Artifact

296 Pages·2016·0.92 MB·English

by  Berliner Janet

Books by Kevin J. Anderson
Dune: The Butlerian Jihad (with Brian Herbert)
Ignition (with Doug Beason)
Books by F. Paul Wilson
The Haunted Air
Conspiracies
Legacies
The Tomb
Deep as the Marrow
Implant
Available from Tom Doherty Associates
www.ebookyes.com
Contents
Acknowledgments
Prologue
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
Epilogue
About the Authors
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank Robert L. Fleck, without whose hard work and dedication this book never could
have been completed. Also Laurie Harper, an excellent agent and friend. And finally Jim Frenkel and the
staff at Forge Books for making the editorial process smooth and enjoyable.
Additionally, thanks are due to our Grenadian friends Moses Findley, George Grant, and Winston, as
well as Rebecca Moesta and Catherine Sidor.
Prologue
GRENADA, DECEMBER31, 1982
Show time!
Peta Whyte struck a Bob Fosse dance pose in front of the brooding edifice
that was Richmond Hill Prison. Despite the tension of the moment, she smiled at
the strange juxtaposition. The two-hundred-yearold fortress, with its view of
Grenada’s harbor and the crystal blue Caribbean, was a perfect symbol of the
harsh reality that now controlled her island, an island that had long been
considered the jewel of the West Indies.
The U-shaped harbor and surroundings looked like a miniature Monte Carlo.
A rainbow of brightly colored tin-and-wooden houses, small hotels, and
provision stores which stocked little more than the necessities of life—rum, rice,
cigarettes, and beer—meandered from the top of several hills down to the
business and restaurant district which fringed the water. Fort George, like Monte
Carlo’s famed Castle-Fort, crested the top of the right-hand hill. Below it, hidden
from view on the far side of the hill, lay the central marketplace. Looming over
that, at the top of Church Street, stood a cathedral whose bells pealed
melodically and often. At the top of the opposite hill, replacing Monte Carlo’s
casinos, was a gun emplacement which surrounded and essentially hid the
island’s only radio station from view.
From where she was standing, Peta could hear her Rasta friend Jimmy and
his buddies playing soca on the steel drums that lined the fringes of Tanteen
Park, which lay directly below her. In her mind’s eye she could see the familiar
scene at the bottom of the hill. Across the street from Jimmy, in front of the