Alisiyad

by Sarah R. Suleski

  “Understand? Approve?”

  He nodded.

  She snorted, and turned to rinse out his shirt. “He’s lucky you killed him before I had a chance,” she said, and snapped the shirt in the air like an exclamation point.

  He smiled, looking considerably more relaxed. “I was worried you might think I’d gone a little crazy.”

  “We’ve both gone a little crazy.” She returned his smile, holding his shirt out to him. “Crazy 1 and Crazy 2. Here, you might want to let it dry out before you put it back on.”

  “Thanks.”

  “It’s the least I can do.” She stretched up and put a hand on his shoulder, pulling him down so she could kiss him. “My poor Russ,” she whispered softly, drawing away. “I’m so sorry they hurt you.” Inwardly she added, I should have been there when you needed me, when you were all alone and they were trying to kill you. I should have been there but I wasn’t, because I can’t get through the Gates on my own, I had to rely on Leeton. And quieter still, a voice whispered to her, What will you do if someday a Gate stands between you and him and you have no other Key to help you through?

  Russ put a hand on either side of her face and returned her kiss, and she allowed the alarming thought to melt away in the warmth. There was nothing between them at the moment, no matter what the future might bring.

  “So,” she said, “what happened after that?”

  And so he went on, telling her how the Ricallyn had tried to use the little girl, Fortya, to summon their leader, Ricalli, and how he had stopped them. And then, how Ricalli had come anyway and what he and the others had done to Alisiya.

  Liseli did not betray just how much grim satisfaction the matter of Alisiya’s death gave her. If anything, she felt the punishment wasn’t enough. No revenge was enough to make up for what Alisiya Leeton had done. Unbidden, the sad eyes of her would-be child appeared in Liseli’s mind, and she closed her own as if it would help keep the vision away. It didn’t. She could see the girl as clearly as if she had been a flesh and blood child standing before her, saying, You did not save me.

  She knew Russ felt guilty that he hadn’t saved Alisiya, it was so like him to feel sorry for her even after she had tried to kill him multiple times. Liseli just patted his arm and said, “It’s not your fault. She brought it all on herself.”

  He just nodded, and slipped the damp shirt over his head.

  Having washed up as best they could at the basin, they turned their attention toward the pantry. Liseli had nearly forgotten their reason for coming to the kitchen in the first place, caught up with Russ’s injuries and his story of what had all happened to him. But he hadn’t forgotten, and was still determined to see her rest and eat something.

  A cellar door was open inside the pantry, with steps leading down into the cool dark. Russ trotted down the steps into the blackness as if it wasn’t even dim, but Liseli didn’t much relish the idea of finding some hapless Ricallyn who had tried to hide down there, and she turned her attention to the food stuffs on the pantry shelves. Russ came back up shortly, carrying a side of ham. He smiled at her and proclaimed, “There’s enough food down there to feed an army. I don’t know what it is . . . they don’t have refrigerators and freezers just like we do, but they’ve definitely got some kind of technology to control the temperature. You should see it,” there was admiration in his voice as he set the ham down on a table with a thump. “There’s more than one room down there, and one of ‘em all packed full with frozen meat, just like a butchers’ shop. And there’s just about every kind of fruit and vegetable.”

  Liseli followed him out of the pantry, nibbling dutifully on a roll of bread. She smiled wryly, thinking that Russ had never been that excited about food storage back at the Burger House.

  “So, is there anything in particular you want?” he asked, inspecting an array of knives sheathed in a knife block like a regular chef. “There’s ingredients for just about anything.” He drew a large knife out and nodded at it in satisfaction, then turned on the ham.

  She watched him inexpertly carve slices off the block of meat, and said, “We need to get back to work soon, so let’s just eat stuff that’s already prepared or ready to eat. We don’t have time to put together a regular meal.” She glanced at the dog, who was so silent and still in its watchfulness that it was easy to forget it was there. “I’ll bet he’d like some ham,” she said.

  “You give it to him.”

  “Aw, Russ. You should try making friends with the dogs. Who knows how long we’re going to be holed up in here with them.”

  “I’m not real big on the idea of losing my hand,” Russ shook his head. The dog seemingly understood what they were talking about, or maybe it was just the scent of ham that piqued its interest, because it edged closer to the table and looked up at Russ with hopeful eyes. It almost made Liseli laugh to see the monster behave like any dog after table scraps.

  Russ hesitantly tossed a hunk of ham toward the dog, and drew back as it snatched the meat out of the air with its powerful jaws. It gobbled down the meat and inched closer, wanting more. “It’s a good thing this place is well stocked,” he said, begrudgingly tossing another bit of ham.

  Just then, all the doors around them slammed shut.

  Chapter 33 ~ This Is What Happens

  They all jumped, startled, and looked around warily in the ensuing silence. The cellar door hatch, the pantry door, all the cupboard doors, and the door to the hallway had all crashed shut.

  “What was that?” Liseli asked, inching closer to Russ.

  “I don’t know.” Russ set the knife down and walked over to the door. He tested the handle, then ran his hands around the edge of the door and said, “It’s not locked . . . but it’s like the door is welded to the frame. Only it’s an invisible weld. I can sense it but I don’t see anything.” He shook his head.

  “Can’t you open it?” Liseli asked, trying not to panic.

  Russ glanced at her, then turned back to the door. It opened with a protesting creak of the battered hinges. Liseli sighed with relief.

  “It wasn’t that hard.” Russ shrugged. “Odd.” It was unsettling how nonchalant he was about opening the door without using his hands, but she was just glad they weren’t trapped in the room after all.

  “Did Leeton do that? Close the doors and seal them shut, I mean?”

  “I guess.” Russ shook his head. “I don’t think Ricalli would bother, knowing we’re Keys; I got it open easily enough. But . . . .”

  “But what?”

  He shrugged again. “I just didn’t realize we could shut things like that. I mean I’ve opened things, but not shut them.” He smiled. “I guess there’s a lot I don’t know, that Leeton does. He’s very powerful. I wish I had the chance to just learn everything he knows from him . . . but I don’t think that’s gonna happen now.” He shook his head. Liseli understood what he meant; Leeton had detached since finding Alisiya, there was no question that something in him had died with his daughter.

  “Russ, I need to know something.”

  “What?”

  “How long have you known that you could do this stuff? I mean, going to different worlds, opening locked doors, untying ropes.” She waved a hand toward the door. “All of it.”

  “Well . . . .” He thought about it for a moment. “Before last week? I didn’t have a clue. And I’ve just been finding things out as they happen since then. It’s been either do it or die, and—” he grinned “—I’m still alive.”

  Liseli nodded. She turned and picked up a slice of ham, tossing it to the dog, who had come out from underneath the table where it had taken shelter when the doors slammed. Then she helped herself to some meat, as Russ came back from the door. She didn’t really know what to say about his newfound abilities, though she could tell by the way he was looking at her that he wanted to know what she thought. She didn’t know what she thought.

  “We should go back by Leeton,” she ended up saying, “just to make sure it was him. I mean, w
hy didn’t he just do that in the first place, if he could?”

  Russ glanced at the door, thoughtfully, as if the answer might be etched in its wood. “I don’t know. But it must have been him. Who else would want the doors shut?”

  Liseli didn’t have an answer, unless there was another one of these Key-people hanging around that they didn’t know about. If so, they were probably screwed, since the whole Key business seemed Russ and Leeton’s best defense, besides the dogs. She shook her head, and focused on something she could control: “We should probably bring some food back with us, I don’t know when he last ate either.” She glanced around. “Did you see crates or baskets or anything like that in the cellar? If not I suppose we could fill a couple drawers with stuff and carry it that way.”

  “I’m not sure. I’ll have to look again.”

  Liseli went down into the cellar with him this time, since he assured her there weren’t any bodies down there. They found some wooden crates full of potatoes, and dumped the potatoes out. They filled the crates with a variety of fruits, vegetables, and dried meat, and then added more rolls from the pantry. Liseli was satisfied that it would make for a well-rounded enough “meal,” and they left the kitchen behind, the dog trailing after.

  They found Leeton in the chamber, still watching over Alisiya. There were no lights in the room itself, but light from the hall shone in through the open doorway. It illuminated the middle of the room, but left the back and corners dark. It shone like a patch of moonlight through a window down onto the altar, and Leeton’s long shadow fell over Alisiya.

  “Did you shut the doors?” Russ asked, and he nodded.

  “I do not like staying in this place, but they have begun to gather,” Leeton said. “Unless they have a Key with them, it should be very hard for them to break in. I did not have the time or energy to seal the doors against another Key.” He turned his back on them, facing Alisiya again.

  He had straightened her limbs into a more natural position, folding her hands over her chest. Her long black hair cascaded over the edge of the altar turned bier, and she looked peaceful in repose, despite the wounds visible underneath her tattered dress.

  “We brought back some food.” Liseli motioned to the crate where they had set them down on the floor. There was no furniture in the chamber save for the stone altar in the back.

  Leeton didn’t reply for a moment, then said, “I don’t need to eat.”

  They didn’t press him on the subject, but Russ asked, “What are we gonna do, now? To get back, I mean?”

  Leeton was quieter for even longer that time. “I don’t know,” he said. I don’t care, his tone seemed to add.

  Russ frowned, but persisted, “What are they doing out there right now?”

  Leeton just shook his head.

  Russ shook his head as well, frustrated, and turned to Liseli, who was quietly munching on an apple. “I’m gonna search the building,” he announced unexpectedly.

  “Why? All the doors are shut, now.”

  “I’m gonna look for a Gate. A Gate to anywhere besides here.”

  * * *

  Later, they returned to the chamber, defeated. Liseli had gone with Russ, despite his protests that she should stay with Leeton and rest. She had no intention of letting Russ disappear on her, forced to wait and wonder while he explored the honeycomb of hallways, rooms, and levels in the vast temple. His choices were to stay with her in the chamber, or let her come with him.

  He hadn’t been able to sense a Gate in any of the doorways within the building. It was hard to tell what time of day it was outside, since the temple had no windows, and their sense of time had been thrown by the unnatural darkness earlier. But they figured it must be nighttime by the time they returned to the chamber, where Leeton still stood over his broken daughter.

  They were both too tired to think about what else to do. There didn’t seem to be anything else to do. The Adayzjians couldn’t get in, and they couldn’t get out, and there seemed to be no resolution to the conflict in sight. They had plenty of food and water to keep them for days, even weeks, to come.

  Russ and Liseli ate some more of the food they’d brought from the kitchen, then tried to sleep. The floor was hard, but they barely noticed, too tired to care about comfort, and just curled up together in a corner behind a pillar. They fell asleep not knowing what they were going to do when they woke up again.

  * * *

  Liseli awoke disoriented. She had been dreaming, and though all memory of the dream fled when she opened her eyes, she started up slightly, as if she had been about to do something or go somewhere. Only when Russ stirred and mumbled something did she remember where she was. There was a faint, steady noise coming from somewhere, and she lay still for a few moments, trying to listen and understand what it was.

  “Russ?” She turned her head and saw his eyes open, two faintly illuminated spots in the dark.

  “Rain,” he grunted sleepily, then rolled onto his back, trying to find a more comfortable position on the hard floor. Then he was still again, breathing deeply, but Liseli didn’t find it so easy to fall back to sleep. She sat up, rubbing her arms and wondering when it had got so chilly. The sound of rain pounding on the roof far above continued, but otherwise it was eerily quiet. She gazed toward the lighted hall, where several dogs lay sleeping, and then to the altar in the chamber where Alisiya lay dead.

  Liseli shivered. The sooner she was away from this place, from that corpse, the better.

  Alisiya turned her head.

  She looked at Liseli, her eyes dark, inscrutable holes in the pale luminescence of her face. She smiled, lips curving slowly, and turned away again, to gaze up into the cavernous dark of the distant ceiling.

  Liseli crawled to her feet, as slowly as Alisiya’s smile, and walked over to the altar as if in a trance. The rain pounded harder, pounding louder, but she could hear her own heart pounding loudest of all.

  “You’re not alive,” she whispered to the body laid out on the altar. But Alisiya’s eyes were still open, and at the sound she turned them on Liseli again.

  “Perhaps not.”

  “You can’t be. I saw how broken you were, Russ told me how . . . .” Liseli paused, Alisiya smiled at her sadly, as if pitying a child just learning how terrible the world could be. “Your bruises are healed,” Liseli realized, staring at the flawless white skin. “How?”

  “The River can heal any wound,” Alisiya answered. She unfolded her hands from the position her father had gently put them in, and reached out, taking Liseli’s wrist in a cold grip. “And I am the River; it’s in my blood, it is my blood. I will heal from any wounds, not matter how fatal.” Using Liseli as leverage, she struggled to lift herself to one elbow. Liseli just stood there, transfixed, too horrified to think.

  “Where is my father?” Alisiya panted, looking around the room.

  Liseli choked on her shocked silence for a moment, then jerked her arm away and said, “Let go of me.”

  Alisiya was too weak to dig her fingers in and hold — she fell back on the altar as Liseli slipped from her grip. “Where is my father?” she repeated.

  “You’re supposed to be dead.” Liseli couldn’t think of anything else. “You were dead, you—”

  “Ha,” Alisiya laughed faintly, resting her head on the altar while shaking it slightly. “Don’t you understand, you stupid girl? He was dead too, your darling loverboy, until my River’s water saved him. But it brought him back to life, that same magic that lives in my veins, that lives in everyone who drinks from the Chaiorra. I was born from the Chaiorra, why shouldn’t it save me like it saved him?” She fell silent, her breathing labored. Talking had drained her, and she closed her eyes.

  “You should be dead,” Liseli insisted stubbornly.

  Alisiya cracked open one eye. “And so should Russ. So should you; you drowned in the River. But you’re not, and he’s not, and I’m not.”

  “That’s not what I meant.” Liseli took another few steps back, and Alisiya
turned to gaze at her.

  “What?”

  “I mean you should be dead, you murdering bitch,” Liseli spat, clenching her fists. “You killed my child. Do you think that I would let you get away with that?”

  Alisiya laughed, a high clear sound likes a child’s laughter. “What are you going to do about it? Have you forgotten the control I have over you?”

  But Liseli felt nothing, not even a twinge of a headache, and it was her turn to smile. “You’re not strong enough to sit up, much less do any of your little voodoo crap on me,” she said with a vicious satisfaction. “You’re just like a helpless little newborn baby, you need someone to watch out for you while you get better. But you don’t have anyone, your daddy’s gone.”

  “Liseli—”

  “Forget it,” Liseli cut her off, and turned abruptly. She stalked away, toward the hall, her hands trembling. She knew what she had to do.

  Quickly, she glanced around for Leeton. She wondered where he was; she’d expected him to still be standing over his daughter, brooding, when she woke up, but there was no sign of him. Now she knew why he’d been watching her, holding his breath, monitoring her corpse as if she would sit up and speak to him again. Too bad for him that he had left his watch too early. Too bad for the both of them.

  She bent and relieved one of the Ricallyn corpses of his knife, and stalked back into the chamber. Alisiya was struggling to sit up, but Liseli strode up to her and with one hand shoved her onto her back. “This is what you get,” she said, bringing the blade down to slash an angry red smile across Alisiya’s throat. “This is what you get when you fuck with me.” She slashed at the flawless white arms, watching the blood bubble from the wrists and spill onto the floor.

  “This is what happens!” she hissed, driving the dagger into Alisiya’s heart. “This is what I do when you take what is mine!”

  Alisiya opened her mouth and blood came out instead of a voice, coloring her cheeks and running down to meet the fountain pumping from her neck. Her eyes fixed on Liseli, turning from black to violet, violet to blue, blue to white, alive to dead. Her arms fell limply over the edge of the altar, streams of red running down and dripping from her fingers onto the cold stone below.