Vale looked as though he might say something else about the following morning, then thought better of it.
Lindiwe was still holding the artefact. Its light rested against her fingers, and the warmth she felt from it seemed to extend beyond her hands. Daniel had moved closer to Mara without noticing. Jonathan remained beside the desk, watching Vale with the patience of a man who had decided he would eventually get an answer.
“You knew what was happening to me,” Lindiwe said.
Vale turned towards her.
“I recognised some of it.”
“Then tell me.”
He glanced at the others. There were several answers he could give, all of them sufficient to end the conversation without explaining very much.
Lindiwe felt him choosing one.
“You don’t have to make it sound sensible,” she added. “I was somebody else a moment ago. I don’t think sensible is going to help.”
Jonathan pulled the chair from beneath the desk.
“An excellent point.”
Vale sat, although he had intended to remain standing.
“There have always been people who could do things they couldn’t explain,” he said. “Most learned to hide it. Some became very good at convincing themselves there was nothing to hide.”
Daniel looked at Mara.
She raised an eyebrow.
“You’re hardly discreet,” she said.
“I’ve been quite discreet.”
“You dismantled a museum exhibit.”
“It was badly assembled.”
Jonathan lifted a finger.
“It was.”
The exchange drew a small smile from Lindiwe. Vale felt the atmosphere ease and found himself continuing before he had decided how much to say.
“Others went looking for explanations. They found people like themselves. Sometimes they found accounts of people who had lived much earlier.”
“The memories?” Mara asked.
“Yes. Dreams at first, usually. Places they’d never visited. Skills they’d never learned.”
Lindiwe watched his face.
“And you?” Lindiwe asked.
Vale glanced at the artefact in her hands.
“What about me?”
“You said you recognised what was happening. How?”
“There are people who can help you understand it.”
“People you work with?”
“Yes.”
“Who are they?”
He paused.
“That’s a longer conversation.”
Jonathan shifted in his chair.
“We’ve come quite a long way for one.”
Vale acknowledged him with a small movement of his head, but his attention returned to Lindiwe.
“You’ve been through enough today. Some rest would—”
“I’ve rested.”
Her voice remained quiet. She had spent much of the day accepting his reassurance because she needed it. Now she wanted something she could decide for herself.
“Tell me who they are.”
The central gem brightened between her fingers.
Vale drew breath to answer, then held it. Lindiwe felt his reluctance as clearly as she felt the warmth against her palms. Beneath it lay concern, and something more guarded. She concentrated on that resistance, gently at first, then with greater purpose.
His hand tightened on the arm of the chair.
“We call ourselves the Watchers.”
Daniel looked towards Jonathan. Jonathan had stopped shifting.
“What do you watch?” Lindiwe asked.
“People like you.”
“For what?”
“To find them before something happens that they can’t explain.”
“Or before someone else finds them?”
Vale’s eyes met hers.
“Yes.”
She felt him trying to withdraw again. Until that moment she had not known she could recognise the effort, let alone answer it.
She held his gaze.
“Show us.”
“I can’t do that.”
But a pale line had appeared beyond his shoulder.
Daniel noticed it first. It stood upright where the hotel wall should have been, faint enough that he might have mistaken it for a reflection. Then another line joined it.
A doorway.
Vale turned.
The light from the artefact reached across Lindiwe’s fingers. Three smaller stones brightened around the illuminated centre; the remaining two stayed dark.
Mara caught Daniel’s wrist.
He looked at her, expecting alarm. Instead, her grip steadied him. The familiar pressure that usually accompanied his ability had eased. He could feel what he wanted to make, and for once there was no struggle between the thought and what followed.
The doorway acquired depth.
“Oh,” Jonathan said.
Beyond it stood a room with a long wooden table.
Vale rose from his chair.
The chair remained behind him, but the carpet beneath his feet had become a dark, polished floor. Tall windows emerged along one wall. Daylight spread across the table, catching scratches in its surface.
Lindiwe could see silver light in Daniel’s eyes. When she turned towards Mara, it was there too.
Then Vale looked back at her.
His eyes were shining.
“What is this place?” she asked.
He pressed his lips together.
The central gem grew warmer.
“Adrian.”
“A room we use.”
“For what?”
“Training.”
The answer came unwillingly. He looked down at his own hands, then at the table.
“You shouldn’t be able to see this.”
Jonathan had stood up. He reached towards the nearest chair and stopped just short of touching it.
“Should I be able to do this?”
Nobody answered quickly enough. He touched it. The wood was cool beneath his fingers. He took his hand away.
“I’d have preferred a firm no.”
Lindiwe almost smiled. She could feel his unease, but it no longer arrived as something that threatened to overwhelm her. She knew where it belonged. She let reassurance reach him, a little at a time.
His shoulders lowered.
He glanced at her.
“Thank you,” he said, then frowned, uncertain why he had said it.
Vale watched the exchange.
“You’re sharing it,” he said.
“What?” Daniel asked.
Vale hesitated again. Lindiwe tightened her fingers around the artefact. He swallowed.
“The connection. Whatever each of you is doing, the others are helping to sustain it.”
Daniel looked at the table. A patch near its far end remained indistinct. He wanted to see it clearly.
The grain resolved beneath his gaze.
He let out a small breath.
Mara felt his pleasure before he turned towards her. She had become aware of something else as well: the boundary where this room met the hotel room, a stubborn edge that interrupted what Daniel was forming.
She knew how to loosen it.
The last strip of hotel wallpaper faded. The window beside it settled into place.
Daniel smiled at her. Neither of them needed to explain. Vale moved towards the table.
“This is where I learned,” he said.
“From the Watchers?” Lindiwe asked.
“Yes.”
“What did they teach you?”
“How to recognise an outcome before it happens. How to distinguish it from fear, or something I merely want.”
As he spoke, movement appeared at the other end of the table.
A younger Vale sat opposite someone whose face remained indistinct. Three cards lay between them.
Vale went still. Lindiwe felt him trying to close the memory. She held it open.
“What are you doing there?”
“Choosing.”
“Choosing what?”
“Which card he’ll turn over.”
The man’s hand moved.
For an instant, Lindiwe saw three movements at once. Each was slightly different. One reached left, another right, another towards the middle.
Vale lifted his hand.
Two of the movements faded. The remaining one continued, turning over the middle card.
He stared at it.
Daniel looked from the card to him.
“You did that.”
“I know.”
For the first time, Vale sounded less guarded than astonished.
He tried again. The hand returned to its starting position. Possibilities gathered around it, and he separated them with an ease Lindiwe could feel.
There was no strain in him now.
She realised there was none in any of them.
Mara stood close beside Daniel. Vale remained within reach. Lindiwe could sense each of them distinctly, yet their presence made her feel stronger, as though something she had been carrying alone had finally found support.
She wanted the room to remain. It did. Jonathan walked slowly along the table.
“How long have they been doing this?” he asked.
Vale’s expression changed.
“We have records going back generations.”
“And the objects?” Daniel asked.
Vale looked towards the artefact. Lindiwe felt the resistance return. She drew him back.
“What objects do you have, Adrian?”
A cabinet appeared against the far wall.
Vale shut his eyes.
“Two.”
Its doors opened to reveal two objects, carefully supported on dark fabric. One small gem glowed on each, while both central gems remained dark.
“Those light when I’m near them,” Vale said.
“Only those?” Lindiwe asked.
“Yes. We never understood why the others wouldn’t respond.”
He looked at the artefact in her hands.
“Until now.”
Lindiwe moved closer. The others came with her.
“Do they work?” she asked.
“No.”
“What have you tried?”
“Everything we understood how to try.”
Jonathan leaned forward, keeping his hands behind his back.
“And you thought they were broken?”
“Some did.”
“But you didn’t,” Daniel said.
Vale looked at the glowing artefact in Lindiwe’s hands.
“I thought we were missing something.”
For a while, nobody spoke.
They examined the objects together. Lindiwe could turn her attention towards a detail and find it waiting for her. Daniel brought it into focus; Mara cleared what obscured it. Vale followed possibilities through the room, choosing which would remain visible.
They began to understand what the others wanted without having to ask.
Then Lindiwe’s injured shoulder ached.
Her grip shifted.
At once, Vale looked towards her.
She was tired. She had scarcely noticed until then.
Enough, she thought.
Daniel felt the change and released what he was holding. Mara let the edges soften.
The cabinet faded first.
Then the table, the windows and the daylight.
Jonathan was beside the desk again.
The hotel curtains were closed. Vale stood near his chair. Daniel and Mara were beside the bed.
Jonathan looked down at his feet.
He had walked the length of that table. He remembered examining the cabinet. He had stood with them for what felt like ten minutes.
Here, he had barely moved.
The second hand on the bedside clock advanced.
He stared at it.
“How long?”
Vale followed his gaze.
“A few seconds.”
Jonathan opened his mouth, closed it, then made abruptly for the bathroom.
Daniel took a step after him.
“Jonathan?”
“Don’t.”
The door swung shut.
They heard him being sick.
Lindiwe lowered herself onto the bed, still holding the artefact. Its light had softened. Mara sat beside her.
For a moment, neither spoke.
“Could you do that before?” Lindiwe asked.
Mara shook her head.
“Could you?”
“No.”
Across the room, Vale was looking at them with an expression Daniel had not seen on him before.
Uncertainty.
Jonathan eventually returned, pale, with a damp towel in one hand.
“I was there for ten minutes.”
“So were we,” Mara said.
He looked at the clock again.
Then he sat down carefully.
“Next time,” he said, “I’d appreciate a chair and a little warning.”