The Chosen

^{CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR}

“It’s all relative, Ms. Abbot. It’s all the same in a way, isn’t it? Think about that.”

Flecks of gore began to dry on Vera’s face as she numbly stared back at Feldspar.

“We’re all servants, are we not?” he suggested. “You are, I am, only to different degrees. All of life is experience, as they say. The same applies to infinity.”

In silence, Vera’s eyes darted about for a weapon. Feldspar had set the big revolver beside one of the Jenn-Air ranges, far out of her reach, and just as out of reach now as the cutlery rack. But what could she be thinking of anyway? She’d seen how useless the knife had been on Kyle; certainly it would be even less effective on Feldspar, who was obviously the core of power in this place.

Unless—

His amethyst, she reckoned.

She remembered what she’d read in the book, that amethyst was their protection. And Kyle had been destroyed only after Feldspar had removed the amethyst pendant. And…

Feldspar wears one too. In fact he always had, since the first night she’d seen him.

And that same amethyst sparkled at her now from the ornate pinky ring on Feldspar’s hand…

“Kyle said I was set up,” she told him. She needed to divert him, she needed to keep him talking and distracted. “How?”

“I should think it would be obvious to you by this point,” Feldspar replied. “I needed someone very badly to run the restaurant, and when I found out about you, I knew that you were the one. I also knew you’d be reluctant to leave your fiance, so I simply made certain arrangements.”

Vera’s eyes thinned. “What kind of…arrangements?”

Feldspar smiled, as if at a naive toddler. “I instructed the Zyramon, via her own sense of creativity, to effect a situation that would induce you to leave your lover.”

“The Zyramon,” Vera repeated dreamily. She’d read about this person in the book. “It said she was a—”

“She’s a synoec, a hermaphrodite. The beautiful woman with red hair? Surely you’ve not forgotten your encounter with her. I believe she engaged the services of a particularly seamy prostitute to lend assistance. They drugged your beloved fiance, seduced him, and made sure that you would have the opportunity to bear witness.”

Vera’s mind seemed to swim suddenly in obscure, dark clouds. Paul wasn’t lying. It was all true…

“A fine ploy that proved to be quite effective, wouldn’t you say, Ms. Abbot? But I had no choice. You were the one, and I was determined to have you regardless of the means.” Feldspar’s brazen bald head shined like a shellacked orb. “And as for the matter of finances, I should also think that that, too, would by now be more than apparent. Our—shall we say—enterprise has access to unlimited financial resources. And I suspect you can guess from whence these resources originate.”

Vera felt sick, her mind still aswarm in the tarn of confusions and impossibilities…

“And we have access to far more resources than mere financial ones,” Feldspar went on, unconsciously eyeing his amethyst ring. “Power, protection, knowledge. And an array of intricacies.”

“Intricacies?”