Page 52 of Dark Chains: First Link
The young assistant had no mental calluses built up over centuries of exposure to powerful compulsion, and he had never been exposed to thralling. He wouldn't even know what it felt like.
Number One led the others around the perimeter of the property, staying close to the walls and the hedgerows. Rami's room was on the first floor, facing the street, which was convenient.
They positioned themselves beside his window, four on one side, four on the other, close enough that the collective operated at full coherence.
The window was closed and the curtains drawn, but curtains and glass did not block mind waves. They degraded the signal, but not by much.
Number One peeked through a gap in the curtains and saw Rami sitting at his writing desk, hunched over something and scribbling notes on whatever he was working on. His back was to the window, so Number One couldn't see what he was doing, but given the way he moved, he was writing something by hand.
He skimmed the surface of Rami's thoughts, expecting the usual background noise of a mind engaged in a mundane task, perhaps a to-do list or a summary of the day's activities, but what he found made the collective pause.
Rami wasn't writing. He was sketching Losham's portrait because he was in love with his boss.
The feelings were so strong that Dave couldn't understand how all eight of them had missed them during the many times they had been in the presence of Losham and Rami.
The assistant must be very good at masking his feelings.
But now Rami was alone, his guard walls down, and he was drawing Losham with profound longing and an ache in his heart, knowing that his love would never be requited. His thoughtswere consumed by Losham and his admiration, or rather adoration, of the male.
Dave filed the information and assessed its implications.
Losham was exclusively attracted to females, and Rami knew this, and the knowledge had shaped his love into something that expressed itself as loyalty, service, and the painful discipline of hiding what he felt and what he wanted.
Mortdh's teachings condemned such desires, and the penalty for acting on them was death. Rami's secret was existential. If exposed, even the fact of the desire, without any physical act, might put him at severe risk.
The information was leverage.
The collective noted this without emotion, the way it noted all potentially useful data. In the event that Rami ever needed to be controlled or silenced, the threat of exposure would be effective even though Dave would have a hard time proving it without Rami ever acting on his desires.
They filed it away as a last resort.
There was no reason to destroy a male who hadn't wronged them. Before their ascension, they might have parroted Mortdh's teachings and called Rami's desires an abomination, but now that the word was often applied to them, they knew how wrong that was.
Rami was no more of an abomination than they were. Being different didn't mean being bad.
The immediate problem remained, though. Rami's thoughts were consumed by Losham, which made steering him toward the alarm code difficult. His mind kept returning to the samegravitational center, the way a compass needle returned to north, and every attempt to redirect his attention was pulled back by the force of his preoccupation.
Number One tried a different approach. Instead of trying to redirect Rami's thoughts away from Losham, he worked with the current, nudging the stream rather than damming it.
Losham's security. The thought was planted gently, a pebble dropped into the river of Rami's consciousness.He's worried, which is why he changed the code. He doesn't feel safe. There is somuch to worry about. I need to remember the new code.
Rami's pen paused. His thoughts shifted from the emotional turmoil to the practical matter of keeping Losham safe. Losham was worried about security. He'd changed the alarm code after the call tonight. He'd chosen not to wait for the call in the backyard but rather to use the library. He'd entered the code himself and told Rami to memorize it, but not to write it down anywhere.
"The only safe place for it is inside your head," Losham had told him. "And it can be stolen even from there."
The code surfaced like a bubble of soap. Sixteen digits.
The collective captured it and verified that it was recorded by all eight minds. Then each one of them confirmed the numbers.
With the code secured, Number One planted the final suggestion in Rami's mind.I'm so tired. It's time to go to bed.
Rami's sketching stopped. He stared at the page for a moment, then put his pencil down, closed the notebook, placed both in the desk drawer, and used a key to lock it.
When he rose to his feet and entered the en-suite bathroom, Number One led the others to the large windows of the library, which also faced the street.
Its heavy curtains were drawn, but they didn't quite meet in the center, and through the narrow gap, a sliver of light spilled onto the garden path.
Number One used that gap to peek into the room.
