Mine to Possess

CHAPTER 43

Dressed only in a pair of loose black pants, his body covered with sweat, Councilor Kaleb Krychek walked to the edge of his balcony and looked down into the gorge that fell away an inch from his feet. But he didn’t notice the dangerous view, his mind on the problem of Shoshanna and Henry Scott. While Nikita, Tatiana, and Ming were all dangerous adversaries, the Scotts were particularly problematic because they worked as a unit. Neither of the two was cardinal strength, but together, they were a lethal combination.

With Marshall gone, Shoshanna had begun jockeying for control of the Council. Kaleb had won the first skirmish, but he was under no illusion the battle would be easy. He glanced down at the mark branded onto his forearm, a deceptively clean-appearing shape that had shifted the course of his life beyond redemption. It was a reminder of what he was, what he was willing to do.

Something brushed his mind then, an oily darkness that looked to him for comfort. It was the voiceless twin of the NetMind, the neosentient entity that kept order in the PsyNet. The DarkMind, by comparison, was pure chaos. Very, very few people knew about the DarkMind. And only one could assert any control over it.

As a cardinal telekinetic, Kaleb had a natural affinity with both the NetMind and the DarkMind. Now he reached out a psychic hand and touched the DarkMind.

Sleep, he said. Sleep.

The DarkMind was tired today. So it slept. Kaleb knew the respite was temporary at best. The DarkMind carried within it all the violence and pain, the rage and the insanity that the Psy refused to feel. It had no voice but spoke through the acts of violence it perpetrated via the weak minds of compromised Psy. It was, in a sense, a lost child. It was also pure evil.

Kaleb had first spoken to it at seven years of age.

Satisfied the DarkMind would cause no more chaos for the next few hours, he returned his attention to the problem at hand. If either of the Scotts discovered the truth behind the mark that branded him, it would give them the weapon they needed to challenge his meticulously planned takeover of the Council. That could not be allowed to happen.

He glanced at his watch. While the sun shone in Moscow, it was now three a.m. in San Francisco. But this conversation could not be delayed. Retrieving a secure phone from inside the house, he punched in a code. “Put me through to Anthony Kyriakus. PsyClan NightStar.”