At the time, she’d dismissed it. Because of her amnesia, she didn’t have nearly the level of understanding of her abilities that the old Myfanwy had possessed. Her previous self had undergone years of training and experimentation with her powers and could do things that were completely beyond the new Myfanwy. For all she knew, that brief flash might have meant that someone was having a stroke, or a seizure, or just an involuntary shudder. She’d dismissed it. But now she wondered if she’d come in contact with the murderer. It was an unpleasant thought, but it opened up a very interesting possibility.
Myfanwy had several secrets in addition to that of working for a covert supernatural government organization. The main secret, of course, was the amnesia. Only a few people were aware that her memories had been stolen from her and that she was masquerading as herself. With the loss of her memories, however, had come a startling development. For all the expertise her old self had possessed, she had always needed to establish physical contact to use her powers. The current Myfanwy could use them at a distance, extending them from her mind out to anyone within a radius of about twenty meters. She looked across at the security guards and knew that, with a thought, she could bring them both to their knees. By shifting the focus of her perceptions, she could view the electricity in their brains, the signals in their spines and muscles, the chemistry in their guts.
So could I track down the murderer with my powers? she wondered. It was a tenuous possibility, very tenuous, but no less likely than the Grafters sniffing out the murderer at the exits. Privately, she doubted that they’d manage it. Expecting the Grafters to pick out the smell of a few drops of blood from hundreds of food-and alcohol-filled passersby on a windy day was not realistic.
She stood up, having made the decision. “When my colleague emerges from her examination, could you please tell her I’ve just stepped away?” she asked the security guards. “She can ring me on my mobile.” They nodded obediently, and she moved toward the escalators, resolute despite the flaws in her plan, of which there were several. For one thing, there were plenty of areas she wouldn’t be able to access: the private boxes, the service areas. I’ll have to go wandering through the crowds, she thought. And hope I’m lucky enough to bump into a serial killer. A methodical approach was clearly needed, so she began at the top. Using her powers to examine people required a good deal of concentration, and so she was obliged to walk very slowly while she did it. She ambled along each of the seating levels, scanning the crowds, trying to pick out that strange flash she recalled.
Nothing. Damn it.
The most crowded areas were around the bars and restaurants, so she headed there next. There were hordes of people waiting patiently (if a little raucously) for drinks. She stood off to the side of the first bar, her eyes narrowed. Her intense focus was disrupted, however, when half a bourbon and Coke was spilled onto her feet by a red-faced young Hooray Henry who was busy drinking his winnings.
“Sorry, miss,” he said, but the sincerity of his apology was somewhat marred by his sniggering and that of his equally intoxicated friends. His laughter cut off into a startled howl as, unaccountably, his wrist jerked and he dashed the rest of his beverage onto his own crotch. Myfanwy rolled her eyes and walked away. It was probably a gross violation of some Checquy code of conduct to use her abilities this way, but since she had no memory of ever reading such a code, she felt no guilt.
Myfanwy made her way down through the grandstand, passing by the various bars and food venders, zigzagging along the concourses, and going back down the escalators. She paused to get a glass of orange juice and then walked over to the lawn by the racecourse. Could a person really just saunter around casually right after he killed someone? she wondered.
“Myfanwy!” She jerked around at her name and did a double take that set her hat wobbling. In front of her was one of the few people she knew who had nothing to do with either the Checquy or the Grafters.
“Jonathan!” she exclaimed. “Hi!” Jonathan was her brother — well, the brother of the body she’d inherited. Two years older, some inches taller, but with the same unremarkable brown hair and facial features. Technically, she was not supposed to know him. The Checquy had taken Myfanwy Thomas away from her family at the age of nine, when her powers first manifested. Jonathan had grown up thinking his sister was dead, and it was only when their parents were killed in a car accident and he gained access to their papers that he learned she was still alive. Even then, he had known only the cover story, that she had been struck down by a rare, incurable malady and taken to a secretive research facility where she could at least be made comfortable.
Jonathan and Bronwyn (the youngest Thomas sibling) had spent several months tracking down their long-lost sister. Bronwyn had finally introduced herself to a startled Myfanwy — an amnesiac Myfanwy who had no fond, wistful memories of her siblings but was prepared to fake them, just as she was faking being a Rook of the Checquy. Both Bronwyn and Jonathan remained unaware of Myfanwy’s real job and her supernatural abilities. They were under the impression that she was a highly paid administrative consultant who had spent many years in a coma and who now suffered from agoraphobia. It was not the best cover story, but it was the only scenario Myfanwy had been able to come up with that fit all the facts.
“I didn’t know you were going to be here,” said Jonathan. “That’s a great hat.” They cheek-kissed awkwardly, partly because theirs was an odd, still-gestating relationship and partly because their respective hats projected in unfamiliar ways and required some careful maneuvering.
“Thank you. You look very handsome. I’m here with people from work.”
“Oh, me too,” said Jonathan. “The bank has a box, and they asked me along. Apparently, they liked what I did in Hong Kong.” He looked around. “Where are your colleagues? I’d love to meet them.”
“I appear to have lost them,” said Myfanwy. Which is the only break I’ve managed to catch today. If she and Jonathan had run into each other when she wasn’t alone, the situation would have gotten very awkward very quickly. Operatives of the Checquy who had been taken from their families were not supposed to reconnect with them. She looked up at the royal box, worried Lady Farrier might be gazing down at her with a pair of opera glasses, then glanced around anxiously, checking to make sure that none of the others were trying to find her. Then she stiffened.
Fifteen meters away, a middle-aged man in a black morning coat was chuckling at a joke his female companion had made and flaring in Thomas’s supernatural senses like a blowtorch.
What is wrong with the universe that it would screw me around like this?
She realized that Jonathan was still talking to her.
“What?”
“Would you like to come up to the box? I’d love to introduce you to some of my colleagues and my boss.”
“Oh, that’s so kind,” said Myfanwy distractedly. She squinted beyond her brother at the man with the flickering aura. He was irritatingly average. A forty-something white male with brown hair and no convenient facial hair or eye patch to help her describe him to the others. She tried desperately to read his name tag but couldn’t make it out. “Could we do it in a little bit? I really need to find my work people. There are some foreign visitors — clients — and I’m slightly worried about them.”
“Of course, I understand. Can’t you call them?”
“I could, yes...” said Myfanwy. “That’s a very good and sane point.” Damn it. “But they don’t speak English. And I don’t speak Dutch!” she said in a moment of inspiration. “Wait, you don’t speak Dutch, do you?” she asked fearfully.
“No, just Mandarin.”
Thank God.
“Well, yeah, there you are. I’ll go find them and make sure they’re taken care of. And then I’ll give you a call, and we’ll meet your people.” She bit her lip anxiously. The man who might be the murderer was shaking hands with his companion. Is he leaving?
“Myfanwy?”
“Hmm?”
“Myfanwy.” The tone in Jonathan’s voice caught her by surprise, and she tore her gaze away from the suspect. Her brother was looking at her with a very serious expression. “Are you all right?”