To Ride Pegasus

“Then let’s start them moving about outside.”

“I would if I were you. The Red Bear’s about to go stir crazy.”

“Red Bear?”

Sally wrinkled her nose. “That’s what I call Vaden.”

“Then Amalda’s Goldilocks?”

“Good heavens, no. She’s Cinderella, remember?”

“Cinderella and the One Bear?”

“Cinderella, the One Bear and…the Wolf!”

Daffyd frowned. “I thought I was a better therapist than that.”

“Oh, it’s just a back-of-the-mind worry. She’s not going to trust herself until she does meet and vanquish the Wolf. And then we can all live happily ever after.”

There was a tinge of bitterness in Sally’s bright voice that made Daffyd look at her closely. He was tempted to probe but that wasn’t ethical, particularly since

Sally would be instantly aware of the intrusion. So he observed Amalda for a few more moments before leaving the Clinic.

In the month Amalda had been at the Center, the over-thin, intense girl-child had been replaced by a still slender but composed young woman. Her fears had slow ly been eased by Daffyd’s adroit therapy and by her own ability to discipline her emotions, to channel the vital energies deftly.

The first sessions with Harold Orley had been conducted with Amalda fairly well sedated. The girl had been revolted by Harold’s witlessness. There could have been no clearer mirror for her reaction. Pity for the moronic empath had been quickly suppressed because Harold would disconcertingly burst into tears. At first Amalda had rebelled at being forced to work with Harold but she could not refute the fact that he would react instantly to her emotions and until she could control them in his presence, she couldn’t expect to be able to control them sufficiently in public.

In the first days at the Center, she had also demanded, even under heavy sedation, to be lobotomized: an operation which Amalda erroneously supposed would suppress her gratuitous Talent. Then she met Harold and realized that the psionic portion of her brain would not be excised by such an operation. Step Two in Amalda’s rehabilitation was her introduction to the Center’s star young

Talent, two-year old Dorotea Horvath. It didn’t take Amalda long to recognize the lesson which, was thus demonstrated to her.

Small Dorotea was playing contentedly with six-sided blocks. When they tumbled, her fury exploded…to be checked, unconsciously but firmly, by her mother.

The young telepath’s thoughts were so loud and clear that Amalda couldn’t fail to recognize the analogy.

“So I discovered a bright new toy in my mind and it won’t play with me, is that it?”

“You have to learn to balance the toy just as Dorotea does…” Daffyd said gently.

“So they won’t all fall down and go boom?”

“With you underneath,” added Sally. “Like the night at the Fact.”

Despite sedation, Amalda paled and shuddered.

“He can’t find me, can he?”

“Not here, behind shielded walls, my dear,” Daffyd reassured her.

Once Amalda could control her emotions, Vaden began to take part in the exercises. It was during these sessions that the phenomenon of the second Fact concert was harnessed. Amalda, with Red, could dominate the emotional atmosphere of any large room, could project, even to the minds of sensitives, any emotion she chose. But the force that Daffyd and Sally had felt at the Fact was absent.

“The team right now is limited,” Daffyd said to Sally, somewhat ruefully.

“Limited?” Sally was surprised.

“Yes. As long as there are no dark emotions being counter-broadcast, she can project what she wants of the lighter ones. But I was rather hoping that she and

Vaden would be strong enough together to counteract…”

“An incipient riot?”

“Yes,” and Daffyd leaned forward eagerly. “That would placate Frank Gillings and wipe out that RP he’s still got against her. And think what it would mean in riot control techniques: two people instead of twenty sensitives, if we have ‘em available when we need ‘em, or instead of the gas.”

“Well, so that’s what you’ve had in mind.”

“As it is, I think we’ll let them operate as a team in those gatherings that tend to develop brawls: conventions, fairs, industrial shows.”

“And what about the Wolf?”

“Ah, yes, but you see, I want him to come out of the woods.

“And Amalda?” Sally “sounded” furious with him.

“Which would you wager on? A Wolf or a Bear?”

Daffyd op Owen was by no means as callous of Amalda’s safety as Sally might think, for he’d circulated a warning to all sensitives for any inquiry about Amalda or Brace Vaden and any unusual activity on Roznine’s part. Ted Lewis, the chief police Talent, gave them their first hint of interest. A well-known and respected Performer’s Agent who just happened to be Polish, asked for assistance from Central Casting to find a missing PA, Brace ‘Red’ Vaden who was reportedly employed but who had obviously not appeared with any working company.

“Now that could be legit,” Ted Lewis told Daffyd. “The guy really is forming up a variety show for the Borscht circuit but for that he doesn’t need a stage director with Vaden’s rating.”