“We know who you are.” Theo spoke up, his voice strong.
“Do you really?” Viktor gave him a condescending smile. “My father was a brilliant man. But he was also cold, with no understanding of life or the human heart. I understood why Nettie and Liliya ran away. My father spent years trying to find them.”
He turned to Semele. “For him, Nettie was the key to unlocking a future world. He never stopped looking for her. I used to dream that I too would meet her someday. I so wanted to.”
Viktor drew from his oxygen. “You see, you belong to that rarest group of observers—the truest of seers—who can take the full measure of life, filled with all its infinite probabilities, and see the future that has been set forth. Just look at Ionna’s manuscript. She didn’t write to Nettie. She wrote to you—she singled you out because you are next in line. Her heir. Your sight, your ability has even greater potential than your grandmother’s.”
Semele shook her head in denial.
Viktor’s gaze shifted to Theo. “Tell me, did you inherit Liliya’s gift?”
Theo didn’t answer, but his eyes hardened.
Semele looked to Theo in surprise. She had never considered that he might possess Liliya’s ability.
Viktor chuckled. “It is no matter to me if you can see through walls.” His eyes searched Semele’s again. “Nothing in the world is more powerful than time. It is the only thing that controls us, until we can grasp how to break free.” His next words made her freeze in terror. “There is a device strapped to your mother, and the countdown has begun. I will leave it up to you to free her. Me, I am happy to watch. My greatest triumph would be to see you become your ultimate self or to die trying.”
“You’re crazy,” she whispered.
“Am I?” Viktor shrugged. “I’ve gotten you this far, dear girl, when no one else could.” He held up Ionna’s cards and the manuscript. “Are you really going to let her down?”
Semele instinctively took a step toward him.
“For the first time since Elisa died so tragically in Gundeshapur, the cards, the manuscript, and the heir are all united. It has taken a long time for this day to come. If it wasn’t for me, Ionna’s legacy would have been kept hidden by both of your fathers, and you would continue to forget who you are.”
Semele found her voice and hated how weepy she sounded. “Why are you doing this? What do you want from me?”
“Your best self.” He motioned to her mother. “You have the power to save her.”
“I don’t … I can’t.…”
“Yes, you can!” he erupted. “Do you know there are premonition bureaus around the world where people send letters filled with visions of the future?” He waved his arms like a conductor. “Do you know how many letters arrived before the Titanic? Before Kennedy was assassinated? Human consciousness knows. The mind can travel time. You have no idea how many others with the sight are out there. But you have the power to write more than a mere letter.” He took a long breath from his oxygen tank and gestured to her, indicating that she could approach her mother. “Now prove me right.”
Semele couldn’t move. She shook her head, unable to understand what she was supposed to do.
“Go on,” he said, his voice muffled behind the mask. “The bomb will explode soon. At least say your good-byes.”
His words galvanized her. Semele rushed to her mother and knelt at her feet. The contraption looked even more alarming up close. “There are too many wires!”
“And not many minutes to spare,” Viktor taunted. “Get to it.”
The timer strapped to Helen’s chest ticked as the seconds moved forward in a relentless march. They had less than fifteen minutes.
Tears ran down Helen’s face as she whimpered behind the gag.
“There’s a pair of wire cutters under the chair,” Viktor called out. “Cutting one of them will disarm it, or so I’ve been assured by the Russian gentleman I paid an exorbitant sum to assemble it.”
Semele found the wire cutters beneath her mother’s legs. “This is insane! I have no idea what to do!”
“Because you’re still trying to live in the moment instead of looking beyond it. Effect can precede cause. So the question is, do you survive this test or not? Do you live or not? The answer is quite simple. Don’t think! Use your ability.”
Semele’s pulse skyrocketed. Her heart hammered in her chest so hard she thought it might give out. She was sure she was going to hyperventilate. She watched the counter tick down.…
13:46 … 13:45 … 13:44 …
“Oh my God, oh my God…” Free-falling into panic, she surrendered completely to its grip. All rational thought abandoned her.
She was about to die.
“Semele!” Theo’s voice sounded dim, far away, and beyond her reach.
“I can’t.” She could barely hold the wire cutters, her hands were shaking so hard.
The timer continued: 12:59 … 12:58 … 12:57 …
“Yes, you can. I know you can,” he said with utter conviction.
She stared at the tangle of colored wires. There were at least thirty.
With an anguished yelp, she cut the white one.
The device beeped, stopped, and then continued its countdown.
12:00 … 11:59 … 11:58 …
Viktor let out a strange, childlike giggle. “Oh my, that was a misstep. Please don’t do that again.”
The minutes belonged to him.
He’s not afraid because he’s already dying.
10:40 … 10:39 … 10:38 … 10:37 …
The first thought came to her swiftly, followed by the answers. Viktor had lured her to Kairos years ago to keep her under his watchful eye. But then he had found out he had terminal cancer last year. Detected long after the jaundice set in, it had already spread from his pancreas. His impending death made him accelerate his plans. He sent Raina to New York to have a tighter grip on Mikhail. Then he put his final experiment into play. He even— She stopped.
“My God,” she whispered. “You killed Marcel too.” Theo’s breath caught. She closed her eyes, and as if her mind was a camera, a shutter clicked and opened up the past. Images of Viktor’s life flowed through her like an electric current.
“How fascinating.” Viktor leaned forward, understanding written on his face. “You can see the past as well? Well, well, this is a surprise.”
Semele could only stare at him, her mind convulsing with what she now knew. “You’re Nettie’s…” She couldn’t say the words, couldn’t vocalize what she had seen.
“Her son?” His voice rang out in the room. “Yes. Very good.” Viktor clapped. “Very good! Brava! This is so much more than what I had hoped for. You have retrocognition as well.”
Semele didn’t understand what that meant. She only knew what she saw.
“You are correct,” he said. “Nettie was my mother. A part of my father’s great experiment. He impregnated her in the hope that his child would inherit her abilities.”