Allegiance of Honor (Psy-Changeling #15) - Nalini Singh Page 0,112
ensure he didn’t end up right next to the building but nearby. Then he made his way closer with painstaking focus, crawling there on his front. Having only one upper limb made the task a little more difficult, even given his Tk—this was a situation where one of Samuel’s prosthetics might’ve come in useful.
He knew they were too late the instant he saw the slightly open door, spotted the browned leaves piled in that narrow gap. Still, he took no risks. Retrieving a low-tech tool from a thigh pocket, a tool that was basically a slender piece of metal with a small angled mirror at the end, he used it to look inside the building.
All he saw were signs of neglect.
Including thick cobwebs that crisscrossed the space and couldn’t have been spun had anyone been moving in the area even a week earlier. He was too much an Arrow, however, to take it as a given that one empty room meant the entire structure was empty. Sliding away the mirror, he made his way around the side of the building and to the back. There was a small hole at the bottom that looked like damage caused by wear and tear.
Again, he used his tool to look inside.
More cobwebs.
The structure had no other rooms from what he could tell.
Lifting his hand, he waved Miane’s people over. They came in quiet as ghosts, but one look inside the structure and it was confirmed they were weeks, more likely months, too late.
“She was here,” Miane said, striding to a dusty corner and pointing to a green bracelet that appeared to have been forgotten there. “I saw her wearing this at our last Conclave.”
Vasic glanced at her. “Why aren’t you picking it up?” It should’ve been an instinctive act for a woman born in a tactile, emotional race.
“Because I’m hoping we can get a psychometric in here.” She looked at her people. “Everyone out. Let’s leave this place as clean as possible for the Ps-Psy, if we can get him.” Miane turned to Vasic. “Can you ’port me back to Lantia? I need to make some calls. The others will stay here and we can move them out on water transport now that we know this location is abandoned.”
Vasic got her to the floating city, said, “If you need someone to take the psychometric to the site, I’ll do it.”
“We’re starting to owe the Arrows far too many favors,” Miane said without heat. “Thank you. Now let me see if he’s willing to do this.”
• • •
VASIC was both surprised and not when the Ps-Psy proved to be Tanique Gray. Anthony Kyriakus’s children had never been ordinary and, given their father, their rebel leanings were almost to be expected. Because he’d seen psychometrics at work before, Vasic kept Tanique within sight once he’d ’ported Miane and the young male to the location of Leila Savea’s captivity, ready to get him to a medical unit should it be necessary.
He didn’t think Miane and the other changelings realized the cost of a Ps-Psy’s abilities. Likely because psychometrics were rare and tended to work mostly with museums and the like. That didn’t negate the danger; it simply kept it out of public view. The last emergency Vasic had heard of, had involved a Ps-Psy who’d been asked to verify the provenance of an old sword.
He’d been paid a considerable sum to handle the weapon because most psychometrics wouldn’t touch anything with a known history of violence. As it happened, the compensation could never have been enough. The Ps-Psy had managed to scream that the weapon had been used in a recent massacre before he stopped talking and started convulsing.
He was still in a high-dependency unit in a private medical facility. The chances of his waking up were slim, but he was kept alive because there was a chance, and Ps-Psy were valuable enough that no one wanted to squander the opportunity, should it exist.
Today he saw Tanique freeze to a stop on the floor of the main room, well before he reached the entrance to what must’ve been Leila Savea’s cell. The younger male’s muscles contracted, his hands fisting as his breathing turned ragged.
Vasic didn’t hesitate. He teleported the other man out of the building and into the trees just outside.
Miane spun around to face Vasic. “What the hell? He was getting something.”
“He was about to go into a seizure.” Shifting on his heel, Vasic walked to where he’d teleported Tanique.