Prophet: Bridge & Sword

by JC Andrijeski

  “I have a condition, too,” I said, pausing when I felt him tense. I waited for him to look up, and when he did, I sighed. “I want you to start seeing Yumi again.” Seeing the anger rise to his eyes, I held up a hand. “Look, this isn’t a punishment. I want you to let her help you with this. Balidor showed me the transcript of your sessions in the tank with him, after I left for China. He showed me the part about your fears around Menlim being alive… fears about what he used to make you do.”

  Seeing the anger flare hotter in his eyes, I held my hand higher, adding,

  “…Especially what he made you do to women. Balidor told me you were afraid of what might happen to me because of Menlim, even before you knew Menlim was alive. He said you were convinced you couldn’t stop yourself from hurting me, if Menlim forced you to do it.”

  Revik’s gaze turned briefly murderous.

  I could feel other emotions churning there, too, and waited for him to process my words, and to get past his anger at ‘Dori.

  “I’m willing to give you a lot more say over security, Revik,” I added. “But I can’t give you carte blanche. Not when it impacts something like killing one of the Four. That’s not only your decision to make. And I need your head clear on this stuff. As clear as possible, anyway.”

  There was another silence.

  I knew that, even now, I was handling him to a degree.

  I’d deliberately referenced Cass as “One of the Four,” not by her name, or even her title. I knew I was playing on his religious beliefs. I wasn’t trying to hide that fact from him, but I needed him to make this less personal––less about me and him and more about what we were trying to do in a broader sense, like keeping the rest of the humans and seers on the List from being eliminated by the Dreng.

  “Revik,” I said, softer. “Would you have let me do that, if it had been Terian? If I was afraid Terian being alive might hurt you?”

  There was another silence.

  I felt the arguments forming in his mind, and spoke before he could voice them.

  “I know what Cass did to us, baby. I know what she did to me, to Lily, to you. But Terian tortured you… for months. He nearly killed you. He nearly killed my brother. He raped and tortured my best friend. He did kill my mother… and nearly started a war.” Swallowing, I forced my voice neutral. “We made the decision to keep him alive, in spite of that. We did that because of who and what he is. What he might mean for the world.”

  Revik continued to focus down, at his feet. “Maybe we made a mistake. Has that occurred to you? That I made a mistake, letting him live?”

  “Yes,” I said, fighting frustration. “Of course it’s occurred to me! But what’s the answer, Revik? What do we do? Just kill anyone who might pose a threat to us?”

  When he didn’t reply, I found myself trying to answer the question on my own.

  Once I did, I realized I did know what I wanted to do.

  “We could leave it up to the Council,” I said.

  Not looking up, I folded my arms, nodded to myself, more sure after I’d said it.

  “We could make a rule that any drastic measure involving one of the Four needs to be decided by Council vote,” I continued, still thinking as I spoke. “Preferably by unanimous vote, at least in terms of their senior members. That way, neither of us would have the final say. We could each make our cases to the Council, regarding recommendations and security concerns. But we give the final decision to seers with supposedly more insight. And objectivity.”

  Revik looked at me, his clear eyes holding a denser scrutiny. “You would do that?”

  Turning over my own words, I nodded. “Yes.”

  “And if they say we should kill Cass?” he pressed.

  I exhaled, staring around the small room. Focusing on the short bookshelf filled with leather-bound books, I thought about his words. But the longer I thought about it, the more I realized it was the only solution either of us would be able to live with.

  “Then we kill her,” I said.

  There was another silence while he thought about my words.

  I watched him stare at the floor of the cell, his thoughts almost visible in the space of our small construct. I knew this conversation hadn’t gone where he’d expected it to go. Hell, it hadn’t gone where I’d expected it to go, either.

  I found myself watching his angular face, seeing the tiredness reflected there, a tiredness that didn’t strike me as being from a lack of sleep.

  “I heard you got pulled in upstairs,” he said, his voice gruff. “Is everything okay? Did we lose anyone?”

  Watching his face, I saw the guilt reflected there, along with a denser pain.

  I bit my lip. “We don’t know for sure yet. But yes, it looks like it.”

  “Who?”

  “Ontari.”

  He winced, the pain in his eyes growing more visible. Shielding his face with a hand, he rubbed his temples, jaw hard.

  “Did they find anything?” he said. “In D.C.?”

  Looking at him, I let some of my exasperation out, despite the guilt and grief coming off him, and the tired expression on his face.

  “That depends,” I said, sarcastic. “It might help if I had any fucking idea what they’d been sent there to find, Revik.”

  He looked over, his clear eyes showing a gleam of surprise.

  “What do you mean?” he said. “I sent them there because of you. It was your dream they were following. The one about the White House. About the safe underground.”

  I stared at him.

  For a long moment, I couldn’t answer.

  I’d just assumed he sent Loki’s team to D.C. as part of some side-project that he hadn’t bothered to tell me about. Looking at him now, I realized he’d done it more as a favor to me, maybe even as a means of showing me he trusted my visions––that he wanted to follow more of those prescient clues coming to me via my dreams.

  Something about the realization brought tears to my eyes.

  Guilt overcame me in the same set of minutes. I’d come in here to try to reason with him, but also to handle him––to push him into a compromise so we wouldn’t fight. Looking at him now, I realized he’d approached this conversation more honestly than I had.

  He’d also tried harder, and with less selfish reasons, to apologize.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, wiping my face with the back of my hand. “Shit.” I gave a humorless laugh, not looking at him. “I thought you just didn’t bother to loop me in.”

  There was a silence while he sat there.

  I could feel him thinking about what I’d said.

  “…And I’m sorry I dressed you down out there.” Giving another half-bitter laugh, I wiped my eyes, still crying for some reason, and now embarrassed about that, too. “I hated talking to you like that in front of them. I felt like you gave me no choice… which made me pissed as hell at you. But things are too damned fragile right now. We can’t have a split in the command structure. We can’t. And I can’t look weak in front of them, even if you are my husband. I know it’s just psychology, but hell, they need to have confidence in me, or I shouldn’t be leading. They’ll never trust me to get them through this, not if they see me as some kind of––”

  “Shhh,” he broke in.

  He was on his feet, and across the room before I knew what he intended. Before I could move away, he was in front of me, holding my arms.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. He gripped a handful of my long curls at the back of my head, even as he pressed closer to me, lowering his mouth to my ear. “I’m sorry, Allie. I really am.”

  I shook my head again.

  I didn’t want his apologies, either.

  “What do you want?” he murmured.

  I gave a short laugh. That one didn’t have much humor in it, either.

  “You probably shouldn’t ask me that right now,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  I felt my jaw harden, right before I looked up, meeting his gaze. “Because a big part of
me wants to shove you around with my light some more.”

  I saw his eyes change subtly, right before he looked down my body. A flicker of pain slid around his light and then into mine, even as I felt him fight to suppress it. Shaking my head, I leaned against the railing, feeling my chest ease, right before I let out another half-laugh.

  That one had more actual humor in it.

  “You’re hopeless,” I said, wiping my face.

  He gave a side-head tilt, another version of the seer’s shrug. “You can push me around a little, if you want.”

  I gave him a half-joking glare. “You might want to be careful what you offer to me right now, husband.”

  He clicked at me, smiling. That time, it touched his eyes.

  “Promises, promises,” he chided. “All bark and no bite.”

  For some reason, that brought a real burst of anger out of me.

  Maybe because it hit too close to the bone right then. Or maybe I finally understood what lived below my needing to hold things together––whether to “manage” my more volatile spouse or for some other bullshit reason. I was afraid I wasn’t cut out to lead these people. I was afraid everything worked better when Revik was in charge.

  In any case, heat flooded my aleimi without warning.

  That time, I shoved him harder, using my light.

  He stumbled back more than a few feet. When he recovered his balance that time, he was panting. He didn’t look angry, though. Cautious, maybe, but not angry.

  If anything, I saw interest on his face.

  “Are you mad?” he said, after a pause. His eyes continued to measure mine, even as I felt him skirt cautiously around my light. “Because we probably shouldn’t do this, if you’re really angry at me.”

  I thought about that, too, and I agreed with him.

  But was I mad? Was that really what was going on here? Frustrated, yeah. But mad? At him? I honestly couldn’t feel that in any part of my light, unless I was suppressing that, too.

  Truthfully, I still felt about ten steps behind him half the time. I felt like no matter how rationally I tried to approach anything––leading the group, running ops, infiltration––he still knew more than me. He still approached things from a clearer space, even when he was upset. I still felt like I lost every argument, even when he conceded defeat.

  Maybe pushing him around in here was all I had.

  He laughed.

  Biting my lip, I glared at him, and he laughed again.

  “Gaos, you are full of shit,” he said, smiling. “But if you want to punish me for it, I already gave you permission, wife.”

  He remained where he was, a few yards away from me, essentially where he’d ended up after I’d shoved him. He watched me, still smiling, and I felt that heat snake back through his light. Some part of me felt as much frustrated by that heat as amused, or even turned on. I still didn’t want to hurt him, but I could feel that pull on him.

  When I looked up that time, his eyes had changed again.

  “Please,” he said.

  His voice was lower that time, gruff.

  I stared at him, feeling my separation pain worsen.

  I knew exactly what he was asking me for, but some part of my mind, maybe a less rational part of myself than my mind, continued to fight it. But yeah, I knew. He’d already asked me for it once, which meant he wanted it pretty badly, likely for the reasons he’d given me that morning.

  Meaning, he wanted to open to me. He thought if I did this, he’d open.

  Maybe he thought it would open me more, too. Maybe he wanted to give me what he thought I wanted. Either way, the bare simplicity of it still felt like a hard wall.

  He wanted me to hurt him. My husband was asking me to hurt him.

  Of course, I knew it wasn’t that simple. He wanted me to push him to some edge he knew better than I did, some edge that made it easier for him to let go.

  I knew my reluctance was mostly fear. My mind contained enough of that irritating detachment for me to see the fear clearly, but not enough to be able to do anything about it.

  “I’ll go see Yumi.” His voice coaxed my light, pulling on me. “I’m agreeing to your compromise, wife. In full. And I’m apologizing.”

  I swallowed.

  I felt the pain worsen in his light, and a part of me flinched.

  Maybe I was the one who needed to see Yumi. Clearly he wasn’t the only one with issues in this area. The difference was, I understood my husband’s issues, mostly. I at least knew where they came from. His wants and fears made sense to me, as did the pulls in his light around what he was asking of me now.

  My own crap, I had a harder time pinning down.

  “I know why,” he said, soft.

  I looked up, realizing only then I’d looked away.

  Biting my lip, I glanced back at the blanked out wall, which used to be the only way we could spend time with our daughter.

  Thinking about her, my chest hurt again.

  “Actually. I kind of want to go see Lily.” Seeing Revik’s eyes soften, I looked away, wiping my eyes, even as I felt a flush of guilt, realizing I was avoiding, even though I was telling the truth, too. “I feel like I’ve barely seen her lately.”

  He clicked at me softly, but there was no anger in it that time.

  “Do you want me to go with you?” he said, softer.

  I thought about that, and nodded.

  “Yes,” I said. “If you want. Unless you’re busy.”

  “Not in the slightest,” he said.

  Something about the way he said it made me relax for real.

  His eyes continued to watch my face carefully, though.

  “So you don’t want to play, then?” he said. “Now, I mean.”

  I looked at him, feeling myself tense, even as that want strengthened in both of our lights. Another flush of pain and images flickered across the surface of his aleimi.

  “Allie.” He hesitated. Then, as if making up his mind, he sent me a pulse of warmth. “Allie, I know why. I really do. But you don’t need to worry about that. I promise you.”

  Feeling what he meant, I frowned, staring at the floor. He’d picked up on something I’d totally missed. I wasn’t afraid of hurting him.

  Well, I wasn’t only afraid of that.

  I was also afraid I wouldn’t do it right, that I’d make an ass out of myself in front of him.

  I knew he’d paid women to do this to him.

  Those seers he paid knew what they were doing, what he wanted. They wouldn’t have hesitated, or held back. I knew there’d probably been males as well as females. I knew that even more now, after seeing him with Dalejem the night before, but I guess I’d always known. I knew some of them must have been human, as well as seer.

  I didn’t want to be measured against them. I didn’t want to be another person in his long list of people who’d gotten him off this way.

  He smiled. I hadn’t looked up yet, but I felt it.

  “Allie,” he said. “You have to know how completely different it is with you.”

  I didn’t meet his gaze, but shrugged. “Doesn’t change the fact that I still don’t know what I’m doing, Revik. I don’t know how to give you what you want.” Biting my lip, I started to go on, then shrugged again, refolding my arms in front of my chest.

  I practically saw him roll his eyes.

  “Are you going to make me say it?” he said.

  “Say what?”

  “Bullshit, Alyson.” His voice turned harder. “China.”

  I gave him an angry look, but he cut me off before I could speak.

  “You do know,” he said. “And don’t even get me started on San Francisco.”

  Knowing he was referring to Jaden that time, I grimaced, now hit by two different sets of unwelcome memories. Most were things I’d much rather have left far, far behind me, and not only because Ditrini featured in a fair few. The fact that it was Ditrini didn’t take away from Revik’s overall point, but I also thought he was missing mine more
than a little.

  It was easy to do that kind of thing when you didn’t give a damn.

  “I get that,” he said, his voice lower. “I really do. It was easier for me, too.”

  There was a silence.

  When the silence continued, I felt him backing off with his light.

  I also felt him politely and cautiously retract his offer.

  Well, not retract it, exactly, but maybe let me off the hook.

  Somehow, that didn’t reassure me either. Pain worsened in my light, even as I felt another part of me grow almost angry. I hated that I wrestled with this crap. I hated that I was such a coward with him, that his past sex life still managed to threaten me and get between us. I shouldn’t have to feel shitty about this. Remembering some of the stories Cass told me back when we were in school together, even things me and Jaden had done––

  “Allie.” Revik’s voice held a touch of warning.

  I killed the thought, erasing it from my mind.

  “Sorry,” I muttered, folding my arms tighter.

  “Don’t be sorry,” he said. “It’s fine. Really.”

  I knew he was being a good sport, though, and that pissed me off even more.

  “I want to see Lily, too,” he said, his voice warmer. “Why don’t we talk about this later? We can have lunch with her, then go to that meeting on Dubai. I think we should still have it,” he added, pulling a long-sleeve shirt off the chair where he’d hung it, and shoving an arm into one sleeve. “It’ll just be a planning meeting now.”

  I felt his light de-charge, even as he said it.

  That worsened my pain, but that time, I only nodded.

  As I did, it occurred to me that we’d just survived our first marital fight.

  The first real one, anyway.

  30

  LILY

  I SAT IN a squashy couch, smiling as I watched Lily bug Revik to color with her.

  She wanted me to color with her, too, but I was a little too entertained watching the two of them, so my paper and crayons sat on the couch next to me, pretty much untouched.

  Something about watching the two of them argue about what color a rabbit should be brought my mind back to the first time Revik and I walked into this room.

  We’d both been so damned nervous.