Dragon: Allie's War Book Nine

by Andrijeski, JC

  But tonight it was my turn again.

  Tonight I would force him to be the one to talk us both into it.

  “I don’t see why you think he’d believe this at all,” I argued. “So you want to go to him, say you’re willing to work for him, but that you won’t be in his network…? All in the hopes that he’ll believe you and later force you to be in his network?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “And you think he’ll believe that?” I said.

  “Yes,” he said, stroking my hair with one hand.

  “Why?” I said. “Why would he believe that, Revik?”

  My husband exhaled, wrapping his arms around me tighter.

  “Dubai,” he said with a sigh, kissing my face. “He would believe it because of Dubai, wife.”

  I bit my lip, fighting not to react to my own memories of what happened in that boathouse. I could see the logic in what he was saying. I could feel the different layers he was threading together. I could see the fucking brilliance there, too, of course, that damned multi-layered thinking of his and how much sense it made. I just didn’t like it.

  I didn’t like it at all.

  “But why would he ever believe you would trust him?” I said, biting my lip.

  Lying there, his heart beating against my ear, he let out a heavier sigh. Then, making a vague gesture with one hand, he rearranged his back in the cushions, combing his fingers through his black hair before he answered.

  “Because I would,” he said finally.

  “You would?”

  He nodded, glancing down at me when I looked up. “Yes.”

  I fought with bewilderment, what might have been disbelief, but Revik sighed again, clicking softly, even as he pressed his lower body against me, a flicker of pain leaving his light.

  “Menlim has this weird code thing,” he explained, his German accent thicker. “He would adhere to the letter of it…at least until I gave him an excuse. It would not have to be a particularly good excuse, wife…but he would need one. It would need to be sufficient for him to feel justified in breaking this thing with me. He would know I would know that.”

  “Why?” I said. “I mean, why would he bother?”

  Revik shrugged. “It is just his way.”

  “So you would give him a reason to break it once you were there?” I said, biting my lip. “So why do we need to go to such lengths––”

  “You know why,” Revik said, his voice exasperated. “Menlim knows I know him. He would know that I would be very, very careful not to give him an excuse…”

  “Does it have to be something this fucking drastic, though?” I said, frustrated. “Does it have to be about us?”

  “Yes,” he said. Looking down at me again, he frowned, his light exuding another coil of pain as he caressed my skin. “I cannot do this stupidly, Allie. We cannot. I know him. It would take a few months…at least…or he would definitely suspect something. Probably five or six months, minimum, to be safe. I have to really make him think that this is not what I want.” He hesitated, stroking my hair once more, combing it through his fingers gently. I felt his light skirting around the next thing. “…He knows I would not just ‘fuck up,’ Allie…not in the usual way. He has to think I’m desperate. Out of my mind with desperation…”

  He shrugged, his light again holding that apology as he glanced at me.

  “…Not rational, wife.”

  I could feel the meaning there, too.

  I knew exactly what he was driving at.

  I also saw the brilliance in it. And the utter fucking stupidity.

  “Revik…”

  “You’re the only thing that would do that to me, Allie,” he said. His voice grew taut, heavier with pain, even as his fingers tightened on my back. “Believe me when I say I’ve thought about this. But it’s the only fucking thing…”

  Stopping his words, he exhaled in what almost felt like anger, even as a sharper pain expanded off his light.

  “What makes you think I could get someone to go there with me?” I said, pressing my lips together. “Enough to make it convincing, I mean?”

  He grunted, cocking an eyebrow at me.

  I frowned up at him, annoyed in spite of myself. “I’m serious, Revik…”

  “We can talk about the particulars on that later,” he said, his voice gruff. “I can’t do that tonight, Allie…I can’t. But trust me, that end of things does not worry me at all.”

  “Because of some Bridge light crap?” I muttered, still annoyed.

  “Among other things, yes,” he said, his voice closer to a growl. “That ‘Bridge light crap’ is a fuck of a lot more compelling than you seem to think.”

  I grunted again, not answering him at first.

  “What if we can’t sell this?” I said then, exhaling. “You say you’re not worried, but what if we really can’t sell it...either of us? No one’s going to believe this of us, Revik. No one.”

  But he was shaking his head, his mouth grim.

  “We can sell it,” he said.

  “How do you know? You’re expecting a fuck of a lot from me…and from whoever it is.”

  He shook his head a second time, clicking. “All you would have to do is be convincing enough from the outside that it gets to Menlim’s people through the mole. It would help if I felt it through my light, too…but we can’t make that too obvious either. We have to at least pretend we’re trying to shield from one another.”

  Gripping me tighter, he shrugged. I felt another flush of that heat coil into my chest.

  “Menlim would tell me, Allie,” he said. “…he would make sure I knew.”

  I was shaking my head again, but Revik sighed, clicking softly.

  He gestured gracefully with one hand. “Of course, you could not be too obvious in the other respects, either…or the lead up to this. There would need to be a courtship…resistance on your part, at least at first. You could insist to everyone that it is only sex, that you are loyal to me. We can talk about the particulars of that, too…more than me, you should definitely try to shield the sex from me at first. In fact, maybe it’s better if I don’t…others will be more likely to believe you would have an affair if it is common knowledge that I am not adhering to vow, and there are more who would believe that of me than you...”

  Still thinking, he added, “I could drink a lot. I would do that anyway. Lose control of my light when I’m with others…again, Menlim knows I don’t deal with separation well. He would believe this. Especially if I was thinking about you...”

  Feeling the anger on my light, he glanced down at my face. He gave me a grim look, but I could still feel him thinking when he nodded again.

  “But yes…stages, wife,” he said. “Refuse to open your light to whoever it is. Refuse to share a bed with them at first. It will have to be gradual to be convincing, which is another reason we will need more than just a few weeks…”

  Holding me tighter, he studied my face. “Menlim knows the bond is strong. He knows it would not bend or break so easily…no matter what attraction existed. You will have to be very careful not to rush things…both of us will…”

  Revik gave me a harder look, his clear eyes glowing slightly as he looked at me.

  “I would lose my fucking mind if I thought you were with someone else,” he said, his voice blunt, holding a denser thread of pain. “…especially if I thought it was more than sex. If I thought there was any chance you were in love with them…” He shook his head, clicking softly. “I would not be rational, Allie. I won’t be rational. There is no fucking way. Menlim will know this…he will believe it, if it is real. You don’t need to worry about ‘selling’ anything…I will be threatened enough, just from being separated from you for so long…”

  He clenched his jaw, studying my expression before he met my gaze.

  “We might even be able to find someone who could be in on it with you,” he added, coiling his fingers into my hair. “Someone who could help you with this. They would have to be a d
amned good infiltrator, but it is possible.”

  Shrugging, he stared at the far wall, still tugging at and playing with my hair, even as I felt his pain worsen. I felt possessiveness on him, even as he tried to hide it. Despite what he’d said, I could also feel him considering different names.

  “It doesn’t matter,” he said then, his voice holding a faint thread of tension. “Even if we don’t tell them, I am not worried. It will be real enough. I won’t have to fake very much…not if we do it the way we’ve been talking about.”

  I winced again, shaking my head.

  I could tell he was more stressed than he was pretending, if only because his accent was so thick I was having trouble understanding him.

  “This can’t be the only way,” I muttered.

  “It is the only way,” Revik said. “Do you think I would ever suggest this lightly? Gaos…even thinking about it makes me fucking insane…”

  His pain worsened, again making me wince, again making me close my eyes.

  Shaking my head where my face pressed against his bare chest, I looked for another thread, any way to make it come out different.

  “What if we made it seem like Lily was at risk? Or Maygar?” I bit my lip, wincing at my own words. “Not for real, of course…we wouldn’t really put them at risk…but wouldn’t that be a lot easier to fake? Parents are never rational about their kids.”

  I glanced up at him, watching him stare up at the ceiling, adding, “And that wouldn’t take months of us both, you know…doing what you said…”

  Stopping, I shook my head, not wanting to finish that thought.

  At the same time, I felt the cowardice there, how much my heart hurt at the thought of offering up Lily. Or Maygar, for that matter. Even so, it was a bullshit offer and I knew it, which is probably why I could say it at all.

  I knew even before Revik answered that it wouldn’t be enough. Not with Menlim.

  Faking some kind of danger to our child would never be enough. Like Revik said, I doubted it would be enough to fake anything, honestly.

  Revik was right. It would have to be real.

  On some level, at least.

  He probably felt some of that on me, but he answered me anyway, clicking softly.

  “No, darling,” he murmured, kissing my cheek. “When it comes to my kids, Menlim knows nothing would scare me more than the idea of him having custody of them.” He kissed me again, pressing his face against mine. “…Nothing,” he added, softer. “I would never do anything that might put my children under his care. I would never willingly enter into his network…never…not if I was thinking about my kids. No matter what the risk.”

  His light exuded an apology, even as I felt his mind still working in those higher currents of light, turning over scenarios, threading them together in different combinations.

  “I love my children,” he said softly. “But I’m more rational about them. Menlim would know that, too.”

  I nodded, feeling that sharper pain harden in my chest.

  “…Anyway,” he murmured, exhaling in a sigh as he tightened his arms around me. “Lily would have you. And Balidor. And your parents…and Wreg, who is scary enough on his own. Menlim knows that. So would I. I would be more likely to trust you to protect Lily than do anything to risk making myself a greater danger to either her or Maygar.”

  Lying on the floor of the tank, naked and wrapped only in my husband, I nodded.

  I let my light flicker out briefly though, touching our daughter where she lay wrapped up in blankets about ten yards from where we were. Lily slept blissfully in a portioned-off part of the same container, her head mashed up against the stuffed elephant she’d been given by Uncle Wreg and Uncle Jon, her fingers clutching his plush leg. I imagined I could feel the ocean rolling under where we lay, rocking her as she slept, rocking us.

  I felt so safe there, with the two of them.

  So fucking safe.

  Closing my eyes, I fought back the fear that wanted to steal over my light, a fear so intense it made my stomach cold, twisting my intestines into hard knots.

  “We can’t keep running, wife,” he said, softer still. “We can’t.”

  I opened my eyes, staring into the dark without lifting my head from his chest.

  I knew he was right.

  I knew it.

  But I couldn’t make myself answer him.

  “Come on, baby…” I murmured. “Come on…I need you more awake than this.”

  Caressing his face, I paused to stroke his hair, even as my light slid deeper into his. I felt him tense in my arms even as he leaned into me again, gripping my sides with his fingers. His light coiled into me harder, and I winced at the pain there, feeling it worsen on my end even as I struggled to keep us both shielded.

  I sat with my mostly-bare legs under me on the wet grass. He still lay more or less in my lap, his face pressed against my leg. We were further in the trees than when he first fell, but not much further. I hadn’t been able to drag him far. I couldn’t take the time to do it, or risk using the telekinesis.

  And Revik was really damned heavy.

  I could feel dawn approaching, for real now.

  Even so, the light hadn’t quite yet started to rise.

  I could see him, though, enough that I was having trouble controlling my light.

  He was a little more filled out than I remembered, like he hadn’t been running as much, or fighting as much in those past eight months. His face was bruised. It had new cuts on it, including one across his cheek that might have had stitches. I’d felt more on his neck and hairline. They were all healing but I could tell some of them had been deep. Probably not deep enough to scar, since he was a seer, but deep enough to make me wince with pain whenever my fingers grazed one of them on accident.

  I could feel other injuries on him…bruised bones, more cuts. Things I couldn’t see.

  “Revik…” I murmured, kissing his face. “Come on, baby…come back to me…”

  I’d spent over an hour on his light already.

  There was only so much I could do.

  I couldn’t detach him from the network. Not yet.

  A part of me wanted to so badly I almost couldn’t think rationally about it, but it would have defeated everything we were doing here, so I didn’t even let myself get very close to the different strands tying him to Menlim and the Dreng. I kept the silver light as far away from me as I could, focusing only on those higher areas of his light, the places where the Dreng and Menlim could not go. I knew they would feel me in his light anyway, but I also knew they would feel me there anyway, no matter where I was.

  I tried to make it look like he was dreaming about me.

  That we were dreaming about each other.

  After I’d gotten the specs and checked and rechecked them, I’d mostly been looking at what they’d done to him. I did that even more carefully than I’d done the other, hidden behind one of the most intense shields I’d ever used to disguise my light. I knew it might still not be enough, but I couldn’t seem to leave him alone.

  And yeah, while I couldn’t fix it yet, my light was already mapping out a plan for that, too.

  I was waiting for Jem now, for Balidor and Wreg. I was waiting for Jem to get the others up to speed, to tell them what we needed now that I had the connection.

  It was taking too long.

  Whatever he was doing, this was taking too fucking long.

  My fingers began combing through Revik’s hair again, noting another cut behind his ear, one on his hand where he held my arm…

  When a voice rose abruptly in my headset.

  “Alyson?”

  It was loud, shocking me with its immediacy.

  Not Jem. Balidor.

  I heard the wonder in just that single utterance of my name, what must have been shock from what Jem had just told them. I brushed it aside, more relieved than I could feel at first that they were finally here, that we could finally do this.

  I didn’t have time to field
their reactions to the rest of it right now.

  Not even Balidor’s…or Wreg’s.

  So I just clicked into sub-vocals.

  Then I launched into it.

  “I’m going to assume you have everyone we need hooked into here in the next five seconds and then I’m only going to explain this once…” I said, without taking a breath.

  I heard Balidor clicking his fingers sharply from the other end. A minor commotion of light and sound erupted; I felt a rush of other lights join the comm link in those same seconds.

  I didn’t wait long.

  “…I have the map,” I said, after a bare pause. “The real one, meaning the one Revik is actually hooked into. It’s fucking rough and it keeps shifting and Revik’s only half-conscious right now…but I think it’ll be more than enough for him to guide us through the main structure. The highest parts of his light are wide fucking awake, and that’s the part of him we need. I can translate from there…”

  I took a short breath, forcing myself to get out the rest of it.

  I could feel a lot of lights listening now, not only Balidor’s.

  “The network seers are all here right now,” I added. “…In the City, I mean. Revik can feel them on his light…that same part of him told me that the main storage facility is here, and the only one that’s currently in operation. They have two more in process…one in Tibet, the other outside of Anchorage. A third was housed in New York under Gossett but got damaged during the last big flood. It looks like they’ve decided to abandon that one and focus on the land-locked cities…with another possible in Zurich next year.”

  Taking another short breath, I added,

  “You’ll need to crack the secondaries and backups when we’ve finished here, especially in the bigger cities…and of course get rid of those other storage facilities. Use the Americans on the latter part of that, if you can…”

  I paused, feeling a denser pain in my heart.

  “And you need to neutralize the mole,” I said. “It can’t wait any longer, ‘Dori. Have Deklan do it. But don’t fucking hurt her, damn it! I really don’t think she has any idea what she’s doing. She thought she’d given that book to Tarsi, not Novak––”