To Ride Pegasus

Her irritation was replaced by a shudder. Vaden could feel the repugnance she experienced when touching Roznine’s mind. But her impression no longer dominated his reaction to Roznine. Not after seeing the man in Court yesterday.

“Did you really look at Vsevolod Roznine yesterday?”

Amalda gave him that wide-eyed innocent stare and he felt her going “dead” on him. At first Bruce thought it was because she was afraid of Roznine and censored any references to him. Now he knew differently.

“Mally hon,” and he took her by the shoulders, forcing her to look him in the eye. “I looked at Roznine. I looked him over good and strangely enough, I liked what I saw.” That got her where she lived, and Red took a deep breath, opening his own inner mind so she couldn’t fail to see the sincerity of his words. “He’s the kind of guy I’d trust and respect even if I could probably take him apart in a fair fight. Oh, I know. I’ve heard all this static about his sewer-sink mind and his power in the city and I don’t know as my public mind would be all that clean and pure. I’ve learned to do my improper thinking carefully but no one’s warned Roznine that there’re guys around reading him now and again.”

Amalda was staring up at him. Her eyes had gone all big and her lips were parted. He wanted to kiss her, to love and reassure her, but not just then.

“Mind you, I don’t think Roznine’s a crusading saint but feckitall, Mally, he’s up against City Hall and when you’re fighting City Hall you use every advantage you can beg, borrow or,” he clipped her lightly on the jaw, “kidnap. Not that I blame him for flipping his nut over you.” He couldn’t keep his voice steady and he knew he was playing-back their initial meeting. “If you affect Roznine the way you do me, I’m damned sorry for the poor guy. It must be hell for him to want you and not get you.”

Amalda discarded all restraint and now remorse/love/ appreciation / agreement / understanding / pride / loyalty/washed over him.

“Don’t do that, Mally. I’ve got to think.”

She bit her lip apologetically and “buttoned” her emotions up.

“Thanks. Now, where was I? Yeah. As of yesterday, I don’t think Roznine could use you. Not now. Or only if you let him. And you won’t. If that’s what’s bugging you, forget it. Or don’t you remember how easily you knocked him out?

You gotta take it easy on the guy, hon. He loves you even if he doesn’t know it.”

“It’s you I’m worried about, Brace,” she said in a very low voice, her eyes wide and full of tears.

So he embraced her, pressing her slender body against him, so she’d “feel” all he couldn’t express. His knowledge that you aren’t selfish with Talent, whatever kind you possessed: that they had a relationship too strong to be broken or diminished by the acceptance of a third party: that Talent had obligations beyond the personal and this was one of them, for both Amalda and Bruce.

She reached up tenderly to stroke his face, her fingers enjoying the tactile contact with the silky hair of his beard, letting her fingers express what she didn’t articulate. As she had learned to accept Brace’s right to decide for them both, she accepted his decision now.

“The stage is set, honey,” he said finally. “Extras all milling about, waiting for the director. Are you going to let him come?”

She gave an impatient little shrug, then squared her shoulders and smiled at him, ready to move mountains, from the look of her. He liked that about Amalda, among a thousand other things. He conveyed that approval with a gentle, mind blown hug. Talent has advantages, too.

Roznine. rubbed at his temples, wondering what kind of fake powder the medic had sold him as a headache remedy.

They had done something to him when he was unconscious. Just as he, Vsevolod Roznine, knew that they had caused him to black out at the hearing. No, not “they”! Her!

The conviction that he had to get to her, be with her, returned with renewed and irresistible force. And Roznine fought it again, fought it as his head throbbed, and his hands clenched into fists of effort to withstand the compulsion.

He flung himself from the table, catching the leg with his foot and upsetting the untouched meal, half-stumbling against the door and striking his temple on the frame. He hit his head a second, a third time. And clutching the molding, threw back his head in bitter laughter.

“Roznine has to beat his own head, because it feels so good when he stops!”

His fingers dug into the frame until his nails bent against the durable plastic.

His head turned slowly, as if he could see straight through concrete and plastic, across the miles to the Center in which direction he unerringly turned.

“NO!’ This time his fists thudded into plastic. “Roznine does not come at a woman’s call. She comes to him!”

How had they done this to him? How could she call him? Once he’d known her name and that she was at the Center, he’d had his people find out all they could. She was registered as a telempath. Roznine had looked that up and the answer had only confirmed what he’d guessed himself: she could transmit emotions and probably receive them.