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“Keele, Pitney, Westover, and Bell were excellent choices for the project,” Melody continued smoothly, as if she hadn’t caught the lightly veiled threat of his words.

“Except that you lost Bell. Not only did she escape after the initial extraction attempt was made, she actually survived the catacombs, thanks to Gabriel Jones.”

“Mr. Jones was a factor in the equation that could not have been predicted.”

“And because of that single unpredictable factor, the entire project failed. One of these days you will learn that no matter how brilliant the plan, there is always at least one unpredictable element.”

“Yes, sir.”

Taggert flattened his palms on the polished surface of his desk and leaned forward a little. Just enough to intimidate. “In my experience, the unpredictable element is a human being. In the case of the Illusion Town Project, there weretwounpredictable people involved: Jones and Bell. In the future, Ms. Palantine, let’s hope you remember that individuals do not operate the way computers do. Logic, for example, is rarely involved. The real world runs on emotions, ambitions, and desires.”

Melody stood very still. “Yes, sir.”

“That’s all for now, Ms. Palantine.”

“Yes, sir.”

She turned, walked swiftly across the carpeted floor, and let herself out into the hall. The heavily paneled door closed softly behind her.

Taggert straightened and went back to the window. Palantine woulddefinitely become a problem in the future, but for now he needed her. He had ambitions, too. His ancestors had left a failed legacy behind on the Old World.

He was going to rebuild that legacy here on Harmony. This time it would be successful.

The legacy had a name: Vortex.

Chapter Forty-One

Melody Palantine held it together until she got to her private office at the end of the hall. Once inside, she locked the door and rezzed themeeting in progresslight.

Frustration and rage threatened to set fire to her senses. She could not allow that to happen. She took a few deep breaths, summoned up her mantra, and whispered it over and over again while pacing the room.

“You have a destiny. You have a destiny. You have a destiny.”

It took a while, but she finally regained control.

When she was no longer tempted to murder the idiot in the CEO’s office, she sat down at her desk, took out her phone, and opened a hidden file.

The photos came up immediately. The images were a century old. There were dozens of them. She had used a camera to record them from multiple sources—libraries, historical archives, Guild museums, and books. Each shot featured the same man. Even though the pictures datedfrom a hundred years earlier, it was impossible to look away. The messianic zeal, blazing charisma, and the power of his talent radiated across the years.

Vincent Lee Vance had built a cult of followers and transformed them into a militia that had fought a guerrilla war via the catacombs. The desperate times that had ensued were known as the Era of Discord.

Vance and his followers had very nearly succeeded in conquering the city-states. But in the end, the hastily assembled teams of ghost hunters had finally managed to put down the rebellion. After losing the Last Battle of Cadence, Vance’s followers had surrendered in droves.

Vance and his lover, Helen Chandler, had fled into the tunnels. For years there had been speculation that the pair were still alive, still secretly plotting. Eventually they were relegated to the history books. Recently, their skeletons had been discovered by a para-archaeologist named Lydia Smith and her husband, Emmett London. There was no longer any question about how Vance and Chandler had died. They had been caught in a lethal energy trap in an uncharted sector of the tunnels.

History fades, but legends rarely do. Legends have staying power.

Once again calm and in control, Melody closed the file and tucked the phone into her handbag. Legends did not always get the details right. Yes, Helen Chandler had been Vance’s lover, and yes, it had been established that they had not had offspring.

But Vance had slept with another one of his followers, a woman named Anna Mark. Anna had been a powerful talent, but she had left the cult when she discovered she was pregnant. She had hidden her relationship with Vance and managed to seduce an elderly, senile man into a quick Marriage of Convenience before her condition was obvious. Under the marriage laws, the birth of the baby had automatically converted the MC into a Covenant Marriage.

The result was that no one ever knew Vincent Lee Vance had fathered a daughter.

His talents had passed down through the family line, often skipping generations. When they did appear, the results were rarely good. Because the secret of Vance’s astonishing success was that he had been a triple talent. Statistically speaking, triple talents were not only psychically unstable but often died young. Those who survived usually ended up in para-psych wards.

Melody had inherited Vance’s three talents. Unlike her ancestors, she was psychically stable. She was strong. She was going to do what Vincent Lee Vance had failed to do—control the Federation of City-States.

She understood what Vance had not—there was no need to conduct an armed rebellion to build an empire. That was Old World thinking. True power in a modern society was achieved by controlling basic resources, technology, and weapons. That was the Vortex approach.