My jaw dropped. "You're kidding."
"I wish I was."
"And my daughter is the same?"
"From what I'm gathering, yes."
"How do you keep from going insane?"
"I turn it off as often as possible."
"But when it's on, you can hear... everything?"
"Every thought-and sometimes I can even feel the corresponding emotion, too, if the emotion is strong enough."
"Sweet mama."
"You can say that again."
But I didn't say it again. I was thinking of my poor daughter and wondering like crazy how she keeps it all together.
The Alchemist, of course, was aware of my thoughts. "There is a chance, Sam, that she is even more powerful than even me."
"Which makes her situation even worse."
"Yes and no. Yes, she might have a bigger range... but she also might have greater control of it, too."
"Greater control?"
"She might be able to direct it more, perhaps. Turn off parts of it, for example."
"Your mother... wow. She must have been a sight to behold."
He looked away. "You have no idea."
I didn't need to be a mind reader to know I'd hit a nerve. Or seeing what I thought I was seeing. "You fear her," I said.
"Let's say that I have a healthy respect for her," Maximus said. "But I do not fear her, no."
Except I might have seen otherwise in his eyes. Something had flashed across them. Something furtive. It was, I was certain, the first and only time I had seen the Librarian display anything but quiet strength. Something deep inside me chuckled. It was a feminine chuckle that devolved into an animalistic growl. That this thing was within me was nearly too terrible to comprehend.
"Comprehend it, Sam. Understand it. Bear it. You have to. You are, quite frankly, single-handedly keeping one of the most dangerous people to have ever walked this earth at bay."
"No pressure there or anything," I said.
He smiled lightly, and the nervousness he had displayed was gone. "Nothing you can't handle, Sam. Remember, you are much more than her."
"My Hermes bloodline."
"That and more."
"My own soul," I said.
"Yes, Sam. Your pure and loving soul is no match for the darkness within her."
I paused, cocked my head, for I heard the words clearly. "She says she will break me. She will find a way. And I will be gone. Forever."
Some of the color drained from his face. "She is wrong, Sam. You can't believe her."
"I don't," I said. "I just packed her down even deeper."
I looked at him, and he looked at me too. He gave me a small, sad smile. I gave him the same small, sad smile. Finally, he said, "You are here about the creator?"
"God?" I said.
"No, your client."
I blinked at that. "My client? Charlie Reed?"
"Yes, Sam. He's a creator, and we need to talk about him. Now."
Chapter Seventeen
Allison and I were jogging.
"So you're telling me you're just like me then?" she asked, phrasing the question only slightly differently than the six other times she'd asked it.
"Insecure? No," I said.
"Sam..."
"Look, I'm not a witch, and have no desire to be a witch. I'm not even sure what the hell a witch does."
"Now you're just being mean. You've seen what I can do."
"And you're just learning," I said. "And you've been at this, what, a couple of years now?"
"There's lots to learn. Lots of spells. Lots of memorizing-"
I waved my hand. "Nope. Not for me."
"According to Millicent, you used to be quite good at it."
"And she knows this how?"
Millicent was, of course, was part of Allison's triad. Millicent was also a ghost. She was also, apparently, once a good friend of mine-we all were-down through the ages, in various incarnations, living as witches on the fringes of civilizations.
"Not always the fringes, Sam. But we were rarely, if ever, accepted. We did what we had to do, to stay alive. Historically, witches weren't exactly looked upon favorably. And to answer your question, Millicent has access to information we don't readily have at our fingertips."
"Because she's dead," I said.
"Right. She has read each of our Akashic records. She knows exactly what we have done, lifetime after lifetime."
"Sounds like she has a lot of time on her hands."
"You don't like Millicent," said Allison.
I shrugged, which might have been lost during the jogging. "She sounds like a know-it-all."