He turned to Diana. Might as well get to it.

“What did the Alarm show?”

As she related her vision Jack realized she was describing the carving and burial of an ancient Opus Omega column.

“You’re nodding,” she said. “You know about this?”

“It’s been going on for thousands of years. Those columns are buried around the globe in a specific pattern.”

Davis frowned. “To what end?”

“When they finish the job, they believe it will give the Otherness the edge to change the world.”

Jack also knew that every insertion of one of those columns into the ground was a knife in the back of the Lady with the dog, and left a scar. Was that the purpose—hurt her? Was she some sort of barrier between the Otherness and Earth, and if they weakened her enough the Otherness could make the leap?

He wished he knew. So many things he wished he knew.

“Are they crazy?” Davis said. “Don’t they know what that will mean? Hell on Earth.”

“Not for them. They believe participants in the Opus Omega will be given special treatment and privileges in the new world order.”

Davis snorted and shook his head. “Privileges or not, they’ll still be in hell. Ignorant dumbasses.” He turned to the girl. “Sorry, Diana.”

She didn’t seem to have heard, or care if she had. She sat twisting her fingers together.

“But in the vision they sealed me in the column—alive—and then buried it.”

“Apparently it’s not enough simply to stick a body in the column. Someone has to die inside it.”

“It was horrible. But then the strangest thing happened. A glowing egg appeared and hatched something . . . something I couldn’t see . . . a dark shape that seemed to suck in the light around it.”

Jack tried to grasp that and failed. Could that be the goal of Opus Omega—create a cosmic egg with some sort of black hole within? He turned to Davis.

“You must have heard about a lot of these Alarms over the years.”

He nodded and glanced at the girl. “From Diana’s father, yes.”

“Did they tend to be pretty much true to life, or more metaphorical?”

“From what he told me, true to life. The Alarms showed either what would happen if we didn’t interfere, or what we should make happen. It wasn’t always clear which. They could be ambiguous at times, but definitely true to life.”

True to life . . . a big egg hatching something. Sheesh.

“But that’s not the strangest part,” Diana said. “The thing that came out of the column . . . it might have been human, but I don’t think so. If it was human, it wasn’t a normal human.”

More vagueness. Couldn’t anything be clear-cut?

“So you didn’t get a good look at it.”

She shook her head. “It was blurred, almost flickering, as if it was flashing in and out of existence. And then a word sounded in my head: Fhinntmanchca.”

“Say what?”

“Fhinntmanchca. Don’t ask me what it means. I have no idea.”

Davis said, “Don’t look at me. I’ve never in my life heard the word, or anything even close to it.”

“I think it refers to whatever came out of the egg.”

That seemed a reasonable assumption.

“Did the egg crack open?”

Another shake of her head. “No, this just sort of emerged from it. One second it wasn’t there, and then the next it was moving toward me.” She looked at Jack. “Fhinntmanchca . . . you’ve never heard of it?”

“No.” He didn’t even know if the word applied to the egg or the thing that hatched from it. “Why would I?”

“I don’t know. The Alarm . . . at the end it was clear that I had to tell someone who could do something about it.”

“And you chose me?”

“Well, the Sentinel would have been best, but no one knows where he is, do they?”

The Sentinel . . . that was what these folks called the point man in the war against the Otherness. Others called him the Defender. They ascribed all sorts of power to him, but he was just a man now, an old one. Jack knew his real name, but the old guy preferred to go by the name Veilleur.

“So, since I couldn’t tell him,” Diana was saying, “it seemed pretty clear I should tell his Heir. And that’s you.”

Yeah, he thought. Me. Lucky, lucky me.

What was he going to “do” about something he’d never heard of?

He’d have to wait until he could ask Veilleur about it, but he seemed to have dropped off the face of the Earth the past couple of months. Maybe the Compendium had heard of this finnymacaca or whatever it was. But even if it was in there, could he find it? Worth a try.

“Got an idea,” he said. He rose and retrieved a pen and a napkin from the bar. “Okay. What’s this thing called again?”

Diana repeated the name and Jack spelled it phonetically: fint-MAHNCH-ka. One weird word. Didn’t seem to fit any language he’d ever heard.

Suddenly Diana shot from her seat.

“He’s here!”

Jack saw Davis instinctively reach for his empty shoulder holster. They both looked around, wondering what she meant.

“I feel him!” she cried.

The whole place was staring at her now. Someone at the bar said, “Hey, you can feel me too! Anytime you want.”

Jack shot a look toward the bar, searching for the comedian. Couldn’t tell so he turned toward the front window and saw Veilleur’s face peering in. An instant later he was gone.

“He’s outside!”

She rushed toward the front door. Davis tried to grab her arm but missed, so he rose and followed on her heels. Jack held back. He wanted to see Veilleur too, but had to let him go.

Diana stepped outside and peered up and down the street. Finally she gave up and came back in.

“I know it was him,” she said with a despondent look as she dropped into her chair.

Jack knew the answer but felt obliged to ask. “Who?”

“The Sentinel. He was right outside. I felt him.”

“Are you sure?” Davis said.

“Of course I’m sure,” she snapped. “Sometimes you just know things, and I know he was out there.” She looked at Jack. “Why didn’t he come in? If I can sense him, I’m sure he can sense me. Why would he avoid me when I could tell him about the Alarm?”

For all Jack knew, Veilleur could have been stopping by to see him after all this time. He certainly understood why he wouldn’t want an Oculus and a yeniçeri to see him in his present condition.

“Maybe he already knows,” Jack said, realizing it sounded lame.

She shook her head. “I don’t understand. It feels like everything is slipping away. The Adversary seems to be getting the upper hand, and the Sentinel does nothing.”

Because he can’t, Jack thought. Because he’s not the Sentinel anymore. There is no Sentinel. Just an old man and his supposed Heir.

But he couldn’t say that. No one could know, or even suspect—especially the Adversary . . . the One . . . Rasalom.

“I’m sure he has a plan.”

“Well, if he does, he’d better act soon, because there’s not much time.”

She pulled off her glasses and he had a glimpse of her startling, all-black eyes before she covered them with her hands and sobbed.

Jack wanted to reach over and hug her against his side and tell her it was going to be all right. But she knew too much to believe that anyone could promise that. And how convincing could he be when he didn’t believe it himself?

He saw Davis’s stricken look and knew he felt the same way.

“Did you see anything else?”

“No,” she said without looking up. “But I had a dream after the Alarm, and it was what I didn’t see then that scares me.”

Jack knew immediately what she was talking about.

“You mean the future?”

She nodded. “I saw the Nantucket house in the summer as it is now. And then in autumn with the leaves falling. Then covered with snow. Then the trees budding. Then . . .” She lowered her hands and leveled her black gaze at him. “Then nothing . . . nothing but blackness.”