He knew he should flee, get down the passage and up the stairs before Armand and Benji could intercept him. But he stood paralyzed gazing at the blood, the unnatural glittering blood. And her dark eyes gazed up at him as her screams continued, ripping through his thoughts, ripping through his will, her eyes pleading with him though she could not move her arms or legs.

He found himself embracing her and lifting her. He held her as if he meant to kiss her, her breasts against his chest and her head fallen back as if her neck had been broken. Dipping his fingers into her open mouth, he brought the blood to his lips! Sweet sizzling sensations just as he’d felt them with Killer. He brought more to his lips. Rippling chills all through his body. He bent to suck the blood out of her mouth with his own.

Let her alone. Do not harm her!

Who was this speaking to him?

Let her go. Do not harm her. It is Amel who is speaking to you. Let my child go.

“Amel?” he whispered aloud.

It seemed an age ago that her screams had stopped, and that a great pounding on the metal door had commenced.

He drank more and more of the blood.

She is my child, Garekyn.

“It is you?” he said, the words lost in the blood flowing into his mouth and down his throat. But he caught no image to confirm it, no flash of the Great One of long ago. Only a great web came alive in intricate detail against a sea of fathomless blackness, and all through this great web myriad tiny points glittered and brightened.

The door flew back off its heavy hinges and clattered to the concrete floor.

Armand stood there facing him. Benji was right behind him.

Garekyn held Eleni against him, drinking from her open mouth as though it were a fountain, his eyes fixed on Armand.

“Give her to me,” said Armand. “Give her to me or I burn you alive.”

Garekyn, do as he tells you to do. He can restore her. I will make him let you go.

Garekyn wanted to do it, to surrender her, let her go. But he couldn’t let go of this blood, this sizzling blood that was so rich and so beautiful and the telepathic voice that was speaking to him almost tenderly, the voice he was certain he knew, coming through this blood. He saw the web growing in all directions, ever more elaborate, and strangely beautiful to him with its myriad pinpoints of twinkling light but even more beautiful was the sense of meaning, the sense of understanding everything utterly and completely, and yet losing his grip on it as soon as he had grasped it. And then he would have the sense again.

He saw the towers of Atalantaya melting. Millions of voices screamed in panic, in agony.

Garekyn, let her go.