Crap, I thought towards Jon. Yeah. I'd better go find him. Either that or he might kill Ditrini before Balidor gets a chance to question him again...
Was it that bad? Jon sent.
When I glanced at him, my jaw hardening, Jon quickly shook his head.
...Never mind. Sorry I asked.
It's all right, I sent back, waving off his words. But I really should go.
Jon gave me a mock salute, sending a pulse of reassurance that I felt in my heart. Again, it was strong enough to startle me, and warm enough that it brought a surprised smile to my lips. Unfolding my arms, I saluted him back, sending him a pulse in return.
Thanks, I sent in the pause after. And congratulations. Really. Just don't kill each other, okay? I added. We need you both, you know. Him, too.
Gotcha, he sent, mock serious. Don't kill husband. I'll try to remember.
Maybe write it down? I suggested. Or have Wreg give you a tattoo?
Ugh. Don't get him started, please... Jon said, rolling his eyes with a genuine frown. Seriously. Don't mention me and tattoos to Wreg in the same sentence...ever.
I laughed aloud at that, unable to help myself.
But I was already edging back through the crowd, too, aiming towards the rounded end of the horseshoe-shaped fish tank and the front door of the restaurant. Most of those clustered around the bar had already forgotten me anyway, partly because I wasn't drinking I suspected, so not in the same space as the rest of them...and partly because most could probably tell I'd been talking to someone in the Barrier, even if they hadn’t figured out who. They'd been watching Jon, too, I noticed, because as soon as he and I stopped talking, Neela smacked him on the shoulder, and offered him a shot of something. One of those two things had Wreg scowling again, but Jon leaned back, nearly sitting in Wreg's lap as he downed the offered shot.
I barely saw this though, because I'd already slid back into the Barrier. That time, I didn't bother getting defensive, and my message was brief.
I'm on my way down, I told him.
Allie, he sent angrily. No ––
But that time, it was me who pushed him out, shutting the door on his light even as I headed for the closest bank of elevators that would take me back down to the basement.
14
CONFESSIONS
HE MET ME at the elevator.
I felt a hard pulse of his light as soon as the doors began to open. Being that close to him, it wasn't just anger I felt, not that time. His hurt hit me that time, too, along with a pain that lived somewhere below that, intense enough that I watched him cautiously as I left the elevator car to face him.
His voice, however, was completely devoid of emotion when he spoke.
"I asked you not to come," he said. "I asked you, Allie."
I frowned, still watching him as I stayed where I was, not moving any closer. It took me a few seconds to pinpoint my exact reaction, even though I could still feel the emotion coming off his light. I realized though, a few beats later, a further reason for my caution.
His eyes were glowing. Pale rings of brilliant green, they shone lighter than the color of new leaves.
"Revik." I softened my voice, making it lower than I had before, in the room. I sent him a reassuring pulse, and felt him wince when it came in contact with his light. "Revik," I said again. "Please. Calm down, okay? I know you're angry...but I had a good reason for wanting to talk to Ditrini..."
"I know," he said, his voice close to a growl again. "You think the Lao Hu put some kind of block on your light. You think he did it..."
I stared at him in surprise. "Well, if you know, then––"
"Alyson," he snapped. "I know because I watched the damned recordings...and because I felt you thinking there might be something wrong with your light in the room." His face hardened more when I touched his light again. "Fucking stop it! I'm not an animal...stop trying to 'manage' me, goddamn it. I have every right to be angry!"
I withdrew my light, but continued to look at him cautiously, both from the Barrier and with my eyes. Him, I could see clearly. Probably because of the bond.
"Revik, you're not yourself right now..."
"Don't start, Allie. Don't fucking start. If I'm not myself, then maybe––"
"Revik!" I said, feeling my jaw harden. "I'm not 'managing' you...you're freaking me out. You've been acting strange all day..." Trailing at the anger that rose to his expression, I cut him off before he could speak. "Look. I know you're pissed I didn't tell you beforehand. I'm not minimizing that. I get it, okay?"
"Bullshit!" he snarled, even as his eyes glowed brighter, causing me to step back. "Bullshit, Allie! If you 'got it' you wouldn't have fucking done it. Do you understand me?"
I continued to watch him warily, now wondering if I needed to call Wreg.
But Wreg wasn't exactly Mr. Rational these days, either. For all I knew, he'd side with Revik on this one.
I found myself fighting to keep my light open in any case, to not withdraw from him, knowing that would only make this worse, whatever 'this' was exactly. I tried to focus on the pain I felt on him, not the anger, the hurt underlying that pain instead of the part of him that felt like it wanted to fight me...physically, that is. Even so, I could feel that a part of me was getting ready to fight him if I had to, too, even as my mind whirled around what I could feel off him, and whatever was going on with his light.
Could this really be all about Ditrini?
Then, it hit me. I knew what this reminded me of.
"He has someone here," I blurted. "Someone in the hotel. High enough in the construct that he can manipulate it..."
"What?" Revik stared at me, his voice hostile as his eyes sparked. "What are you talking about, Alyson? Are you saying the Lao Hu has someone here?"
"No...Revik." I shook my head, fighting impatience that time. "Shadow. He's messing with your light again. He's found some way to gain control of our construct, probably through––"
"No, Allie."
"Yes, Revik...he has. I know you think this is you, but it's not. I swear it's not..."
"No, Allie." His voice was harder that time, but when he shook his head, I saw some of that fire in his eyes dim. "No...that's not it."
I stared at him, affected more by his tone than by his words. I could hear him in it again. I recognized Revik, not that person under the influence of the Dreng. Even so, I found myself looking at his eyes warily, swallowing.
"How can you be sure?" I said finally.
"I'm sure, all right?"
"Then what is this? What's wrong with you?" Hesitating, I spoke again, before he could answer. "...Is this somehow connected to what's going on with me?"
He shook his head, but it didn't feel precisely like a 'no' that time.
"Are you sure, baby? Even earlier, in the room, something was going on with you. You even said––"
"I'm fine, Alyson. It's not Shadow, okay?"
At my worried look, he clicked shortly, putting his hands on his hips. I watched him stare hard at the floor, as if indecisive.
"What?" I said. "What aren't you telling me?"
He gave a short laugh, glaring at me.
"Nice diversion, wife. Really fucking nice..."
"I'm not diverting you," I said, frustrated. "And I'm not ignoring the thing with Ditrini! I know I was in the wrong there...but it was a snap decision. I didn't do it that way out of some intention to deceive you...I did it because I was in a hurry. I wanted to know what was wrong with me, and I knew you and Balidor would put me through a million protocols and probably make me wait through days of you interrogating him before you let me near him..." At the anger building in his expression, I cut him off. "I knew what you'd say, okay? I knew...and I understood all of the arguments, and I didn't want to wait..."
He let out a humorless sound, right before he gave me a hard stare.
"Look," I said. "I know it was a jerk maneuver...I know it, okay? But it's made me realize a few things about how things run around here..."
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"How things run around here?"
"Yeah," I said, feeling my own anger sharpen. "I had to threaten them to get Tenzi and Garend to listen to me, too...and pull rank. I'm pretty tired of it. Either I have a position of authority here, or I don't. If I don't, then you need to tell me that...now. Because I don't see anyone around here questioning you..."
There was a silence while he stared at me, his eyes now holding something like disbelief. When he finally spoke, his voice mirrored the same emotion.
"Wife, Balidor kicked me out of meetings for months...not just interrogations of high risk prisoners, actual planning meetings. With our people..."
"That was an unusual circumstance."
"And so is this!"
"We had Vash then," I snapped. "I trusted Vash, okay? I trusted him to keep his personal feelings out of important decisions, at least in terms of his recommendations to me. He let me do risky things if he thought they'd get a result. Hell, he encouraged it at times. He wasn't constantly telling me to second-guess my own instincts..." Seeing Revik's incredulous look, I added, "I trust Balidor too, but in a different way. Frankly, he moves too slow for what's going on right now. You know it. You've agreed with me on this. So he can't be in charge of this kind of thing...not in an emergency..."
"But what on Earth does that have to do with––"
"Because when it comes to me, you're too slow, too," I said, my voice sharp. Seeing the startled look coming to his face, along with what looked like a deeper emotion, I added in a subdued voice, "Look. We can talk about this later, but you wanted to know why I did it and that's why. That's the honest truth. I wasn't willing to wait through what to me seems excessive caution...not from you or 'Dori or anyone else...” Hesitating, I added,
“...I also knew I had the advantage with Ditrini in that he doesn't view me as a threat, either...more like some kind of kid wearing a tiara. For the same reason, I thought he might actually tell me something, intentionally or not, because he wouldn't have his guard up in the same way he would with you and 'Dori. That was my hope, anyway." Seeing Revik's expression closing once more, I added,
"When I realized the issues with my light might have started as far back as China, I felt like I couldn't wait any longer, whether you or Balidor approved or not..."
Hesitating again, I watched his face warily.
"Are you sure you're okay?" I said. "You feel like yourself?"
"I didn't say that, Alyson. I didn't say either of those things," Revik said, looking at me, his eyes hard, but only faintly brighter than usual. "I never said I was okay. I just said I didn't think Shadow is manipulating me through the construct..."
"Then what's wrong with you?" I said, feeling my frustration rise. "What aren't you telling me? You know something..."
"...I don't know anything," he cut in, giving me another warning look. "I asked Balidor and Wreg to take a look at my light again on the plane, which they did, while you were asleep. I told them I was having problems with it, and asked if either of them thought it was from what Shadow did to me in his construct. Neither one of them think this particular problem is from Shadow. They thinks it's something else."
"What?" I said, keeping my voice even with an effort. "What do they think it is?"
Revik shook his head, but again, not in a 'no.' Instead of answering, he clicked at me angrily.
"You're really not going to tell me? Even now?" I said, biting my lip. When his expression only grew angrier, I felt my jaw harden, too. "Do you need to yell at me before you can tell me if you're all right? Because if you do, I wish you'd just do it and stop beating around the bush..."
He glanced at me, raising an eyebrow before he let out a snort, almost involuntarily that time. The anger remained in his light and his eyes, and that tighter expression still colored his face, but I felt something in him give, too.
After another few seconds where he seemed to be struggling against his own emotions, he walked backwards. Not away from me exactly, but further from the elevators, closer to an un-renovated segment of the basement that housed part of an old wine cellar. I knew the main wine cellars could only be reached by a different set of service elevators, the ones closer to the lobby-level kitchen of Park Place South. That part of the basement housed mostly food stores anyway, not weapons or prisoner interrogation cells, and it was a maze all of its own, since they'd had a massive overstock of food long before we'd gotten here.
Seers had a tendency to think in terms of contingency planning anyway, even when there wasn't a Displacement going on. Most of the older seers remembered those initial purges and the years of starvation that followed as they found themselves dependent on human food supplies for the first time, as well as a human economy from which they were initially excluded.
Since we’d taken over large chunks of the massive underground tunnels under the hotel for our own purposes, the hotel owners had built out several of these levels even more. That was another thing I'd learned about seers. They tended to utilize underground spaces...a lot...maybe from so many lifetimes lived in the massive caves of the Pamir.
All of this swirled around somewhere in the back of my mind as I followed Revik deeper into the older, faded-yellow-painted corridor of the original hotel's basement. I watched as he walked into a small tasting room across from the original wine cellar. After a slight hesitation, I followed, but only after he looked back, motioning a semi-polite request with one hand.
Once he'd closed the door behind us, leaving us both in the small, featureless room with the white walls and a solitary chair near a plain, wooden table, I found myself studying his face again, trying to decide what his expression meant.
He was still making me nervous, I admit.
I wasn't even sure why exactly, if it was that his eyes still glowed with light, or how tired he looked after our too-short nap, or the heaviness I still felt around his aleimi. It occurred to me that he felt stressed out. Really stressed out, and not just about Ditrini.
Mixed with all that were those erratic currents in his aleimi, the ones that made him move as if he were gearing for a fight.
I glanced around at what looked like plaques on the wall, along with a few pictures of famous people who'd been brought down to the cellars to taste this or that bottle, likely before it had been served to a larger number of guests upstairs. I saw images of movie stars from the early part of the last century standing with human maitre d's and what might have been the previous owners in tuxedos and expensive suits. Thinking about the green organic machines in the next room, I couldn't help feeling strangely old and young at the same time.
It was strange to think of Revik in that light; he'd probably been in his forties or fifties when most of those pictures had been taken. Older than I was now.
When Revik turned towards me again, I saw his eyes appraise mine.
His continued to glow, but they now held a denser, more focused emotion, one I also couldn't effectively read, not even through the bond. As I thought it, it occurred to me again that I had likely been compensating for whatever was wrong with my light by leaning on his. Something, incidentally, that had gotten increasingly more difficult to do since he'd been injured in Argentina, much less now, when he was actively shutting me out.
He must have heard me think that, at least part of it, because I saw his eyes change, right before he relaxed back out of that near-fighting stance.
Stepping away from me, he folded his arms, leaning on the wooden table.
"So what do you think now?" he asked me. His voice was deep, almost gruff, but I still jumped a little when he broke the silence. "...Now that you've talked to him, what do you think? Do you still think they did something to you?"
Sighing a little myself, I fingered my hair out of my face.
Thinking about his question, I nodded.
"Yeah," I said. "I do. I have no idea what, but yeah...I don't know how else to explain what's wrong with me, unless it's something Shadow did." Seeing Revik frown, I added, "I left a note wi
th Balidor to that effect. I also advised him that he shouldn't bother trying soft approaches with Ditrini...especially given what's going on in China."
Hesitating at Revik's continued utter lack of expression, I shrugged with one hand.
"...I recommended that they start him on wires. Immediately, that is. I don't think drugs will be enough," I said then. Seeing Revik's frown deepen, I cleared my throat. "Do you have a problem with that?"
His eyes narrowed on my face. Right before they flickered away.
"Do I have a problem with my wife recommending torture?" he said drily. He shrugged with one hand, his face unchanging. "I don't know. What do you think?"
I felt my own face redden, but only tightened my jaw. "You think it's the wrong move?"
"I think you're looking for revenge. Not answers."
Feeling my jaw harden more, I nodded.
Then I folded my arms, too, forcing myself to shrug. "Well, I'm open to other suggestions. I also considered calling Voi Pai to see if we could discuss some kind of information trade," I added, keeping my voice neutral. "...It's pretty clear Shadow betrayed her, too...possibly using Ditrini to do it. I thought she might own up to what she did to me, if I made it worth her while. From what Tenzi and the others tell me, they're pretty desperate over there..." Again I paused, watching his face. "Do you think it’s worth even discussing a trade with the Lao Hu? Or should we just put a bullet in Ditrini’s brain and be done with it?"
Revik's jaw hardened. When I didn't go on, he took his weight off the table, his eyes still fixed on my face.
"I saw the note," he said, his eyes back on the white walls. "I know all of this, Alyson." His mouth hardened once more. "Of course, you might not have known that. I had to threaten them to even get them to let me look at it..."
Allie's War Season Three Page 111