Revik closed his eyes, longer than a blink, leaning his face against the other seer’s.
“Are you going to tell me what you’re talking about?” Revik said. Nudging him with his chin, he sharpened his voice. “…With Balidor?”
Dalejem laughed, pushing at his chest.
“You already know what I’m talking about,” he said, clicking at him. “Balidor wants to recruit you to the Adhipan. If we actually spent this time out here doing what we’re supposed to be doing, it might convince him to do it sooner rather than later.”
Revik frowned, staring into the seer’s light green eyes.
“Bullshit,” he said, blunt.
Dalejem laughed again, clicking at him.
“Gods, you look young sometimes,” he said, his voice affectionate. “You seriously did not know this? What do you think we’re doing out here? We could fuck in the tent and be more comfortable, you know. And for them, there would be the added bonus that they could watch… hardly an unwelcome pastime for most seers.”
Revik’s frown deepened, even as he sat back on his heels.
Resting his palms on his thighs, he looked at the other in confusion.
“Why would Balidor want me in the Adhipan?” he said finally.
Dalejem burst out in another laugh.
“You are joking, right?” he said.
Revik shook his head, once. “No, brother. I am not.”
Sitting up, Dalejem stared at him, his green eyes holding a more prominent veneer of incredulity. “Gods. You’re not joking, are you? You really are serious.”
Revik felt his puzzlement turn to irritation.
“Are you just going to keep saying that?” he said, annoyed. “Or are you going to tell me what the hell you’re talking about? I’m not joking. I’m clearly not joking. And I have perfectly valid reasons for asking.”
Revik let his irritation become even more audible.
“…Is this something to do with Kali?” he said. “Because my actual sight rank is shit since I left the Rooks. I don’t even remember most of what I knew there, anyway. And what I did know I’ll have to entirely relearn, according to Vash, given how I did those things before, and how dependent I was on the Rooks’ construct to do pretty much anything with my light.”
Thinking about this, turning it over in his mind, his frown turned to a scowl.
“Why in the gods would Balidor want me anywhere near the Adhipan, given all that?” he said, frowning down at the dirt.
Still thinking aloud, he added,
“Does he think I would possibly give him intel? On the Pyramid? Because I would do that, anyway, brother. He does not need to recruit me for that. I would tell him or show him anything I could.”
He frowned, still thinking.
“Truthfully,” he admitted. “I’d be shocked if that wasn’t all gone. There is no way Galaith would allow me to leave the network with that information intact. He would guard that information first… before all else. Before more transitory intel, for certain.”
When he glanced up, he flinched.
Dalejem was staring at him in open disbelief.
He was gaping at him, really.
“What?” Revik said. “What did I say now?”
Dalejem shut his mouth with a snap.
The incredulity never left his eyes, or his expression. It reflected strongly in his voice when he spoke.
“Do you have any idea what your potential sight rank is, brother? Any at all?”
Revik frowned.
Thinking about this, he shook his head, once.
“No,” he said. “How could I? I haven’t been tested since––”
“Fuck testing,” Dalejem said, frowning. “Who said anything about testing? Do you know what it is?”
“No,” Revik said, frowning back at him. “How could I?”
Dalejem just stared.
Then he sat up, abruptly, a string of curse words in Mandarin bursting from his lips.
He still sounded and felt mostly incredulous, borderline shocked.
“Gods, Revik! You are serious.” Still staring at him, Dalejem leaned closer. “Why in the seven realms do you think Galaith had you so high in the structure of the Pyramid at your age? You’re a fucking savant, brother. You’ve got more above your head than any seer most of us have ever seen, apart from maybe Balidor… or your blood-aunt, Tarsi.”
Revik blinked.
Then he frowned, wondering if Dalejem was pulling his leg.
Dalejem burst out in another incredulous laugh. At Revik’s irritated look, the green-eyed seer held up his hands in a peace gesture.
“Okay, brother,” he said. “Okay. Fine. Then tell me. Explain this to me. Why do you think Galaith had you down as his successor, out of all of the hundreds of thousands of seers at his disposal in that Rook network?”
Frowning, Revik clicked under his breath.
“It’s different in the Pyramid, Dalejem,” he said, shaking his head. “I thought everyone in the Adhipan knew all this. Abilities don’t mean the same thing when you’re a Rook. Sight rank didn’t mean the same thing. We borrowed the abilities of other seers… a lot of other seers. There’s a whole library of skills inside the Org network. Any one of us could access these things. What we could do had very little relationship to anything we were born with––”
But Dalejem was shaking his head, clicking louder.
“It’s not that simple, and you know it, brother,” Dalejem warned.
“It is that simple.”
“No,” Dalejem said, sharper. “It is not.”
At Revik’s silence, Dalejem exhaled, once more shaking his head.
“Gaos,” he said. “How can you be so fucking intelligent and so completely dense at the same time? It is a puzzle, brother. Truly.”
Revik felt his fingers clench on his thighs.
“Fuck you,” he said coldly.
Dalejem let out a humorless laugh.
“Gods. You’re turning me on like you wouldn’t believe right now, brother, so don’t tempt me…”
Seeing Revik’s jaw harden, Dalejem caught hold of his arms, pulling him closer, so that Revik half-leaned on his chest.
“I am not making fun of you, damn it,” Dalejem said, that denser affection in his voice. “I’m dead serious. How did you not know that Balidor wanted you to become one of us? Everyone in the camp knows. They have known since you first arrived here. Bringing you here has been one big recruitment exercise, in large part. One you have passed with flying colors, by the way… apart from the amount of slacking we had done these past few weeks.”
Revik shook his head, even as a pain sharpened in his chest.
The pain worsened as he thought through the other’s words.
For a few seconds, he let himself get lost there.
He let Dalejem’s words become real in his head.
He thought about living in the Pamir with Dalejem, rather than in the cold, empty caves of the monastery by himself. He thought about what it would be like to go on ops with him, to share a bunk with him, to be able to train with him and the others like he had been.
Pain slid hotly over his light.
Revik felt a slow, dense tug of the same coming off the seer holding him, pooling like molten liquid in his chest.
“You’d like that?” Dalejem said, softer.
Revik rolled his eyes, clicking.
Still, he felt his face warm when he nodded.
Glancing up, he gave Dalejem a harder look.
“Would you?” he said, sharp.
Dalejem rolled his eyes, a smile teasing the edges of his mouth.
“What do you think, brother?” he said, grunting. “I’m about to forget all of my resolutions again today, and undress you once I’m done reassuring you… which should give you some indication of how much I like that idea.”
Smiling at Revik’s averted eyes, Dalejem shook him a little.
“And for that matter, why do you think Balidor assigned me to do this job,
rather than another of his seers? Do you think that was purely generosity of spirit on his part?”
Pausing, the green-eyed seer answered his own rhetorical question, puffing out his cheeks before he spoke.
“He thought I had sufficient motivation to try and make you work at this, brother,” he said, as though the answer were obvious. “He thought I might have my own reasons to want to see you pass the trials sooner rather than later.”
Revik nodded, then glared at him, feeling that heat return to his chest.
“You would not lie to me about this, Dalejem? Because that would be… unkind.”
Dalejem’s eyes turned incredulous.
“No. Gaos. What possible motive would I have to toy with you like this? You think I don’t want you to come with me? I’m in love with you, brother. I’ve all but told you that.”
Revik’s anger deflated, all at once.
Staring into those green eyes, he felt the pain in his chest worsen.
“You love me?” Revik said.
Dalejem laughed. “You look surprised.”
“I am surprised,” Revik admitted.
He hesitated, thinking about the other’s words, about what he felt himself, trying to decide if he should say something in return.
Before Revik could make up his mind, Dalejem shook him lightly by the arms.
“No,” the other seer said, clicking softly. “Think about it later, Revik. Tell me what you feel later. Don’t tell me anything now.”
Revik hesitated, then nodded to that, too.
Looking up, he studied the seer’s eyes, focusing on the violet rings around the lighter green of his irises. Pain shivered back through him, stronger that time, enough that his vision blurred.
“Can I give you head?” he asked.
Pausing on the pain that slid off Dalejem’s light at his question, Revik added,
“We can work on infiltration after that. Or shielding. Or whatever you want. I’ll work harder at it this time. I vow it.”
Dalejem burst out in a laugh.
“Is this a bribe?”
Revik smiled, sliding his hand up the other’s thigh, massaging it slowly with his palm. “You have given me an incentive,” he said, inclining his head.
Dalejem slid his fingers into his hair again, gripping him tighter.
“Fine,” he said. “Promise me you really will try, though, brother. You should be able to do these things in your sleep, Revik… I mean it. So promise me you will really try to work at this today, at least for some part of today.”
Revik nodded, acknowledging his words with a gesture.
Then, quirking an eyebrow, he said, “You mean on the infiltration, right?”
Dalejem laughed aloud at that, shaking his head.
He let out a low gasp a moment later though, as Revik began unfastening his pants.
“I do love you, brother,” Dalejem said, his voice a murmur. “Those aren’t just words.”
Revik hesitated. Feeling embarrassed somehow, he smiled, letting his voice turn teasing. “Is this a sex-love, brother?” he said, returning his eyes to Dalejem’s belt.
“You mean a crush?” Dalejem said, his eyes faintly predatory. “A fixation?”
Looking up, Revik shrugged, answering only with his eyes.
Dalejem laughed again.
Revik could feel the other seer liking the expressiveness of his face and eyes, even his silences when they contained more than one meaning, and the way Revik had a tendency to talk with his hands. Dalejem liked those things about him enough that another ribbon of pain coursed through the green-eyed seer’s light as he thought about them.
The intensity of Dalejem’s pain tightened Revik’s chest.
He found himself caressing Dalejem’s jaw, wanting him again, letting the other seer feel his want.
“I may have those things, too,” Dalejem admitted. “The sex-crush. The fixation. But no. It’s not only that, brother.”
“How can you be sure?” Revik said.
Hearing his own voice, he realized the question was real.
Dalejem caressed Revik’s arm with light fingers, then his face, fingering the last remnants of the bruise he’d given him when he’d punched him in the face, over a week ago now. He frowned faintly, as he touched the bruise gingerly, and Revik clicked at him, shaking his head.
“Don’t apologize again. I mean it.”
“It is inexcusable. A seer child’s answer to jealousy, to possessive rage––”
“Not again,” Revik warned. “I mean it. Let it go.” Muttering under his breath, he added, “I probably would have done the same to you. Probably worse.” Nudging him with his hand, he added, “Answer the question. Stop distracting me.”
Dalejem smiled, clicking the roof of his mouth softly with his tongue, even as he began massaging Revik’s chest with strong fingers.
“I can tell the difference, brother,” he said, his voice a murmur again. “If you are going to tease me for my age, at least give me credit for it now and then too. Fixation and crushes are for now, for today, for tomorrow… for whenever my cock gets hard around you, which, admittedly, is most of the time right now. The other, is, well…”
He made a vague gesture with one hand, frowning slightly.
“The other is always,” Revik finished, pulling it off the seer’s light.
He knew the quote.
He remembered it from the caves.
There was a silence after he said it.
In it, Revik felt his face warm.
He looked away from Dalejem’s face when that silence stretched, gazing out over the view of the valley above their small corner of the jungle. Refocusing his eyes on the distant curve of sky, he saw a black, red and yellow bird flying between canopies across the field, what might be a toucan from the brightness of the plumage.
Revik was still looking out over that expanse, at the muggy, yellow-tinted sky, when he jumped a little, feeling the other’s hands on him.
Dalejem didn’t smile that time when Revik turned.
He only looked at him, his green eyes serious.
“Exactly that, brother,” he said, caressing his face. “Exactly what you said.”
Revik felt the pain in his light worsen, right before he lowered his mouth.
Twenty-Four
Change Is Coming
They got back to the camp late.
Well… later than they had planned.
The sun had just sunk below the highest of the distant mountains, coloring the muggy air a pale pink and blue, streaked with pieces of orange and red.
Before Revik wandered off to find them food, he watched Dalejem head for their tent to drop off the pack he’d brought with them up the hill.
They’d spent the rest of the afternoon working on sight skills.
Well… mostly.
Dalejem started him on blocking at first.
He moved Revik into identifying resonances shortly after, then began testing his actual working skills. Dalejem started the second half of their work by instructing Revik to demonstrate his ability to locate a number of different people and places, throwing him a lot of secondary and tertiary links and then greater to see if he could follow the trails.
Revik found himself losing himself inside the complexities of different Barrier frequencies and lights, remembering spaces and structures behind those waves that he’d almost forgotten in his five years in those caves.
At the very end of the session, Dalejem tested him on a time jump, using one of his own past ops as Revik’s target.
By then, Revik found he was actually enjoying himself.
Well, he was enjoying himself… until he saw too much of the evening after the operation itself, and a fleeting imprint of Dalejem spending the night with Yumi, which caused another argument between them.
Revik finally shut up about it when Dalejem pushed back, pointedly asking Revik questions about Mara, then about his time under the Rooks, and finally about his fixation on Kali, and how Revik acted
towards her in Saigon.
Somehow that argument ended in them fucking, too, although Revik couldn’t remember who started things that time, either. He only knew that halfway through it, he’d almost forgotten why he’d been angry in the first place, and by the end he didn’t care at all.
Then, when they were on their way back down the hill, they ran into Yumi, Dalai and Ontari on their way back to camp, and Revik found himself remembering why he’d been angry and got jealous and annoyed all over again.
They’d more or less sorted that out by the time they re-entered the main construct.
Anyway, as Dalejem reminded him, more than once on the walk back, it was normal for seers to get angry with one another while setting boundaries around a new agreement. They would both be touchy for a while, he said.
Revik didn’t bother to tell him he hadn’t been in any kind of “agreement” like this with another seer before, so he wouldn’t really know.
Anyway, at base, he knew Dalejem was right, of course.
Just anecdotally, he knew that, given that seers had been telling him such things more or less his entire life. He’d also observed it from the outside, just from watching new couples among his own kind where the light-connection was strong.
None of that helped overly, of course, in terms of how he actually felt.
He still had to bite his tongue when Yumi winked openly at Dalejem on that trail, right before she smirked down at where the two of them held hands.
“Have a good afternoon together, brothers?” she had asked with a smile. “You both look… disheveled,” she had added, her smirk growing more apparent.
“Please just let it go, brother,” Dalejem said, when Revik saw him next. “I did not keep anything from you. I told you I had not been with anyone in an exclusive way in years. Anyway, it was nothing. A bad night with too much pain.”
Standing there, Revik only nodded, biting his tongue.
He’d brought two mugs of chikre over from the mess tent, a kind of meal-like soup in lieu of dinner. Carrying them to where Dalejem sat on a log around the fire, saving the two of them a spot to sit, Revik stretched out his hand, offering one of the mugs to the other seer. Smiling up at him, Dalejem caressed Revik’s thigh through his pants, accepting the offering with a pulse of warmth.
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