To Ride Pegasus
- Автор: Маккефри Энн
- Серия: Talents #1
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «To Ride Pegasus». Краткое содержание книги:
Vaden looked toward the unconscious girl and gave a sort of incredulous shrug.
“She was so pleased to think she did have ability. She’d tried often enough to qualify as a vocalist.” Vaden made an exasperated noise in his throat. “The first time she sang for me I couldn’t credit that she’d been refused a license.”
He turned back to Daffyd. “It just didn’t make sense.”
“I’d hazard that you were the missing factor.”
“A modern Svengali?” Vaden was bitter.
“Not exactly. But the brain generates electrical currents. And in the same way that a receiver must be tuned to a certain wave-length to get a message broadcast on that same wavelength, minds must be broadcasting on the same frequency. Yours and Amalda’s are. Were either of you ever parapsychically tested?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Well, we can sort out the pure mechanics later during testing but there is one other pressing question I must ask.”
Vaden did have Talent, whether it had blossomed through contact with Amalda or not was immaterial, for he instantly perceived what was on Daffyd’s mind and stiffened. Daffyd continued, feeling it wiser not to let Vaden realize that he was in the presence of a strong telepath…at least not yet.
“Granted you serve in the capacity of an amplifier for whatever mood Amalda creates, what happened the other night at the Fact? What terrified her so that she fled from what obviously was a smash-success? She had that audience in the palm of her hand.”
An expression akin to terror crossed Vaden’s face, ruthlessly suppressed in a second.
“You were in the audience?” Vaden asked, temporizing.
“Yes, Sally Iselin had heard Amalda two nights before and wanted me to confirm her suspicion that Amalda was a high-gain empathist. What scared Amalda off that stage? And sent both of you into hiding?”
There was nothing helpful in Vaden’s mind except a repetition of what Daffyd and Sally had felt in Amalda’s projection. Instead, Vaden’s thoughts became despairing.
“That’s why you’ve got to help us, op Owen. Turn Amalda off!”
Vaden didn’t attempt to disguise his fear now. And he didn’t strike op Owen as easily frightened. He was tough, able to take care of himself from the look of his bearlike build. And had taken care of himself, to judge by the scars on his knuckles and face.
“Fortunately, no one can turn Amalda off. Nor do I yet see the necessity.” Only a nebulous but overwhelming fear in both Vaden and Amalda.
“You’d better see,” Vaden cried, leaning urgently toward op Owen. His eyes were blazing with anger, fear and a sense of impotence which would be more frightening and humiliating to a man of Vaden’s temperament. “You’d better see that it’s crushing Amalda to the point where she was willing to commit suicide rather than live with what she’s become!”
“You haven’t told me what frightened her and what, if I may speak candidly, is bothering you as well.”
Vaden got a grip on his fear and anger. “There was someone else in that audience,” he said in a harsh controlled voice, “who suddenly linked up with us.
Someone who was trying to dominate. Who was determined to control what Amalda can do. She got the brunt of it, of course, then I caught it.”
Op Owen was certain then, with an awful instinct, that Roznine was the third person. And the ramifications of that premise were decidedly unsettling. He managed to smile reassuringly at Brace Vaden. He swung his chair idly from side to side with counterfeit unconcern. He had lost Solange Boshe but he wouldn’t lose Amalda…and Vaden…and Roznine.
“That’s very interesting,” he told Vaden. “Does Amalda have any idea of the man’s identity?”
“How could she?” Red Vaden asked scornfully. He was making a notable effort to cover his inner perturbations. He couldn’t bear even the notion of sharing Amalda with anyone. “The minute she realized what was happening, how strong the guy was, and what he wanted her to do, she made as if she was taking a short break. And told me to follow. But she won’t ever sing again. You don’t know what it does to you…”
“I probably more than any man,” Daffyd said with a slight smile.
Vaden discredited the statement with a cutting sweep of his hand.
“You’ve got to understand that Amalda must be turned off.”
There was an edge in his voice now: he was hitting an emotional high, too.
Daffyd reached surreptitiously for the trank gun.
“Don’t you dare!” Vaden moved with surprising speed and grabbed op Owen’s hand.
“I thought you’d understand, op Owen. Whoever that guy is is double dangerous!”
“You’ll have every bit of protection the Center and every other Center in the world can offer you, Vaden,” Daffyd replied, allowing his voice to take on strength without volume. “Which is not inconsiderable, I assure you. What you don’t understand, Vaden, is that Amalda’s main problem is simply lack of control of her rather breath-taking ability.”
“You don’t understand.” Vaden was desperate. “She can control masses of people.
Those subbies in the Fact…she could have made them do anything. That’s what’s terrifying her. And me. And that other freaked-out mind…he wanted to use her to control that kind of a dangerous mob. God, man, I know what riot is. I’ve seen them. I’ve been caught in them. I know what happens. She could cause one. She even started one by not being there. She could incite the entire goddamned Jerhattan complex…”
“How?” asked Daffyd blandly.
“By…by…doing what that mind wanted her to do the other night.”
“But,” and Daffyd matched Red Vaden’s urgency with his own, “she didn’t! And she couldn’t! And nothing on this world, not even some freaked-out mind with a megalomaniacal bent could make her. And once she’s learned to control this…winged horse of hers, I think you’ll all find this not so cursed a Talent.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“How old is Amalda?”
“What? What has that got to do?”
“How old?”
“She’s twenty-two…”
“Twenty-two. And rather young for twenty-two, I should imagine. That’s still a tender age.” Daffyd could’ve wished for some of Amalda’s empathic strength but he was getting through to Vaden’s basic reasonableness. “And she has become emotionally involved with you…No offense, please, Mr. Vaden. From a rather humdrum frustrating existence, she has erupted onto the stage, into prominence…Even a mature personality could be dazzled. Then she is thrown into a highly charged situation-the concert at the Fact-it was unnerving for me as an observer, and I’m well in command of my emotional responses. She is frightened and runs! For which I don’t blame her at all. In short, Amalda has been operating on high for some time. We are still frail masters of our powers, Mr. Vaden. And that receiver/broadcaster unit which is Amalda is overcharged.
“No, Mr. Vaden, we can’t turn her off. We don’t want to. But we can teach her how to channel her Talent, how to discipline it so it won’t run away with her as it has just done. We can also show you how to help her put on the brakes. Oh, yes, you can apply what, to all intents and purposes, are circuit breakers. She will need your strength and aggression, Mr. Vaden. In fact, and this is between us, Amalda is not as important as both of you. So I will consider you a team, because that’s what you are.”
“Then you can help?” asked Vaden. He didn’t quite believe op Owen but the aura of belligerent desperation was fading.