Journey Through the Mirrors (38 page)

The officer ran out of the room.

“I can’t believe we’re about to do this,” Logan said.

“Let’s go,” Valerie said. “We need to get a safe distance away from here.”

“What about searching for the device?” asked Logan, still in disbelief. “We can’t just blow up this historic building!”

“We have no choice! We need to be long gone before the timer goes off.” Valerie grabbed Logan by the arm, and they headed to the main entrance. Sylvia and Chetan finished setting the timer and followed them.

As Logan left the building, he could see police vehicles with flashing lights blocking the streets in all directions. Valerie led everyone south on 18th Street just past E Street, where two black WCF vehicles were parked in the intersection. Logan and Valerie took off their gas masks and turned to look at the building.

“Four minutes,” Sylvia said, as she looked at her PCD.

“The seventy-nine-point-six-five-four-hertz signal is still going strong,” Chetan said, looking at the display of a small device he was carrying.

Logan spotted his children and Ms. Sally standing next to Mr. Perrot. Madu and Nadine were standing with him behind a police barricade. Adisa Kayin was not far away. Logan looked at the redbrick building two hundred meters from where he was standing. He could not imagine that the Council of Satraya building, which had stood for more than two hundred years, was about to be destroyed, and all its history with it. He suddenly remembered something.

“The books!” he yelled. In all the chaos, he had forgotten to take the original set of the
Chronicles
out of the glass case in the drawing room. “I have to get the books!” He started running.

Valerie ran after him and grabbed him by the arm. “No way! There’s no time!”

“I have to!” Logan insisted, looking down 18th Street at the Council of Satraya building. Valerie continued to bar his way. Logan shook his head in disbelief, as a numbness came over him. Not only had he failed to protect his father’s copy of the
Chronicles
, but he had failed to protect Deya’s. His vision began to blur. It was similar to what had happened to him in the ocean in Mexico, when he’d somehow seen Jordan’s feet underwater. His vision took on another perspective, and it suddenly seemed as if he was looking out of the glass case in the drawing room where Deya’s set of the
Chronicles
was displayed. The gray ash was no longer floating in the air. It had settled on the furniture and the floor. Some of it had landed on the glass case. Logan’s vision zoomed in on the gray ash, and he could make out the individual nanites. None of them was moving; they were all dead. Suddenly, his perspective shifted back to normal, and he was looking down 18th Street. “The nanites are dead!” he said to Valerie. “They’re dead. Turn off the explosive!”

“How do you know that?” she asked.

A uniformed officer walked over to Valerie. “We got everyone out of the building,” he said.

Sylvia announced the countdown. “Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven . . .”

“They’re dead, I’m telling you!” Logan shouted.

“Just got a call from Darvis,” Chetan said. “The seventy-nine-point-six-five-four-hertz signal is gone.”

“What? The signal is gone?” Valerie asked.

Chetan held up his PCD. “Darvis says the signal is no longer there.”

Valerie turned to Sylvia. “Kill the timer!”

42

It only takes one person to see a situation differently for the universe to unleash a rainfall of possibilities.

—THE CHRONICLES OF SATRAYA

WASHINGTON, D.C., 9:04 P.M. LOCAL TIME, MARCH 24, 2070

“One more second,” Sylvia said, as she inspected the explosive device, “and all of this would be gone.”

Valerie had led her team back inside the Council of Satraya building after the 79.654-hertz signal had suddenly stopped. Everything on the first floor was covered with fine gray soot.

“You and Chetan gather as much evidence as you can,” Valerie said to Sylvia. “Then go home and get some rest. We’ll pick things up in the morning.”

As Valerie walked back outside and down the front steps of the building, she saw many of the people who were at the commemoration talking to a WCF agent who was trying to calm them down, as they asked about what had happened inside and the conditions of others who hadn’t made it out. In the distance, by the barricades, she saw police officers holding back news reporters and camera crews. She made her way over to Logan, who was standing with his children and Ms. Sally. Mr. Perrot stood a few meters away, talking with Madu and Nadine.

“Dad,” she said, “take everyone back to my apartment. It will be crowded, but everyone can spend the night there. I’ll assign a protection detail to take you.”

“Do not worry about us,” Nadine said. “Madu and I have to return to our hotel to prepare for our flight back to Cairo tomorrow morning. Our plane leaves very early.”

“In that case, I’ll have someone take you back to your hotel tonight and then to your flight in the morning.” Valerie gestured to a group of uniformed officers standing nearby, then turned to Logan. “I’ll see you back at the apartment.”

He shook his head. “I’m going with you. The books are still in there.”

Logan gave his children a hug and said good-bye to Madu and Nadine, before the police officers escorted them away. Then he and Valerie slipped through the crowd and entered the Council building.

When they reached the drawing room, Logan went to the display case, carefully lifted it, and set it on the floor. He grabbed the first of the three books of the
Chronicles
and put it in his backpack.

“How did you know the nanites were dead?” Valerie asked him. “How did you know that the signal had stopped?”

Logan looked at her a moment before answering. “It’s that problem I’ve been having with my vision. That perspective shift. When it happened tonight, I found myself looking out at the room from inside the display case. I could see the nanites. They weren’t moving.”

“Maybe I was wrong,” Valerie said. “Maybe you shouldn’t see a doctor. Whatever it is, you might just have saved not only this building but many lives.”

Logan smiled, but he remained silent, placing the remaining two books into WCF evidence bags.

“We found it!” a voice called out from the hallway. A female agent dressed in a blue jumpsuit entered the drawing room. In one hand, she was carrying a wand-like device, and in the other she held up a dark green object the size of a lunch box. “We found it under the sink in the first-floor bathroom.”

Sylvia and Chetan, who were about to leave, turned around and went over to her and examined the device.

“Bag it. Chetan and I will take it back to the lab,” Sylvia said. “I’ll start looking at it tonight.”

“No,” Valerie said. “Both of you go home and get some rest. We have a lot to deal with tomorrow, and I need both of you alert and well rested.”

Sylvia and Chetan acknowledged her instructions and exited.

“Same for you,” Valerie said to Logan. “Go back to the apartment and get some sleep. You have the books now.”

“Easier said than done, knowing that someone tried to kill everyone at the commemoration ceremony,” Logan answered. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I’m running out of brain cells trying to keep track of everything that’s happening,” Valerie said. “The natural gas crisis, worldwide earthquakes, Goshi’s death, the break-in at the Château, the abduction of your mother’s music teacher, and then all of that followed by a mass-murder attempt. What is going on?”

“What about the appearance of Randolph Fenquist and the man he claimed was Giovanni Rast?” Logan added.

Valerie shook her head, uncertain.

“The most important question is why the same people who destroyed the natural-gas wells would also want to kill everyone at the commemoration.”

“Yes, the same weapon was used in both attacks—the nanites,” Valerie said. “We need to find out who planted the activation device here tonight.”

“It’s not going to be easy,” said Adisa Kayin, who had joined them. “More than two hundred people were arriving and departing all evening, and that doesn’t include the service staff we hired. And there are no cameras near the bathroom where the device was found.” Adisa shook his head as he watched WCF personnel lift the deformed bodies of the victims off the floor and put them into black body bags.

“Are you all right, Adisa?” Logan asked.

“As well as can be expected,” he answered. “I apologize for listening in, but I don’t understand who could commit such a despicable deed.”

“Neither do we,” Valerie said.

“Logan, I know that this may not be the proper moment to mention it, but while we were outside, I was approached by Giovanni Rast. He has an outlandish claim and wants to meet with the entire Council as soon as possible.”

“I would advise you to proceed cautiously,” Logan said. “Giovanni’s association with Randolph Fenquist makes me skeptical of anything he has to say.”

“So you know him?” Adisa asked.

“I know of him,” Logan replied. “His claim may have some merit, but I would suggest that you not include Randolph Fenquist in the meeting. The Sentinel Coterie has no right to be involved in the Council’s business.”

Adisa nodded. “I will be in touch,” he said, before he walked away.

43

If you close your eyes and meditate all the days of your life like the ascetic, you might miss the very thing you are living your life to learn.

—THE CHRONICLES OF SATRAYA

WASHINGTON, D.C., 11:10 P.M. LOCAL TIME, MARCH 24, 2070

Logan unlocked the door to Valerie’s apartment and entered quietly. He walked to the den, where a lamp was on, and set an evidence bag that contained the three volumes of the
Chronicles
on the coffee table. Then he made his way to the master bedroom and peered through the partially open doorway. Jamie was sleeping on the bed next to Ms. Sally, and Jordan was sprawled on the floor in a sleeping bag. Logan was relieved that they were safe and sleeping peacefully after witnessing the attack on the Council of Satraya offices.

Back in the den, he poured himself a glass of wine and sat on the couch. Valerie had remained at the Council of Satraya building to continue the investigation. It was going to be a long night for her, and Logan didn’t expect her to return home anytime soon. Mr. Perrot hadn’t made it back, either, and was probably still with Madu and Nadine.

Logan took a big gulp of wine and leaned back. The evening’s horrific events were fresh in his mind.
Who in the world would want to kill everyone at the commemoration?
The people he loved most could have all died tonight—his children, Valerie, Mr. Perrot. He felt angry, outraged, and, he had to admit, a little frightened.
Or was the real target President Salize or one of the members of his energy advisory council?
Logan was also troubled that in the heat of the moment, he had forgotten the books. They were within seconds of being destroyed and would have been the second set of the
Chronicles
he’d failed to protect. Logan picked up one of the books on the table in front of him and fanned through the pages with his thumb. He stopped when something on one of the pages caught his eye. He ran his finger over a small spot of blue wax. He grinned; he knew exactly where the wax came from: Deya’s Manas Mantr candle. A thought struck him like a bolt of lightning. He could have kicked himself for not thinking of it before.

Logan went over to the corner of the den where he’d left his backpack and took from it the plastic box containing his mother’s recordings, Deya’s small mirror, and her blue Manas Mantr candle, which he had carefully wrapped in tissue paper. He found a candle holder in one of Valerie’s cabinets and put the blue candle in it. The candle was just like his father’s. Logan had learned from an entry in his father’s journal that the Manas Mantr candle was mysteriously linked to a man named Bate Sisan, who he’d later figured out was Sebastian Quinn. In one of Logan’s candle visions last July, when he was trying to unravel the Freedom Day conspiracy, Bate Sisan had given him some cryptic advice that had later been instrumental in foiling the plot. Logan pinched the burned wick, straightening it out. He cleared the table and lit the candle, then sat down on the floor and stared into the flame. Almost immediately, a ringing sound came to his ears, and his peripheral vision began to darken. He looked forward to going back to the old study his father’s candle had taken him to.

*  *  *

Instead, Logan found himself standing in a lush, well-tended walled garden. The sun shone brightly in the cloudless sky. There was a stone
pergola to his right and urns containing young banyan trees at the corners of the garden. Logan walked over to one of the six free-standing concrete pillars at the center of the garden and read the words inscribed on it:
Perfection is an illusion theorized by your personality.
It was from the
Chronicles
. Logan looked around. Where was he? Beyond the pillars, he spotted a small pond with a bench next to it. He stepped between two of the pillars and walked over to the pond. The water in it was crystal-clear, allowing him to read a message that had been stamped there:

In the once Great House,

Where fire is and ashes rise,

Where the ear stone fell,

Will hold your prize

Logan’s eyes widened. He was in Deya’s garden. Mr. Perrot had told him that he had found this riddle in Deya’s garden, and it had led him to other riddles and eventually to the place where she had hidden her set of the
Chronicles
.

The wind kicked up, rustling the leaves on the trees. The sunlight faded. Logan looked up at the sky and saw ominous dark clouds. Then he noticed mist forming on the other side of the pond. He tensed, and his heart began to race as the mist coalesced into a shadowy human figure. It was the same haunting figure he had seen in the old study. He recalled what it had told him during their last encounter, that this was a place of sincerity, of humbleness, and that one should not presuppose one’s entitlement to be there. Logan closed his eyes and calmed his mind. As suddenly as the wind started, it died down. He opened his eyes, squinting because of the sunlight that had reemerged through the scattered clouds. The shadowy figure was now more defined.