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Chapter Eight

The room heat on high, Charon was thoroughly kicked back in one of the penthouse suites at the Cambridge Hotel. Unable to sleep for the pain, he'd ordered some good booze from room service, lined up his pill collection, and popped the ones that might help him get through the next few hours until he came up with Plan B. It didn't used to be like that for him. He always had a Plan B, with C, D, E, and F if needed, but these days it was harder and harder to focus on more than one thing at a time. Like the rush he'd gotten on the pyramid. No distractions from that gleeful joy. The downside being no way around the misery he was going through now. His body was giving him royal rotten hell as the disease worked to reassert itself for the setback he'd handed it.

Waiting for the meds to kick in, he distracted himself from the stubborn pain and the frustration of his failed hit on Dun by flipping through his complimentary copy of the Toronto Times.

It had all the usual Strum und Drang side by side with the repetitive daily-living crap. That was the way of things: total disasters are fine so long as they don't happen to you, isn't it a pity, but all's well here. You'd think seeing the global body count piling up and having each catastrophe presented in graphic detail over their dinner, not to mention forty-eight times a day on the boob tube, would wise people up about the world being a Nasty Place to Live. Yet—and this was the knee-cracking kicker—there was always an undercurrent of shocked surprise in the reporting. Was it an act put on for the masses, or what? He was still trying to figure that one.

Huh. They should live a stretch of his life, see the things he'd seen—and done. That'd turn them inside out. Literally.

"And, man-oh-man, you ain't seen nothing, yet," he chuckled, then paused and winced, his breath short again. Things were getting worse, more painful than before. He took a different pill, chugging it down with the whiskey. You weren't supposed to do that, but Jesus palomino, he was dying, what's the worst that could happen now?

He gave it ten, then popped an extra. The edge slowly softened and withdrew for the time being. That had been a bad one. He'd have to wind things up here quick while he could still function.

So, how to take out fang-boy and his doll of delights . . . hello . . . ?

Drawn by the headline, he fastened on a short inside piece below the fold about the bizarre accident on 401 that morning, a car going out of control on ice, a freak gust of wind slamming it into—he grinned at the name of the woman driving: Sabra du Lac. It just had to be witchy-girl. Who else could have a moniker like that? Jeez, they didn't even try to get her a decent cover name when she relocated here from the other coast. Must have cost a fortune to forge the paperwork. Where did they take her . . . ?

He laughed. Oh, man, they were making it just too easy. St. Michael's Hospital was just around the block. Even in his shape he could walk it.

What the hell, why not? The pills were starting to kick in. He'd have a one-hour window before they knocked him into tomorrow. Plenty of time to suss out the lay of the land, figure a possible ambush. If Dun was there . . . assume he was, since that would explain his overnight bag and hurry to get moving. One thing you could count on was the way he hung on to that little piece of ass. With her being human again he'd probably be freaked out of his mind about her. Off guard.

Oh, hell-yeah, baby.

But even with that possibility, Charon would have avoid him, avoid a physical confrontation, but still . . . it couldn't hurt to be prepared to improvise. Just in case an opportunity popped up. Cripes, it was a hospital; the place was set up for taking people apart and putting them together. All he had to do was make sure the pieces were too completely scrambled for reassembly.

Charon pulled on his heavy overcoat, gloves, and wrapped a thick muffler around his face. The cold hit him harder than it used to, like everything else. After a moment's thought, he found the eye patch and put it on as well. There'd be security cameras all over that place. Might as well give them something memorable to focus on. The same principal worked for people, too. Most tended to remember the patch, not the man wearing it. Damn, he should have thought of using the scam centuries ago.

It was well after 4:00 A.M. One of the night nurses came to check on Sabra. Philip Bourland roused enough to watch, then couldn't sink back to his doze again. He'd been told—with considerable sympathy, for the staff was excellent—his presence wasn't necessary, that they'd call him if Sabra woke, but he'd be damned before he budged just yet.

If she woke. The way the nurse said it gave him hope that Sabra would come around. Thousands of people came into their care here every year, with such experience they had to get a feel for each patient and know who would make it, who would not, if only on a subconscious level. Had she said if there's a change which was more ambiguous, he might have been more pessimistic.

He still wouldn't have left, though.

Philip stood and stretched, stiff and sore from being propped in the chair for much of the night, but didn't care. Aspirin would take care of it easily enough. He wished it was that simple for Sabra.

As Richard had done before him, Philip went to stand by her bedside. He wanted more than anything to feed some of his own strength into her, keep her going, bring her back. If there was a way of doing it he'd have made it happen. Seeing her so still and helpless against his memory of her normal boundless vitality, it wasn't fair or right. She was a good woman, not deserving of such a turn.

He wondered if Richard knew just how much he loved her.

You try not to show it, to spare the other man's feelings.  

Of course he'd known from the first she and Richard were involved with each other and had been for a long time, but Sabra said it wasn't exclusive, that Richard wouldn't mind.

Philip minded. He had too much respect for Richard to do him an ill turn. "I'm old-fashioned that way," he told her.

"So am I," she said, smiling. "You've no idea."

It was the summer he'd adopted Michael, and not long after she'd moved to Toronto. He and the boy were still devastated from the loss of Stephanie, Elena, and Seraphina. Had his own daughter and grandchildren been murdered it couldn't have hurt more. Sabra couldn't take away the pain, but she had a way of making it easier to bear just by being around, and she was over at the house often, looking out for Michael, helping him.

Helping me as well, Philip admitted, noticing her a lot more than he thought he should.

She, being perceptive, also turned out to be receptive, but did not resort to any obvious flirting. A look combined with a warm smile here and there were enough to set his heart racing into overdrive. Then one night, while Michael was asleep in his room, she stayed on later than usual, and they got to talking in Philip's office. First it was about schools, private versus public for Michael, then on to other subjects.

Philip had no memory of the conversation, yet Sabra's eyes and voice held his whole attention. In a "what the hell" moment, he'd opened a bottle of wine. That loosened him up a bit, but not to the point of pressing things even though they'd moved from chairs to the big leather sofa. They were chuckling over some point or other, one of Richard's eccentricities, perhaps, then Sabra was somehow very close. It seemed the most natural thing in the world for her to be kissing him like that. He started to kiss back, then remembered Richard and eased away.

She's so damned young, she has no idea what she's about on this.  

Which turned out to be completely wrong. She knew exactly what she was doing and what she wanted, but she also eased away to hear him out. Then she shook her head over Philip's diplomatically worded qualms.

"Richard and I have always been like this. When we want to be together, we are, and when we're apart . . ."

"How could he not want you all to himself? And you him?"

"He does. He has. I do and have. Philip, it's all right. He knows."

"Oh, my God."

Sabra laughed at his chagrin. "He has no objections whatsoever."

"How can he not?"

"Richard and I are each free to go our own way. It's always worked for us."

He didn't know what to say to that, except for holding a secret relief that they'd not picked him out for some exotic threesome activity. His dignity wouldn't have stood for it. "It's brilliant, but absurd. You're utterly wonderful, but I'm much too old for you."

There it was, his greatest apprehension and also his last, best line of defense. He'd said it just right: resolutely, but without self-pity or giving offense, just a statement of irrefutable fact, allowing her a graceful exit.

It should have worked, too.

Sabra only burst into laughter.

After a moment, he began to laugh, too. He blamed the wine.

After another moment she was back in his arms giving and receiving a second kiss. This time when he pulled away it was to allow himself to look at her anew. She was absolutely "breath taking," in the literal two-word sense. He'd not been this stirred up by a woman in years.

That smile of hers—was "bewitching" also too old-fashioned a term? Whatever, it worked. With surprising, insistent strength, still laughing a little, Sabra pulled him on top of her, and they were thrashing about on the sofa like couple of sex-starved teenagers. Dear God, but the energy of it, where the hell had he been keeping it all these years? She seemed to bring it right out of him, in more ways than one. He'd never been so focused, hardly noticing when they rolled in seeming slow motion from the sofa to the more spacious floor. Kissing and fondling in their heat, exploring and tearing off clothes all at once, how had they managed?

And then it came down to that most intimate part of the exchange, and for him it was not only about flesh into flesh but soul meeting soul. It's one thing to shed clothes and share bodies, it's quite another to summon the courage to allow your soul to be seen by another. Everything was there in the eyes . . . or not. Adults often had trouble holding a steady gaze with each other, even when they were in love. It could be too personal an invasion, taken as a challenge or judgmental, all the wrong things, so most never tried for very long.

When you looked into your partner's eyes and saw . . . what? Each and every time it was different, even with the same partner. As they lived and grew, so changed that soul behind their eyes, revealed, if one dared to trust, dared to be seen.

Philip dared while looking at Sabra's soul and . . .

 . . . saw himself through her eyes.

That couldn't have been right, but the longer he looked in wonder as he pushed into her, bringing her nearer to her peak, the more it became a certainty. She looked right back, exultant, wholly centered on him.

He suddenly knew he was loved, without restraint, without conditions, with all her heart, here and now.

He couldn't help but return it.

She called out his name in her crisis, her open gaze still locked on his face as he rode through it with her. She understood what this meant to him. He'd never before had that with any woman. She let him see.

And in that moment, he experienced her climax as well as his own. Until now he'd never known that half of it. Sabra took him there.

Good God.

Was "devastating" the word? Close. As close as one could get.

The French had gotten it so right, the petite mort, because afterward he simply lay like a dead thing, unable to move because his overloaded senses were still trying to catch up with and process what had just happened to them.

All he could do was continue to look into her eyes and hold her until sleep seized him away.

They were still close when he woke a bit later. Naked, on his side, the carpeted floor hard, but with her soft, warm little body tucked firmly against his, her back to him.

She sighed, then giggled.

"What?" he whispered, his lips right by her ear. Her hair smelled of flowers. Real ones.

"Just something Richard told me right after he noticed that I liked you."

Philip wasn't sure he wanted to know, but went with it. "Which was . . . ?

"He said, 'Please don't break him.' "

"Oh, really?" Now that was funny.

"He should have said it to you instead, about me." Another giggle that went all through her, transmitting to him via her flesh where they touched. A lot of that. They were like two spoons, with her delightfully bare ass right against his . . . oh, my, this is very nice. It got better when she responded to his questing caress.

No need to look into her eyes this time.

And now her lovely clear eyes were shut, with tubes and wires attached to her fragile flesh, her battered body shielded by a thin sheet and bandaging, and only the beep of a monitor to tell him she still lived.

When he wept, it was with his hand before his face so she didn't have to see what turmoil and terror for her had done to his soul.

He brushed his fingers against the one wisp of her hair that had escaped the gauze dressings, then went back to sit and wait and pray.

Damn. She's so young, a sweet, caring woman not at all deserving of such a cruel turn. Why her? Why . . .

The regular slow beep of the monitor lulled him. So long as it continued all was well . . .

Philip let his head droop. The scent of the roses he'd brought floated up to him. That helped. She had to wake and see them. And smile. All really would be well once she opened her eyes and smiled again.

So powerful was his confidence in that, he actually saw it take place in his mind. Sometime tomorrow she would come awake. She likely wouldn't remember the accident, but she would be back with them. That's all that mattered.

His waking dream shifted to reality a moment, and he seemed to be just slightly outside himself, seeing his big form slumped in the chair, his long legs stretched toward the wall so as not to trip the staff when they came in. He listened on one level to the routine of the ICU ward going on outside the glassed-in room, taking comfort from its calm. He'd barely noticed the other patients, but they also had people, families waiting on them, hoping, praying for a recovery. The poor young man over there, body alive, but his head turned to pulp when his cycle went out from under him on road ice. No helmet. An older woman on that side, brought in when her heart kept stopping during surgery.

Then out in the hall was the special guard he'd arranged for and got. A tall man with the rare ability to make himself unobtrusive despite his severe dark suit and multiple concealed weapons.

Philip had also reluctantly accepted the oddness surrounding Sabra's accident and done what he could toward that end by bringing in the paranormal group to investigate. For whatever else—just in case there was a more corporeal threat afoot—that's why the guard was there.

Now, if Richard would just open up and say what he knew about it.

Pressing him would do no good. Whoever he'd worked for and whatever he'd been involved in before taking on the identity of one Richard Dun, security specialist, he must have been damned good at it. It wasn't hard to believe that he'd been involved in some type of black ops training and projects. Maybe when this was all over he'd let slip a little more information. But Philip had a name: Richard d'Orleans. Couldn't be many like that about. Easy to trace with the right contacts, and he had plenty of those here and abroad . . .

Philip's waking dream was gradually taken over by the sleeping kind, where he had no control over what crossed his mind's eye. Those were not always pleasant. This time he dreamed of something black flowing into the ICU ward, rising up like a walking cloud.

Only no one else saw it. They went about their business unaware. How could they possibly miss the damn thing?

It drifted purposely toward him, filling the glassed-in room with itself.

Solid. The thing was solid. It fell on him, dragging his sleeping form from the chair with iron-hard strength. He crashed hard on his back. It knelt heavily on his chest. He punched and clawed and thought he connected, but the pressure was crushing, crushing, crushing; he couldn't breathe.

He fought until his air ran out. The thing utterly obliterated him.

Puffing hard with the sweat running free from the exertion, Charon stood away from the big man's body where it lay on the polished floor. For a bare, hopeful moment he thought the pale-haired dude might be Richard Dun, but no such luck. Bagging two in one would have been great, but go with what's handed you and all that. Charon could have fed off the man's energy, but he didn't have enough of the right kind to do any good. It took energy to take in energy. You could be surrounded by food and not have enough strength to lift it to your mouth. That was his situation. I got only enough juice for one shot. Priming for the pump. 

Lancelot could walk in any second, too, better hurry—life was short in more ways than one.

So always have dessert first.  

Charon flipped up the eye patch and with his fading Sight concentrated hard on the frail, tiny woman on the bed. No contest, even in a coma she was still one hell of a heavy hitter. The protections surrounding her threatened to sear his skin like the sun. It would be much safer to take her out from six feet away with one of the wadcutters in the pistol he'd smuggled in. That's what he'd intended on doing given the chance.

Except for the stuff inside eating him alive. The way it was growing now, in another day he'd be in a bed just like that with the best modern meds dripping into one arm, keeping his body going, and in the other hand a button leading to a pump so he could dose himself with painkillers, and they never gave you enough of those. Damn, he could have learned a lot from this bunch in his early days when he was still refining his torture technique.

He reached forward and tasted ever so cautiously of the protective energies. Oh, yeah, that's the real hooch. And just under them was the good kind. What she was using to make herself better. Strong. Healing. Wouldn't want to overdo it, but he desperately needed the time that fix could buy him.

Charon moved next to the high bed, his open hand hovering over her face. There was no outward reaction from her, but he saw and felt the enveloping protections going wild. One freaking powerful hurricane-level wind swept out of the Otherside and tried to haul him away from her. It bit at him like the biggest damn dog ever, roaring around the room, flinging things about as he drained strength from her.

Oh, yeah, that IS the good stuff! 

The force of the fresh energy slammed into the top of his skull and down to his feet. He swayed and staggered, but kept feeding. This was even better than Snaky's blood, there was more of it, and he didn't have to fight as hard for a drink. Full-bodied, baby, and then some. He felt it rushing through every part of him, meeting the out-of-control cancer cells and blasting them to screaming bits. Yeah, that'll teach 'em, mess with me, huh? Take that, why don'tcha?

But maybe—as fresh sweat broke out on him—too strong, like switching to bourbon after a lifetime of water. There was such a thing as alcohol poisoning. In the Yucatán he'd had his shields to hide him and time to prepare and maintain control over the flow; the old snake god hadn't been expecting trouble. This babe had all the doors bolted, with psychic razor wire surrounding her like a cocoon. Her energy was working in him, though, making the gains worth the pain-price.

He bared his teeth at her defenses, braced against the wind, and continued to feed, but people were beginning to notice. Someone in the nurses' station, maybe sensitive to Otherside matters, looked up and saw the stranger in the special room. Never mind that he was in doctor's scrubs, he wasn't supposed to be there.

Instead of coming to check herself, she made a detour to the doors opening on the hall. Through the whirling Otherside debris, Charon saw her bring in a new player, that security type in the suit who'd been cooling his heels ever so quietly. Feeding time was almost up, dammit.

The man directed the nurse to one side and approached with caution. Sensible fellow. She got on a phone, probably calling for reinforcements.

He spotted the big guy on the floor and pulled a gun.

Charon grinned. This could get interesting.

"Move away from her," the man said, aiming the weapon, textbook pose. "Hands up and move away."

Charon raised one hand, palm out, holding the other over the woman. Just a little redirection of the power and a mental nudge—

The security guy went flying backward too fast to register surprise. He whammed against the wall behind him, making a hell of a noisy landing and did not get up again.

Wow. That was impressive.  

The nurse gaped and dove behind her desk, dragging the phone along. The cavalry had to be on the way by now. Charon was reasonably sure he could fight off them and all their cousins, but that would only be channeling the energy, not storing it, not using it to heal himself. Wasteful. A hell of a lot of fun, but not too smart.

He went all out now. Both hands over the bitch, and take all he could while he could. This was prime feeding, too bad he had to hurry.

The rush made him dizzy-giddy in a good way, not the weakness kind when his pills were screwing with his brain chemistry, but the sort you get on a really fast plane ride with a wildman pilot. This one was all climb, no drop.

Of course, it couldn't last forever. The first jolt out of his fun was when she went into arrest. Major dip in the graph, but she still had plenty of juice left. He sucked it in . . .

Until something hit him.

He couldn't see it. Must be the opposition. Pissed, too.

Charon felt it first as a firm punch in the shoulder, which he ignored. The second strike had more meat to it. He was knocked straight back, struck the wall, cracking his head. He slid down, fast.

Ow. Not fun now.

Dizzy, no giddy. Man, someone was really pissed. What a howling in the wind.

He pushed partway from the floor and considered having a quick second helping, but the brouhaha had attracted too much attention. The nurse was emerging from behind the desk as other people crowded through the door, trying to assess what was going on. Several went to check on the security type, who was groggily stirring.

The energy high went to Charon's head like sucking beer through a straw. He could knock them all over and no problem, but . . . wasteful. No point. There wasn't anyone in that pack he couldn't take out the ordinary way in his sleep. Better to get out, digest the feast, and make good use of the high while he still had it.

Standing, he prepared to bull his way through the medical version of the Keystone Kops, but paused.

He grinned down at Sabra, shoving his black patch back in place. "Hey, baby, was it good for you, too?"

Blood streamed from her ears and closed eyes.

Bourland gave a violent start and tried to shove the overwhelming blackness away. Stubborn stuff, and he was so weak. No air for a while, now it was back in force and tasted odd. Then the restraining darkness evolved into a nurse struggling to keep an oxygen mask over his face. He still fought, but she won. Giving up, he let her do her job, and tried to sort out what had brought him to this confusion. He gradually regained full consciousness to a thunderous headache, and became aware of activity around him.

No longer in Sabra's room, he was outside on the floor, and there was all sorts of hell going on. Doctors and nurses were hustling, alarms buzzed, beeped, and shrilled. Strong enough now to fend off help, he lurched to his feet, horribly sick and wobbly-weak, and stared through the glass at the frenzy around Sabra. So many staff, security guards, and noise in this otherwise quiet place . . . what the hell happened? What was going on? He fumbled out his cell phone, and clumsily hit the autodial for Richard's number.

"Get down here," he said.

With a satisfied grunt, Charon eased deep into the broken-in backseat of the cab he waved down near the hospital. What a party. He should have fun like that every night. His body felt light for a change, the way it was supposed to feel, all parts in working order, sir. He figured he'd bought well over an hour of battery power, which should be enough.

That was a job well done, minimum of fuss, and even the security cameras turned out to be a snap. On his way out he'd cupped a hand over the front of one like muzzling a dog and, with the feedback cracking along the wires in ways that it shouldn't, given Realside physics, had shut down the whole system. Any recordings made prior to that would be unaffected, but so what? He'd be just another out-of-focus shape in an overcoat, the eye patch obscuring his face. There'd been no camera in the small room where he'd slipped the medical scrubs on over his street clothes and clipped on a stolen badge. Security, my ass. Hell, he could have walked in there wearing a clown suit and gone anywhere he liked.

Well, he was out now and on his way.

"Where to?" the driver asked.

"North to 401 until I say different."

"Sounds like a long trip. You sure?"

Charon put three hundred in U.S. bills over the seat top. Ben Franklin had fans on this side of the border. "I'm sure. Move it, I'm in a hurry."

Swallowing further questions, the driver sought out Yonge Street, going north to 401, then headed west, the first leg of the trip. Witchy babe lived—make that used to live—out in the boonies. Charon had scoped the place via maps and aerial photos, so it was almost like he'd been there earlier. Man, weren't computers a gas?

Despite the energy rush, he felt the pills he'd taken earlier trying to make him sleepy. Well, he could fight that off easy enough now. The pain had dulled down to almost nothing. If he could hold it off just a little longer . . .

The taxi's suspension swooped as they hit some change in the highway grading. God, but Canada was just the living end about road repair. Never finished, year after year, how did fang-boy put up with it? Well, too bad, soon none of that crap would matter. People would have other things to worry about than resurfacing the damn highways. Woozy in the gut, Charon rolled down a window and let the cold night air work on him. Too freaking hot in here, but he could deal. Every click of the meter took him closer to the brass ring.

Where had Lance gotten himself to, anyway? He was still tight with his old lady, so he should have been with her, not the other guy, whoever the hell he was. Put up a good fight, just lucky for him he didn't have the right kind of wattage or that would have been too bad, that's all she wrote.

The driver made the exit and they were barreling north, tires hissing loud on the wet road. Snowy fields and black fences sped past. Charon felt every bump and dip, but so long as the heap got them there he could hang on. They were in the home stretch. He gave secondary directions. The man said he knew the area and made the correct turns when they came.

Charon had no need to count down the minutes to their destination, he could feel things slowing inside of him. The power hit had helped a lot, but was not going to last. The one at Stonehenge had been good, Chichén Itzá the best, draining off the old ahkin had been a taste-treat sensation, but this must be the downside of the bell curve. He suspected the boosts would continue to shorten in duration until . . .

Hey, belt it, already. I'm almost there.  

He held things in, conserving himself until the driver slowed, checking mailboxes along a narrow road. When had they turned off here?

"This it?" The headlights fell on a new mailbox with the name 'du lac' on it in reflective letters.

"You got it, pal. I need you to wait." Charon dropped another c-note over the seat.

The driver still had change left above the meter charge from his original retainer. "Sure."

"Won't be long, but you can cut the motor."

The man did so, and Charon let himself out.

He trudged up a driveway cleared of snow along two narrow strips, just wide enough for car tires. There'd been a hell of a fall here recently, which was a good reason to live in the Caribbean. Maybe he'd go there afterward. Or not.

The house—more of a cottage, really—looked to be World War II vintage. With all her money you'd think she'd have done better for herself than a dump like this, but her choice probably had to do with the local energy lines or some crap like that. Lots of trees, you almost couldn't see the house for them. Evergreens and oaks. Very symbolic. Ho-hum predictable.

Lights showed behind the windows, but they were only part of the security system. Lance would have insisted she have one, probably installed it himself just to be sure. Yup, nothing was too good for his old lady.

Charon got past it in a very few minutes, but then he was an old hand at getting around such snags. He let himself inside by the front door and turned on more lights as though he owned the place.

Comfy living room, all the usual stuff, nothing too ancient or too new to give away the truth about her background. He knew one of them had a da Vinci or a Botticelli hanging on a wall like a magazine pinup. Well, it wasn't here. He was after something way more valuable, anyway.

Oh, hell.

It struck fast, felt like a killing constriction around his chest. For an instant he feared Snaky had invisibly returned somehow and was doing his crushing thing. Be just like him to change his size and come slithering up from Nowhere for a surprise ambush. Charon hastily backed out of the house, and the tightening abruptly eased.

Heart attack? No way. The pain was different from that or the cancer. It had nothing to do with his human-weak bod or his disease; witchy girl had some less prosaic protections set up in the place. He backed off more and used his Sight.

Holy moly, what a light show. Millennium bash in Times Square.

He wanted sunglasses. The babe knew her noodles. That kind of barrier was into overkill, and it was just the defense. She could have death traps rigged all through the place.

Hm. Maybe not. Her type had a thing against using that kind of power. They really should get over themselves and grow some sense.

Invasion was going to be a hell of a strain on his dwindling energy, so he'd have to hurry. Plan it out, then. Where would she keep the thing? Near an altar? Nah, her type was so far up the corporate ladder as to not really need one. Still, she might have something set up as kind of a respect thing. Look for one of those first. Besides, she wasn't the sort to shove her treasures under a mattress. He would guess it would be . . . ah, screw it, just go for the money and make it fast.

He took a deep breath and dove inside. The pressure wound tight around him again as invisible forces tried to expel his unwelcome presence, but he endured them. Sweat broke on his body. He tripped on things that weren't there, stumbled from one room to another, trying to sense his target while the pressure threatened to squeeze him in two.

Finally. In a back room that was chock-full of plants and grow-lights, he found it. She didn't even try to hide the thing. Good grief, it was right there, sitting like a decorating statement on its own table near one of those New Age style mini-fountains. You'd think she'd show it more reverence as hot as she and her boy-toy were to get hold of it in the first place.

Charon whipped off the piece of white gauzy silk covering and picked up the small cup. The pressure on him suddenly ceased. Okay, that was good. Made it, but jeeze, he was pooped. No reserves left. If he had to go through the gauntlet again . . . nah, break a window out for an exit. Keep it simple.

The trophy itself was not much to look at, being a kind of half-sphere less than a handspan across and made of humble brass not gold, but a mile away you could see it was the real magilla, the one and only, accept no substitutes, one hundred percent gen-u-ine Holy Grail.

Sweet.

So, how about a test drive?

He put the bowl, cup, whatever in one hand, held the other over it, took another deep breath . . . and oh-so-gently touched on the power. Had to be careful, this was like trying to hand-dip a thimble of water from Niagara at full rush. Lose your balance and you were in, over the edge, and bye-bye.

His hands shook. This was no place for amateurs.

Here it was: The moment of truth or consequences . . .

Pale light seemed to leap from the cup to his outstretched fingers like soft lighting. Warm tinglies traveled up his hand, wrist, up and up, the light fading the higher it went. His shoulder, yeah, something was working there, a decided warmth as it seeped into his chest, a definite heat when it hit his lymph glands.

Freaking hell, talk to me, baby!  

Free air, singing with the living energy of the plants, whooshed right to the bottom of his lungs, cleaning them out. He exhaled and his Sight picked out the microscopic particles of his disease hanging before him like black vapor.

Ohhh, yeaaah. This will do. Once he got it to the right place and could make a proper job of it. This would serve as a fine pick-me-up in the interim.

Then the air seemed to congeal. Shit, too much of a good thing. All the difference between getting a little sun tan and facing down a flamethrower. He fell away, knocking over the fountain. Crash, bang. Bull in a china shop interlude as he struggled to keep his feet. Water splashed everywhere, the pump whirring loudly with nothing to drive. Burn-out soon. For them both.

He hastily withdrew from the cleansing while his head was still on the end of his neck. The house's protections abruptly kicked in again, trying to get rid of him. Fine, he had the brass ring, time to exit, stage left; he was strong enough to deal with them now. He wrapped the little cup in the silk, slipped it in his coat pocket, and got the flock outta Dodge.

Hustling into the cab, he told the driver to take him back to Toronto. The meter was higher than Everest; the man cheerful, totally clueless about what going to happen at the end of the ride. He didn't have the kind of spiritual energy of the old ahkin or witchy girl, but now Charon had the means to change that. With the Grail and a little Otherside switcheroo he could order up room service whenever he needed from anyone at hand. By the time they got back to the city a light snack would hit the spot. He could get his cash back and remove a witness. Neat.

Charon hugged the precious Grail to himself, the anticipation making his heart thrum.

Not long after Bourland's call Richard arrived at the hospital with Michael, the two of them tearing up to the ICU ward. The news was what he feared most. The attack on Sabra had her on the edge. If not for the machines, she'd have slipped away already.

Bourland was in the hall outside, relegated there by a preoccupied and hyperbusy staff. He looked awful, ghastly pale and stinking of chloroform. Hospital security was all over, along with the police, and a couple more of the dark-suited security types he'd brought in. The ant nest was thoroughly stirred.

"What happened?" Richard demanded after he showed ID for the umpteenth time. They'd almost not allowed Michael in for not having one, but Richard fixed things with a single piercing look and an inarguable order to butt out. The cop had rocked back on his heels and let them pass.

Bourland had trouble finding the words; he looked to be in shock.

Richard leaned close. "You're scaring Michael. Get a grip."

Visibly pulling himself together, he set his teeth, nodding once. "Sorry. I don't know much, just what they've told me. Some man in medical scrubs and an eye patch got in. They saw him standing over Sabra. The security man tried to stop him and got thrown across the room for his trouble. They're treating him. Concussion."

"What happened to you?"

"Not sure. I was asleep in the chair." Bourland's face went scarlet. "They think he put me out with chloroform, something like that, then went after Sabra. Her life support alarms went off. The doctors should have gotten to her in time, but they can't figure out what's been done. Then they threw me out."

Richard looked through the glass inset on the door. Everyone was still working, still rushing about, focused on her. So long as they didn't stop . . .

Michael had not said a word since Richard roused him from sleep and told him they were leaving. "Uncle Richard? Dad . . . ?"

Bourland went to him. "It'll be all right."

The boy's head drooped. "Tell them it's like an aneurysm." He stumbled over the word as though he'd never said it before.

Bourland didn't pause to ask how Michael knew that; he bulled into the ICU and got someone to pay attention. Only after one of the doctors heard and took him seriously did he allow himself to be guided out of their way.

Richard fought off his own personal meltdown, holding everything at a distance. All he wanted was to rip the world apart at the seams. He managed not to for Michael's sake. And Bourland's. They did not need to see that side of him, ever.

Why hadn't his blood helped her? There should have been an improvement, or at least a strengthening. It would have begun working in her from the first, changing things, returning her to life and health.

Unless she'd been right. The dark Gift given once could not be given again.

The sheer helplessness surged over Richard, but he cast that to one side as well. There was only one way he could save her.

The Grail.

If he had the time to get to Sabra's house and back.

They had life-support machines. If they could keep her body going until his return . . . and then he'd hypnotize the whole damned hospital into forgetting if need be.

"Michael—I've got to go fetch something. Tell your father not to give up, have them put her on a machine if they must, but don't give up on her. I'm going to her house and back." He started for the exit.

But Michael seized his hand. Strongly, dragging him to a halt. "That is not for her."

He paused, resisting the reaction to shake clear. Michael held fast. "W-what?"

"That's not her road." The boy was very intense, very certain, not to be ignored.

How did he know? "It will make her well."

Michael streamed tears and shook his head. "That's not your road, either. You must take another."

The voice was Michael's, but the words were his own, from a long-ago time . . .

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Contents
Framed

Back | Next
Contents

Chapter Eight

The room heat on high, Charon was thoroughly kicked back in one of the penthouse suites at the Cambridge Hotel. Unable to sleep for the pain, he'd ordered some good booze from room service, lined up his pill collection, and popped the ones that might help him get through the next few hours until he came up with Plan B. It didn't used to be like that for him. He always had a Plan B, with C, D, E, and F if needed, but these days it was harder and harder to focus on more than one thing at a time. Like the rush he'd gotten on the pyramid. No distractions from that gleeful joy. The downside being no way around the misery he was going through now. His body was giving him royal rotten hell as the disease worked to reassert itself for the setback he'd handed it.

Waiting for the meds to kick in, he distracted himself from the stubborn pain and the frustration of his failed hit on Dun by flipping through his complimentary copy of the Toronto Times.

It had all the usual Strum und Drang side by side with the repetitive daily-living crap. That was the way of things: total disasters are fine so long as they don't happen to you, isn't it a pity, but all's well here. You'd think seeing the global body count piling up and having each catastrophe presented in graphic detail over their dinner, not to mention forty-eight times a day on the boob tube, would wise people up about the world being a Nasty Place to Live. Yet—and this was the knee-cracking kicker—there was always an undercurrent of shocked surprise in the reporting. Was it an act put on for the masses, or what? He was still trying to figure that one.

Huh. They should live a stretch of his life, see the things he'd seen—and done. That'd turn them inside out. Literally.

"And, man-oh-man, you ain't seen nothing, yet," he chuckled, then paused and winced, his breath short again. Things were getting worse, more painful than before. He took a different pill, chugging it down with the whiskey. You weren't supposed to do that, but Jesus palomino, he was dying, what's the worst that could happen now?

He gave it ten, then popped an extra. The edge slowly softened and withdrew for the time being. That had been a bad one. He'd have to wind things up here quick while he could still function.

So, how to take out fang-boy and his doll of delights . . . hello . . . ?

Drawn by the headline, he fastened on a short inside piece below the fold about the bizarre accident on 401 that morning, a car going out of control on ice, a freak gust of wind slamming it into—he grinned at the name of the woman driving: Sabra du Lac. It just had to be witchy-girl. Who else could have a moniker like that? Jeez, they didn't even try to get her a decent cover name when she relocated here from the other coast. Must have cost a fortune to forge the paperwork. Where did they take her . . . ?

He laughed. Oh, man, they were making it just too easy. St. Michael's Hospital was just around the block. Even in his shape he could walk it.

What the hell, why not? The pills were starting to kick in. He'd have a one-hour window before they knocked him into tomorrow. Plenty of time to suss out the lay of the land, figure a possible ambush. If Dun was there . . . assume he was, since that would explain his overnight bag and hurry to get moving. One thing you could count on was the way he hung on to that little piece of ass. With her being human again he'd probably be freaked out of his mind about her. Off guard.

Oh, hell-yeah, baby.

But even with that possibility, Charon would have avoid him, avoid a physical confrontation, but still . . . it couldn't hurt to be prepared to improvise. Just in case an opportunity popped up. Cripes, it was a hospital; the place was set up for taking people apart and putting them together. All he had to do was make sure the pieces were too completely scrambled for reassembly.

Charon pulled on his heavy overcoat, gloves, and wrapped a thick muffler around his face. The cold hit him harder than it used to, like everything else. After a moment's thought, he found the eye patch and put it on as well. There'd be security cameras all over that place. Might as well give them something memorable to focus on. The same principal worked for people, too. Most tended to remember the patch, not the man wearing it. Damn, he should have thought of using the scam centuries ago.

It was well after 4:00 A.M. One of the night nurses came to check on Sabra. Philip Bourland roused enough to watch, then couldn't sink back to his doze again. He'd been told—with considerable sympathy, for the staff was excellent—his presence wasn't necessary, that they'd call him if Sabra woke, but he'd be damned before he budged just yet.

If she woke. The way the nurse said it gave him hope that Sabra would come around. Thousands of people came into their care here every year, with such experience they had to get a feel for each patient and know who would make it, who would not, if only on a subconscious level. Had she said if there's a change which was more ambiguous, he might have been more pessimistic.

He still wouldn't have left, though.

Philip stood and stretched, stiff and sore from being propped in the chair for much of the night, but didn't care. Aspirin would take care of it easily enough. He wished it was that simple for Sabra.

As Richard had done before him, Philip went to stand by her bedside. He wanted more than anything to feed some of his own strength into her, keep her going, bring her back. If there was a way of doing it he'd have made it happen. Seeing her so still and helpless against his memory of her normal boundless vitality, it wasn't fair or right. She was a good woman, not deserving of such a turn.

He wondered if Richard knew just how much he loved her.

You try not to show it, to spare the other man's feelings.  

Of course he'd known from the first she and Richard were involved with each other and had been for a long time, but Sabra said it wasn't exclusive, that Richard wouldn't mind.

Philip minded. He had too much respect for Richard to do him an ill turn. "I'm old-fashioned that way," he told her.

"So am I," she said, smiling. "You've no idea."

It was the summer he'd adopted Michael, and not long after she'd moved to Toronto. He and the boy were still devastated from the loss of Stephanie, Elena, and Seraphina. Had his own daughter and grandchildren been murdered it couldn't have hurt more. Sabra couldn't take away the pain, but she had a way of making it easier to bear just by being around, and she was over at the house often, looking out for Michael, helping him.

Helping me as well, Philip admitted, noticing her a lot more than he thought he should.

She, being perceptive, also turned out to be receptive, but did not resort to any obvious flirting. A look combined with a warm smile here and there were enough to set his heart racing into overdrive. Then one night, while Michael was asleep in his room, she stayed on later than usual, and they got to talking in Philip's office. First it was about schools, private versus public for Michael, then on to other subjects.

Philip had no memory of the conversation, yet Sabra's eyes and voice held his whole attention. In a "what the hell" moment, he'd opened a bottle of wine. That loosened him up a bit, but not to the point of pressing things even though they'd moved from chairs to the big leather sofa. They were chuckling over some point or other, one of Richard's eccentricities, perhaps, then Sabra was somehow very close. It seemed the most natural thing in the world for her to be kissing him like that. He started to kiss back, then remembered Richard and eased away.

She's so damned young, she has no idea what she's about on this.  

Which turned out to be completely wrong. She knew exactly what she was doing and what she wanted, but she also eased away to hear him out. Then she shook her head over Philip's diplomatically worded qualms.

"Richard and I have always been like this. When we want to be together, we are, and when we're apart . . ."

"How could he not want you all to himself? And you him?"

"He does. He has. I do and have. Philip, it's all right. He knows."

"Oh, my God."

Sabra laughed at his chagrin. "He has no objections whatsoever."

"How can he not?"

"Richard and I are each free to go our own way. It's always worked for us."

He didn't know what to say to that, except for holding a secret relief that they'd not picked him out for some exotic threesome activity. His dignity wouldn't have stood for it. "It's brilliant, but absurd. You're utterly wonderful, but I'm much too old for you."

There it was, his greatest apprehension and also his last, best line of defense. He'd said it just right: resolutely, but without self-pity or giving offense, just a statement of irrefutable fact, allowing her a graceful exit.

It should have worked, too.

Sabra only burst into laughter.

After a moment, he began to laugh, too. He blamed the wine.

After another moment she was back in his arms giving and receiving a second kiss. This time when he pulled away it was to allow himself to look at her anew. She was absolutely "breath taking," in the literal two-word sense. He'd not been this stirred up by a woman in years.

That smile of hers—was "bewitching" also too old-fashioned a term? Whatever, it worked. With surprising, insistent strength, still laughing a little, Sabra pulled him on top of her, and they were thrashing about on the sofa like couple of sex-starved teenagers. Dear God, but the energy of it, where the hell had he been keeping it all these years? She seemed to bring it right out of him, in more ways than one. He'd never been so focused, hardly noticing when they rolled in seeming slow motion from the sofa to the more spacious floor. Kissing and fondling in their heat, exploring and tearing off clothes all at once, how had they managed?

And then it came down to that most intimate part of the exchange, and for him it was not only about flesh into flesh but soul meeting soul. It's one thing to shed clothes and share bodies, it's quite another to summon the courage to allow your soul to be seen by another. Everything was there in the eyes . . . or not. Adults often had trouble holding a steady gaze with each other, even when they were in love. It could be too personal an invasion, taken as a challenge or judgmental, all the wrong things, so most never tried for very long.

When you looked into your partner's eyes and saw . . . what? Each and every time it was different, even with the same partner. As they lived and grew, so changed that soul behind their eyes, revealed, if one dared to trust, dared to be seen.

Philip dared while looking at Sabra's soul and . . .

 . . . saw himself through her eyes.

That couldn't have been right, but the longer he looked in wonder as he pushed into her, bringing her nearer to her peak, the more it became a certainty. She looked right back, exultant, wholly centered on him.

He suddenly knew he was loved, without restraint, without conditions, with all her heart, here and now.

He couldn't help but return it.

She called out his name in her crisis, her open gaze still locked on his face as he rode through it with her. She understood what this meant to him. He'd never before had that with any woman. She let him see.

And in that moment, he experienced her climax as well as his own. Until now he'd never known that half of it. Sabra took him there.

Good God.

Was "devastating" the word? Close. As close as one could get.

The French had gotten it so right, the petite mort, because afterward he simply lay like a dead thing, unable to move because his overloaded senses were still trying to catch up with and process what had just happened to them.

All he could do was continue to look into her eyes and hold her until sleep seized him away.

They were still close when he woke a bit later. Naked, on his side, the carpeted floor hard, but with her soft, warm little body tucked firmly against his, her back to him.

She sighed, then giggled.

"What?" he whispered, his lips right by her ear. Her hair smelled of flowers. Real ones.

"Just something Richard told me right after he noticed that I liked you."

Philip wasn't sure he wanted to know, but went with it. "Which was . . . ?

"He said, 'Please don't break him.' "

"Oh, really?" Now that was funny.

"He should have said it to you instead, about me." Another giggle that went all through her, transmitting to him via her flesh where they touched. A lot of that. They were like two spoons, with her delightfully bare ass right against his . . . oh, my, this is very nice. It got better when she responded to his questing caress.

No need to look into her eyes this time.

And now her lovely clear eyes were shut, with tubes and wires attached to her fragile flesh, her battered body shielded by a thin sheet and bandaging, and only the beep of a monitor to tell him she still lived.

When he wept, it was with his hand before his face so she didn't have to see what turmoil and terror for her had done to his soul.

He brushed his fingers against the one wisp of her hair that had escaped the gauze dressings, then went back to sit and wait and pray.

Damn. She's so young, a sweet, caring woman not at all deserving of such a cruel turn. Why her? Why . . .

The regular slow beep of the monitor lulled him. So long as it continued all was well . . .

Philip let his head droop. The scent of the roses he'd brought floated up to him. That helped. She had to wake and see them. And smile. All really would be well once she opened her eyes and smiled again.

So powerful was his confidence in that, he actually saw it take place in his mind. Sometime tomorrow she would come awake. She likely wouldn't remember the accident, but she would be back with them. That's all that mattered.

His waking dream shifted to reality a moment, and he seemed to be just slightly outside himself, seeing his big form slumped in the chair, his long legs stretched toward the wall so as not to trip the staff when they came in. He listened on one level to the routine of the ICU ward going on outside the glassed-in room, taking comfort from its calm. He'd barely noticed the other patients, but they also had people, families waiting on them, hoping, praying for a recovery. The poor young man over there, body alive, but his head turned to pulp when his cycle went out from under him on road ice. No helmet. An older woman on that side, brought in when her heart kept stopping during surgery.

Then out in the hall was the special guard he'd arranged for and got. A tall man with the rare ability to make himself unobtrusive despite his severe dark suit and multiple concealed weapons.

Philip had also reluctantly accepted the oddness surrounding Sabra's accident and done what he could toward that end by bringing in the paranormal group to investigate. For whatever else—just in case there was a more corporeal threat afoot—that's why the guard was there.

Now, if Richard would just open up and say what he knew about it.

Pressing him would do no good. Whoever he'd worked for and whatever he'd been involved in before taking on the identity of one Richard Dun, security specialist, he must have been damned good at it. It wasn't hard to believe that he'd been involved in some type of black ops training and projects. Maybe when this was all over he'd let slip a little more information. But Philip had a name: Richard d'Orleans. Couldn't be many like that about. Easy to trace with the right contacts, and he had plenty of those here and abroad . . .

Philip's waking dream was gradually taken over by the sleeping kind, where he had no control over what crossed his mind's eye. Those were not always pleasant. This time he dreamed of something black flowing into the ICU ward, rising up like a walking cloud.

Only no one else saw it. They went about their business unaware. How could they possibly miss the damn thing?

It drifted purposely toward him, filling the glassed-in room with itself.

Solid. The thing was solid. It fell on him, dragging his sleeping form from the chair with iron-hard strength. He crashed hard on his back. It knelt heavily on his chest. He punched and clawed and thought he connected, but the pressure was crushing, crushing, crushing; he couldn't breathe.

He fought until his air ran out. The thing utterly obliterated him.

Puffing hard with the sweat running free from the exertion, Charon stood away from the big man's body where it lay on the polished floor. For a bare, hopeful moment he thought the pale-haired dude might be Richard Dun, but no such luck. Bagging two in one would have been great, but go with what's handed you and all that. Charon could have fed off the man's energy, but he didn't have enough of the right kind to do any good. It took energy to take in energy. You could be surrounded by food and not have enough strength to lift it to your mouth. That was his situation. I got only enough juice for one shot. Priming for the pump. 

Lancelot could walk in any second, too, better hurry—life was short in more ways than one.

So always have dessert first.  

Charon flipped up the eye patch and with his fading Sight concentrated hard on the frail, tiny woman on the bed. No contest, even in a coma she was still one hell of a heavy hitter. The protections surrounding her threatened to sear his skin like the sun. It would be much safer to take her out from six feet away with one of the wadcutters in the pistol he'd smuggled in. That's what he'd intended on doing given the chance.

Except for the stuff inside eating him alive. The way it was growing now, in another day he'd be in a bed just like that with the best modern meds dripping into one arm, keeping his body going, and in the other hand a button leading to a pump so he could dose himself with painkillers, and they never gave you enough of those. Damn, he could have learned a lot from this bunch in his early days when he was still refining his torture technique.

He reached forward and tasted ever so cautiously of the protective energies. Oh, yeah, that's the real hooch. And just under them was the good kind. What she was using to make herself better. Strong. Healing. Wouldn't want to overdo it, but he desperately needed the time that fix could buy him.

Charon moved next to the high bed, his open hand hovering over her face. There was no outward reaction from her, but he saw and felt the enveloping protections going wild. One freaking powerful hurricane-level wind swept out of the Otherside and tried to haul him away from her. It bit at him like the biggest damn dog ever, roaring around the room, flinging things about as he drained strength from her.

Oh, yeah, that IS the good stuff! 

The force of the fresh energy slammed into the top of his skull and down to his feet. He swayed and staggered, but kept feeding. This was even better than Snaky's blood, there was more of it, and he didn't have to fight as hard for a drink. Full-bodied, baby, and then some. He felt it rushing through every part of him, meeting the out-of-control cancer cells and blasting them to screaming bits. Yeah, that'll teach 'em, mess with me, huh? Take that, why don'tcha?

But maybe—as fresh sweat broke out on him—too strong, like switching to bourbon after a lifetime of water. There was such a thing as alcohol poisoning. In the Yucatán he'd had his shields to hide him and time to prepare and maintain control over the flow; the old snake god hadn't been expecting trouble. This babe had all the doors bolted, with psychic razor wire surrounding her like a cocoon. Her energy was working in him, though, making the gains worth the pain-price.

He bared his teeth at her defenses, braced against the wind, and continued to feed, but people were beginning to notice. Someone in the nurses' station, maybe sensitive to Otherside matters, looked up and saw the stranger in the special room. Never mind that he was in doctor's scrubs, he wasn't supposed to be there.

Instead of coming to check herself, she made a detour to the doors opening on the hall. Through the whirling Otherside debris, Charon saw her bring in a new player, that security type in the suit who'd been cooling his heels ever so quietly. Feeding time was almost up, dammit.

The man directed the nurse to one side and approached with caution. Sensible fellow. She got on a phone, probably calling for reinforcements.

He spotted the big guy on the floor and pulled a gun.

Charon grinned. This could get interesting.

"Move away from her," the man said, aiming the weapon, textbook pose. "Hands up and move away."

Charon raised one hand, palm out, holding the other over the woman. Just a little redirection of the power and a mental nudge—

The security guy went flying backward too fast to register surprise. He whammed against the wall behind him, making a hell of a noisy landing and did not get up again.

Wow. That was impressive.  

The nurse gaped and dove behind her desk, dragging the phone along. The cavalry had to be on the way by now. Charon was reasonably sure he could fight off them and all their cousins, but that would only be channeling the energy, not storing it, not using it to heal himself. Wasteful. A hell of a lot of fun, but not too smart.

He went all out now. Both hands over the bitch, and take all he could while he could. This was prime feeding, too bad he had to hurry.

The rush made him dizzy-giddy in a good way, not the weakness kind when his pills were screwing with his brain chemistry, but the sort you get on a really fast plane ride with a wildman pilot. This one was all climb, no drop.

Of course, it couldn't last forever. The first jolt out of his fun was when she went into arrest. Major dip in the graph, but she still had plenty of juice left. He sucked it in . . .

Until something hit him.

He couldn't see it. Must be the opposition. Pissed, too.

Charon felt it first as a firm punch in the shoulder, which he ignored. The second strike had more meat to it. He was knocked straight back, struck the wall, cracking his head. He slid down, fast.

Ow. Not fun now.

Dizzy, no giddy. Man, someone was really pissed. What a howling in the wind.

He pushed partway from the floor and considered having a quick second helping, but the brouhaha had attracted too much attention. The nurse was emerging from behind the desk as other people crowded through the door, trying to assess what was going on. Several went to check on the security type, who was groggily stirring.

The energy high went to Charon's head like sucking beer through a straw. He could knock them all over and no problem, but . . . wasteful. No point. There wasn't anyone in that pack he couldn't take out the ordinary way in his sleep. Better to get out, digest the feast, and make good use of the high while he still had it.

Standing, he prepared to bull his way through the medical version of the Keystone Kops, but paused.

He grinned down at Sabra, shoving his black patch back in place. "Hey, baby, was it good for you, too?"

Blood streamed from her ears and closed eyes.

Bourland gave a violent start and tried to shove the overwhelming blackness away. Stubborn stuff, and he was so weak. No air for a while, now it was back in force and tasted odd. Then the restraining darkness evolved into a nurse struggling to keep an oxygen mask over his face. He still fought, but she won. Giving up, he let her do her job, and tried to sort out what had brought him to this confusion. He gradually regained full consciousness to a thunderous headache, and became aware of activity around him.

No longer in Sabra's room, he was outside on the floor, and there was all sorts of hell going on. Doctors and nurses were hustling, alarms buzzed, beeped, and shrilled. Strong enough now to fend off help, he lurched to his feet, horribly sick and wobbly-weak, and stared through the glass at the frenzy around Sabra. So many staff, security guards, and noise in this otherwise quiet place . . . what the hell happened? What was going on? He fumbled out his cell phone, and clumsily hit the autodial for Richard's number.

"Get down here," he said.

With a satisfied grunt, Charon eased deep into the broken-in backseat of the cab he waved down near the hospital. What a party. He should have fun like that every night. His body felt light for a change, the way it was supposed to feel, all parts in working order, sir. He figured he'd bought well over an hour of battery power, which should be enough.

That was a job well done, minimum of fuss, and even the security cameras turned out to be a snap. On his way out he'd cupped a hand over the front of one like muzzling a dog and, with the feedback cracking along the wires in ways that it shouldn't, given Realside physics, had shut down the whole system. Any recordings made prior to that would be unaffected, but so what? He'd be just another out-of-focus shape in an overcoat, the eye patch obscuring his face. There'd been no camera in the small room where he'd slipped the medical scrubs on over his street clothes and clipped on a stolen badge. Security, my ass. Hell, he could have walked in there wearing a clown suit and gone anywhere he liked.

Well, he was out now and on his way.

"Where to?" the driver asked.

"North to 401 until I say different."

"Sounds like a long trip. You sure?"

Charon put three hundred in U.S. bills over the seat top. Ben Franklin had fans on this side of the border. "I'm sure. Move it, I'm in a hurry."

Swallowing further questions, the driver sought out Yonge Street, going north to 401, then headed west, the first leg of the trip. Witchy babe lived—make that used to live—out in the boonies. Charon had scoped the place via maps and aerial photos, so it was almost like he'd been there earlier. Man, weren't computers a gas?

Despite the energy rush, he felt the pills he'd taken earlier trying to make him sleepy. Well, he could fight that off easy enough now. The pain had dulled down to almost nothing. If he could hold it off just a little longer . . .

The taxi's suspension swooped as they hit some change in the highway grading. God, but Canada was just the living end about road repair. Never finished, year after year, how did fang-boy put up with it? Well, too bad, soon none of that crap would matter. People would have other things to worry about than resurfacing the damn highways. Woozy in the gut, Charon rolled down a window and let the cold night air work on him. Too freaking hot in here, but he could deal. Every click of the meter took him closer to the brass ring.

Where had Lance gotten himself to, anyway? He was still tight with his old lady, so he should have been with her, not the other guy, whoever the hell he was. Put up a good fight, just lucky for him he didn't have the right kind of wattage or that would have been too bad, that's all she wrote.

The driver made the exit and they were barreling north, tires hissing loud on the wet road. Snowy fields and black fences sped past. Charon felt every bump and dip, but so long as the heap got them there he could hang on. They were in the home stretch. He gave secondary directions. The man said he knew the area and made the correct turns when they came.

Charon had no need to count down the minutes to their destination, he could feel things slowing inside of him. The power hit had helped a lot, but was not going to last. The one at Stonehenge had been good, Chichén Itzá the best, draining off the old ahkin had been a taste-treat sensation, but this must be the downside of the bell curve. He suspected the boosts would continue to shorten in duration until . . .

Hey, belt it, already. I'm almost there.  

He held things in, conserving himself until the driver slowed, checking mailboxes along a narrow road. When had they turned off here?

"This it?" The headlights fell on a new mailbox with the name 'du lac' on it in reflective letters.

"You got it, pal. I need you to wait." Charon dropped another c-note over the seat.

The driver still had change left above the meter charge from his original retainer. "Sure."

"Won't be long, but you can cut the motor."

The man did so, and Charon let himself out.

He trudged up a driveway cleared of snow along two narrow strips, just wide enough for car tires. There'd been a hell of a fall here recently, which was a good reason to live in the Caribbean. Maybe he'd go there afterward. Or not.

The house—more of a cottage, really—looked to be World War II vintage. With all her money you'd think she'd have done better for herself than a dump like this, but her choice probably had to do with the local energy lines or some crap like that. Lots of trees, you almost couldn't see the house for them. Evergreens and oaks. Very symbolic. Ho-hum predictable.

Lights showed behind the windows, but they were only part of the security system. Lance would have insisted she have one, probably installed it himself just to be sure. Yup, nothing was too good for his old lady.

Charon got past it in a very few minutes, but then he was an old hand at getting around such snags. He let himself inside by the front door and turned on more lights as though he owned the place.

Comfy living room, all the usual stuff, nothing too ancient or too new to give away the truth about her background. He knew one of them had a da Vinci or a Botticelli hanging on a wall like a magazine pinup. Well, it wasn't here. He was after something way more valuable, anyway.

Oh, hell.

It struck fast, felt like a killing constriction around his chest. For an instant he feared Snaky had invisibly returned somehow and was doing his crushing thing. Be just like him to change his size and come slithering up from Nowhere for a surprise ambush. Charon hastily backed out of the house, and the tightening abruptly eased.

Heart attack? No way. The pain was different from that or the cancer. It had nothing to do with his human-weak bod or his disease; witchy girl had some less prosaic protections set up in the place. He backed off more and used his Sight.

Holy moly, what a light show. Millennium bash in Times Square.

He wanted sunglasses. The babe knew her noodles. That kind of barrier was into overkill, and it was just the defense. She could have death traps rigged all through the place.

Hm. Maybe not. Her type had a thing against using that kind of power. They really should get over themselves and grow some sense.

Invasion was going to be a hell of a strain on his dwindling energy, so he'd have to hurry. Plan it out, then. Where would she keep the thing? Near an altar? Nah, her type was so far up the corporate ladder as to not really need one. Still, she might have something set up as kind of a respect thing. Look for one of those first. Besides, she wasn't the sort to shove her treasures under a mattress. He would guess it would be . . . ah, screw it, just go for the money and make it fast.

He took a deep breath and dove inside. The pressure wound tight around him again as invisible forces tried to expel his unwelcome presence, but he endured them. Sweat broke on his body. He tripped on things that weren't there, stumbled from one room to another, trying to sense his target while the pressure threatened to squeeze him in two.

Finally. In a back room that was chock-full of plants and grow-lights, he found it. She didn't even try to hide the thing. Good grief, it was right there, sitting like a decorating statement on its own table near one of those New Age style mini-fountains. You'd think she'd show it more reverence as hot as she and her boy-toy were to get hold of it in the first place.

Charon whipped off the piece of white gauzy silk covering and picked up the small cup. The pressure on him suddenly ceased. Okay, that was good. Made it, but jeeze, he was pooped. No reserves left. If he had to go through the gauntlet again . . . nah, break a window out for an exit. Keep it simple.

The trophy itself was not much to look at, being a kind of half-sphere less than a handspan across and made of humble brass not gold, but a mile away you could see it was the real magilla, the one and only, accept no substitutes, one hundred percent gen-u-ine Holy Grail.

Sweet.

So, how about a test drive?

He put the bowl, cup, whatever in one hand, held the other over it, took another deep breath . . . and oh-so-gently touched on the power. Had to be careful, this was like trying to hand-dip a thimble of water from Niagara at full rush. Lose your balance and you were in, over the edge, and bye-bye.

His hands shook. This was no place for amateurs.

Here it was: The moment of truth or consequences . . .

Pale light seemed to leap from the cup to his outstretched fingers like soft lighting. Warm tinglies traveled up his hand, wrist, up and up, the light fading the higher it went. His shoulder, yeah, something was working there, a decided warmth as it seeped into his chest, a definite heat when it hit his lymph glands.

Freaking hell, talk to me, baby!  

Free air, singing with the living energy of the plants, whooshed right to the bottom of his lungs, cleaning them out. He exhaled and his Sight picked out the microscopic particles of his disease hanging before him like black vapor.

Ohhh, yeaaah. This will do. Once he got it to the right place and could make a proper job of it. This would serve as a fine pick-me-up in the interim.

Then the air seemed to congeal. Shit, too much of a good thing. All the difference between getting a little sun tan and facing down a flamethrower. He fell away, knocking over the fountain. Crash, bang. Bull in a china shop interlude as he struggled to keep his feet. Water splashed everywhere, the pump whirring loudly with nothing to drive. Burn-out soon. For them both.

He hastily withdrew from the cleansing while his head was still on the end of his neck. The house's protections abruptly kicked in again, trying to get rid of him. Fine, he had the brass ring, time to exit, stage left; he was strong enough to deal with them now. He wrapped the little cup in the silk, slipped it in his coat pocket, and got the flock outta Dodge.

Hustling into the cab, he told the driver to take him back to Toronto. The meter was higher than Everest; the man cheerful, totally clueless about what going to happen at the end of the ride. He didn't have the kind of spiritual energy of the old ahkin or witchy girl, but now Charon had the means to change that. With the Grail and a little Otherside switcheroo he could order up room service whenever he needed from anyone at hand. By the time they got back to the city a light snack would hit the spot. He could get his cash back and remove a witness. Neat.

Charon hugged the precious Grail to himself, the anticipation making his heart thrum.

Not long after Bourland's call Richard arrived at the hospital with Michael, the two of them tearing up to the ICU ward. The news was what he feared most. The attack on Sabra had her on the edge. If not for the machines, she'd have slipped away already.

Bourland was in the hall outside, relegated there by a preoccupied and hyperbusy staff. He looked awful, ghastly pale and stinking of chloroform. Hospital security was all over, along with the police, and a couple more of the dark-suited security types he'd brought in. The ant nest was thoroughly stirred.

"What happened?" Richard demanded after he showed ID for the umpteenth time. They'd almost not allowed Michael in for not having one, but Richard fixed things with a single piercing look and an inarguable order to butt out. The cop had rocked back on his heels and let them pass.

Bourland had trouble finding the words; he looked to be in shock.

Richard leaned close. "You're scaring Michael. Get a grip."

Visibly pulling himself together, he set his teeth, nodding once. "Sorry. I don't know much, just what they've told me. Some man in medical scrubs and an eye patch got in. They saw him standing over Sabra. The security man tried to stop him and got thrown across the room for his trouble. They're treating him. Concussion."

"What happened to you?"

"Not sure. I was asleep in the chair." Bourland's face went scarlet. "They think he put me out with chloroform, something like that, then went after Sabra. Her life support alarms went off. The doctors should have gotten to her in time, but they can't figure out what's been done. Then they threw me out."

Richard looked through the glass inset on the door. Everyone was still working, still rushing about, focused on her. So long as they didn't stop . . .

Michael had not said a word since Richard roused him from sleep and told him they were leaving. "Uncle Richard? Dad . . . ?"

Bourland went to him. "It'll be all right."

The boy's head drooped. "Tell them it's like an aneurysm." He stumbled over the word as though he'd never said it before.

Bourland didn't pause to ask how Michael knew that; he bulled into the ICU and got someone to pay attention. Only after one of the doctors heard and took him seriously did he allow himself to be guided out of their way.

Richard fought off his own personal meltdown, holding everything at a distance. All he wanted was to rip the world apart at the seams. He managed not to for Michael's sake. And Bourland's. They did not need to see that side of him, ever.

Why hadn't his blood helped her? There should have been an improvement, or at least a strengthening. It would have begun working in her from the first, changing things, returning her to life and health.

Unless she'd been right. The dark Gift given once could not be given again.

The sheer helplessness surged over Richard, but he cast that to one side as well. There was only one way he could save her.

The Grail.

If he had the time to get to Sabra's house and back.

They had life-support machines. If they could keep her body going until his return . . . and then he'd hypnotize the whole damned hospital into forgetting if need be.

"Michael—I've got to go fetch something. Tell your father not to give up, have them put her on a machine if they must, but don't give up on her. I'm going to her house and back." He started for the exit.

But Michael seized his hand. Strongly, dragging him to a halt. "That is not for her."

He paused, resisting the reaction to shake clear. Michael held fast. "W-what?"

"That's not her road." The boy was very intense, very certain, not to be ignored.

How did he know? "It will make her well."

Michael streamed tears and shook his head. "That's not your road, either. You must take another."

The voice was Michael's, but the words were his own, from a long-ago time . . .

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Framed