"It is always the quick deaths with you," she said. "And I suppose you want me to remove everything else, after that?"

"Yes," he said.

"You really are peculiar," said the witch. "I can't imagine why you think death is preferable to the company of your brothers."

The witch was not quite as all-knowing as she imagined herself to be. Charlie imagined punching his thumbs through her bright glittering eyes and then eating them like sugarplums. He said, "It's not the company of my brothers I'm trying to get away from."

"Clever," said the witch, and shoved the knife into his bone-plated chest. She missed his heart on purpose, which required hacking at him for some time before she got it right. Blood spattered her face and dress. Charlie's brothers watched.

Charlie, dying, hoped the witch's guest arrived before she had time to change.

The line between life and death was a thin one for a gargoyle, and Charlie, though he had never found much occasion before his captivity to walk it, found that he had some talent navigating the world beyond his body. He could see things about people-private, unconscious things. As a dream, a disembodied soul, almost nothing was hidden. He could peer into hearts and heads, and while he was not so nosy as to pry deep into places he did not belong, being able to explore the world as a ghost did alleviate the suffering he left behind. If only for a little while.

And the witch was totally clueless, which made the experience all the sweeter-and more-because death was also a good opportunity to explore possible avenues of escape for himself and his brothers. Charlie did not know what kind of spell the witch had put them under, only that someone, somewhere, must be familiar with it, or know what could be done to break it. Haunting the witch for that information was impossible, even dangerous. The shields around her thoughts were simply too tight, and Charlie feared pushing-that somehow she would sense him, recognize him, even, and the game would be up. Then there would be no more death. No more escape into the world.

Emma changed everything. Not, perhaps, Charlie's approach to the witch, but his approach to everything else in his life, which suddenly seemed burdened down with unnecessary secrets, the hands of the past reaching out to hold him down. He was not human, and though he had masqueraded as one for years and years, helping this child, even as a ghost, demanded that he give up some of that hard-earned anonymity, the illusion of separation between himself and others, the world and his personal, singular I. Never mind that Charlie was a prisoner, that he had lost the right to solitude. Reaching out was far more intimate, because it was his choice, his connection to make, and the consequences would be greater than any the witch could impart upon him.

And it was worth it when Emma, trapped in darkness, turned to the sound of his voice, and though she was afraid she did not lose herself, and though she had been abused so horribly by men, thought hero when she listened to him speak.

Words were not enough to express what that did to him, and it was not pride that made him warm, but something deeper-genetic, maybe, a biological imperative that had been suppressed in his psyche until that moment, that bloom of recognition when he thought, My kind have given up our souls for safety. We murdered ourselves the moment we forgot what we could do for others. What we should do, no matter what. No matter the risk. It is not us or them, but all of us, together.

And he carried that with him the first time he followed Emma from her bas.e.m.e.nt prison into the well-lit living room of an old farmhouse, and found a startling array of equipment: cameras, televisions, sound machines. Thousands and thousands of dollars worth, and farther beyond, in other rooms, he sensed more: offices, computers, editing equipment; an infrastructure dedicated to the subjugation of innocence.

And subjugate they had, Mrs. Kreer and her son, Andrew. Both their minds were tight, as were their hearts-as difficult to read as the witch-but Charlie did not need to push deep to know what they were about. All he had to do was watch, ghostly arms wrapped tight around Emma as Mrs. Kreer carefully applied glossy red lipstick to her small mouth.

Emma hated Andrew-feared him, too-but she thought, I am not alone and I am warm, when Charlie kept his word. And so he did not leave her. Not until the filming was over and he felt the tug, the inexorable rush, and he was forced, unwilling, back into his healed body. The living could not exist without the soul-to resist would be committing to a true death, and Charlie was not ready for that.

But he did ask for the knife again. And again. As many murders as he could squeeze into the witch's schedule. He needed to die, and stay dead, for as long as possible. The pain was momentary, easily endured, nothing at all compared to what Emma suffered. What she would continue suffering, unless he helped her.

Charlie's options, though, were rather limited. As a ghost, he had a form, but no real ability to affect his physical surroundings. The best he could do was scare Mrs. Kreer and her son-which he'd tried, on his second visit. The old woman did not give any indication of noticing him, and her son was much the same, except for one violent shiver which was just as likely due to a bad meal rather than Charlie's presence. It was a p.i.s.s-poor reaction and Charlie had no explanation for it. Emma most certainly could see him when he chose to materialize-though admittedly, he did so with a very toned down version of his face and body. The girl was traumatized enough without seeing what he really looked like.

So. If he could not help Emma himself, he needed to find someone who could. Tricky. The world was a big place. He had almost six billion candidates to choose from. Kind of, anyway. He liked to keep his options open.

He narrowed his search based on location; Emma was being kept in Washington state, in a little town in the mountains northeast of Seattle called Darrington. It took him far too long to discover her location-a weakness on his part, because every time he died he went straight to the child. A compulsion: he needed to know she was all right, still alive. And then, of course, he would say a word or two, and before long his time would run out and back under the knife he would go again.

But Emma was being held on the west coast of the United States, and that seemed as good a place as any to start his search, beginning first with her mother. He knew where she lived; the address was easy to take from Emma's mind. She came from a house in the Cascade Mountains, only several hours away. Charlie went there. Just one thought and poof. Faster than light, a speeding bullet.

Charlie did not tell Emma he was going to her mother, and was glad for it. He did not want to tell her what he found: empty sh.e.l.l casings, the decaying body, the blasted face. He did not want to tell her that it appeared no one had found or disturbed the remains, and therefore, no one had reported her as missing. Emma and her mother had lived a very isolated life. Perfect targets, well chosen. It was the ruthlessness that shocked him, though he supposed that was nave. He had seen enough horrors during his captivity to know better than to underestimate any capacity for cruelty. Especially when performed by those who could command perfect masks, spinning their lies into lives made of illusion. Like the Kreers, who had a perfect reputation in the community they lived in. People... liked them. Which was vomit-inducing, but unchangeable.

It made his burden heavier, and though the candidates he found were good men and women, professionals, even that was suddenly not enough. Mere honesty and integrity were not adequate standards; nor was a desire to do good.

Charlie wanted more out of the person who helped Emma. He wanted someone who would throw his or her life into the effort with as much intensity as a parent for a child, with all the dedication and commitment that such devotion required. He wanted someone who would not give up. He wanted someone who would fight to the bitter end to see Emma safe.

He wanted someone who would love the girl as much as he did.

So he drifted-pressured by time and patience, because every day was a day that Emma got hurt-listening to thoughts and hearts, looking and looking for that one bright song. He was relentless, could not remember a time in his life when he had felt such implacable drive, and he wondered at himself, at the way he had spent his life before now; drifting around the world, moving from city to city, immersing himself in books and learning, walking streets only to pretend to be something he was not, because it was easier and safer than wearing his true inhuman face. Casting illusion through shifting shape.

Gargoyles were not the only kind with such gifts of transformation, but Charlie knew those others only by their eyes. Golden and bright, like twin suns. Animals. Pure shape-shifters, in the truest sense of the word. A long time since Charlie had seen one of them. Almost twenty years, at least. He wondered how many were still left in the world, if they outnumbered the gargoyles and other creatures of the arcane and uncanny. In these modern days, what was considered normal vastly outweighed its opposite, though pockets remained, often hiding in plain sight. Clinging desperately to secrets, because the truth was unthinkable. Charlie could not imagine what the media would make of someone like him, what governments and scientists would do to a person so radically different from human. The heart might be the same-all the emotion and pa.s.sion-but the body, the flesh...

Flesh meant nothing. Flesh was nothing but a vehicle for his soul, but a vehicle that Charlie desperately missed as he searched for help. In his body, he could have stormed the farmhouse, taken Emma away-but he was trapped across the ocean, in a city near the sea, and he had nothing to give the little girl but a promise.

I will help you .

Charlie gave up on Washington state and moved to Oregon. Pa.s.sed over that state in a day. California was his last hope; after that, he would begin moving farther inland. Three days searching, and time was running out; he needed to find someone fast. All those high expectations, his convictions, just might have to fade to the side in order to get the job done.

And he was ready-he was ready to do it, come what may-when he felt a tug on the edge of his spirit. A call.

He followed. He had no choice; he felt like he was listening to Emma for the first time, only this was a boy, tied up in the back of a van that suddenly lurched, slamming the whimpering child against sharp equipment. A man swore. Charlie heard gunshots.

Gunshots, and something stronger. Another mind.

Charlie focused on that mind, binding himself to the imprint of it, and went, dropping his spirit into the middle of a storm, a tumult, spinning wild against thoughts of pain and anger, and there, at the center...

A woman. Strong-determined-carrying a resolve so stubborn and powerful, Charlie felt it strike his own heart in a perfect sympathetic echo.

She was very tall, with skin the color of deep bronze; a woman easy to hold on to, with shapely legs and a small waist; broad shoulders and strong arms. Nothing girlish about her; just solid strength, easy confidence. And her mind...

Charlie lost himself inside her head, rolling through her thoughts, which were impossible and unending and fast-so fast-quicksilver and mercury and lightning rolling into one flashing vision of cars and bullets and dying men and he heard: I have to stop this-I can't let him go-and-Quinn, be careful- He pressed for her name and found-Agatha-and there was another man beside her-Quinn-but his thoughts were quiet in the shadow of her mind, and Charlie watched, appalled and fascinated and terrified, as Agatha threw herself against death, fearless, all to stop- A man who hurt children.

Charlie pressed himself deep inside Agatha, burying his soul against her own, sharing her life as she fought with all her strength to take down the man she hunted. When she breathed it was for him, and he breathed for her, curling around her lungs, beating with her heart until it was his heart, until he could not tell where he ended and she began, and it was wrong-wrong to be so close to someone without permission, but he could not help himself because to be in a mind so strong, so wild and chaotic and perfect, was a drug.

He had his champion. Right here. His huntress. The perfect woman for Emma.

The perfect woman for you , a voice whispered.

A bad thought. He had not come looking for himself. His heart did not matter. He had a mission, a little girl to save. She was the only one he had time for.

And besides, humans and gargoyles did not mix. Not ever, and not unless deception was involved. The physical differences were just too great.

Yet he wondered, as he finally untangled himself from her soul, what it would be like. He wondered, because it came to him in increments, bits of stunning truth, that the woman was even more extraordinary than he had first imagined, and he saw things inside her head-impossible things-that made him question once again the world around him, turn the paradigm upside down.

She'll believe me , Charlie realized. I won't need to hide myself from her. I won't need to pretend I'm a ghost or an angel or a devil.

With this woman, all he needed was the truth.

Things happened: the child, the police, the waiting punctuated by a phone call. Charlie listened to it all, still judging, tasting Agatha's reactions and thoughts. He wondered at his luck.

Finally, though, Charlie felt his spirit stretch-his body, coming back to life. He readied himself to leave, still floating close, eavesdropping, tasting Agatha's thoughts and the quiet mind of the man beside her. Friends, partners. Dedicated fighters. Not lovers.

The pull got stronger. Charlie could not help himself; at the last moment, he reached out and touched Agatha. Placed the hand of his spirit against her neck, infusing that spot with warmth, with the focus of his heart. He pretended he could feel her skin. He pretended she could feel him.

And when she reached back to touch her neck-startling, unexpected-her hand pa.s.sed through his and he felt a quiet caress move along the entirety of his soul, strong and lovely and undeniable.

Thousands of miles away, Charlie's heart began beating again. Agatha disappeared.

He opened his eyes. Above him, stone. Beneath him, sand, cool and soft. His wings ached.

The witch was not there waiting for him. Charlie turned his head and looked at his brothers.

"Yes," he said, to their unspoken question. "I found her."

Chapter Three.

The future returned to Aggie later that evening.

She was alone, as usual. Mulder and Scully were on the television, squabbling while she sucked down a greasy hamburger and milkshake from the nearby Hardee's. Comfort food-she needed it bad. She also needed to curl up and suck her thumb, but she was trying to be mature about her emotions.

What she really wanted-what she thought would cure the ache in her heart: was to return to the office. There was always someone there burning the midnight oil: Roland, usually, who practically had an apartment attached to his suite. Even if she got a lecture, at least there would be something to do. A distraction, maybe. Anything to take away the vision of Rujul's haunted eyes staring at her from the floor of that van.

G.o.d . Roland did not know jack s.h.i.t about how Aggie relaxed. The job was her vacation. Getting things done, being useful. Time off was for pansies. Even c.r.a.p like today was no deterrent, it just made her want to work harder. She chased memories by making new ones, by doing something good to replace the bad.

Push, and push hard. That was Aggie's motto. It was how she had managed to survive into her mid-twenties and get past the weirdo ignoramuses who could not see beyond her skin color or wild hair; the only way she had been able to grow up as the only multiracial kid within a hundred miles, in a town populated by cheerful white supremacists, well-meaning I-am-going-to-save-your-soul Baptists, and an odd fringe collection of artistic eccentrics, hippies, and poets (who were neither poor nor starving, because they managed to supplement the growing of their words with the growing of weed).

Idaho. A wonderful state.

At least her family life was normal. Good parents, cheerful household, no money problems worth speaking of. Aggie's dad was a lawyer, and his office had perched on the back end of the house, right below her bedroom. Which meant some really great eavesdropping.

And later, games of fate.

Aggie did not move from the couch. Relax, relax, she told herself, chanting it until her muscles began to unwind. This episode of the X-Files was a good one-all about words and hearts and pa.s.sion burning, with poor Scully so confused about l.u.s.t and love. Aggie could not relate, but it made for good television. That, and she kept hoping Mulder and Scully would kiss each other well and good. Having a relationship vicariously through fantasy and excellent scripting was all Aggie had at the moment-and to be honest, it wasn't all that bad. Her imagination was always better than reality, which was capped by her inability to find the right connection with a man she could trust enough to share her secrets.

I can see the future , she wanted to say, one day. Say it, and have the other person believe her. No judgment, no fear, no greed, fust loving acceptance.

Right. Big dreamer. Stupid romantic.

Aggie continued watching television, sinking deeper into a drowsy funk. She kept herself awake only to see the end of the episode, and right at the climax, right when the bad guy jumped Scully with his hands outstretched for blood, something else began to happen inside Aggie's head. Her mind danced with color, flickering brighter than any television screen, and she caught a glimpse of things to come.

It was odd. Aggie almost never saw her own future: a mystery-one she had learned to live with, albeit with some lingering frustration. There were ways around the disability; all she needed was to look at the people around her and she could extrapolate from their readings the things she needed to take care of for herself.

But sitting on the couch she began to see things, and it took her a moment to realize that what she was viewing was for her alone and no other. It certainly had nothing to do with the television-though she did wonder about the actors on the screen. She could receive readings from seeing pictures, moving or otherwise. But no, after a moment of careful scrutiny she decided David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson were not in her head.

But Aggie was. And there was a little girl in front of her. A photograph of a blond child, no older than eight or nine, with pale cheeks and hollow eyes. She was naked. She sat with her legs spread apart.

Aggie squeezed her eyes shut. She fought the visions, but they continued bright, clear, and-G.o.d, please...

She ran to the kitchen, braced herself against the sink, swallowed hard. She did not vomit. She held on, but when her stomach was settled and her mind quiet, she slid to the checkered linoleum and buried her head beneath her arms. The image of the little girl lingered, a ghost in the sh.e.l.l, frozen and staring. There was nothing provocative about that gaze, despite her posture. When Aggie closed her eyes, all she could see were eyes that begged, eyes that whispered, Help me, with all the quiet sweet pleading of someone still innocent deep in the core of her heart.

It was a terrible thing to see, and it did not feel like fate. There were no probabilities dancing. All the images inside her head were the same-exactly, precisely the same. Which was impossible. Variation was the game of the universe, the future built upon chaos, shifting constantly, affected by as little as one wrong turn, or a thought gone bad. It was true what they said, that something like the flap of a b.u.t.terfly wing could set off a storm in Texas-except, here it was not the weather being meddled with, but lives.

This isn't the future , Aggie told herself. This is a summons.

But a summons to what? To help the child? And who in the world would be able to summon her?

Roland could , she thought. And there were several other telepaths employed by Dirk & Steele who might have a similar ability. But she trusted her friends. They were family. And no one at the agency would risk betraying those bonds by something so silly and wasteful.

So. This was from someone else. Maybe. Could be she was finally going crazy-the lock-her-up kind-and that her brain was giving out under the stress of having to keep straight the infinite possibilities engaged by every living creature Aggie encountered. It was a hard task for one mushy piece of gray matter, and today had been very stressful. Sometimes she could turn it off-sometimes her brain did it for her-but always, always, the gift waited, lingered.

No, stop it. Don't think like that .

It was too frightening. Insanity was a distinct possibility; there was precedent amongst some members of the agency's recent past. The human body was capable of handling only so much, and the horror for those born different-wired with a few more bells and whistles than the rest of the world-was that psychological help was nonexistent. If you got sick in the head, you took care of it yourself-or relied on a friend to talk you through. You pulled yourself up by the bootstraps; that was the only way to survive.

And even amongst the agents at Dirk & Steele, some were more different than others. Aggie wondered what it was like for the shape-shifters when they got sick. There was no science to account for men who turned into animals, who could sprout wings and fur. None at all; only magic, true miracles, through and through. And to see it, to know and believe it...

Nothing was sacred. Anything was possible. Aggie could no longer take her world for granted. Which was far more disturbing than it should have been, considering all that she could do.

Aggie forced herself to stand. There was a reason she never had visions of her future self-she realized that now. It placed her in a peculiar kind of paradox she had no explanation for-a trap of being bound by a future she had not contemplated, might never have considered, had she not been witness to such a forceful invasion of her mind. She felt like a serpent eating its own tail.

She returned to the living room. There was another X-Files episode on-a marathon of them. This time, baseball players. Aliens in love. The weird was different from her reality, but equal in terms of off-the-wall intensity.

And you wouldn't trade it for a thing. Weird is what keeps you going, what lets you help people in ways others can only dream of. Like today. You saved a life. No matter how you feel, you rescued a little boy .

One boy out of thousands, maybe millions. Bad numbers, worse odds.

But if she tried hard enough, if she wished long enough, perhaps she could pretend that it was not the number of rescues that mattered, but only that a child was safe, that in a world where there was so much suffering, one act of goodness could mean everything. That she was making a difference.

And now another child needed her help.

I need to find that photograph . A hard copy of it, or a scan on the Internet. It was not enough to view the girl inside her head. There had to be a physical connection. It was the same for many of the other agents at Dirk & Steele; like Roland, who could only see across great distances if there was a telephone involved. E-mail did not cut it. Strange, yes, but those were the breaks. You simply had to take what was offered, no matter the form or shape, and run with it. Make do.

So Aggie went to her computer, swallowed hard before typing in her search parameters, and did just that.

Aggie found the girl in the wee hours of morning, after an exhaustive search that left her sick and tired, hand aching from clutching a pen as she made notes on the children she did find, and who gave her terrible visions of futures to come. At least three of them would be easy to locate by the authorities, and Aggie sent Roland a note with the information, flagging the e-mail red for priority. She knew him; by morning all of her research would be pa.s.sed on to a paid-to-be-anonymous tipster-a man who had a good reputation with the police, and who could not be traced back to the agency. It had to be that way. No one wanted questions asked. The public jobs Dirk & Steele did were public only because there was no alternative. Most of the agency's work was much more subtle.

But the little girl in question-a new memory, to replace Rujul-finally appeared on a Web site that advertised itself as a forum dedicated to the "visual exploration of the human form." Innocent enough, but when she dug deeper-as the blogs of certain self-a.s.sured "child lovers" suggested-she found something far darker than a simple exploration of the human body.

She found children. Lots of children. Hidden beneath layers of links and code, nestled deep inside the core of a site that on the surface was hideously innocuous.

The girl was located on one of the last pages Aggie looked at. It was the same photograph, the same ghostly gaze. Aggie stared, pouring herself into those eyes, hunting for the truth, the future, some shining light she could follow. She wanted to know why this one life was so important that the probabilities fell away, why for once she was the victim of her own unpredictable mind.

Her vision split, curling around the present and future. She saw darkness, utter and complete, a future of darkness that was not the grave, but worse, a living tomb, damp and cold and filled with something more than rodents and insects and other creepy-crawlies of the imagination. She heard movement, saw a flash of light- And the outline of a man, or the semblance of a man, because at first Aggie thought he was wrapped in a black stocking that covered him from head to foot, but then she realized that no such thing existed, and that what she gazed upon was a shadow. A man. A force, maybe. A presence that in all probable futures whispered Emma, don't be afraid, and, Emma, I came back with help. And Aggie could see that the girl crouched inside the darkness was not afraid of the shadow, the man. Aggie was not afraid, either. She sensed no premonition of terrible things, just a warmth that sank into her bones...

Aggie blinked hard, pulling out. She remembered the heat that had fallen upon the back of her neck at the crime scene, and touched herself again. Her skin felt ordinary. No caresses, this time.

She swallowed hard and forced herself to look at the girl's photo again. Emma, she thought, and bright lights dragged across her eyes as she stared into the face of a narrow man whose hair gelled into dagger spikes, and whose gaze held a hunger that made Aggie think drugs, but worse, because all the probabilities pointed to another kind of taste. Variations of this man appeared to her-in a room with long blinds, and behind him an old woman rubbing her hands down the back of his neck.

Aggie looked hard across the veil of possibilities, but found no clues as to where the little girl was hidden away. Nothing at all, not a vision of the outside, not a bill on a table, no words. No one talked inside her head except to say, Look at this, do this, hold yourself just so, you little s.h.i.t. And then, quieter, gentler, Emma.