Untouched

Chapter 21

“Gavrikov wants Kat Forrest.” I stared across the desk at Old Man Winter, a few hours later. I felt better after talking to Zollers, more determined. I had some clarity. Old Man Winter watched me the same as always, but next to him, Ariadne seemed to study me with more suspicion, more wariness. “But you probably knew that, because you know her name’s not Kat, not originally.”

Ariadne’s facade of wariness broke and she looked at Old Man Winter, then back to me. “What do you mean? What’s her name?”

“Klementina Gavrikov,” I said, forcing myself not to smile. It wasn’t funny that Old Man Winter hadn’t told his top lieutenant, who I liked to snark at, something of vital importance. Or at least that’s what I told myself as I mashed my toe into my shoe and against the floor. Nope, didn’t smile.

“She’s his…” Ariadne blinked three times, then looked to Old Man Winter for confirmation.

“Clone,” I said, “or at least that’s what he thinks.”

“He is incorrect,” Old Man Winter said, his hands steepled in front of his face.

“Don’t tell him that,” I said. “I don’t want to see what happens when a human bomb gets told he’s wrong.”

“She is his sister,” Old Man Winter said, as though I had not interrupted. “Not a clone.”

“Oh?” I cocked an eyebrow at him. “Gavrikov…Aleksandr,” I said, softening my tone, “seemed to think she had died in 1908.”

“She did not.” He stared back coolly. He did everything coolly, dammit…I wished I had his glacial reserve. Half the time I was trembling beneath my badass exterior, just a scared kid. “She is as long-lived as any other powerful meta and as adaptable at healing. Whatever happened to her, she recovered.” He hesitated. “Though there is a…cost to her power.”

“There’s a cost to any power, it seems.” I breezed it out, way more than I really felt. “After all, if I used my power constantly, I’d end up with the mental equivalent of a clown car.”

Ariadne didn’t seem to find that amusing. “Her power, when used to excess, triggers almost the opposite.”

“Personalities leave her?” I shrugged. “Explains a lot.”

Old Man Winter spoke. “She loses her memory. If a Persephone-type reaches the end of their strength and continues to heal or grow a life, it is at the cost of their own faculties. They become a blank slate, new, fresh. Young again, as well, but at the cost of all they remember.”

“Tabula rasa,” I said with a breath.

“Indeed.” Ariadne took her usual place by the window. “If Gavrikov is after her, it would be best if we hid her for a while.”

Old Man Winter gave her a subtle nod. “You know where.”

“The basement? You’re gonna send her to the basement, right? Where you stuck me when I was hiding from Wolfe?” I shook my head. “Bet the flower girl will love that. Couldn’t you send her to another campus?”

Old Man Winter’s reaction was subtle, but not so subtle I missed it. “It would be best to have her close at hand.”

“Why?” I was curious. “Because you can protect her better here?”

His answer was lacking in any kind of subtlety, and it rattled me. “Because it is not wise to deprive a man who can explode with the force of a nuclear bomb of the only thing he desires—the thing he would be willing to do anything to get.”

I felt a pressure deep in my throat, this time less raw emotion and more…unsettling. “Yeah…that doesn’t sound too wise.”