Tzekich snapped, "Just read the damned note!"
Xavier tried to hide a smile, clearly pleased he'd got under her skin. "All right, let me see. Let me see. Let me see." He squinted and shifted the paper a little closer to his eyes. Then a little farther away. Then back to its original position. "Got some passengers tonight," he finally read. "Two kids from that school in Simka. Eloping, the idiots. Going to Niagara Falls, to get married then fuck their brains out. Pathetic. But I get paid, so who cares? I'll be back in time for…" Xavier stopped reading and folded the page. "The rest is just private."
Dreamsinger held out her hand for the note. Xavier only stared at her until Tzekich heaved an exasperated sigh. "Either you give it to her or she takes it from your cold dead fingers."
"If you want me to kill him, dear sister," Dreamsinger said, "just say the word."
Tzekich gave a humorless laugh. "No thanks, milady. That might sound as if I was giving an order to a Spark Lord… or asking for a favor, which is possibly more dangerous."
"Spoilsport," Dreamsinger pouted. She looked back at Xavier, her hand still held out for the message. With a grumpy look, he plodded across the room and gave her the page. Dreamsinger unfolded it and studied the message briefly. "What time did you receive this?"
Xavier said, "A few hours ago. From my man Ripsaw."
"When did Ripsaw receive it?"
"He walks around the port every night after supper. Between six and midnight."
"I want the exact time."
Xavier smiled as if he'd been hoping she'd say that. "Ask Ripsaw yourself." He pointed at one of the men who'd been standing too close to the windows when Dreamsinger blew them in-a man with more blood on his clothes than in his veins. Dreamsinger peered at the corpse with calculation in her eye; perhaps debating whether it was too late to try a Twinning, whether the brain was still intact or just soggy sweetmeats. After a moment, she sighed with regret.
"So," she said, "we don't know whether this note got written before or after passengers arrived at the Hoosegow. If it was before, the captain simply expected 'two kids from that school'-which doesn't tell how many really showed up. If it was after, and the captain was looking right at the two teenagers as he wrote his message… that would make things more interesting." She looked at Xavier. "Do you know if Hoosegow actually left port?"
The old man made a sour face. I suspected he did know, but disliked providing information that might actually be useful. Before he could vacillate on an answer, one of the two surviving enforcers spoke up. "I was on harbor watch tonight. Hoosegow left its slip at 11:05."
Xavier gave the man a dirty look; the enforcer ignored it, keeping his gaze on Tzekich. Obviously, the bully-boy had decided that pleasing the top boss helped one's career far more than humoring a surly deputy.
"So," Dreamsinger murmured, "the boat is on its way. No reason for that if it didn't have passengers; so Sebastian must have showed up and said, 'Let's go.' He wouldn't do that unless Rosalind was with him."
"Rosalind?" Knife-Hand Liz repeated. "I thought you said…" Her voice trailed off.
"Dear sister," Dreamsinger said, "one version of your daughter is dead. Another may be sailing to Niagara Falls; and now I'll have to follow." She shuddered. "Pity me, friends. Such a dreary place. So conventional and crowded. Why do people come from around the world to see water falling over a cliff? And all the hideous 'attractions'; they should be called distractions, built to prevent newlyweds from realizing the banality of what they've just done. I hate it all. Hate it, hate it, hate it. Hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it…" She stopped herself with an effort. "But, I suppose while I'm there, I can check-"
Her voice choked silent. Her face froze-as if some inner reflex held her expression immobile so we couldn't guess what was going through her mind. An instant later, she whirled to face the three of us at the window. "This Sebastian was a powerful psychic?"
We all nodded.
"What was his power?"
Impervia and the Caryatid looked at me to answer. I chose my words carefully. "Our psionics teacher says Sebastian can talk to the world: as if land, sea, and air are full of happy puppies, eager to fulfill the boy's tiniest wish. So his powers cover the whole spectrum."
"The boy talks directly to nanites? And he's headed for Niagara Falls?" Dreamsinger's voice had gone shrill. "With a creature that can make itself look like Rosalind?"
Mother Tzekich stirred at her daughter's name, but didn't have a chance to speak. Dreamsinger surged toward the window where Impervia, the Caryatid, and I still crouched. The Spark Lord grabbed me by the jacket and heaved me up as if I weighed no more than a rag doll. "Fool!" she whispered, so softly no one else could hear. "Those curds weren't a bioweapon. They were cast-off cellules from a Lucifer."
"But I thought…" Opal had said the flake-away bits of Lucifer were like grains of black gunpowder. Dark and dry. I suddenly remembered that both Dreamsinger and her brother had asked if I was sure the curds I'd seen were white and wet, not dark and dry. They both must have suspected there was a Lucifer in our neighborhood, but my talk of a bioweapon had made it seem like something else. "It looked like cottage cheese," I said. "Honestly…"
"The Lucifer mutated," Dreamsinger told me in another furious whisper. "It's been trying to do that for decades. It knows Spark Royal can track its life-signs… so the blasted thing finally managed to change its metabolism. And now it's going to Niagara Falls with a psychic?"
She tossed me aside in disgust. Pure luck let me grab a corner of the window frame and catch my balance; otherwise, I would have fallen onto the broken glass that littered the floor. Dreamsinger didn't care-she was already stepping over the sill, out onto the dark lawn. At the same time, she tapped her pearl necklace: the one that was actually a radio transmitter. "Spark Royal, attend," she snapped. "I need immediate pick-up, this location."
"Please activate anchor," a metallic voice said from the necklace.
"Give me ten seconds."
Dreamsinger reached toward her waist. To my eyes, she was grabbing at nothingness a short distance in front of her bare navel. A belt pack, I thought; her armor must have pouches and attachments that I couldn't see because of the Chameleon spell. A moment later, she pulled a small device from thin air-a black plastic box the size of a book, with four metallic gold horseshoes arranged in a diamond on its top face.
"Dearest sister," she called to the Caryatid, "could you come here, please?"
The Caryatid hurried forward.
"Do you see this switch?" Dreamsinger pointed to a toggle on the box's side. "When I'm gone, please push that; it turns the anchor off. Be careful not to turn it on again-just keep the anchor safe, and I'll come for it someday."
"Yes, milady."
"Good. Keep faith with me." Dreamsinger kissed the Caryatid lightly on the lips. Then she whirled and told the rest of us, "Only my sister on the Burdensome Path may touch the device. Everyone else stand clear."
Without waiting for an answer, she stepped away from the Caryatid, pushed the toggle-switch herself, and laid the box on the ground. "Spark Royal, attend," she said to empty air. "The anchor is active. Take me home."