“I sleep, son, I sleep right there in the chair. I’m fine. I sleep better than I did when I was on all that medicine. It’s kind of deep and natural. I sleep holding her hand.”
And I try not to think, Rowan, why the hell did you leave me? Why did you drive me out on Christmas Eve? Why didn’t you trust me? And Aaron, why the hell didn’t you break the laws of the Talamasca and come here? But that wasn’t fair. Aaron himself had explained that situation-how they had given him his orders to stay away, and how guilty, how spineless, he had felt.
“I sat there at Oak Haven giving you all those excuses. I let you return to the house alone. I should have trusted my own conscience. Dear God, it’s the old dilemma.” Aaron’s entire loyalty to the Talamasca was now in question. Thank God that he loved Beatrice, that she loved him. What would become of a man like that, cast out of the Talamasca? Hell, the handsome gypsy with the jet-black eyes and the golden skin was young.
He closed his eyes.
He knew the nurse was fiddling with the IV again. He could hear her, and hear the little beeps which came from the electronic control. How he hated these machines, machines which had surrounded him in the cardiac unit for so long.
And now she lay there at their mercy, she who had taken so many people through the techno-medical vale of tears.
Whatever happened, she had suffered for it unspeakably, and he had made his vow. When that thing was found, he would kill it. Nobody would stop him. He would kill it. He would not hesitate for the sake of any legal or religious authority, or any family pressure or any moral qualm. He would kill it. That had been Julien’s message. You will have one more chance.
And as soon as he could leave this bedside without worrying, as soon as he really knew that Rowan was stable, he’d go looking for it himself.
It had failed to couple with its daughters…the Mayfair Witches. It had chosen those who did possess the extra chromosomes, but the births had failed. How had he known his brides-by scent, perhaps, or something visible which others didn’t see? For massive irregularities had been found in Gifford and in Alicia, and in Edith, and in the two cousins in Houston.
Would he now seek a mate at random? Who could know.
Michael was in terror of the news-another rash of inexplicable deaths. An unknown disease surfacing suddenly in the headlines. Women on slabs in Dallas or Oklahoma City, or New York. Imagine it, this tall blue-eyed creature, bringing death with his embrace. For without exception, his deadly semen had caused them to ovulate instantly, for the egg then to be fertilized and for the embryo to grow out of control.
All that was known now from the analysis of the doctors. It was also known that he, Michael, had the chromosomes, though they were inactive. And so did Mona, in whom they were also inactive, and so did Paige Mayfair from New York, and so did Ancient Evelyn and Gerald and Ryan himself.
The family was handling it fairly well, as far as he was concerned, though there was much discussion now as to whether Clancy and Pierce should marry, for both of them had the extra complement, too.
And what was he to do with Mona? Did he dare touch Mona again? They both had the abnormality. How significant was it? How much of Lasher’s birth had been chromosomal, and how much his soul sliding in there and taking over? What right had Michael to be touching Mona anyway? That was all past. It was past the minute he saw Rowan lying on the stretcher. Past, past, past. He’d had enough fun in life. He could sit in that chair forever. Just be with her.
However, there were good arguments for ignoring the genetic analysis, said the doctors, at least for Clancy and Pierce to trust to “nature,” whatever that might truly be. Pierce’s sisters did not have the extra-long double helix. They had extra genes, but it simply wasn’t the same. Ryan and Gifford, both with extra genes, had failed to produce a monster. Michael had had lovers. Yes, and if years ago his girlfriend hadn’t chosen an abortion against his heartfelt wishes, he might have had a normal child.
Forensic analysis of Deirdre’s genetic blueprint had also indicated she did not possess the extra chromosomes, yet she had given birth to a child who did. Still, should those who carried the extra package court disaster?
“Look, that thing came through on Christmas. Rowan and I didn’t make it. We just created a fetus, and the thing took it out of God’s hands. It didn’t grow out of control in Rowan’s body. It didn’t make her abort. Not until that thing went into it.”
God’s hands. How odd of him to have used the word God. But the longer he stayed in this house, the longer he stayed in New Orleans, and there was no reason to presume he wouldn’t forever, the more normal the concept of God seemed.
Whatever, the genetic material had only been discovered. A small core of family-managed doctors were working right round the clock to solve the mystery, working even now…
Nothing was going to happen to these doctors either. Only Ryan and Lauren knew their actual location, their names, the laboratory in which they worked. The Talamasca would not be told this time, the Talamasca whom Aaron no longer trusted, and whom he suspected of the worst, most unspeakable wrongs.
“Aaron, take it easy,” Michael had said earlier this afternoon. “Lasher could have killed those doctors, it’s just that simple. He could have killed anyone who had any evidence.”
“He is one being, Michael. He cannot be in two places at once. Please believe me, a man of my ilk doesn’t make rash statements, especially not about an organization to which he has given his undivided loyalty for an entire life.”
Michael hadn’t pressed him. But he hadn’t liked the idea, not at all. On the other hand, there was something he should have told Aaron! If only they’d been alone, but that never seemed to happen. When Aaron had stopped this morning, Yuri, the gypsy kid, had been with him, and the indefatigable Ryan and his clone, son Pierce.
Michael looked at his watch. It was ten-thirty. And it was Aaron’s wedding night. He sat back, wondering when it would be proper to call. Of course there would be no honeymoon for Aaron or Beatrice. How could there be? But they were married now, lawfully under the same roof, and the entire family was happy. Michael had heard enough to be sure of it from the cousins who had come to visit all day long.
Well, he had to get a message to Aaron. He had to not forget this. He had to remember everything, and be ready, and his weariness couldn’t get to him, or fuddle him. Not this time.
He turned and opened the top drawer of the chest very quietly. The big gun was a beauty. He’d love to take that down to a shooting gallery and fire away. Funny thing was, Mona said she liked to do that. And he’d gotten a kick out of it. Mona and Gifford had gone target practicing together in a funny place in Gretna where you wore ear covers and eye covers and fired at paper targets in long concrete carrels.
Ah, the gun, yes, and also here was the notepad he had put there himself some weeks before. And a fine-point black pen, perfect.
He took the pad and pen, and shut the drawer.
Dear Aaron,
Somebody’s going to take this note to you. Because I will not have a chance to tell you this for some time. I still think you’re all wrong about the T. They couldn’t have done those things. They just couldn’t. But there is another corroborating opinion. This you need to know.
This is the poem Julien recited to me, the poem Ancient Evelyn recited to him over seventy years ago. I cannot get away to ask Ancient Evelyn if she remembers it. She’s no longer talking sense, they tell me. Maybe you can ask her. This is what is written in my mind.
One will rise who is too evil.
One will come who is too good.
’Twixt the two, a witch shall falter