Zara’s eyes were hot with rage, but she pulled herself together with visible effort. “Egan will put a rope around your waist. He’ll hold the other end. When you have the crystals, signal him by yanking on the rope a couple of times. He’ll pull you out.”

“We both know if it was that easy, you would have done it yourself. You’re a light-talent. But you can’t even get past the entrance, can you?”

Zara gave her a thin smile. She was still in control, but cracks were appearing in her icy composure. “You are wasting time, Ms. North. Egan will slide open the door for you.”

“What a gentleman,” Alice said.

She walked slowly toward the entrance of the Dream Chamber, drawing Pete with her.

“Shit,” Pete whispered. “I hate this place.”

Egan followed. He picked up the rope that was coiled on the floor at the entrance and looped the noose-like end around Alice’s waist. She shuddered in revulsion when he touched her. He did not appear to notice, let alone take offense.

Satisfied that the line was secure around her, he grasped the other end firmly in one hand. Then he used both hands to haul aside the heavy steel plate blocking the entrance.

Night and energy from the farthest end of the spectrum swirled just inside the opening. Fog-like tendrils of power stormed in the Chamber.

“Hurry,” Zara shouted. “There isn’t much time left.”

“Too bad you didn’t think of that before you started fiddling around with those crystals,” Alice called over her shoulder.

“This is your fault, damn you,” Zara shrieked. “Get those crystals out of there or we are all dead.”

A frisson of awareness whispered through Alice. Drake was somewhere nearby. She could sense it.

She glanced toward the vaulted opening at the far end of the cavernous room. She could not see anyone, but the certainty that Drake was close was growing stronger.

She was equally certain of another fact. Zara and Egan would not hesitate to use Pete and her as hostages.

Not yet, she thought. Too dangerous.

There was no such thing as telepathy, or so the experts claimed. But she shared some kind of psychic connection with Houdini. On stage he always seemed to get his cues right. As for her bond with Drake, that was a lot more complicated, but she no longer doubted that it existed. He certainly could not read her mind but he had a gift for strategy. If she gave him an opening, he would seize it.

Step one was to keep Zara and Egan distracted for a few more minutes.

“It’s going to be okay, Pete,” she said quietly.

She reached back for his hand, gripping his fingers tightly, and moved to the entrance. She needed physical contact for what she was about to do.

Pete looked as if he might be ill but he stumbled forward with her.

“Trust me,” she whispered.

“Not like I’ve got a lot of choice,” Pete said. “Sure hope you know what you’re doing.”

“I’m the box-jumper,” she said. “The magician’s assistant. That means I know the secret of the trick.”

“Yeah? So where’s the magician?”

She was careful not to look back over her shoulder. “He’ll be on stage any minute now.”

“What part am I playing in this performance?”

“You’re the volunteer from the audience.”

“I was afraid of that.”

She tightened her grip on his hand, kicked up her talent, and pulled him with her through the wall of midnight.

Chapter 36

THE GREEN GHOST FIRE BLOCKED THE QUARTZ TUNNEL, forcing all of them to a halt. The ball of Alien energy was fueled by the chaotic currents that burned at its core. It had no doubt been blazing just as fiercely ever since the Aliens had vanished.

Drake watched the ghost through his mirrored glasses. He could have removed the shades because all of the energy that emanated from the quartz catacombs was paranormal in nature. But he did not know what surprises Zara might have in store. Even a simple amber-rez flashlight could temporarily blind him.

Houdini, stationed on Drake’s shoulder, rumbled impatiently and blinked his hunting eyes.

“No way Egan could have made it past that ghost,” Fletcher said. “It’s possible that it drifted in from a connecting passage after he went through, but more likely he deliberately planted it here on the off chance that someone found the gravestone entrance and tried to follow him.”

Although they were called ghosts, the balls of psi-fire that floated through the maze of Alien catacombs were not the remnants of sentient beings. The technical name for the phenomena was Unstable Dissonance Energy Manifestations, also called UDEMs. They were one of the many hazards of the tunnels and the primary reason for the enduring power of the Ghost Hunter Guilds. Only those with a talent for dealing with the unique psi of the UDEMs could neutralize the dangerous, unpredictable storms of psi that drifted randomly in the eerie underworld.

“Are we sure this is the right passage?” Jasper asked. “What if Houdini is wrong?”

Houdini bounced on Drake’s shoulder, agitated by the delay.

The vast array of green catacombs was a bewildering maze to human senses. Only a small portion of the Underworld had been mapped. No one knew how far the passages extended. The Guild did its best to guard the known entrances and restrict unauthorized access, but there were thousands of secret holes-in-the-wall that were used by illegal antiquities hunters, thrill-seekers, and the occasional serial killer.

“Houdini is leading us in the right direction,” Drake said. “He’s got some kind of psychic connection with Alice. Dust bunnies have no trouble navigating underground.”

He did not add the obvious point: Houdini’s guidance was their best hope—make that their only hope—of finding Alice in time to save her. His intuition told him that if Zara Tucker and Egan managed to get off the island, Alice would be dead within hours.

“We’ve seen how some dust bunnies bond with humans,” Fletcher said to Jasper. “Drake’s right, got to trust Houdini here. Not like any of us can track a man through the tunnels.”

Jasper stepped forward. “I’ll take care of this sucker. Haven’t done this kind of work in a while. Got to admit, sometimes I miss it.”

Drake felt energy shift in the atmosphere and knew that Jasper was raising his talent. A second, smaller ghost flashed into existence directly in front of the blocking storm. Jasper’s UDEM oscillated with hot energy at its core, but unlike the wild ghost it was under his control.

Jasper used his talent to maneuver the second ghost until it collided with the furnace of hot psi that blocked the tunnel. There was a flash of green lightning. Energy roared in the atmosphere. A moment later the wild ghost winked out.

Jasper quickly extinguished the ghost he had created. He was grinning.

“That was fun,” he said.

“Good to know you haven’t lost your touch,” Fletcher said. “Nice work.”

Houdini bounced up and down and rumbled ferociously, urging everyone forward.

They moved swiftly, but distances underground were difficult to gauge. Drake reasoned that the Chamber could not be too far from Shadow Bay via the Underworld tunnels because Egan had evidently come and gone frequently between the two locations. But there was no way to be certain how their position belowground related to the aboveground terrain.

They rounded a corner. Houdini abruptly stiffened on Drake’s shoulder and growled a warning that brought them to a halt in a large, high-ceilinged chamber. A dozen glowing passages branched off on all sides. Houdini was gazing intently at one of the corridors. He was tensed with the anticipation of a predator.

“We’re close,” Drake said.

Jasper glanced at Houdini. “Yeah, the little guy looks ready to go for someone’s throat.”