Elodie closed the cast-iron skylight behind herself, her senses heightened with adrenaline and her heart thumping in her ears. She looked around, the street lights were casting an orange glow on the road beneath her leaving the slated rooftops in shadow.
She closed her eyes and took three deep breaths to centre and calm herself, drawing the cold air into her lungs and letting the refreshing oxygen swamp her blood stream.
On the third out breath she opened her eyes. In moments like this it was essential to stay centered and was worth the few seconds it took.
She knew she could do this, as long as she could hold her focus.
She rose into a crouching position and ran, her trainers gripping well on the smooth slates, to the edge of the roof.
Elodie leapt across the alleyway, landing neatly on all fours on the next roof. Three houses later, she had settled into the rhythm of running 10 steps up to the ridge, a cautious 10 steps down and a leap over the alleyway to the next house. She felt totally alert, her senses enhanced by the danger of the moment.
She’d always know that this might happen but still it had come as a shock. She was grateful she’d had the foresight to figure out the escape routes. She only had to hope the Agents would underestimate her.
Had she been right to trust the flash of intuition giving the crystal to Paul?
However they’d traced her she didn’t know but could only presume they’d upgraded their technology. Until she’d figured it out the crystal was best in the possession of someone who didn’t know, someone like Paul.
Now was not the moment to think, she reminded herself but to breath and move as she’d been taught. She listened keenly for any sounds of pursuit but all she heard was the steady hum of traffic on the main road and unhurried footsteps on the pavement below.
She knew that if she could just make it to the end of the terrace and down onto the street below then she could soon lose herself in the busy evening crowds of the main road.
There her thoughts would not be so easily traced.
She saw the wrought iron fire escape, winding down from the last house to its scrap of a back garden. In a few steps she was standing on the edge of the roof. She turned and dropped, dangling for a moment by her fingertips from the cast iron guttering, before landing, in a cat like crouch, lightly on the top platform.
She took the steps four at a time, vaulting round the corners on the banister rail, descending as fast as she could towards the gloom of the gardens below. All the while her eyes scanned the darkness, searching the shadows for movement.
Nothing.
She’d have to find a way to get word to her parents and the rest of the Society. Above all the other nine should not converge in Paris as planned. But all that could wait. She cut her thought. Now was the time to breathe, run and stay focused.
She saw the alleyway at the end of the garden leading to an adjacent street. Elodie tore across the darkness toward it, vaulting neatly over the wooden fence.
Once covered from view she gave herself a few seconds to calm her pulse before creeping cautiously to the end of the alley and checking left and right.
Only the lights of televisions flickered behind closed curtains and the streetlights hummed quietly onto the rows of parked cars. She saw the silhouette of a cat ahead, silently slinking across the street.
Go Elodie, she urged herself and sprinted toward the main road.
If she could just get there and lose herself in the crowds ...
Her feet pounded the pavement as she pushed herself forward. Every second counted.
Only 30 meters, 20 meters, 10 meters and still there was no sound of pursuit. With a last push she threw herself round the corner onto the main road.
A bus rumbled past in the stream of traffic and groups of people filled the pavements on their way out for the evening. Elodie slowed her pace to blend in, finally allowing herself the space to process the thoughts that had been piling up in her mind.
What had happened?
How had they found her?
It could not have been through her thoughts. She was always impeccably careful.
It couldn’t be a coincidence that all three dimension jumpers were raided at the same time?
A sentence said to her by her teacher many years ago tumbled to the forefront of her mind.
“Your energy field will shine like a beacon ...”
Of course! That had to be it!
They had gone beyond thought tracking. They must be reading our energy fields, isolating us by the one thing that sets us all apart. Elodie squeezed her way through the crowd waiting at the bus stop, thinking hard.
What could she do?
Somehow she must disguise herself, cloak her energy field.
An idea came to her. She doubled back, passing the steel shutters of a closed news-agent and a busy brightly lit off-license and headed through the doors of a late-night chemist. Two could play at this game, she wasn’t out of the running yet.
Minutes later she came out of the shop, clutching a small, brown bottle. She twisted the plastic lid off and tilted it back to her lips, letting the sickly, sweet liquid slide down her throat and grimaced, knowing that her clean lifestyle would give her a minimum of tolerance to the codeine solution.
Casting another quick look around and tucking her head down she set off, mentally replaying the scene in her flat.
Mon Dieu! What have I done? she thought.
A wave of nausea rose from her stomach. She forced herself to breathe deep. There was no use in worrying, what was done was done. She knew that in her heart it had felt right and wasn’t that what she’d always been taught, to trust her heart?
Now, it seemed, was the moment when all the teachings would be put to the test.
But above all, she needed to get back to mainland Europe as quickly and efficiently as possible.
She downed the last of the bottle and tossed it into a bin as the edges of her mind started to fog over.
Paul: December 16th.