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Writer's pictureCharlotte

Posthumanism & Paranormal Romance Affinities: session pre-reading

Nalini Singh’s Slave to Sensation (2006) pp. 254-260


She turned to Tamsyn the second they were behind the solid wooden door of the bedroom. “How can you stand this? Being shut away safe while they might not be?”


“I’m the healer.It does no one any good if I die. I fight my battlesafter they’ve fought theirs.” Intense emotion overlaid her every word.


“At least you get to fight. They should’ve let me help—I have enough Tk and Tp powers to cause some mayhem.”


“There might not be any need for violence. The wolves have a pact with us.” Tamsyn didn’t sound too convincedof her own argument. “I’ve been thinking of something.”


“What?” Sascha paced the room, feeling more like a caged animal than the cool, controlled Psy she was supposed to be. “That it’s idiotic to be locked up here when we’re fully capable of protecting ourselves?”


“If you go down, you make Lucasvulnerable.” Tamsyn’s wordspleaded with her to think. “If the SnowDancers pick up that the mating dance is incomplete, they’ll use you as a lever against him.”


“Will they know if we don’t tell them?”


Tamsyn paused. “I’m not sure.They’re wolves, not cats. Theirscent is very different from ours—they might assume you already belong to Lucas.”


For some reason, that made Sascha smile. “How can you talk about belonging to someone so easily? I thought predatory changelings were independent by nature.”


“Simple.” Tamsyn walked over and took Sascha’shand. “Because Lucas belongs to you, too.”


Sascha wanted to break the contact but she could feel the healer’s need for touch, for Pack. Nate was down there facing off with the wolves, and despite the logic of her statements, Tamsyn was terrified. Not quite understanding how she knew what to do, she pulled the other woman into a hug. Tamsyn came without hesitation.


“How can you treat me like one of the pack?” Sascha asked, even as she stroked Tamsyn’sthick fall of hair.


“You smell of Lucas, and I don’tmean on a physical level.It’s difficult to put into words.” She pulled back from the embrace, as if she’d received what she needed to be strong again. “Our bodies and hearts recognize yours. We knowyou’re one of us.”


“But I’m notmated to Lucas yet,” Sascha argued, feeling the noose slip

about her neck. She couldn’t,wouldn’t, destroy these people who’d come to mean everything to her. If Lucas went down, DarkRiverwould fragment.


The pack might physically survive with the deadly sentinels at the helm, but they’d all be broken. She would not do that to them.


“You’re so close as to make little to no difference.” Tamsyn pushed her hair off her face and held up a hand when Sascha began to speak. “Don’t ask me what the final steps are. I can’t tell you. It’s differentfor each couple…”She sighed. “But the male half of the pair usually has a better idea of what’s needed—I guessit’s nature’s way of ensuringthe more independent females can’t avoid bonding.”


“He’ll never tell me.” She sat down heavily on the floor,her head hangingbetween bent knees. “I’m coming apart at the seams and I refuse to take Lucas with me.”


Tamsyn knelt in front of her. “That’snot your choiceto make. Matingisn’t marriage. You can’t divorce each other and you can’t walk away once you’ve found one another.”


Sascha met the other woman’scompassionate gaze. “I’lldestroy him.” It was a painful whisper.


“Maybe. Or you might save him.” Tamsynsmiled. “Without you, Lucas might’ve become too much his beast, too much the predator, cruel and withoutmercy.”


“Never.”


“He was christened in blood, Sascha. Don’t ever forget that.” Tamsyn sat down cross-legged in front of her. “Until he met you, do you know what he was like? Do you know where he was going? Day by day I watched him get more protective, more unbending and strict, especially with the kids, and there was nothing I could do.”


Sascha was caught by the passion in the healer’s voice.


“He’s undoubtedly our alpha, someone we’d follow into hell and back if he asked it of us. But it takes more than an iron fist to rule,and he was starting to lose those other parts.”


“He’s so good with Kit,” Sascha said, recalling all the times she’d seen him with the juvenile.


“Five months ago, not long after we lost Kylie, he banned Kit from solo runs.”


“Why?”


“He didn’t want the boy hurt.” Tamsyn shook her head. “Kit has the scent of a future alpha—to have him always have a babysitter could’ve destroyed his development and turned him from us. Even more than the other juveniles, Kit needs the freedom to let his beast roam.”


“You persuaded Lucas to changehis mind?”


“No, Sascha. You did.” She put a hand on Sascha’s knee. “Kit was ready to rebel when Lucas quietly took him out for a run soon after he met you. When he came back, Kit wasn’t with him.”


“He let Kit go his own way?” Sascha knew it must’ve been one of the hardest things he’d ever done. Protecting his own was a compulsion with him. It was also something he couldn’t indulge in—it would smother the very people he was trying to shelter from harm.


Tamsyn nodded.“You allow him to think, to see past his emotions.”


“I think you’re giving me too much credit. I can barely understand my own emotions.”


“I think I know what an E-Psy is.”


Sascha twisted her fingers together.“You think E stands for Emotion, don’t you? I’ve already considered that but it makes no sense. Before Silence, all Psy felt emotion.”


Tamsyn didn’t answer her. “The changeling healersaround the countryhave a sort of informal alliance,” she said, in what seemed a complete change of topic. “We share our knowledge in spite of the fact that we might belong to enemy groups. The alphas don’t even try to stop us. They know we’re healers because we can’t be anything else—we refuse to withhold information that could save a life.”


“And the Psy call themselves enlightened,” Sascha whispered, stunned by the humanity of these so-called animals. “We wouldn’t give water to our enemy if he lay dying on our doorstep.”


You would, Sascha.You’re Psy, too. Maybe, just maybe, there are more like you than you know.”


“If you knewhow much I hoped for that… I don’t want to be alone,

Tamsyn.” Tears choked up her throat.“I don’t want to die in cold silence.”


Tamsyn shook her head. “You’renever going to be alone again. You belong to us, to Pack.” Her hand coveredSascha’s. “Don’t be afraid of letting go of the PsyNet. We’ll catch you when you fall.”


Sascha desperately wanted to tell her the truth but couldn’t. If any of the leopards found out, they’d never allow her to set her plan in motion and it had to go ahead. If it didn’t, the SnowDancers would declare war. In a war between the most lethalwolf and leopardpacks in the country and the Psy, thousands would die, innocents and guilty alike.


Nobody could know the ultimate secret of the PsyNet. It wasn’t only an information net, it was a life net. No one knew when it had been created, but theories abounded that it had come into existence on its own because Psy minds needed the feedback of other Psy minds.


Deprived of that feedback, they shut down and died. Even comatose Psy retained the PsyNet link, their bodies well aware of the requirement for the connection to ensure survival. The instant Sascha dropped out of the Net, she’d begin to slip into the final darkness.


“Thank you,” she said to Tamsyn,hiding her fear.


The woman squeezed her hand. “The reason I told you about the healers alliance is that we pass on a lot of things through word of mouth. One of our oral stories is very interesting—it tells of healers of the mind. They disappeared from the stories almost a hundred years ago. Interesting timing, don’t you think?”


Sascha stared. “Mind healers?”


“Yes. They couldapparently take suffering and anger from people, enablingthem to see past the block emotion can often be. They could also heal those who’d been abused, violated, hurt in a thousand different ways. They bandaged up wounds that might otherwise have destroyed people.”


Tamsyn’s eyes were intent. “They were adoredbecause everything that they took from others, they put into themselves. They had the capacity to neutralize the burden, but it had to have hurt.”


Sascha was so stunned, she was trembling. All those times she’d imagined taking away people’s pain, all those times she’d felt the heavy rock of others’ emotions sitting on her heart… none of it had been pretend. “They healed souls,”she whispered, knowing Tamsyn was right.


The explanation fit. No wonder she was fracturing. Her cardinal powers had been brutally contained for twenty-six years, growing endlessly with no release. The pressure point had been reached.


“I think that’s what you are, Sascha. A healer of souls.”


A single tear streaked down Sascha’s face.“They told me I was broken,” she whispered. “They told me I was flawed.” Because of their lies, she’d contained her light, her rainbow of stars, trapping the healing gifts of her mind. “They crippled me. And they had to have known!” Her mother certainly had to have understood her child’s unusualmind. She was Council —she knew their history, what had to be hidden…what had to be destroyed.

“When they tried to get rid of violence,” Tamsynsaid, shifting over to sit beside Sascha, one arm around her shoulders, “they also got rid of one of their most precious gifts.”


------------

pp. 301-307


Sascha forced herselfto nod. “We should start.”She led him to the sofa. Lucas sat down, legs sprawledalong its length.Without argument, she crawled up to lie with her head against his chest, putting her arms around his muscular frame.


She could hear his heart, his life, through the soft cotton of his gray T-shirt. How could he condemn her to steal that from him? How could he force his pack to go on without their leader? She wasn’t worth the sacrifice, a woman born of a race who’d lost their humanity a hundred years ago.


“Ready?” A gentle hand smoothedover her unboundhair.


She’d neverbe ready to kill them both. Only,the alternative was much worse. “Yes. Judd and Sienna will be setting off the distraction in a minute.” Takinga deep breath, she closedher eyes and found him.


Lucas’s flame was pure heat, pure light. He’d trusted his mind to her but she didn’tgo in, couldn’t face what she might see. His emotions for her might destroy her. Instead, she gently mergedinto the upperlayer until her thought patterns began to echo his in a subtle way that didn’t change them but altered their psychic feel.


Letting Lucas’sheartbeat soothe her, she openedher mind’s eye. She was still behind her shields, still protected. If she wanted, she could pull back without betraying anything.


Brenna’s screamsreverberated in her mind.


No, she could never pull back. First, she checked that the truth of her healing, rainbow-bright mind was hidden deep. Then she manufactured a flaw in her shields,something that lookednatural. In a way, her plan was blindingly simple … if you were a cardinal E-Psy forced into becoming a genius of multi-layered shields, and if you were able to link with and so easily mimic changeling minds.


She’d realized sometime last night that her ability to touch changeling minds was part of her gift, because the nature of empathy made it impossible for one to turn evil and do harm to an open mind. When they’d crushed the development of empaths, the Psy had destroyed the growth of their conscience.


“This one’s for us,” she said within her soul. It was for all thoseE-Psy who’d died tortured deaths in the transitional phase, all those who’d gone insane under Silence, and all those who’d buried their gifts so deep they thought they were broken.


After a lifetime of feeling as if she’d failed at being Psy, she was winning at being everything she was capable of being. And if the changelings alone ever knew of her victory, then that was good enoughfor her. More than good enough. Because they remembered. Unlike the Psy, they didn’tsystematically erase those who didn’t “fit.”


Using the flaw she’d created, she allowed vague tendrils of her Lucas- influenced thought patterns to filter through. She shaped the outgoing whispers based on Rina’s mind. Rebellious, headstrong, loyal, independent, and sensual, these were the traits of the women the killer had taken. The altered blend of her psychic signature was very carefully tailored to appeal to him.


Most Psy would have no idea what was unusual about it. Some might notice but they’d see her cardinal star and put it down to some odd talent. Only a Psy who’d ripped open a changeling mind would recognize this scent for

what it was.


Fifty known operators.


Sascha refused to let herself think about failure. She had to trust in fate and the killer’s hunger for this particular breed of prey.


As the thought patterns filtered through, she slipped out a hidden doorway built into her outer shield and into the starry night of the PsyNet. It was the same trick she used while ghosting. But this was even more dangerous.


Today, her mind was trapped inside her shields, because it needed to maintain the contact with Lucas and feed the false illusion. When she went ghosting, she left behind an illusion mind, while her consciousness, her self, traveled the Net. In a sense, she split herself into body and mind.


A variation on the same thing occurred when she “met” someone on the PsyNet. Because she usually needed to continue functioning on the physical level, she sent out a roaming piece of herself. For the time it was on the Net, that piece actedas a separate individual apart from her, almost as if she’d copied herself. There was vulnerability there on account of the underlying connection to her inner mind, but it was so low most Psy never worried about it.


The part of her on the outside today was connected directly to the core of her mind. She couldn’t use a roamingpiece of herselfbecause the NetMindwould pick it up and so would other Psy. To createthe illusion that she wasn’t in the Net at all, she had to be outside but fully connected to the core. However, if someone took control of her here, they’d have unhindered access to her brain—mind control on the most intimate level.


However, she couldn’t worry about that possibility—she had too much else choking up her throat. Already, the currents of the Net were spreading her bait. All she had to do was wait and watch. Hidden against her own mind, her presence was almost impossible to detect. This was such a dangerous maneuver that most Psy would never think to look for it, but she had to be outsideher shields to see the killer’s mental face.


Even if she didn’t recognize him, she’d have enough to ID him from the PsyNet databases. So long as the rainbow of her true mind stayed hidden, she’d be able to use the resources of the Net.


Two curioushigh-Gradient minds passedclose by but didn’t stop. She heard parts of their conversation, which they weren’t bothering to shield. The word “cardinal” featuredprominently. The flaw she’d createdwas unique but not so overwhelmingly a bad fit that normal Psy would question it. She’d counted on their arrogance, which led them to think changelings harmless and thus not worth studyingas you would an enemy.


Her nerves relaxed a fraction at the small success. The temptation to go back and wipe away her shields until she could touch Lucas’s mind in a psychic kiss was almost overwhelming. She needed touch and she knew her loverwouldn’t mind the caress despite his independent nature.


He belonged to her as much as she belonged to him.


However, to expose him that way would be sheer selfishness. An intruding Psy could harm him through her if her shields cracked.And Lucas couldn’tdie. She wouldn’t allow it.


Something pinged on her outermost shields, which weren’t actually shields but warning beacons, one of her secret creations. Excitement mounting, she watched. Oh hell! Why hadn’t she realized that she’d inevitably draw this one mind?


Sascha.


Mother. I’m sorry I haven’tresponded to your call—I’ve been very busy.

She answeredusing the mental pathways of telepathy, as if she wasn’t actually present on the Net. Hopefully, her mother was too preoccupied by the hunt for the killer and the Laurens’ distraction to quiz her about exactly what she’d been up to.


One of your shieldshas a fracture. Fix it before peopletry to take advantage and sneak in viruses.


Of course Nikita would worry about viruses. Thank you.


There’s somethingodd about your patterns. Perhapsa visit to Medical is in order.


Fear and betrayal gripped Sascha around the throat. Nikita had to know what was wrong with her daughter, had to have seen her before she’d been old enough to conceal her mind. Yet she was giving advice that could lead to Sascha’s exposure. Did she suspecthow far her offspring had gone from the accepted Psy path?


Are you sure that’s necessary? she asked. It appears to be a minor problem.


As the head of the Duncan household, I received a notice from Medical noting your lack of physical examinations since you reachedadulthood. Nikita’s tone didn’t change but Sascha thought she heard a thread of warning. It might be politic to get a scan done before they pull you up for a random check.


Her relief was almost crushing. Whatever else she might be doing, at least Nikitawasn’t trying to serve her daughter up to the authorities. It wasn’t much but it was something. I’ll do it as soon as possible.


You haven’treported on the DarkRiver projectfor a couple of—She paused. I have to go. Something’s just gone wrong with two of the main information relay points. Things are already becoming gridlocked. With that, Nikita’s mind was gone as quickly as it had appeared.


Sascha felt the information backing up on the Net and breathed a sigh of relief. Sienna and Judd had come through. Every Psy surfing the Net in this location would be streaming toward those points, looking to fix the damage before it cascaded into chaos.


Likely, they’d already fixed it, but the backlogwould take hours to clear. In the tumult, her odd signature would hopefully gain no real attention…except from one very dangerous Psy.


These things were thought by the hidden part of her that was a fountaining rainbow inside unbreakable walls. Outside those walls, she was cool and remote, protecting herself from disclosure even when most people, including Psy, would’ve considered themselves safe.


A whisperof violence swept by her. Every one of her senses screamedand she felt the rough edge of a growl in the back of her throat. Lucas’spersonality was alpha, too strong. It shouldn’t have been coming through this clearly but it was and she had to use it. Thinking quickly, she merged the anger into the tendrils of thought going out into the Net. These women wouldhave the capacity for anger. Anger was a kind of passion.


Her race had tried to delete anger, rage, hate, but they hadn’t understood that anger could spring from deep love, the most complete need to protect. Lucas was furious because she was putting herself at risk, enraged at the thought of her being hurt. There was nothing evil about those emotions.

They were so pure they burned.


Unlike the emotions now coming slowlycloser. This violencewas sly, cunning in the way of jackals or vultures. Most Psy probably never understood why this outwardly “normal” mind made them slightly uncomfortable, because most Psy no longer had the ability to recognize evil, even if it stood right in front of them. What a perfect hiding ground for a killer, Sascha realized.


The scent of rotting malevolence abruptly stopped approaching and then disappeared altogether. She frowned. Had the murderer been scared off? A second later,she felt anotherfamiliar presence and almost cursed.Enrique’s cardinal blazewas obvious a mile away.No wonder the killer had run.


She wanted to scream in frustration. Something deep within her flexed its claws and it felt good. Right at that instant,she itched to tear into Enrique’s interfering arrogance, arrogance that might cost Brenna her life.


He didn’tcontact her when he reachedher, not seeingher presence on the Net. Instead, he examined the manufactured flaw with the utmost care. Sascha wondered whether he even understood what he was looking at.


She’d have suspected him for the murderer, except that she knew there was no emotion in Enrique. None. Even for the Psy, he was the coldest creature she’d ever met. Nothing in her empathy reacted to him. That, she realized at last,was why he’d constantly rubbed her raw.


Her motherwas cold, but Sascha’s senseshad always pickedup a low-level emotional feedbackfrom her, as they did from other Psy. Her race might’veburied their emotions but they were there. In Enrique’s case, there was nothing to indicate he’d ever had the capacity to feel.

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