Heartland

have to See to tell that you don't know the answer to that question. Your head is filled with spirits, but you still don't know anything useful. You don't know why.'

If Philippe had known who the Opposition was, why hadn't he killed them? Why had he let them live?

A really troubling point intruded on my thoughts: What if everyone had been lying to me? What if there was no Opposition. Perhaps they were all scrambling in the vacuum to be the last one standing. It is the first way.

'Why don't you tell me?' I asked Husserl, shoving that possibility aside. That was too chaotic, too unstructured, and I couldn't believe that Philippe would have left so much to chance.

He laughed. 'Why should I? Why don't you ask him? You're his master now, aren't you? Or are you just a simple tool?'

'You're trying to twist me,' I said. 'Just like he did. Everything you say is the same manipulative bullshit that Philippe used to pull on us. He read people very well, and he didn't have to know the future to know how they'd react in certain situations. You're doing the same thing.'

'Of course I am,' Husserl said. 'We all do, M. Markham. It's a facet of being human: all that lying, cheating, and conniving. It's what makes our meat so sticky sweet to the pure light of our souls. All that corruption. All that filthy sin. What else would the Divine Spark soil itself in but that which is the very opposite of its purified innocence?'

'Don't make this metaphysical,' I said, realizing that sentiment applied to my line of thinking as well. Keep it concrete. 'I'm talking about the very specific mechanics of shaping events and people to your ends. You're just like Philippe: whispering what we want to hear; suggesting what we already know, but can't bring ourselves to want. The only difference between you two is that he was better at it than you. Even with your special glasses.'

Husserl laughed. 'Better than me? You think my actions are driven by jealousy, by some vague psychological need?'

'Are they?'

'Why do you think Philippe and I are at odds? How do you know this course of events isn't something that we planned together?'

'You-' And I stopped. Wouldn't that make sense? Wouldn't that explain why Philippe hadn't killed him. What about the others? Cristobel had accepted his sacrifice eagerly; and Antoine, burned by my actions in Ravensdale, had suffered that pain in order to receive his reward. Why couldn't Husserl's actions be considered in the same light? Who was to say that they weren't all so aware of the big picture that a sacrifice of the flesh was but a minor token if it moved the plan forward. Hadn't Husserl done exactly that when he had called me at the Archives, ostensibly from Tevvys' phone? He had claimed to have done so at my request, but I didn't know that Moreau had delivered that message any more than I knew how Husserl had gotten my phone number. What had that conversation accomplished? He had told me I was a singularity, a point beyond which no future was certain, and that realization had unlocked an awareness of the Hierarch's grand plan. He had moved Philippe's design forward in a manner that suggested he was aware of some of the details of that vision.

But this was the lie he wanted me to believe. A twist of logic that seemed so obvious and so natural, but when I looked at it more closely, it fell apart. So Husserl was privy to Philippe's plan, and Philippe knew that Husserl knew. But that didn't tell me who was ultimately playing whom. Husserl had as much opportunity-if not more-than any of the Architects. If he could read the future, then I would have been disappointed if he hadn't been able to anticipate what was coming. It would be easy to claim ownership of the plan now as I was the only one who could readily contradict him. Control didn't mean compliance or agreement. It simply meant knowledge.

Those who understand the big picture get to fine-tune the small details. One of the truisms of the Watchers. If you Know, you can act. If Husserl Knew, then why couldn't this all be an act? A misdirection for my benefit?

Which circled us back to the basic question: Why?

I put my hands flat against the floor, and the Chorus remarked on the rhythm of ley energy storming beneath me. Like the vibrations from the DJ's record, back at Batofar. A subsonic vibration, a confusion of echoes. In my own head, the same sort of mixture-too many histories, too many divergent desires. It became difficult to parse the 'why?' out of the noise.

'Why did you call me when I was at the Archives?'

Stalling. Trying to think. Trying to put more of the pieces together.

'I've already told you.'

'I don't believe it was just to tell me that I was the axis around which all of this turned. I would have figured that out eventually. You forced the issue, and you revealed yourself. I didn't know your involvement prior to that call. Why did you give away that advantage?'

'It confuses you, doesn't it? That we might not be enemies. That we might be working toward the same goal.'

'What goal? Coronation?'

'It is the inevitable outcome of this course. A new Hierarch will be Crowned.'

'And you think I should be showing more enthusiasm about giving you that opportunity.'

'I know you will.'

I shifted my weight forward and Husserl didn't seem bothered by the shift in my position. I considered the distance between us, and the obstacles: Antoine, Henri, the blood, Charles. .

'Where's Marielle?' I realized.

He smiled, a motion made all the more sinister by the fact that no lines developed on his face. He really did have the skin of an infant. 'That's a better question.'

I repeated it.

Husserl inhaled deeply, like a hound scenting the approach of rain. 'I won't try to convince you that she came willingly, because you won't believe me, so I will say that she is in my care, and will remain so until Coronation. At which time, I will put a knife into her chest and cut her heart out.'

Her heart.

On the floor beside me, the tarot card twitched, the wet smear of ink and blood solidifying into a concrete picture. Hearing some echo in Husserl's words, I listened to the Chorus for a moment as I watched the picture on the card become clear. A woman holding up a cup, and rising out of the frame, only his crossed feet and the wide pole upon which he was crucified visible, was the Martyr. It was identical to the watercolor I had seen at the Chapel of Glass, though a close-up detail. The crucified man's flaming heart wasn't visible. But the cup was.

Philippe's spirit giving me a nudge, trying to bridge a gap and make a connection. Drink from this vessel. The Ace of Cups; I had drawn it on the chart of the Architects, an unconscious doodle while Vivienne had been mesmerizing me. Words and tongues; tell me what ails you? Earlier, at Batofar, I had sipped from a cup Marielle had given me containing a concoction that had driven out the poison in my system. But was that all it had done? Had it created some other connection?

Her hips moving, inviting me to try again. In the alcove on Batofar, the physical connection. I had been caught up in the moment, in the sensation of being alive and whole again, and I hadn't been paying close enough attention. Keys and locks. Opening doors and crossing thresholds; connections made across disparate spaces. Marielle hadn't been fucking me. She had been trying to extract something from me during the sex. She had tried to break open some mystery hidden within my heart. What I say and what I mean are never the same.

What had she tried to take?

'You won't harm her,' I said.

His smile remained. 'You are guessing, calling my bluff.'

'No, I know you're lying.'

'And how do you know that?'

'Because if you wanted to kill her, you'd have done so already.'

He nodded. 'Yes, in much the same way I would have cut your throat while you were busy dreaming that petty little dream of yours if that is what I had wanted.'

'Yes.'

'Very good. You are learning to think.' He leaned on his cane, the light flashing on his glasses. 'If I haven't killed you, then I must want something.'