Daniel Hecht_Cree Black 02 by Land of Echoes Read Free Book Online Page A

horrible to contemplate.
    She was speechless for a moment before she tried the word. "You mean . . . possession. You think this boy is—"
    Mason nodded minutely. Julieta and Dr. Tsosie, their faces in shadow now, just watched her.
    Possession: The word seemed to linger in the air, a pollutant that hung like smoke between them. Whatever skepticism they'd felt had given
     way to ambivalence, and in only a few moments the dynamic had changed. It struck Cree that they were sincerely looking to
     her for answers, for help. Now she understood what their terse questioning really was. The effect of an intense paranormal
     experience was much like dealing with the death of a loved one: Witnesses went through a predictable sequence of denial, negotiation,
     anger, and resignation. People who came to a parapsychologist demanding "Prove it!" were actually people who'd already had
     a deeply convincing experience and were seeking assurance that there was some rational foundation for what they'd already
     been forced to deal with at an emotional level. That these two were already in the negotiating phase meant they'd had a tough
     time of it.
    The sun had dwindled to a blob of molten magma at the horizon. Nearer now, the tramcar turned on its interior lights, and
     in the twilight the row of disembodied bright windows flew upward toward the station. Cree was freezing.
    Possession: a being that lived inside you, laid its energies along your nerves, invaded the circuits of your brain, and took
     up residence in your thoughts. Reports of such occurrences stretched from oral traditions come down from prehistory to the
     Bible to well-documented cases in the present day. Of course, she and Ed had talked about it, but in ten years of paranormal
     research, Cree had avoided the concept, hoping it was just another example of sensational folklore or Hollywood horror hoopla,
     like zombies, werewolves, and witches on broomsticks.
    But Mason was right, the local field of a human nervous system would create the perfect home for an errant, bodiless being.
     As would the proximity of a human personality going through parallel psychological processes. Possession was the ultimate
     affirmation of what Cree had always believed: that it was people who were haunted as much as places.
    "Yes, that's what I was thinking, Cree," Mason said gleefully. "This boy is, in conventional parlance, possessed. And if I
     were you, I'd call your colleagues tonight. Tell them you've got what you've always wanted—a paranormal entity in a bottle,
     just waiting to be studied."

5
    CREE PACED the carpet of her hotel room, waiting for the phone to be picked up in New Orleans. From her fifth-floor window,
     she looked down at the lights of the cars oozing along Central Avenue, the downtown artery better known to visitors as Route
     66. Resonances of James Dean and Bob Dylan were few and far between now, but Cree had found them—not so much in the restored
     Historic 66 sections with their retro restaurants and clubs, but the dingy strip of older motels and greasy spoon diners.
     Somehow she felt more comfortable there; the restaurant where she'd grabbed a burger on the way back from the mountain was
     just the kind of place Pop used to like. Once a daughter of a working stiff, she thought, always.
    Paul Fitzpatrick didn't pick up, but she got his answering machine. "Hi, it's me," she said, feeling awkward about the message
     she needed to leave. "I'm in Albuquerque. At the Hotel Blue—I don't know why it's named that. My talk went really well. I
     ran into my old mentor, Mason Ambrose." Pause. "Well, I didn't run into him, he showed up and kidnapped me. He sandbagged
     me completely. Brought a woman to meet me? A client? I kind of agreed to look into a problem at this school she runs over
     near the Navajo reservation." Kind of was inaccurate: She'd already canceled her flight back to Seattle and arranged to ride with Julieta McCarty to the school
     tomorrow. "She was