplification of it that she'd heard in that terrible opaque nowhere space—

And then, she was there, pinioned in the massive whiteness as before, with just a faint blur of turquoise behind the ice. Caitlin tried to scream to relieve the terror but her face felt partly paralyzed.

With extraordinary effort, Caitlin spoke to Adrienne, not knowing whether she was communicating out loud or only mentally. Her lips misshaped the words: “Did . . . anything . . . happen . . . when I approached the room?”

“The stone just went dark,” Adrienne said with what sounded like awe.

Inwardly Caitlin smiled. Had she made that happen? If so,
how
?

Thinking back, she realized what it had to be. Until now, Caitlin had been regarding this stone as a problem, a danger. She had been
giving it the wary, scheming respect due a menacing stranger. But this stone—or at least
a
stone, perhaps Yokane's piece, maybe the two of them together,
some
damn segment of the Source in some combination—was
not
a stranger to her. Standing in the United Nations conference room, floating in the sky above dying Galderkhaan, Caitlin had reached into the energy generated by an artifact like this and flung it at the ancient city.

She looked at the semidormant stone before her.

You can connect to it
, she told herself.
You can work with it. The vibrations, the energy, something about it synced with you.

She had quieted it somewhat. But she still didn't know how, still didn't understand the mechanism. Of more immediate concern: she didn't know how long the truce would last.
Would the stone somehow reach back to the rest of the Source in the present day, get more power, and come back more vigorous than before?

“Dr. O'Hara?” Adrienne asked. “Can you give me data—?”

“Quiet,
please
.”

Caitlin had to learn more. This was a standoff. She had made a fist without realizing it and flexed her fingers. And then she was jolted by an unexpected connection.

The superlatives
, she thought with a burst of emotion.
The hand gestures.
Weeping inside, she suddenly grasped the profound intent of the physical arm, hand, and finger movements used in the Galderkhaani language. They weren't merely accents. They were a subliminal, subsonic, energy-based form of expression that added untold depth to the words.

Come back
, she admonished herself.
Concentrate on the ice from the vision with Ben . . . something neutral
—

It came back to her, instantly and easily. Reaching to and through the whiteness, she found only tiny sparks of energy. It quieted the stone entirely.

I am the conduit that connected the stone with its home
, she realized. The energy of the Source was not restricted by place
or
time. Her own
energy was a link between then and now, just as it had been at the United Nations when she linked between the ancient
cazh
and the victimized kids in her own time.

That's why the acoustic levitation worked to contain the stone
, she realized. Sound was energy too. The stone was stilled by a powerful cushion of it, its vibrations calmed.

Now she had to work on amping the stone up or down, to see the degree to which she could bond with it and control it. As Yokane had done to her, as Caitlin had just done to Flora Davies, so she must do to the stone. If there was another assault like the one that impacted the animals, she might be able to contain it. If ancient souls were using the tiles to reach children, including Jacob, she might be able to break that connection as well.

But which way? She considered pointing up at first, which was what the Technologists had intended. But some instinct made her slowly, barely, point down instead, reaching through her fingertips and far beyond them, searching for the way to connect.