Memory and Dream

“The dark man? You mean Rushkin?”

“I refuse to allow him the privilege of a name,” the woman said bitterly. “Monsters such as he forgo that right through their actions.”

A monster, Rolanda thought. And she’d just let the others go off to confront him. Why hadn’t she gone with them and helped? But if she had gone with them, Rushkin’s numena would have gotten away with stealing the paintings and then where would Cosette and the reading woman be?

“And John?” the woman asked. “Do you know his whereabouts?”

Rolanda shook her head. “I never got the chance to meet him. He went ahead of the others—after Rushkin. Hopefully they caught up with him.”

An odd sound came from the storeroom—a soft whufting cough of air being displaced. As the two women turned to look, Rolanda’s grip tightened on the baseball bat she was still holding at her side. But this time it was Cosette who had materialized there in the dark. She stood in front of her painting for a long moment, then slowly turned to face them.

“John’s dead,” she said as she walked out into the light.

She looked different from the last time Rolanda had seen her. Her eyes were puffy and rimmed with red from crying, but the sadness that had brought on the tears had since been replaced with a grimness that stole away all the lightheartedness in her features that had made her so immediately engaging.

“Rushkin killed him,” Cosette went on, “and Isabelle’s the next to die.”

“He’s going to kill Isabelle?” the reading woman asked, shocked.

“No.” Cosette explained how they’d all been trapped in the makeshift studio Rushkin had put together for Isabelle. “She’s going to kill herself. It’s the only way she thinks she can stop Rushkin.”

“We have to stop her,” Rolanda said, but Cosette only shrugged. “It’s her choice, isn’t it?” she said.

“How can you be so callous?” Rolanda demanded of her. “If it weren’t for Isabelle, you wouldn’t even exist.”

“That’s not exactly such a blessing,” Cosette said. “We didn’t ask to be born. We didn’t ask to be different.”

It felt so odd to Rolanda to hear those familiar complaints in this situation. She was far more used to them coming from the children she saw in her office upstairs. The runaways who felt they owed nothing to anyone for having been brought into a world they hated, who struggled to make do with an existence that offered them only hardship and pain. The immigrant and black children who battled the double grievance of those same joyless homes coupled with the racism directed at them by their peers and the rest of society.

“I’m sure Isabelle never meant to make you unhappy,” she said.

“She never thought of us at all. All she wanted to do was to forget we ever existed. You know what she said to me?” she added, turning to the other numena. “That we’ll never have red crows or dreams, because all we get is the real we have now.”

“Is what we have such a bad thing?” the woman asked.

“Hunted by Rushkin and his creatures?”

“But was that ever Isabelle’s doing?”

Cosette hesitated. Rolanda could see that she didn’t want to deal with the logic of it, but she had no choice —not under the steady gaze of her companion’s solemn-grey eyes.

“No,” she said, her voice pitched low.

Some of the harshness left her features, making her look younger again. Almost fragile. Rolanda knew exactly what the other woman had meant about wanting to protect her. At that moment she wanted to enfold Cosette in a shielding embrace and dare the world to do its worst, because it’d have to go through her first to get at her. But she knew better than to try.

“Will you take me to Isabelle?” she asked instead.

“We’ll be too late.”

“But we could still try.”

Cosette nodded. “Except, they told me to come back to guard the paintings.”

“I will guard the paintings,” the reading woman said.

“His creatures are really scary,” Cosette said, wavering.

“I can call some people to stay with you,” Rolanda told the woman. Then she reached out her hand to Cosette. “Come on. Just show me where Isabelle and the others are. I won’t ask you to go back inside with me.”

Cosette hesitated for a long moment, then allowed herself to be led upstairs. The other numena locked the door to the cellar and pocketed the key before following them up.

“I know some guys in the projects,” Rolanda said. “They’re gang members, but they owe me. All we’ll need is a couple of them to deal with that pair who came by here earlier.”

“Whatever you think is best,” the reading woman said.

It took three calls before Rolanda could get through to the boys she was looking for. They had all found a haven through the Foundation at one point or another in their young lives and were eager to repay the favor.

“They’ll be fifteen minutes,” she said after she’d cradled the receiver. “Go,” the older numena told her. “I can wait on my own until they arrive.”

“But—”

“You waste precious time.”

Rolanda studied her for a moment, then nodded. She pulled a twenty out of her pocket.

“They’re coming in a cab,” she said as she handed the money to the reading woman, “but they won’t be able to pay the driver. This should cover it.”

“I will deal with whatever arises,” the reading woman said.

“Right.” Rolanda gave Cosette a quick glance. She looked terrible. “You ready?”

When Cosette nodded, Rolanda led the way to the front door. Opening it, she found yet another half-familiar stranger standing there on the porch. In the poor light he seemed to loom up taller than his bulky six-two, one hand raised, reaching for the doorbell. He glanced down at the baseball bat that Rolanda was holding and took a step back from her.

“I’m reaching for my ID,” he said as his hand went for the inner pocket of his sports jacket.

He brought out a small billfold and flipped it open so that she could see his badge and identification.

“Detective Roger Davis, NPD,” he said slowly. “We met one of the times you brought some of your kids down to the precinct for a tour.”

“I remember,” Rolanda said.

“I want to ask you a few questions about this afternoon’s attempted robbery—in particular, what you know about the Native American with the ponytail who was involved.”

“He thinks Bitterweed’s John,” Cosette said.

The detective had misleadingly placid features. Rolanda remembered thinking when she first met him on that precinct tour how he seemed to be just a big easygoing guy. Then she’d looked into his eyes and realized that he didn’t miss a thing. That penetrating gaze that had so surprised her was now focused on Cosette.

“You know who I’m talking about,” he said, making a statement of what could have been a question.

Cosette shrugged. “It wasn’t John’s fault they looked the same, but he was getting blamed for what Bitterweed did.” She turned her attention away from the detective to look at Rolanda. “It was Bitterweed who killed Kathy’s mother—not John. And certainly not Alan.”

“You’re saying that we’re dealing with two men here and they look exactly the same?” Davis asked.

Cosette gave him a tired nod.

“One named Bitterweed and one named John?”

“John’s dead,” Cosette said in a voice drained of expression. “As for Bitterweed, if you hang around here long enough, he’ll be—”

She broke off suddenly, features going ashen. Behind them, Rolanda heard the reading woman gasp.

“What is it?” Rolanda asked, looking from Cosette to the older numena. “What’s happened?”

“She ... she did it,” Cosette said softly. “She really did it ...”

They were talking about Isabelle, Rolanda realized. Through their connection to the artist, they’d just felt her die. Rolanda thought she was going to be sick.