"Maybe . . ." she said, under her breath. But the very thought of him leaving chilled her to the bone.
He turned, looking back at her. "What were you looking for?"
She frowned. "1 don't follow you."
"Before the wave struck. You were about to tell me something. You'd seen something, hadn't you?"
She felt a sudden coldness on the back of her hand and looked. It was a spot of rain. She brushed at it, then looked back at her brother.
"It was a shell. One I'd never seen before. It was attached to the rock but I couldn't free it with my fingers. It was like it was glued there. A strange, ugly-looking shell, hard and ridged, shaped like a nomad's tent."
More spots of rain fell, distinct and heavy. Ben looked up at the sky, then back at her. "We'd best get back. It's going to fall down."
She went to him and took his hand.
"Go," she said. "But not yet. Not just yet."
He leaned forward, kissing her brow, then moved back, looking at her, his dark green eyes seeing nothing but her for that brief moment. "1 love you, Megs. Understand that. But I can't help what I am. I have to go. If I don't. . ."
She gave the smallest nod. "I know. Really. 1 understand."
"Good." This time his lips touched hers gently, then drew away.
She shivered and leaned forward, wanting to kiss him once again, but just then the clouds burst overhead and the rain began to come down heavily, pocking the mud about their feet, soaking their hair and faces in seconds.
"Christ!" he said, raising his voice against the hard, drumming sound of the rain. For a moment neither of them moved; then Meg turned and pointing to the bank, yelled back at him.
"There! Under the trees!"
Ben shook his head. "No. Come on! There's half a day of rain up there. Let's get back!" He took her hands, tugging at her, then turned and, letting her hands fall from his, began to run back along the shore toward the cottage. She caught up with him and ran beside him, laughing now, sharing his enjoyment of the downpour, knowing—suddenly knowing without doubt—that just as he had to go, so he would be compelled to return. In time. When he had found what he was looking for.
Suddenly he stopped and, laughing, throwing his hands up toward the sky, turned his eyes on her again. "It's beautiful!" he shouted. "It's bloody beautiful!"
"I know!" she answered, looking past him at the bay, the tree-covered hillsides misted by the downpour, the dour-looking cottages on the slope before them.
Yes, she thought. You'll miss this in the City. There it never rains. Never in ten thousand years.
CHAPTER SIX
Compulsions
THAT NIGHT he dreamed.
He was floating above a desert, high up, the jet-black lavatic sands stretching off to the horizon on every side. Tall spirals of dust moved slowly across the giant plain, like fluted pillars linking heaven and earth. A cold wind blew. Over all, a black sun sat like a sunken eye in a sky of bloodied red.
He had come here from dead lands, deserted lands, where temples to forgotten gods lay in ruins, open to the sky; had drifted over vast mountain ranges, their peaks a uniform black, the purest black he'd ever seen, untouched by snow or ice; had glided over plains of dark, fused glass, where the image of his small, compacted self flew like a Doppelganger under him, soaring to meet him when he fell, falling as he rose. And now he was here, in this empty land, where color ended and silence was a wall within the skull.
Time passed. Then, with a huge, almost animal shudder that shook the air about him, the sands beneath him parted, the great dunes rolling back, revealing the perfect smoothness of a lake, its red-tinged waters like a mirror.
He fell. Turning in the air, he made an arrow of himself, splitting the dark, oily surface cleanly. Down he went, the coal-black liquid smooth, unresistant, flowing about his body like cold fire.
Deep he went, so deep that his ears popped and bled. His lungs, like flowers, blossomed in the white cage of his chest, bursting, flooding his insides with a fiery hotness. For a moment the blackness was within, seeping into him through every pore; a barrier through which he must pass. Then he was through; freed from his normal, human self. And still he sank, like a spear of iron, down through the blackness; until there, ten miles beneath the surface, the depths were seared with brightness.
The lake's bed was white, like bone; clean and polished and flat, like something made by men. It glowed softly from beneath, as if another land—miraculous and filled, as bright as this was dark—lay on the far side of its hard, unyielding barrier.
He turned his eyes, drawn to something to his left. He swam toward it.
It was a stone. A dark, perfect circle of stone, larger than his palm. It had a soft, almost dusted surface. He touched it, finding it cool and hard. Then, as he watched, it seemed to melt and flow, the upper surface flattening, the thin edge crinkling. Now it was a shell, an oyster, its circumference split by a thin, uneven line of darkness.
His hand went to his waist; he took the scalpel from its tiny sheath, then slipped its edge between the plates. Slowly, reluctantly, they parted, like a moth's wings opening to the sun.
Inside was a pearl of darkness—a tiny egg so dark, so intensely black, that it seemed to draw all light into itself. He reached out to take it; but even as he closed his left hand about the pearl, he felt its coldness bum into his flesh then fall, like a drop of heaven's fire, onto the bed below.
Astonished, he held the hand up before his face and saw the perfect hole the pearl had made. He turned the hand. Right through. The pearl had passed right through.
He shivered. And then the pain came back, like nothing he had ever experienced.
Ben woke and sat upright, beaded in sweat, his left hand held tightly in his right, the pain from it quite real. He stared at it, expecting to see a tiny hole burned through from front to back, but there was no outward sign of what was wrong. It spasmed again, making him cry out, the pain unbelievable—worse than the worst cramp he had ever had.
"Shit!" he said under his breath, annoyed at himself for his weakness. Control the pain, he thought. Learn from it. He gritted his teeth and looked at the timer on the wall beside his bed. It was just after five.
He must have damaged the hand, getting Meg out of the water.
When the pain subsided he got up, cradling the hand against his chest, and began to dress. It was more difficult than he had imagined, for the slightest awkward movement of the hand would put it into spasm again, taking his breath. But eventually it was done and quietly he made his way out and down the passageway.
The door to Meg's room was open. Careful not to wake her, he looked inside. Her bed was to the left against the far wall, the window just above her head. She lay on her stomach, her hair covering her face, her shoulders naked in the shadow, her right arm bent above the covers. The curtains were drawn, the room in partial darkness; but a small gap high up let in a fragment of the early morning sun, a narrow bar of golden light. It traced a contoured line across the covers and up the wall, revealing part of her upper arm. He stared at it a moment, oblivious of the dull pain in his hand, seeing how soft her flesh seemed in this light.
For a moment he hesitated, wondering if he should wake her.
And if he did?
He shivered, remembering how she had come to him in the night, and felt that same strong stirring of desire. Though it disturbed him, he could not lie to himself. He wanted her. More now than before. Wanted to kiss the softness of her neck and see her turn, warm and smiling, and take him in her arms.