“Your daughter,” Zabb said, and lifted an eyebrow.
“Yes,” she said shortly. “They’re all in danger. We’ve got to bypass all these endless battles and capture him.” She paused and looked to Zabb. “Will you capture him?”
They stared at each other. Softly Zabb said, “I renew my offer.”
“I repeat my refusal. And offer this as surety – give me what I want, and I will leave. Never return. Please, Zabb, let me go home.”
He touched her cheek with a forefinger. “I promise I will capture him for you.”
“This is all very wonderful,” Taj said. “But the groundling is sitting in a private limbo. Doesn’t talk, has to be mind-controlled before he’ll eat.”
“We have to get him back,” Tis said.
“How?”
“I don’t know, but we’ve got to think of something.”
They were all gathered about Mark’s bed in the infirmary. Roxalana had been reading to him, and she turned off the book as Tis and Zabb arrived. Tis noticed the bed was surrounded with bouquets of flowers, candy, and the offerings of children – colored pictures, favorite stuffed animals. Mark had certainly had an effect on Rarrana during his time there, and people – especially the children – were missing him.
The children had all been fascinated with the human: his enormous height, and his friendly, playful mien. Takisian males tended to be absentee fathers until their offspring were old enough to be interesting. “Interesting” translated into six or seven when you could teach them to ride, skate, dance, ski, shoot. Otherwise any meaningful contact between children and adults was with women. But Mark had loved the little ones, and he showed infinite patience as he looked at their pictures, played their games, listened to their innocent confidences.
Roxalana looked at the briefcase Tisianne was carrying, and her brows drew together in a sharp frown. “What is that for?”
“I’m going to test a theory.”
“On Mark? Oh, no, you’re not. You just give him time.”
“We’ve run out of it,” Zabb said.
“Melant’s making progress,” Roxalana argued.
Zabb looked at the human, locked in his gray and private world. “Oh, really?”
“I think Mark is suffering not only from the shock of losing Starshine, but from guilt,” Tis said. “He had a theory his ‘friends’ were people he possessed and in effect kidnapped from another dimension. I think if we can summon Flash, he can talk some sense into mark.”
“You’re insane. Do you realize the risk you are running? Mark explained to me that if anyone else tries to take these powders, they will die. How do you know the loss of Starshine hasn’t left him in the same situation?”
“I don’t, Lani.”
“Blaise’s armies are falling back everywhere. A little patience and Vayawand will fall. Why do you have to endanger Mark?”
“Because with each day that passes, and each defeat inflicted, four other lives are placed at greater and greater risk.”
“And putting aside Tisianne’s selfish desire to see her friends, body, and baby rescued – each one of these victories is costing us dearly,” Zabb said. “I’ll sacrifice anyone if we can end this sooner rather than later.”
Roxalana just looked at them for a long, long time.
Then she stood and said, “Sometimes I hate us because nothing and no one is very precious to us.”
The House, vindi,” Zabb said softly. “There is always the House.”
“Demons take the House! It’s made up of individuals, but we always forget that. Well, kill him if you must,” and she walked to the far wall.
Tisianne removed a vial of orange powder. A flicker of alarm showed in Mark’s sunken eyes.
“Mark, I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t believe it would work,” Tis said softly.
The ace stretched out a trembling hand and lightly touched the three remaining vials of yellow powder. Roxalana came flying back across the room like a fury, snatching up the vials. She flung them against the wall. They shattered in an eruption of sparking glass shards and powder.
“My, that was dramatic,” Zabb drawled. “Any particular reason for that display?”
“Not those. Not the yellows. I just… feel it will kill him.”
Tis was shivering. She hugged herself and looked desperately at Lani. “Do you sense anything about Flash?” Her sister shook her head.
They were both hesitating. Zabb took command of the moment. Mind-controlling Mark, he forced the ace to down the orange powder.
Mark burst into flames.
In less than a second the bed was a blazing inferno. Zabb cursed and stepped backward, shielding his face from the heat. Roxalana shrieked, grabbed up a blanket, rushed forward to smother the fire. Tis caught her by the arm, stopped her. “Wait,” she said.
Inside the flames Mark’s body blackened, shriveled… and then, somehow, began to drink in the fire. The flames flickered, faded, and were absorbed.
When the last of them went out, J. J. Flash, Esquire, was stretched out casually in the ashes of the bedclothes, hands locked behind his head.
“I hate hospitals,” Flash announced. He rose. “So you want me to kick Meadows’s butt, huh? Okay, give us some time alone. Granted I can’t prose and drone like the deader, but I’m pretty persuasive.” He looked over at Roxalana. “Don’t suppose you could stay, could you? The drip’s fallen big-time for you. A little reminder of life and love?”
Tis exchanged an incredulous glance with her cousin as Roxalana held out her hand to Flash and said, “I’d be delighted.”
An hour later, when Mark returned to himself, he had a very bad feeling that Flash had been terribly wicked. When it penetrated that he was lying naked in the hospital bed with Roxalana curled up next to him, he was sure of it.
He sat up abruptly. The sheet slid down. He yanked it back up. “What did he do?” he blurted, and then froze.
Roxalana serenely pushed back her hair and, propping herself on an elbow, stared down into his face. “He was very persuasive.” Mark gaped at her.
His bathrobe and pajamas were a knotted mess on the floor. He snatched them up and tried to dress beneath the sheets. It didn’t work too well. It really didn’t work when she slid her hands under his ass and yanked the pajama bottoms back down to his ankles.
“Need some help?” He stuttered out a few noises. “Don’t lose your voice again.” She fished out the robe and tossed it back on the floor. “Flash is mentally… fatiguing. I like the whole of Mark Meadows much better than the individual parts. Now, take off those pajamas and tell me how remarkable I am.”
Despite her exhortation, Mark told her with hands and lips rather than words. The cosmic cheering section had all bellied up to observe – and comment – and there was still this aching void where Starshine used to live, but it was bearable pain now.
Much, much later, as Mark gathered his clothes and began to dress, Roxalana sat up and shook back her hair.
“Thank you,” she said.
“Thank you.”
She shrugged off his gratitude. “Mark, now that you have a tongue again, do please get control of my wayward brother. I’m afraid she’s going to get himself killed.”
Insomnia had become a constant companion, and even copious amounts of alcohol no longer cured it. Mon’aella had suggested pills. Kelly had sweetly inquired if she was going to repay him for saving her life by enticing him into a drug overdose. His wife’s lips had curved in a small, secretive smile that sent Kelly back to the company of Jay Ackroyd.
“If Blaise doesn’t kill me, she will.”
“Why should she?” the ace asked logically.
“You’re right, there’s not enough in it for her… yet.”
“And Blaise still likes pulling the wings off you.”