Chapter Twenty

Natalia Hawthorne reached forward, found the button that upped her stereo’s volume, and held it down. She had been told that the sound system that came in her 2009 Bugatti Veyron EB 16.4 was almost as powerful as its engine; for $1.5 million dollars, it had better.

            She had mastered the violin by the age of thirteen and enjoyed its unique sound; the song blasting from her car’s speakers was performed by an electric violin, accompanied by a drum beat more suited for rock and roll. It was lovely.

            The driveway to her home " to the home of hundreds, true, but her home all the same " was several miles long. To the common eye it was a beautifully flowered, lusciously green driveway, but a normal driveway still. Having driven it many times, Natalia knew better; though she couldn’t see the cameras among the flowers, or the security turrets under the ground, or the explosion-proof communications monitoring tower built into one of the trees, she knew they were there. Such precautions were necessary; behind the front gates, after all, they housed the greatest secrets of mankind.

            She pulled up to those high front gates " intricately designed with metal leaves and curving patterns, 10,000 volts of electricity surging through it " and stopped the car. She stepped out, walked over to the monitor protruding from the red bricked column to the left of the gate, and entered the code 95834 on it. A small screen rose up out of the monitor, a screen equipped with retinal scan technology.

            Natalia leaned forward and looked into it; the screen was as reflective as a mirror, and the sultry amber eyes of an Artist of the Yellow, curtained by dark blonde locks, peered back at her.

            There was a small beep: “NATALIA HAWTHORNE: WELCOME TO KINCAID GARDENS.”

            The gates began to open.

            Natalia smiled.

           

            Kincaid Gardens.

            At the present Lady Natalia Hawthorne, S3-Rank Artist of the Yellow, Expeditionary of the Gardens, friend of few, enemy of many, was thirty-three years old. Her proficiency with mathematics meant she didn’t even have to work it out in her head; she just knew that, due to thirty-three, she had been a resident of Kincaid Gardens for twelve years, first learning of its amazing existence at the age of twenty-one. She hadn’t driven inside then; then she’d been in the backseat, watching in awe at what passed her by once inside those tall gates. The gorgeous architecture of the buildings and halls, the bell towers, the lush green parks; it reminded her very much of one of those old universities, the kind where you have difficulty telling where the town ends and the college begins.

            … the difference being, of course, that those old town-universities were not epicenters for Artists, as Kincaid Gardens was. The typical day at a normal university was that of attending a math class, or a debate hall, or of working out finances as to how one would pay for such a thing; a typical day in the Gardens (which, Natalia noted to herself, wasn’t exactly a university) was of developing new and interesting Artistries, of attending a lecture on the importance of so-called junk DNA for Artists, or of writing an elanology report for the archives.

            The roads were smooth and without blemish; she drove along them slowly, occasionally stopping as others crossed the street; a child, likely around the age of seven or eight, smiled at her while his mother pulled him along by the hand, his lovely Blue Eyes possibly hearing Natalia’s silent hello there. After several minutes she at last passed through the city itself and into the residential portion of the Gardens, the woods thickening and the canopies letting in only small beams of light. She’d lived in the same house for five years now, located in the back corner of the forest, a cozy two-story A-frame. She pulled into the drive, turned off the car, stepped out, and lightly placed two fingers to the ground, closing her eyes to concentrate…

            … there were people in her range of detection, walking through the woods some quarter-mile away, but none of them were inside her house. A break-in was highly unlikely inside Kincaid Gardens, but Natalia wasn’t an Expeditionary for nothing; she was paid to be paranoid. Jangling her keys in her hand, she walked to her door and unlocked it.

            Before she was an Artist " dreadful days she preferred not to remember, for many reasons " Natalia lived in what was essentially a dump, beer bottles overturned and abandoned on the carpet, cigarette butts floating unflushed in the toilet, roaches running rampant across the ceiling. Having escaped that torment, Natalia’s home was simple and clean, comfortable and quiet. Even Ragstoriches" her cat " practiced spotlessness; the kitty had lived alone for a week and three days yet no trace of rough housing could be found.

            Natalia walked to her bedroom and stepped before her mirror and chest. A choice was given to Expeditionaries upon licensing: they could attire themselves in greater protection for higher defense and lesser movement or lesser protection and greater movement. Natalia chose the latter, and her body armor was a sleek black thing, interwoven with unseen lightweight Kevlar; she removed her feminine yet dutiful boots, her leather gloves, her long-sleeved suit and utility belt, and stood naked from the waist up.

            From her shoulders to her wrists she bore a defining piece of art; beautifully flowing, the strands thicker toward the top and growing thinner as they descended her arms, black entwined lines, a tattoo she received the day after her eyes went from green to Yellow. She knew what they stood for; no one else did. Atticus likely had good guesses but he was tact enough to not voice them.

            Natalia’s past was her past. No point in thinking about it.

            She finished undressing, put on a comfortable, form-fitting outfit from her closet, and looked at herself without expression in the mirror. Her hips felt naked. She lifted the utility belt off her bed and refastened it around her waist, taking her Glock handguns and returning them to their holsters. Paid to be paranoid.

            Yet something else was missing, and after a moment she remembered her cell phone in the pocket of her just-removed bottoms. She took it out and saw that she had a voice mail. She immediately checked it, the deep tones of her fellow Expeditionary Stefan Iversen meeting her:

            “Välkommen tillbaka, Lady Hawthorne. När du får denna inbjudan Sir Erlander. Något viktigt har kommit upp, jag tror du är efterlyst för ett uppdrag.”

            (“Welcome back, Lady Hawthorne. When you get this call Sir Erlander. Something important has come up, I believe you're wanted for an assignment.”)

            Already another assignment…? She’d just gotten home as it was. Either they were shorthanded or this was something truly special, something they believed needed her particular touch.

            Ragstoriches walked into the room with the same confident prowl of her master, looking up at her with the barely-open eyes of an untroubled cat. Natalia knelt and rubbed her, causing her eyes to close. At the touch Natalia knew via Artistry: her cat had missed her.

            “My apologies, Miss Riches,” Natalia said. “I won’t be long. I’ll be sure to let them know you disapprove.”

            Clomp, clomp, clomp were Natalia’s heels on the hardwood floor, and she was gone.

 

            The phone rang one time.

            “Ian Erlander,” Ian Erlander said; fifteen years out of Sweden had nearly removed the accent completely. Now he spoke with the remarkably refined English of a professor, exuding intelligence with each gently spoken word, his deep voice probably envied for its mellifluous timbre.

            “Hello,” was all she said. She thought she heard a chortle; his time with her had taught him that her curt demeanor did not mean she was unkind.

            “Hello hello,” he said. “Have you arrived home already, Natalia?”

            Only a few Artists in the Gardens stood well enough with her to say Natalia without the honorific Madam before it. It was, she supposed, a mark of their friendship. They had run many dangers together; friendship was inevitable.

            “I have. I just got a call from Iverson, telling me to call you.”

            “Yes, I wasn’t able to make the call myself at the time… I was speaking with Atticus. Can you come to Kincaid Hall?”

            “Headed that way now,” she said. “If I may ask, why am I being summoned from my home within moments of returning to it?”

            His tone did not say bad news, thank God: “Patience is a virtue, Madam Hawthorne.”

            She smiled but her voice didn’t show it. “I guess. I’ll see you in ten.”

           

            Clomp, clomp, clomp were Natalia’s heels on the marble floors of Kincaid Hall, and people turned to watch her entrance. Most wore clothes that said business, or maybe professionalism; none of them sported her bold arm tattoos or wore guns in public. A Green Eyed woman braved a look at her before quickly looking away. Natalia was respected in the Gardens, no doubt, but that didn’t mean she was approachable.

            Ian had said Kincaid Hall but he hadn’t said where in Kincaid Hall. Kneeling down again, Natalia touched two fingers to the floor and felt inside her thoughts…

            … getting a good read on other levels of the Hall wasn’t as easy as searching the ground floor, but she managed. As expected Ian and Governor Atticus were in the governor’s personal office, joined by a third person that Natalia couldn’t identify. She rose to her feet and clomp, clomp, clomped to the elevator. She preferred no company; locking her hands in front of her, a gesture performed with the thoughtlessness of breathing, she performed Yellow Mark: Solitary Circle. A Yellow Eyed man in a suit had been approaching the elevator with a cup of coffee in hand; he suddenly stopped, looked at her in confusion, and the doors closed. Typically a Yellow Artistry would have a harder time working on another Artist of the Yellow, but such success was a testament to Natalia’s proficiency.

            Up she went… second floor… third floor… and at the fourth floor she exited.

           

            She did not bother to knock. She stood at the door to Atticus Kincaid’s office for one second before the Artist of the Blue, out of sight, called : “Please come in, my friend.”

            She twisted the door handle and walked inside. She had been inside this office many times; she was on far greater terms with Atticus than with his six siblings; being one of seven Governors to Kincaid Gardens the office was understandably fashionable, with beautiful artwork on the walls, luscious potted plants in the corners (cared for by an Artist of the White attendant), and a desk that left no doubt that whoever sits behind it was important. Atticus Kincaid " no doubt " was important, and more importantly, he was her friend. He had recruited her when her eyes changed color.

            … recruited? No. Rescued was the word.

            Ian Erlander " six-foot-three, a complexion of light chestnut, dark stubble covering his face in a way most women probably found sexy " smiled at her when she entered. He held his hands behind his back, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, his well-worked muscles intimidating. But not as intimidating as those Red Eyes, the irises a lovely, light hue of an almost ripe strawberry.

            “Good to see you again, Natalia,” he said, inclining his head. “Nice to see you’re unharmed from your last assignment, as well.”

            “Not much harm to be found on such a breezy assignment,” she said; she smiled at Atticus Kincaid, who also seemed happy to see her, before taking a quick scan around for the unidentified third person. She found him, standing on his own in the corner of the room, a fifty-something, short Purple Eyed man with combed grey hair and a goatee. He smiled at her. “Convincing the Prime Minister to change his mind was simple, when your eyes are this color.”

            “I imagine so, my dear,” Atticus said, stepping forward with a smile. He was fifty-one but could have passed for a little younger; his short beard and mustache were only recently taking silver wings. He stood at Natalia’s height, about five-foot-seven. “And thank you for coming so quickly. We did hate to call you.”

            “I assumed it was important,” she said.

            “And it unquestionably is,” Atticus said. “Please, come have a seat…”

            Natalia sat on one side of the desk, next to Ian, while Atticus sat on the other side. The man Natalia did not know stood beside the Governor’s chair and was looking at Natalia with an expression she couldn’t read, his eyes first examining her arms, then her face; she was tempted to offer him a handshake simply to learn what his mood was.

            “Natalia, as I was telling Sir Erlander here before you came in… this gentleman is Mr. Hugo Reid, Artist of the Purple. He is a representative of the Holders.”

            Hugo Reid’s face said that he expected Natalia to react to this news with some kind of reverence. Her expression remained as neutral as ever, and she could see it already in his eyes; she was annoying him.

            “Mr. Reid has come to this office with some fairly remarkable news,” Atticus continued. “He’s compiled a report on the matter and wishes for us to see it.”

            “On what matter, Governor?” Ian asked.

            “Ask him yourself,” Atticus said with a smile. “Mr. Reid, the floor is yours.”

            Hugo Reid coughed once, twice, three times, four times, goodness man, five times, six times before opening the folder in front of him.

            “Before I start, I’d like to express my appreciation to both of you, Sir Erlander, and you, Madam Hawthorne, for your attendance.”

            “Of course,” Ian said. Natalia said nothing.

            “Now… what I’ve collected here is a report on recent discoveries of mine. I noticed some anomalies in a certain part of Georgia and began investigating things there…”

            “Anomalies?” Ian asked.

            “Yes… for example…”

            Reid used a remote control to turn on the large flat screen television in the corner of the room. A football field appeared, along with several players. The crowd was on its feet.

            “A football game,” Natalia said, meaning you brought me away from my home to show me sports?

            “Keep watching,” Reid said.

            A player fell back with the football in hand, and as others approached him to take him down, he threw the ball with incredible force. More force than a normal person could ever have managed.

            “Red Artistry,” Ian announced.

            The player on the other end of the field leapt to catch the ball, was going to come up short, and…

            “An Artist of the Green,” Natalia observed.

            “Precisely,” Reid said with a smile. “My thoughts were the same. Those high schoolers are almost certainly Artists.”

            “So it’s a recruiting assignment,” Natalia said. “The Holders are a political organization, they never deal with recruiting. Why now?”

            Reid looked at her and she saw it again: she was annoying him. “That’s not a concern for you, Madam Hawthorne. What matters is that I noticed the anomalies and began tracking them.”

            “There’s more,” Atticus said. “Mr. Reid?”

            “Yes… yes, look at this,” he said, brandishing a photograph. The heavyset girl in the picture appeared to be dead. A thumb and forefinger, covered in a plastic white glove, were holding one of her eyes open.

            “A Maria Nicole Friendly,” Hugo Reid said. “Died recently from what is being described as an aneurism. From what I can gather, that isn’t correct. This girl was an Artist of the Purple, and it seems she downloaded too much information too quickly.”

            “Hm,” Ian said thoughtfully.

            “Are these happenings in the same area?” Natalia asked.

            “Not just the same area, Natalia,” Atticus said with excitement, “the very same high school.”

            “Maple… Maple something…” Reid said, looking to his notes. “Yes. Maple Hill High School, in Savannah Georgia. And look at this, taken from the school’s website…”

            Reid slid a photograph across the desk and Natalia took it, Ian leaning over to see as well. Several students " one of them the Friendly girl from the last photo " stood with a trophy, some smiling, some not, all of them wearing sunglasses.

            “This is a chess club,” Ian said.

            Natalia was putting the pieces together. “A chess club that wears sunglasses…”

            “To cover their eyes… yes,” Atticus said happily.

            “If this is true, and all of them are indeed Artists, then this will be the largest gathering of Artists outside of the Gardens since the Edinburgh incident,” Natalia said.

            “And read the names, you two,” Atticus said, leaning over the desk to point at the captions beneath the picture. Ian read aloud.

            “Vivian van Valen… Dominic Beaumont… Elijah Beaumont…” He looked up at the others with a look of shock, a look of bedazzlement. “Beaumont?”

            “Yes, Ian,” Atticus said, nearly whispering. “Beaumont.”

            “Didn’t Roland Beaumont come from Savannah?” Natalia asked. Now she was getting excited.

            “If either of those boys inherited a fraction of their father’s talent they’ll be remarkably gifted Artists,” Ian mused. “I wonder what Artistries they possess…”

            “As you both now realized, this is an assignment of great priority,” Atticus said. “Not only is it in the Garden’s best interests to recruit these young ones, but it is imperative that such a large number of untrained Artists be removed from society until they are trained. For the safety of those around them.” Atticus gestured to Reid. “It was Mr. Reid’s intentions to go to Savannah himself to recruit these young people. But unfortunately, he doesn’t possess a license to recruit. But both of you do.”

            “You want us to accompany him to Savannah,” Natalia said. Atticus nodded.

            Natalia took a deep breath and let it out. Hundreds of miles away sat a “chess club” of Artistry talent, hidden in a high school, of all places. Natalia had no desire to return to a high school " she’d hated her own time there " but she had a great desire to find those sunglasses wearing students within it. How would she approach them? What would they say when she did? Would they feel that they were being rescued as she had when Atticus found her?

            A rare smile, and Natalia stood.

            “Mr. Reid… Sir Erlander… get ready. We leave tonight.”