The Beholder (10 page)

Chapter 20

The wind howled like a banshee as they approached the airport, but Jason barely heard it, his mind was so focused on the voyage ahead. He had never been to Paris, and the very idea of it evoked images in his mind of a perfect city, rich with love and romance. He was brimming with anticipation, and Emily’s closeness only increased the nervous tingle running through him.

Half an hour later they parked the motorcycle in a lot and merged with the jostling crowd at Newark Airport. Jason was startled to discover that Emily already had all the necessary documents—including his own passport—in her pocket. He had to wonder if the passport was authentic or fake.

When it was time to board, Emily took the window seat, and Jason settled in beside her, looking forward to the flight. Eight and a half hours would be plenty of time for him to furtively observe Emily’s actions and expressions, the perfect lines of her lips, the long lashes that accentuated her beautiful amber eyes, the way her hair curved in soft waves over her shoulders.

But Emily had her own agenda. As soon as the plane took off, she bombarded him with a rapid fire series of questions about himself and his life. He had to concentrate, not wanting to mess up and look like a blithering idiot.

“So you are an interior designer?”

“I thought you knew that already. I thought you knew everything about me.”

She shrugged. “I saw a general outline within the aura around you, but no particulars. Now when you are close to me I can see more than when you were at a distance. Which one of your creations is your favorite?”

“McAlester’s,” Jason said without hesitation. “Matt and I slaved on it, but without Debbie’s hard work the project would have been soulless.”

“McAlester’s? Oh, I’ve been there a few times,” she said, and Jason unsuccessfully searched his mind for any memory of her in the place. “It’s a really nice place, and it has a unique spirit. You three have talent.”

Jason snorted. “Maybe, but in comparison to the Hall of Refuge, McAlester’s is sloppy work.”

Emily held up one finger. “Here you’re wrong. You and your friends create positive things, and that’s worth a lot.”

He was flattered, but the truth was he’d never in his entire life find anything to compare to the Hall of Refuge, and the knowledge was vaguely depressing to him. Still, it did feel good to hear her compliment him. He decided now was the time to turn the tables, to ask her some of the thousands of questions bouncing around in his head.

“How did you figure out where I worked?”

“That was the easiest part,” Emily said. Jason rested his head against the headrest, enjoying the melody of her sweet voice. “Tyler told me everything he had managed to find out about you, but I used another source as well. You see, all people leave ‘traces,’ which are invisible to those with ordinary eyesight. But Sighted people can see the world in another way. That’s how I found you. Yours was very different from anyone else’s.”

“I have a trace?” Jason raised his eyebrows. “What’s so peculiar about it?”

She laughed, her eyes sparkling. “It’s the size of Newark International Airport.”

Jason gaped at Emily, trying to make sense of what she was telling him. “When we got there I couldn’t control the defensive shield for an instant … and when that happened I saw your Light,” she said, looking vaguely dazed. “It’s so beautiful. I wish you could see it.” The light vanished from her eyes. “There’s only one person with a similar trace and aura as yours.”

“Pariah?” Jason guessed.

She nodded. “But his is stable, intense, and evil. Yours is frighteningly volatile, but still in the development process. Yours is more like a volcano that’s about to erupt. Sometimes I actually feel afraid when I’m beside you.”

That seemed impossible. Of all the things this tiny girl had faced, for her to be afraid of him? There was obviously so much more he needed to learn before he could understand any of it.

“What about your trace?”

Emily smirked. “Oh, it’s nothing like yours. If we were to speak about Energy in terms of rain, then my aura is a drizzle and yours is a downpour. At times I struggle for breath when your Energy flares, and it gets harder for me to control it with each hour.”

“But I don’t do anything,” Jason objected. “Yes, I did stop time, like you said, but I have no idea how I did it.”

“Well, actually, Tyler helped you there a bit. You’re very close to revealing the Beholder in yourself, but you still need guidance. We were trying to break through the stereotypes ingrained in you, hoping you would fathom that not everything you see is the way it seems to be, that not everything you touch is the way it actually feels.

“You see, there are two realities. You know one: lackluster and sham. But when you see the other, you’ll understand that the reality we are all taught to see is just a disguise.”

Jason was silent for a moment, captivated. “What do traces look like?”

“Usually they resemble a vapor trail left behind a person. They fade but can still be seen after a few months if they’re strong enough. Tyler’s trace looks like a fog of various colors. It’s intense and quite easy to find if anyone is searching for him.”

“If anyone is searching for him?” Jason shot a glance at Emily. How could she be so calm? “So traces can give us away to the wrong people?”

She shook her head, then tucked an errant curl behind one ear. “We tend to our Energy and erase it if needed.” Emily smiled. “Tyler and I are trying to erase yours, but it’s a bit more difficult.”

“What
are
traces?”

“They’re people’s Energy. Energy is the fifth element, the quintessence pervading all the other elements. You know about earth, air, water, and fire. Energy is different from them because you can’t see it. Well, most people can’t, anyway. Energy rules and guides the four elements into a Librium.

“Energy is ubiquitous. It is in your brain, it is in the middle of our planet, in a butterfly’s wing. It is the most vital thing in existence. Without Energy, fire wouldn’t burn, water wouldn’t flow, and a living being wouldn’t breathe.

“Humans are a species who need Energy in abundant quantities. They are huge sources of Energy but are unable to control it, because they don’t know anything about it. Eventually it dissipates too quickly. To live, people need to replenish their Energy supplies pretty often, but if you are able to control it and hold it within, you might run a hundred miles without getting tired, you could feel full without eating for months, you might even fly.”

Jason glanced around, observing the other passengers. They sat in their own world, oblivious of him and Emily and the unbelievable conversation they were having. It was impossible for Jason to envision this other reality of which she spoke, inconceivable to put himself in the center of a burning tornado and somehow control it. How could none of these people see this Energy of which she spoke? How could he believe Mankind was unseeing? How could there be another version of his world?

“What about the defensive shield?” he asked.

“It’s around you as well as around the places where we hide.”

“Including the underground place where we were?”

“Yes. The Hall of Refuge is a unique place, and yet its protection could have caved in if we’d stayed any longer. We couldn’t risk losing such a precious hideout, which is why the five of us had to leave.”

“The five of us? Are Matt and Debbie involved in this as well?”

Emily hesitated, then swallowed, looking reluctant. “They are, Jason. Even before all of this started, Matthew, Debbie, and you had become bound in an Energy Trinity.”

“What?”

She nodded. “You passed some of your Energy to them, and they did the same to you. You are gradually becoming the One Energy Unity, something which was destined long before you met. Now if any part of this bond is ruined, the other two are doomed.”

That explained why Pariah had tried to kill Matt and Debbie. “I’ve heard stories about children and their mothers having a bond. When a child was in trouble, his or her mother sensed it even if she was far away. Do you mean to say there’s something like that between me, Matt, and Debbie?”

“Yes, but I’d say yours is like the bond of twins rather than mother to child.”

“Oh?”

Emily’s face softened, her gaze filling with a deep sadness. “Sighted twins cannot live without their other halves, at least not for a very long time. If one dies, the other is doomed to follow. They form an indivisible unity. What you three have is exceptionally rare and is called Soulfusion. It’s actually stronger than a Twins’ Bond.”

“This is unbelievable,” Jason muttered. Uncomfortable, he fidgeted with the latch of his table, still locked into the back of the chair in front of him. Then he raised an eyebrow. “Wait. You said Unsighted people can’t see Energy. But what about the fight between you and Pariah? Light was flashing out of both of your bodies. I could see it!”

She nodded reluctantly. “Well, yeah. We had to resort to an exceptionally powerful Energy which is used very rarely. We turn to it only when there’s no chance the Unsighted can figure out the source of the light. When we have to use it, we disguise the Energy as lightning.”

“I don’t know,” Jason said, doubtful. “That light was so bright I’m sure lots of people saw you. And it didn’t look like lightning to me.”

She smiled. “Actually, no one did except you, because I made all people in the area leave.”

Jason’s jaw dropped. “So that’s why … Wow. Now I get it! I saw them all going! So that was you? Incredible! I thought I was going insane.”

“That’s why I was so exhausted,” she explained. “It’s difficult to control so many people and fight against the Evil One at the same time.”

Jason shifted in his seat and puffed out a breath. “I think you’d better tell me more about the Energy that you and Pariah used. The more I find out, the more prepared I will be.”

“All right. Well, first of all, there are different types: light and dark, positive and negative, live and dead. Sprouts of extremely concentrated Energy are what we call Énergie Morte, and they are very powerful. Their deadly rays of Energy would disintegrate an Unsighted person if only one tiny sprout touched them. They wouldn’t even leave even a handful of dust behind. It takes years of learning to create that kind of Energy, and even longer to learn how to defend against it.

“Apart from Énergie Morte, I use other kinds of Energy that help me influence people and make them do things they’d never consciously have done otherwise. For example, after that fight with Pariah, I made the publishers of the New York newspapers write about a short circuit that caused a fire in the building. That will explain the pieces of glass and plastic all over the place.” She gave him a weak smile. “It’s easy to disguise the truth.”

Emily had barely answered one question when more popped up in Jason’s head. He peppered her with questions, needing to comprehend the system, though it seemed to him to be nothing but confusion and disorder. From what he could tell, he stood right in the middle of the chaos, and he needed to bring it to order if he was going to stay alive.

“How can my Energy affect things?”

“That’s a good question,” Emily said, then smiled up at the flight attendant when she stopped to offer them a drink. Both accepted a plastic cup of water and a bag of chips, then waited for the woman to move on down the aisle before continuing their conversation.

“What you have to understand is that there is a perfect order in everything. Within a crowd of thousands of people in the streets of New York, there is a perfect order. Even the universe, with its billions of stars, has a perfect order. Energy on our planet seeks the Librium, so when an outburst violates it, all the other Energy tries to find ways to restore it. Your appearance may disturb the balance, and bring about chaos that even the Unsighted will feel, though they won’t have any idea why it’s happening.”

“And this is all the result of my dreams?” he asked.

“Dreams?” She shook her head and fixed her eyes on Jason. “They aren’t dreams. They’re ‘fusions.’ And now that you’ve mentioned them, can you tell me what you saw?”

He’d been afraid she’d ask that. Of everything he’d experienced so far, the fusions were the worst part. The sense of being inside the victims’ minds and bodies as they were being torn to shreds was something he didn’t want to revisit. But she needed to know, so he took a sip of water, then told her.

“At first I didn’t pay too much attention to them,” he admitted. “I thought they were just awful nightmares, and they sort of faded from my memory. But I was inside those people’s minds all the time, the same way I was inside yours. Pariah or his people tortured, then killed those people—and me.”

Her eyes widened. “You were within the minds of the Doomed!” The news seemed to impress her, but it had lost its novelty with Jason.

“Yeah, except I saw you in the ladies’ room, and you’re not the Doomed.”

“I created that one on purpose. Your last fusion was supposed to be an exception,” Emily said. “I broke the defense of your mind so you would find me, then instilled the vision into your brain.”

Jason grimaced. “That was quite painful, I must say, when you broke into my mind. Wait. You instilled a vision in my brain? Does that mean you blocked the others? I won’t have to have these fusions anymore?”