“Yes, you do!” Terian said, gripping him tighter. “Don’t lie to me, Revi’. He already knew. He knew before I did!”
“So?” Revik said finally. “That doesn’t tell me anything, Terry. You asked Allie to come here before she’d done any of that.”
“But I saw it,” Terian said, his voice imploring. “I saw it, don’t you see? I saw what she would do. And I saw what he would do to me. And then it happened and I knew it wasn’t just pretty pictures, like before. I knew it wasn’t far away. It was close. So very, very close. Like the falling stars and the mother-cunt with the green eyes and you coming here. I knew it was now, Revi’. I knew I needed you to come save me now. Not in far away!”
Revik’s indecisiveness worsened.
Being so close to the other male, his light skirted and wove into the other seer’s, without his really willing it. In fact, with the other’s hands on him, his face only a foot or so away, Revik couldn’t really keep him out.
Yet he knew he wouldn’t see anything definitive there, even if he could scan him. Even if they weren’t both in a Dreng construct, Terian’s light didn’t work like that of most seers; it never had. It’s why collars didn’t work on him, why they could split his mind and it didn’t kill him, how he knew the future in more than just dreams.
Whatever happened to him, no matter how fucked up Terian got, that higher part of him always, magically, remained untouched.
It was how Terry was able to see things no other seer could see.
Not even Allie. Not even Kali.
“Revi’, please!” Terian begged, clutching at him again. “Please help me! I will give you all the seers I have from the List. I will give you all the humans. I will give you whatever you want! But you must help me! He will not let me stay alive for much longer. It is a clicking clock, tick-tock, tick-tock. Closer every day. Closer every minute!”
Pausing, he gripped Revik tighter, lowering his voice to a whisper.
“You must know, Revi’,” he said, conspiratorial. “You must know––you must. If I die now, it will not be good for me. I will not go… to a good place.”
Revik stared into those amber eyes, at the expression there, the light shining through them.
He saw his fear. It felt utterly real.
More than that, he saw him. He saw something he’d maybe never seen in Terian before, in all the years he’d known him. He saw a glimmer of him––as in Feigran, the seer he could have been, before Menlim and Galaith and whoever else got hold of him.
For an instant, Revik could only stare at it, lost in recognition.
“Get her the fuck off that stage,” he growled, releasing him. “Get her off there, and take us to the seers on the List. Then we’ll talk, Terry.”
Revik hadn’t even finished speaking when a smile split that face, relief pouring through Terian’s eyes and light so intensely, Revik winced back.
“No promises!” Revik snapped. “I mean it! I answer to her.”
“Thank you!” Terian leaned forward, kissing him on the cheek. He didn’t stop grinning when Revik pushed him off. “Thank you so much, brother! Thank you! Thank you!”
“Terry… cut it out. Jesus…”
“I’ll suck you off, if you want,” he offered, still clutching his arms. “Or you can do me, and your wife can watch. She would like that, wouldn’t she? Wouldn’t she like that, Revi’?”
Revik grimaced. “I highly doubt it.”
Even so, something in the way Terian said those words finally caused Revik to relax. They also made him want to laugh more than punch the other seer in the face––probably because he’d sounded a hell of a lot more like Feigran just then, than he had like Terian.
He glanced at the stage as he thought it.
Allie was already walking off the long platform, aiming the stiletto heels towards the dark blue velvet curtain on the far end. Disappointed calls from the audience accompanied her, but when her eyes flickered back over her shoulder, Revik saw them shift up, and again he found himself thinking she was looking in his direction.
Before he could make up his mind for certain, she winked.
…Right before a bare smile crossed her lips, and she looked away.
54
REGROUP
I FOUND THEM in the lobby of the club.
They’d removed the collar by then.
The orange-eyed seer met me on the other side of the stage, grinning at my half-naked and sweaty body before he twirled a finger in the air, indicating for me to turn around. He took the collar off me after using the retinal scanner to open the lock.
Once he had, he kissed the back of my neck.
I jerked away, giving him a dirty look, but he only laughed.
I changed out of the stage gear, although I wasn’t thrilled with what I was given to change into, also by the orange-eyed seer. I didn’t have anything else, so I took the clean clothes without protest, rinsing off in the shower in the back, and tugging on the new clothes over my damp body. All the while, I did my best to ignore the muscular seer who continued to stand in the doorway, making the occasional lewd remark that I ignored. I could feel him watching me through the material of the thin partition, but I ignored that, too.
The new outfit was better than the stage outfit, but not by much.
I was overly conscious of eyes on me as I exited through the door leading out of the backstage area and made my way across the open floor. I got a few drunken gropes as I passed, mostly from the same guys who’d been cat-calling me from the foot of the stage.
I felt Revik’s light snake out at the first of those. His light didn’t relax even after I jerked away, then promptly smacked the offending hand. I did it hard enough that the guy let out a surprised cry followed by a hurt-sounding whimper.
It didn’t stop the next guy from trying it, though.
…Or from sounding equally hurt when he got the same result.
People. Jesus.
Terian’s goons followed at a distance, but the orange-eyed seer had vanished. I only marked the location of the guards with the bare edges of my light, focusing most of my attention on the group of seers waiting for me just inside the black, double doors of the club.
Revik stood in front, next to the Terian with the auburn hair.
I struggled to look at Revik as I got closer to where they all stood.
It wasn’t embarrassment, really. I’m not sure what it was.
All I know is, I found myself adjusting the short dress I wore, smoothing it down so that it covered as much of me as possible. I still wore the crazy-high, fuck-me stilettos, the dark eye makeup I didn’t bother to take off, and my hair was damp from the shower, hanging down past my shoulders, but I did my best to face off with my armor-clad brothers and sisters like everything was normal.
I felt Revik’s eyes on me, and when I got closer, I felt his relief, enough that I glanced up.
His eyes held mine a few seconds longer than usual. Then his gaze drifted lower, looking at me in the skin-tight black dress. His eyes lingered on my legs… then the shoes… before making their way back up to my face.
“Do you mind?” I smiled in spite of myself, smacking his arm. “Jeez, husband. Be a little subtle, why don’t you?”
Something in my words––or maybe the smack––seemed to knock him out of his trance.
He held up a hand in a seer’s apology, right before he used that same hand to catch hold of my arm, and pull me up against his body. He wrapped his arm around me before I could get my breath, or even my balance, and then I was fighting not to react to the currents I felt sparking dangerously through his light.
That relief was still the strongest, however.
“There,” Terian said from next to us. “You see? Safe and sound. As promised.”
Revik gave him a look that could have cut glass. His eyes sparked with light in that same pause, and I wrapped my arm around him tightly in reflex. Feeling him respond to my touch, as well as the heated coil of light and reassurance I sen
t through his aleimi, I fought to calm both of our lights down, and help him regain control.
I sent him a more subtle pulse once I felt him relax, reminding him he couldn’t go telekinetic in here, whatever Terian was up to.
Menlim would have eyes all over this place.
Terian’s gaze flickered directly to mine.
“I have you shielded, sister.” His face and voice turned grim. “If I did not, trust me when I tell you––we would not be standing here right now.”
“You have a means of circumventing the construct?” Revik asked him.
“Of course,” Terian shrugged.
Revik frowned, glancing down at me, right before he looked back at Terian.
I felt skepticism in his light, but like me, he seemed to have decided to take Terian’s claims at face value, at least for now.
“Fine,” Revik said, gruff. “Are we going?”
I could feel part of the source of that gruffness in his light, even as he squeezed me tighter against his side. I heard the relief in his voice that time, too.
“Of course.” Terian beamed, motioning gracefully towards the door. “I have transportation waiting for us. It’s just outside.”
I glanced up at Revik, who returned my frown.
Again, I felt the part of him willing to follow this a little further, if only to find the List seers. Whatever Terian claimed or didn’t claim, he was a part of this construct. He had to know it well by now, given who he was. Moreover, he could have called Shadow and his minions any time he wanted. Either he was telling the truth about needing our help––
Or, yeah, this was a trap.
Revik glanced at me again, gripping me even tighter.
Terian was smiling at both of us when he glanced back in our direction.
“It is most charming, to see the two of you,” he said. “…Most charming.”
When I quirked an eyebrow, letting my skepticism show in my light, he blew me a kiss, grinning before he walked to the club’s front door and pushed it open with his palm. The affection radiating from his light, the near… happiness… I felt there, was weirdly disarming. It had been since that first conversation I’d had with him in his expensive Burj Kalifa suite.
Even after he informed me I would be dancing for Revik––or else he would be forced to drug Revik and leave him at the club while we went after the Listers alone––Terian never stopped being friendly, or grinning at me, or touching me affectionately.
I still didn’t know if the thing with Revik had been an empty threat or not.
At the time, I hadn’t been willing to risk it.
Because yeah, Terian.
Even so, something about how he looked at me and Revik felt so sincere, I fought not to return the smile, despite the odd eddies and fluctuations still sliding around his light. I felt more eyes on me then and glanced to the side.
Jax stood there, along with Chinja, Dalejem and Declan.
They had Kat with them, too, so apparently Terian took me at my word when I told him she needed to come with us. I saw Revik looking at her, puzzlement in his light, and clenched my jaw, but didn’t try to explain. All of them avoided looking at me once I’d turned––Chinja, especially, who had her arms folded and stared stubbornly off to the side.
The sole exception was Dalejem.
Dalejem stared right at me, but I couldn’t read his expression at all. I saw his eyes drift from my damp hair down my body to my legs. His eyes paused on the stilettos, then slid slowly back up, taking in my body in the clinging dress.
I felt pain leave his light in a dense cloud.
Before I could even react to it, Revik shoved the other seer in the chest with the flat of his hand, and not gently. The pulse of anger that flared off his aleimi took me aback.
“Fuck off,” he growled, as if the message wasn’t clear.
Dalejem stumbled a few steps back. He didn’t speak, but Kat jumped, blanching, not far from where he ended up. She looked around at the other seers, as if requesting an explanation, but none returned her gaze.
There was a loud-feeling silence.
Then Dalejem shrugged, taking a further step back with his body as well as his light, his expression unmoving. Even so, I saw something flicker across his eyes, right before he motioned neutrally towards the front door.
“Are we going with him or not, laoban?” he said, his voice openly deferential.
Revik followed the gesture with his eyes. I felt another flush of indecision on him, coupled with a denser irritation at the other seer that made me wonder again.
I knew Revik might be pissed off that Dalejem gave me to the trader. I knew he might be pissed off that Dalejem had his hands on me, too, while he’d been playing the part of drunk, horny guy at the pier.
Something about this felt different from either of those things, though.
Did something happen between the two of them? Something more recent?
The thought brought a flicker of uncertainty into my light, along with a paranoia intense enough, I had to fight to control it, even with Revik holding me.
Revik must have felt it. He looked down, holding me tighter, even as his mouth curved in a slight frown.
“What do you think?” he said. Seeing the question in my light, or possibly in my eyes, he blew away my concern, nudging me to focus on the immediate. “Terian. Do we follow him? Or do we end this now?”
Looking up, I sighed, then looked around at the others.
“Do you really want to abort the op?” I said.
I pulled at his light, just enough to make my point, and his pain abruptly worsened.
“If he’s causing this…” I said, then trailed. “What do we do? Just live with it? Take the chance he won’t be able to use us to get at Lily?”
Revik’s jaw tightened.
I felt him thinking, turning over what I’d said. I felt a glimmer of his actual thoughts then, even beyond the issues he and I were having with our light.
We could bolt, now, cut our losses, he was thinking.
With Terian knowing exactly where we were, any chance of a clean exit had already passed, but we’d likely lose fewer people––meaning, if we just broke cover and ran––than we would if we followed Terian and it turned out to be a trap.
We’d also less likely end up imprisoned. Or as slaves.
“We’d be abandoning them,” I reminded, quieter. “All of them. And we’d be giving up on the chance of using Feigran to fix Lily’s light.”
His narrow mouth firmed.
I felt him weighing his own knowledge of Terian, of what he felt was likely to happen if we went with him. I felt him using his military mind, as well as his family mind––meaning his father’s mind toward Maygar and Lily. I felt him think about the bank job in New York and all the other times my impulses had paid off.
I felt something else there, too.
A part of him wanted to go forward with this, even more than I did––and for reasons he hadn’t shared with me. That was the part I felt him wrestling with. It felt almost like he was using my intuition to rationalize what he wanted to do anyway. I couldn’t get a sense of what that was about––if it was about Feigran, the Listers, Lily, me.
Whatever it was, something about it made me nervous
I was still watching his face, trying to decide what I was seeing, when Revik let out a held breath. Taking my hand, he lifted it to his lips and kissed my palm, sending a denser, more deliberate thread of love through my light––coupled with a heated relief that I was okay.
Both things came through strong enough to cut my breath.
“Okay,” he said, loosening his hold on me. “Okay, wife.”
He kissed me, and I felt another shiver of his pain.
“Okay,” he repeated, smiling at me.
Funnily enough, that time, I think he was trying to reassure me.
I followed as he turned, walking us both to the club’s door. He never once let go of me as we made our way outside, and then I was looking
at a gold and red sunset, shimmering on the glass buildings, and on the windshield of the black limousine that waited for us on the curb.
Gazing into the warm light of the fading sun, I knew, somehow, that things were about to change for us again––and not only for me and Revik.
55
THE WATERFRONT
TERIAN DIDN’T TAKE us back to the Burj Khalifa.
I saw the glass and steel spire through the window in the distance, but we drove past it, directly towards the Gulf. His driver aimed the limousine for the densest part of the walled shields that surrounded the city.
My mind recalled the maps we’d gotten from Vik and Dante’s satellite hacks. I knew the OBE fields that lived on this part of the water were new, deadly, and highly complex. Given how well the organic generators were protected on shore, I wasn’t sure we’d get out that way even if Revik went full-bore with the telekinesis.
In other words, we were about as far from a true exit as we could possibly be right now.
I tried to keep the worry out of my aleimi, even as the physical lights of ships and smaller recreational boats grew closer and more numerous.
We ended up at The Waterfront, an exclusive stretch of man-made land, connected by an elaborate series of canals that wound around a curved jetty shaped as a crescent moon.
I remembered that from our planning sessions, too.
While we pored over maps during strategy meetings on the carrier, Revik showed me how this segment of the city could be seen as the crescent moon and star, visible all the way from space. Loki showed me the same symbol on the inside of his arm in black seer’s ink––the same arm where he wore the sword and sun symbol on the outside.
Not knowing Loki very well, I didn’t ask.
Wreg volunteered later that the Rebels first recruited Loki in Afghanistan, where he’d been fighting in wars for decades, alongside both humans and seers. That was after Loki apparently spent a few decades meditating in caves out in the Afghani desert.
I couldn’t help being curious about that, and, more to the point, curious how Gina was coping with some of this stuff, as she learned about her new boyfriend. Being involved with a seer so much older than her was probably weird enough––and Loki wasn’t exactly your run-of-the-mill seer. If I had to guess, telling his new girlfriend he’d once belonged to a group of seer terrorists plotting to take down the human race under Revik probably wasn’t high on Loki’s list of confessions, either.
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