Almost succeeded, too, Gabriel thought as he picked his way through the scraggly brush poking its way between dirt clods. She'd gotten him in a state to accept help from Kessler, of all people.
Never again.
Gabriel reached the fence and boosted himself over it, clearing the barbed wire. When he came down, his knees almost buckled.
He was weak. Weak in a way he'd never been before. And there was a feeling inside him—a hunger. A burned-out feeling, as if a fire had passed over him, leaving him blackened and parched. Like cracked earth thirsty for summer rain.
He'd never felt like this before. And part of him, a small part that sat back from the rest of his mind and sometimes whispered judgment, said that there was something dangerous about feeling this way. Something wrong.
Ignore it, Gabriel thought. He made his legs move down the uneven sidewalk, tightening muscles so they wouldn't shake. He wasn't afraid of this kind of neighborhood—it was his native environment—but he knew better than to show weakness here. The weak got picked off in a place like this.
He was looking for someone else weak.
The whispering part of his mind twinged at that.
Ignore it, Gabriel thought again.
The liquor store was up ahead. Beside it was a long brick wall decorated with the remains of tattered posters and notices. Men stood against the wall, or sat on crates in front of it.
Men—and one woman. Not a beauty. She was skin and bones, with hollow eyes and unhealthy hair. A tattoo of a unicorn covered the calf of one leg.
Now there was irony. A unicorn, the symbol of innocence, virginity.
Better this scrawny ratbag than the innocent witch back in the lot, he thought, and flashed his most brilliant, disturbing smile at nothing.
That thought demolished the last of his hesitation. It had to be someone. He'd rather it be this bit of human garbage than Kaitlyn.
The burned, parched feeling was overwhelming him. He was a scorching void, an empty black hole. A starving wolf.
The woman turned toward him. She looked startled for a moment, then smiled in appreciation, her eyes on his face.
Think I'm handsome? Good, that makes it easy, Gabriel thought, smiling back.
He put his hand on her shoulder.
The ocean hissed and spat among the rocks. The sky was an uneasy color, more metallic violet or grayed lavender than real gray, Kaitlyn thought. She was standing on a narrow rocky peninsula. On either side of her was the ocean. Ahead the peninsula stretched out like a bony finger into the water.
A strange place. A strange and lonely place…
"Oh, no. Here again?" Lewis said from just behind her.
Kait turned to see him—and Rob and Anna, as well. She smiled. The first time she'd found them in her dream she'd been confused and almost angry. Now she didn't mind; she was glad of the company.
"At least it's not so cold this time," Anna said. She looked as if she fit into this wild place where nature seemed to rule without human interference. The wind blew her long dark hair behind her.
"No, and we should be glad to be here," Rob said, his voice full of suppressed excitement. He was scanning the horizon alertly. "This is where we're going, remember—if we can find it."
"No," Kait said. "That's where we're going." She pointed across the water to a distant shore where a cliff rose, black with thick-growing trees. Among the trees, shining in the eerie light, was a single white house.
It was the white house Kaitlyn had seen in a vision at the Institute. The one in the photograph shown to her by a lynx-eyed man with caramel-colored skin. She knew nothing about the man except that he was an enemy of Mr. Zetes, and nothing about the house except that it was connected to the man.
"But it's our only chance," she said aloud. The others were looking at her, and she went on, "We don't know who they are, but they're the only people who even have a chance to help us against Mr. Z. We don't have any choice but to try and find them."
"And maybe they can help us with"—Lewis changed to telepathic speech in midsentence—this thing. Maybe they'll know how to break the link.
Anna spoke quietly. "You know what the research says. One of us has to die."
"Maybe they can find some way around that."
Kaitlyn said nothing, but she knew they all felt the same way. The web that tied them together had brought them very close, and there were some wonderful things about it. But all the same, in the back of her mind there was always the pounding insistence that it had to be broken. They couldn't live the rest of their lives like this, welded together this way. They couldn't…
"We'll find the answers when we get there," Rob said. "Meanwhile, we'd better look around. Examine everything about this place. There must be some clue as to where it is."
"Let's walk up there," Kait suggested, nodding toward the end of the peninsula. "I'd like to get as close to that house as possible."
They kept a close watch as they walked. "Same old ocean," Lewis said. "And back there"—he gestured behind them—"same old beach with trees. If I had my camera we could get a photo to compare to other things. Like, you know, pictures in books or travel brochures."
"There's just not enough to distinguish it from other beaches," Kaitlyn said. "Except—look, does it seem to you that there are more waves on the right side?"
"It does," Rob said. "That's weird. I wonder what would cause it?"
"And then there are these," said Anna. She dropped to one knee beside a pile of rocks, some long and thin, some nearly square. They were stacked like a child's blocks, but much more whimsically, forming an irregular tower that had appendages sticking out at intervals—like airplane wings.
The piles were all over the peninsula, resting on the huge boulders that lined either side. They ranged from small to gargantuan. Some, to Kaitlyn's eye, looked like crude depictions of people or animals.
"I have the feeling I should know this," Anna said, her hands framing the stack, not quite touching it. "It should have some meaning to me." Her face was troubled, her full lips pinched, her eyes clouded.
"Never mind," Rob said. "Keep walking and maybe it'll come to you. Is it a place you've seen before?"
Anna shook her head slowly. "I don't think I've seen it. And yet it's familiar—and it's north, I'm sure of that. North of California."