Wild Cards V (47 page)

“No one knows more about Hartmann than Sara Morgenstern.” Misha waved away Gimli's suggestion. “Allah's dreams have shown me her face. She is the one who will destroy Hartmann, not Chrysalis.”

“Right. She's Hartmann's lover. We think Hartmann's got mind powers—so who's he most likely to control?” The headache was slamming at Gimli's temples now, and his head felt packed full of mucus. “We have to go to Chrysalis.”

“We don't know that Chrysalis would have any interest in helping us. Maybe Hartmann controls her as well. My visions—”

“Your visions are crap, lady, and I'm getting fucking tired of hearing about them.”

“They are Allah's gift.”

“They're a gift from the wild card, and every last joker knows what's in
that
package.” Gimli heard the door to the warehouse open. His gaze spun away from Misha to see Polyakov standing there. “Where the hell are you going?”

Polyakov exhaled sharply. “I've heard enough. I won't be caught with fools. Go to Chrysalis or go to Morgenstern—I don't care which. I even wish you luck; it may work. But I won't be associated with it.”

“You're walking?” Gimli said in disbelief.

“We have a common interest, as I've said. That seems to be all. You do as you like; you don't need me for that. I will pursue this my own way. If I uncover anything of interest, I will contact you.”

“You try something on your own and you're more likely to get caught. You'll alert Hartmann that people are after him.”

Polyakov shrugged. “If Hartmann is the threat you think he is, he already knows that.” He nodded to Gimli, to Misha, to File and Peanut. He stepped outside and closed the door softly behind himself.

Gimli could feel the gazes of the others on him. He gestured obscenely at the door. “To hell with him,” he said loudly. “We don't need him.”

“Then I go to Sara,” Misha insisted. “She will help.”

You don't have a choice. Not now.

Gimli nodded reluctantly. “All right,” he sighed. “Peanut will get you a plane ticket to Washington. And I'll see Chrysalis.” He touched his hand to his forehead; it felt suspiciously warm. “In the meantime, I'm going to bed.”

Tuesday, 10:50
P.M.

Gimli had told her that she must be careful that no one was watching Sara's apartment. Misha thought the dwarf paranoid, but she waited several moments before crossing the street, watching. There was never a way to be sure—Sayyid, her husband, who had been in charge of all aspects of the Nur sect's security, would have agreed.

“No amateur will ever see a professional unless he wants to be seen,” she remembered his saying once. Thoughts of Sayyid brought back painful memories: his scornful voice, his overbearing manner, his monstrous body. She'd felt relief mingled with horror when he'd been struck down in front of her, his bones snapping like dry twigs, a low animal moaning coming from his crumpled body.…

Misha shuddered and crossed the street.

She pressed the intercom button at the front door, marveling again at the American obsession with ineffectual security—the door was beveled glass. It would hardly stop anyone desperate to enter. The voice that answered sounded tired and cautious. “Yes? Who's there?”

“This is Misha. Kahina. Please, I must talk with you.…”

There was a long silence. Misha thought that perhaps Sara wasn't going to answer when the intercom's speaker gave a dry click. “You may come up,” the voice said. “Second floor. Straight ahead.”

The door buzzer shrilled. For a moment Misha hesitated, not certain what to do, then pushed the door open. She entered the air-conditioned foyer and went up the stairs. The door was cracked open; in the space between the door and jamb, an eye stared at her as she approached. It withdrew, and Misha heard a chain rattling. The door opened wider, but only enough to let her pass. “Come in,” Sara said.

Sara was thinner than Misha remembered, almost gaunt. Her face was sallow and drawn; there were pouchy dark bags under the eyes. Her hair looked as if it hadn't been washed in days, lying limp and lusterless around her shoulders. She locked the door behind Misha, then leaned back against it.

“You look different, Kahina,” Sara said. “No
chador,
no veils, no bodyguards. But I remembered the voice, and your eyes.”

“We've both been changed,” Misha said softly, and saw pain flicker in Sara's dark-rimmed pupils.

“I guess we have. Life's a bitch, huh?” Sara pushed away from the door, knuckling at her eyes.

“You wrote about me, after … after the desert. I read it. You understood me. You have a kind soul, Sara.”

“I don't write much lately.” She went to the center of the living room. Only one lamp was on; Sara turned in dim shadow. “Listen, why don't you sit down? I'll get something to drink. What would you like?”

“Water.”

Sara shrugged. She went into the kitchen, came out a few minutes later with two tumblers. She handed one to Misha; Misha could smell alcohol in the other. Sara sat on the couch across from Misha and took a long swallow. “I've never been more frightened than the day in the desert,” she said. “I thought your brother—” She hesitated, glancing at Misha over the rim of the glass. “I thought he was utterly mad. I knew we were all going to die. And then…” She took a long sip.

“Then I cut his throat,” Misha finished. The words hurt; they always did. Neither one of them looked at the other. Misha put her tumbler on the table beside the couch. The chiming of ice against glass seemed impossibly loud.

“That must have been a very hard decision.”

“Harder than you could believe,” Misha answered. “The Nur was—and still is—Allah's prophet. He is my brother. He is the person my husband followed. I love him for Allah, for my family, for my husband. You've never been a woman in my society; you don't know the culture. You can't see the centuries of conditioning. What I did was impossible. I would rather have cut off my hand than allow it to do that.”

“Yet you did.”

“I don't think so,” Misha said softly. “I don't think you believe it, either.”

Sara's face was in darkness, haloed by backlit hair. Misha could see only the gleam of her eyes, the shimmer of water on her lips as she raised her glass again. “Kahina's dreams again?” Sara mocked, but Misha could hear the words tremble.

“I came to you in Damascus because of Allah's visions.”

“I remember.”

“Then you remember that in that vision Allah told me you and the senator were lovers. You remember that I saw a knife, and Sayyid struggling to take it from me. You remember that I saw how Hartmann had taken your distrust and transformed it, and how he would take
my
feelings and use them against me.”

“You said lots of things,” Sara protested. She huddled back deeper in the couch, hugging her knees to her chest. “It was all symbols and odd images. It could have meant anything.”

“The dwarf was in that vision, too,” Misha insisted. “You must remember—I told you. The dwarf was Gimli, in Berlin. Hartmann did the same thing there.”

Sara's breath was harsh. “Berlin—” she breathed. Then: “It's all coincidence. Gregg's a compassionate and warm man. I know that, better than you or anyone. I've seen him. I've been with him.”

“
Is
it coincidence? We both know what he is. He is an ace, a hidden one.”

“And I tell you that's impossible. There's a blood test. And even if it
were
true, how does that change things? He's still working for the rights and dignity of all people—unlike Barnett or your brother or terrorists like the JJS. You've given me nothing but innuendo against Gregg.”

“Allah's dreams—”

“They're
not
Allah's dreams,” Sara interrupted angrily. “It's just the damned wild card. Flashes of precognition. There are half a dozen aces with the same ability. You see glimpses of the possible futures, that's all: useless little previews that have nothing to do with any god.”

Sara's voice had risen. Misha could see her hand trembling as she took another drink. “What did
you
think he'd done, Sara?” she asked. “Why did
you
once hate him?”

Misha had thought that Sara might deny it; she didn't. “I was wrong. I thought … I thought he might have killed my sister. There were coincidences, yes, but I was
wrong
, Misha.”

“Yet I can see that you're frightened because you might have been right, because what I'm saying might be the truth. My dreams tell me—they tell me you've been wondering since Berlin. They tell me you're frightened because you remember one other thing I told you in Damascus: that what he did to me, he would also do to you. Don't you notice how your feelings for him change when he's with you, and doesn't that also make you wonder?”

“
Damn
you!” Sara shouted. She flung the tumbler aside. It thudded against the wall as she rose to her feet. “You have no
right
!”

“I have proof.” Misha spoke softly into Sara's rage. She looked calmly upward into the woman's glare.

“Dreams,” Sara spat.

“More than dreams. At the mosque, during the fighting, the senator was shot. I have his jacket. I had the blood analyzed. The infection is there—your wild card virus.”

Sara shook her head wildly. “No. That's what
you
want the tests to show.”

“Or Hartmann had his own blood test falsified. That would be easy for him, wouldn't it?” Misha persisted. The wild agony in Sara tore at Misha, yet she persisted. Sara was the key—the visions all said that she was. “And it would mean that perhaps you were right about your sister. It would explain what happened with me. It would explain what happened in Berlin. It would explain everything, all the questions you've had.”

“Then go to the press with this proof.”

“I am. Right now.”

Sara's head swayed back and forth in dogged refusal. “It's not enough.”

“Maybe not by itself. We need all that you can tell us. You must know more—other strange incidents, other deaths…”

Sara was still shaking her head, but her shoulders slumped and the anger had drained away. She turned from Misha. “I can't trust you,” she said. “Please. Just go away.”

“Look at me, Sara. We're sisters in this. We've both been hurt, and I want justice for that, as you want justice for your sister. We cry and bleed and there's no healing for us until we
know.
Sara, I know how we can mix love and hate. We're related in that strange, awful way. We've both allowed love to blind us. I love my brother, but I also hate what he's done. You love Hartmann, and yet here's a darker Hartmann underneath. You can't move against him because to do so would prove that giving yourself was a mistake, because when he's
here
all you can think about is the Hartmann you love. You'd have to admit that you were wrong. You'd have to admit that you let yourself love someone who was using you. So you wait.”

There was no answer. Misha sighed and nodded. She couldn't say any more, not when each word tore a visible wound in Sara. She moved toward the door, touching Sara gently on the back as she passed. Misha could feel Sara's shoulders moving with silent tears. Misha's hand was on the knob when Sara spoke behind her, her voice choked.

“You swear it's his jacket? You have it?”

Misha kept her hand on the knob, not daring to turn, not allowing herself to feel hope. “Yes.”

“Do you trust Tachyon?”

“The alien? I don't know him. Gimli doesn't seem to like him. But I will trust him if you do.”

“I have to be in New York later this week. Meet me in front of the Jokertown Clinic Thursday evening at six-thirty. Bring the jacket. We'll have Tachyon examine it, and then we'll see. We'll see, that's all. Is it enough?”

Misha almost gasped with the relief. She wanted to laugh, wanted to hug Sara and cry with her. But she only nodded. “I'll be there. I promise you, Sara. I want the truth, that's all.”

“And if Tachyon says it proves nothing?”

“Then I'll learn to accept the guilt for what I did myself.” Misha started to turn the knob, stopped. “If I'm not there, know that it's because he stopped me. You'll have to decide what to do then.”

“Which gives you a convenient out,” Sara said derisively. “All you have to do is not show.”

“You don't believe that. Do you?”

Silence.

Misha turned the knob and went out.

Tuesday, 10:00
P.M.

Chrysalis swung open the door to her office. She paid very little attention to the dwarf who sat in her chair, his bare feet propped up on her desk. She shut the door—the sounds of another busy night at the Crystal Palace dropped to a distant tidal soughing. “Good evening, Gimli.”

Gimli was feeling rotten. The lack of surprise in Chrysalis's startling eyes only made him feel worse. “I should learn that you're never caught off guard.”

She gave him a tight-lipped smile that floated over a webbing of muscles and tendons. “I've known you were back for weeks. That's old news. So how's your cold?”

Gimli sniffed, a long, wet inhalation. Another chill rattled down his spine like a tray of ice cubes. “Shitty. I feel like hell. I've had a fever I haven't been able to kick for two days now. And I've evidently got somebody in my organization who can't keep his or her mouth shut.” He gave her a rueful grimace.

“You wouldn't get colds if you'd wear shoes. You brought me a package, too.”

“Fuck,” Gimli spat out. He swung his legs down and hopped from the chair with a grimace. The sudden movement made him dizzy, and he steadied himself against the desk with a hand. “I might as well have come in the front door. Why don't we just skip the conversation entirely and you just give me an answer?”