The Left Hand of Memory (Redlisted) Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  House of Mnemosyne

  Sanguine

  Damage Control

  Emulator

  Pulse

  Seraglio

  The Second Coming

  Queen of the Fairies

  Visitors

  Postmortal Coil

  Haunt

  Superstition

  AWOL

  Cicatrix

  Avatar of Orpheus

  Familiar

  Good Luck

  Invidia

  Remote Binding

  Loyalties

  Labyrinth

  Proxy

  Protocol

  Chimaera

  Wire

  Mask

  Hold Still

  Wake Up

  Murder by Poison

  Under His Skin

  Leverage

  Deep End

  Amputate

  Summons

  Glossary

  Redlisted

  Book Two: The Left Hand of Memory

  Sara Beaman

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  REDLISTED

  Book Two: The Left Hand of Memory

  Copyright © Sara Beaman.

  Cover art and design by Sara Beaman.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except in the case of a reviewer, who may quote brief passages embodied in critical articles or in a review.

  Trademarked names appear throughout this book. Rather than use a trademark symbol with every occurrence of a trademarked name, names are used in an editorial fashion, with no intention of infringement of the respective owner’s trademark.

  http://sarabeaman.com

  ISBN: XXXX

  For Jessica Weiss.

  Prologue

  {Mnemosyne - 1893}

  I climbed the stone stairs out of the labyrinth slowly, my joints grinding bone on bone. I felt the pain as a vibrating itch, no more than a trivial nuisance. Nevertheless, it served to remind me just how decrepit my corpus had become. The centuries had taken their toll on this body. I would need to find a replacement soon. Perhaps this time I’d pick something different—something more robust, I should think. Male, even. We were at war, after all.

  I put on a stern expression with which to meet my guest, Zenas Markham. He stood waiting for me in the clearing, flanked by two of my lieutenants. I’d never before seen him with my own eyes; I’d only ever seen him in the memories of my children. Looking upon him now, I saw two faces: the face he presented to the world, and the face he was born with, the one he concealed behind his Thalian blood magic.

  To anyone else, Markham would have appeared to be a man of twenty-five, tall and handsome, with long black eyelashes and long black hair. In reality, he was far too thin, with ungainly long limbs, an enormous nose and an overbite. He looked no older than fourteen. I could not understand what my daughter Thalia had seen in him so many years ago.

  He bowed deeply, trembling. It occurred to me that he did not know why I’d summoned him. In fact, judging from his surface thoughts, he imagined I meant to kill him.

  “Stand up, boy,” I said.

  He pulled himself upright.

  “Honored Grandmother,” he said, not meeting my eyes, “truly, it is humbling to stand in your presence.”

  “Am I to take your groveling as an apology?”

  “N-no, certainly not. My actions in Chicago—you must understand, Grandmother, I had no idea they impinged upon your interests."

  I arch an eyebrow. "Thalia was my daughter. You believed I would take no interest in the fate of her progeny?"

  “Please, Grandmother, I know it must be difficult to believe me, but I solemnly swear to you, I speak the truth.” He dropped to his knees and bowed his head in supplication.

  “Of course I believe you, you fool,” I said. “I would know if you were lying.”

  “I—I see.”

  “Get up.”

  He stood.

  “Don’t do that again. It’s unbecoming.”

  He nodded, brushing off his pants. His cheeks flushed.

  “I haven’t brought you here to kill you, you know.”

  His eyes widened. A spark of hope lit up his heart.

  “I’ve brought you here because I have a favor to ask of you.” I smiled. “I assume I can rely on your assistance?”

  “Yes! Of course! Anything—I will do anything.”

  “I need you to find someone for me. And once you have found him, I need you to bring him here.”

  “Who?”

  “My son, Julian Radcliffe?”

  “Mr. Radcliffe.” Markham swallowed hard. “Is he the…” the traitor? “The portraitist?”

  “He is the one who defected to the Wardens, yes.”

  “Ah—yes. Excuse me. Please excuse me for my impertinence.”

  I did not react to his apology.

  “Where is Mr. Radcliffe now?” Markham asked. “In Red Hook?”

  “No. He is in Chicago. At your estate.”

  “At my estate?” He was too frightened to object, but his thoughts were frantic. The Wardens will be waiting for me there—they’ll lock me up again—maybe kill me this time—

  “Mr. Markham, I assure you, you will be perfectly safe. I will help you create a new persona, one the Wardens won’t recognize. And I will give you a trinket that will bolster the illusion and keep you safe from their surveillance.”

  “I see,” he said. “What kind of trinket?”

  My hand went to my neck, to the space between my collarbones where my golden amulet hung on its chain, invisible. It was my most prized possession, my trump card against the Wardens. It had taken decades of experimentation and vats of my enemies’ blood to create, and the idea of lending it to this shifty double agent troubled me. But I had an end for him to reach, and only the amulet could provide the means.

  “Nothing of any consequence,” I told him. “Come here.”

  He approached me apprehensively, as if I might strike him without warning. With a long breath, I opened the necklace’s clasp and removed it from my own neck, then stepped forward and fastened it around his.

  “There,” I said. “Take care of it. I expect you to return it along with my son.”

  “Of course,” he said.

  “Grandmother,” Markham said, “how best should I approach Mr. Radcliffe? I’ve heard he is…” a recluse. “Reserved.”

  “You will assume the persona of someone he’ll be glad to see. No—more than glad, delighted. His dear tutor, Lucien Verlinden.”

  “I see, but I, I’m afraid I’ve never met the man,” Markham said. “How will I manage to portray him well enough to convince Mr. Radcliffe?”

  Turning my focus inward, I brought to mind the last time I spoke with Lucien. I envisioned his form in perfect detail, recalling every scar, every pore and follicle. For Markham’s benefit, I put on the illusion of him: his pale face, his dark hair, his thin waist and broad shoulders. I reached my hand, Lucien’s hand, out for Markham’s.

  “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance,” I said in Lucien’s voice.

  Markham took my hand in his and shook it.

  “You’re certain Julian will want to see this man?”
he asked.

  “Oh yes,” I said. “Julian would do anything for me.”

  Markham smiled awkwardly. “I see,” he said, though he understood nothing.

  “Come closer,” I said. “Let me show you why.”

  Markham took one more step forward and stood right before me, toe to toe. I placed my hand on his cheek. He trembled beneath my touch, then closed his eyes and began to relax as I enveloped him in stolen memories: scenes I recalled through Julian’s eyes, intimate moments where his unrequited desire for Lucien flared red-hot, unbearable. Markham’s long eyelashes fluttered, and a smile played across his pink lips.

  “I understand,” he said as I drew my hand away. “I look forward to meeting Mr. Radcliffe.”

  I smiled.

  House of Mnemosyne

  {Katherine Avery - 2010}

  In my last waking moments, an ancient, skeletal husk of a woman—a woman whose head Adam and I had been carrying around in a custom-fitted case—drained all of the blood out of my body through my mouth. She kept me awake, her lips pressed against mine, until the moment my heart stopped beating. I wasn’t prepared for death, but I accepted it with grim resignation, knowing I’d fought as hard as I could against it.

  Then my memories returned, starting from the very moment I was born, each presented vividly and in greater detail than I’d ever before been able to recall them. I was surprised to be able to see and hear and feel any of it; I was surprised to experience anything at all, being dead. But still, I wondered if that not-so-instant replay was no more than my entry into the afterlife.

  I saw my whole life, step by step, up until those last waking moments, down in Desmond’s crypt in upstate New York. I felt Mnemosyne kill me again, and again I felt the world go black.

  Now my somatic senses are returning, real ones, immediate. I get the sense that this is no longer a memory: it’s the present day, the present time. I feel light against my eyelids, feel my cheek resting on something scratchy and off-gassing. I open my eyes. In front of them there are legs in a crossed position, legs in dark jeans stained with blood. Feet in scuffed, muddy dress shoes.

  I look up. It’s Adam. For a moment half his head looks shot through, ruined, but then the injury flickers away and he looks whole again.

  “Are you okay?” I ask, sitting up.

  “I’m dead,” he says. “So are you, I’m afraid.”

  “Wait, so, what are you saying? Is this—“

  “The afterlife, or something?” He shakes his head. “No. But it’s not the real world, either.”

  “What?”

  “We’re dreaming,” he says.

  I look around. We’re sitting in between two rows of leather-upholstered, boxy chairs in what looks like a waiting room, all glass and brushed steel and polished hardwood. “This is a dream?”

  “A shared dream. We’re both having it.”

  “Okay…”

  “It’s like a little pocket of the collective subconscious—something we call the oneiroxis.”

  “It looks like the waiting room of a law firm.”

  “It might as well be,” he mutters.

  Adam helps me to my feet. The grapefruit-sized hole in his head flickers in and out of view once again.

  “Your head—why does it keep doing that?“

  “Sorry,” he says. “I’m not an illusionist, and Desmond kind of did a number on me. It’s hard for me to keep the wound from showing.”

  I remember watching as the bullet sailed through his skull, dragging him into the panic room, watching his blood pool out on the concrete floor. I’d thought he was gone.

  “But you’re not dead, though?” I ask. “I mean, not any deader than before.”

  “No. Not for the time being.”

  I let out a breath. I’d thought he was gone.

  “Are you okay?” he asks, putting a hand on my shoulder.

  I don’t want to think about his question. “You said we’re both dead. So I’m a… you know, a revenant?”

  “Yes. Unfortunately.”

  “But who initiated me? You were unconscious.”

  “Mnemosyne,” Adam says.

  “Shit.”

  “Yeah.” He brushes a strand of hair away from my face. “Kate, I—“

  “Wait,” I say, frowning. “Adam, how do you know that? About Mnemosyne?”

  “There’s a lot I haven’t been able to… look, I wish I’d been able to tell you sooner, but—“

  “But what?”

  “I, uh, I downplayed the extent to which I’m involved with the House.”

  “The House? You mean the House of Mnemosyne?”

  “Yes. She’s brought you here to extend you a formal invitation—“

  “Mnemosyne is here?”

  He gives several tense little nods. “Listen. Kate, when she offers to make you a member of the House, just say yes.”

  “What? Why the hell would I do that?”

  “When she made me the same offer, I rejected her. It wasn’t—everything since then has been…” He trails off. “Just say yes, okay?”

  ***

  Before I can form a reply, a door swings open. A man in a crisp business suit with long brown hair sticks his head out into the waiting room. He walks over to me and extends a hand. His face is vaguely familiar; I remember seeing him here and there when I worked at SpiraCom. We’ve never spoken before, and I don’t know his name.

  “Richard Stone,” he says. “You must be Katherine Avery.”

  I shake his hand, confused. “You work at Spira Communications in Atlanta, don’t you?”

  “I just resigned,” Richard says.

  “Really?”

  “Yes. I’d love to share horror stories, Katherine, but Mother Mnemosyne’s ready to see you now,” Richard says. “It’s best not to keep her waiting.”

  Adam and I follow Richard into a boardroom with frosted glass walls. A massive table sits at the center of the room, surrounded by leather chairs on casters. At the far end of the table, in front of a black whiteboard, stands Mirabel.

  I take a step back, alarmed. “Mirabel?”

  “Her double, actually,” she says in a low, gravelly voice. “My previous corpus was on its last legs. I almost took yours, but then I thought better of it.”

  “Oh. It’s you,” I say. “Hello Mnemosyne.”

  “Katherine. Please, sit down.”

  Richard pulls out a chair for me. Adam sits to my right; Richard takes a place next to the head of the table, next to Mirabel-Mnemosyne.

  I turn to Adam with a glare. “So how long have you been trying to resurrect her?”

  “What do you mean?” he asks.

  “Was that your real objective, with the SpiraCom raid and the trip to Red Hook?” I ask him.

  “No,” he says. “My real objective was to get the head into Desmond’s hands, just like I told you.”

  “Really?” I ask. “Was that all?”

  Adam looks to Mnemosyne as if for confirmation, or perhaps for permission. She gives him a nod.

  “No,” he admits. “Not entirely. We hoped we could convince Desmond and his unit to forsake the Wardens and revive Mnemosyne.”

  “All right,” I said, not bothering to address how fantastically unfeasible that would have been. “Did Haruko know about all that?”

  “I never spelled it out for her, no, but—“

  “But, regardless, you knew your end goal was to try and revive Mnemosyne.”

  Adam takes a moment to reply.

  “Yes,” he says.

  I turn away from him, fuming.

  “What?” he asks.

  “Adam, she’s a monster!”

  “She is your Mother,” Richard says. “Show her some respect.”

  “Show her some…? She killed me!” I protest.

  “Spare us your theatrics, Katherine. Lest you forget, I saved you from Desmond Schuster,” Mnemosyne says. “And I did you a favor, finishing what Adam started with you. Unless you enjoyed depending on him for you
r survival?”

  I find myself unable to come up with a retort.

  “Although I imagine he rather liked it,” she says.

  Adam sputters. “That’s not—I did what I had to—“

  “Whatever,” I say. “Why am I here? Let’s get to the point.”

  Richard pinches the bridge of his nose. “Katherine, we’ve brought you here tonight to extend to you a formal offer of initiation into the House of Mnemosyne. A process which normally is treated with a bit more decorum.”

  “Gee, I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m still kind of getting used to this whole being a vampire thing. Which I didn’t ask for, by the way.”

  “Kate,” Adam says in a warning tone. “Please—“

  “And from what Adam just told me out in the hall, this isn’t really an offer of employment, is it?” I ask. “I’m being conscripted.”

  “Kate,” Adam says again.

  “Adam, what did you tell her?” Richard demands.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Mnemosyne says. “Katherine’s appraisal is fair. And since it’s clear she doesn’t care for niceties, I will be blunt.”

  Mnemosyne gives me her undivided attention. I have to fight with myself not to look away; maintaining eye contact with her gives me a headache.

  “There are things I need you to do for me, child,” she says. “If you’re compliant and respectful, you’ll be given the autonomy to do them your way. If not, you will be made to do them however I see fit.”

  I look down at the table. I can’t keep myself from marveling at how stupid this whole situation is. Why does it matter whether or not I have the autonomy to do her things my way? And why does she want me to act like I respect her? She can hear what I’m thinking—what difference does it make if I say it out loud?

  “Well?” she asks. “Do you give your will to the House of Mnemosyne?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “What is it that you want me to do?”

  “That depends very much on your answer,” she says.

  I look at Adam. His head wound flickers in and out of view.

  “Adam.” Mnemosyne looks at him. “Some years ago I asked you the same question, did I not?”