Of course, by now, it also related to concerns around Chinese national security.
From what Balidor told me, the average Chinese person understood seers far better than the average human from the United States...or even India, where large numbers of seers also had been living alongside humans, pretty much since first contact. For years, the Chinese had the only human population that mingled freely and on a near-equal footing with seers and their culture. Yet the Chinese seers also remained strangely protected, even isolated under the system that grew around their quasi-religious status.
It made sense that Balidor would bring us here, I thought. It was about the only place left that Revik might actually be cautious about approaching.
“It is true,” Vash said, in response to my thoughts. “...The Chinese are less naive about seers. And the Lao Hu, of course, are quite powerful infiltrators.”
He smiled, bowing respectfully to the female, Voi Pai.
“...It makes them slightly paranoid about your presence here, Alyson,” Vash added somewhat apologetically, although I wasn’t sure to whom. “They know that where the Bridge goes...divisiveness follows.” He smiled wider, winking at me as he glanced at Voi Pai. “They are a little wary of my presence here, as well, if it reassures you...”
The female seer folded elegant arms in front of the indigo dress. Without taking her eyes off me, she gave an articulate sniff at Vash’s words.
“No,” she said, her eyes still boring into mine. “It is this one we fear, old man. Not you.”
I flinched a little at the lack of respect she showed Vash. But I held her gaze, feeling her push at me, trying to see how I would react.
Tightening my light around myself, I smiled at her.
“I mean you no harm,” I said, gesturing respectfully.
Voi Pai smiled. “Maybe not, Esteemed One. But you have already made us very visible. Too visible, in my opinion...I have my people to think of.”
She paused, looking at Vash once more, her voice and eyes hard.
“She brings Death to us, old man.”
Vash purred, holding out his hands in a gesture I recognized as a seer apology. Clearly, her informality didn’t bother him. But then, not much bothered Vash, really.
“Death,” I muttered. I studied her gaze. “I take it you mean that literally, sister? You’re not being poetic?”
“Why did you come here?” she said.
I raised an eyebrow, combing my long, rather greasy hair out of my face with my fingers. Looking down at my body without the sheet, it occurred to me that I wore nothing but a white silk shirt and a pair of boxer shorts. I still found it uncomfortable to look at my legs and arms, with how thin they were. I’d need to do something about that, and soon.
“Didn’t Vash tell you?” I said to her.
“I wish to hear the reasons from you...if it pleases, Esteemed One.”
I hesitated, then gestured apologetically. “I was asleep, I’m afraid. I did not make the decisions for this leg of our journey.”
“Who did?”
“If I was asleep, honorable Voi Pai, then how would I know that, either?”
Vash smiled at this, clicking somewhat humorously.
Voi Pai, however, did not appear amused. Her eyes narrowed further.
It occurred to me again that she almost looked like a statue, with her flawless pale skin and that black hair swept up above an athletically thin but voluptuous body. She reminded me of a Chinese version of Ullysa, an infiltrator and prostitute Revik had befriended during his years watching over me in the United States. But that comparison wasn’t quite right, either. Voi Pai’s whole being exuded power, whereas Ullysa’s had exuded a kind of calm repose. That same power in Voi Pai’s light made her difficult to look away from, and intimidatingly beautiful, even without the silk dress and dramatic make up.
She quirked her lips at me, but her eyes only hardened more.
“Do not tempt me, Bridge,” she said. “...Only a fool would lie with the mate of Syrimne d’Gaos.”
Her eyes drifted out the door to my right, where I glimpsed the overhanging trees of a sculpture-filled garden. I saw flowers there too, what looked like cherry blossoms. Inhaling deeply, I realized I could even smell them.
Replaying her words, I smiled in spite of myself.
“I wasn’t asking,” I said.
The woman frowned again, her yellow eyes locked on mine.
After another pause, she looked away, clicking softly to herself as her eyes roved over the room’s walls. Even the way she clicked at me seemed to carry an accent. She gestured fluidly with one hand, a sign of respect.
Her words carried less respect.
“Why don’t you run along now, little Bridge?” she said. “We honor you, but we do not want you here. Go back to your mate...reassure him for awhile until he stops making war with us...”
I swallowed, looking from her stone-smooth face back to Vash.
“Is that a possibility?” I said to him in English.
“Do you want it to be, Alyson?” the old seer asked.
“I meant,” I said, feeling my jaw harden. “Is he here? Revik?”
“He will be, soon enough, I’m sure,” another voice said.
I turned my head, found myself looking at Balidor.
“...especially with the way you’re constantly telling him where you are with your light whenever you wake...” he finished, giving me a wry smile.
Humor stood in his eyes, but it struck me as a mask. Beneath it, he looked exhausted. His gray eyes appeared clouded, and he had at least two days’ growth of gray and blond-streaked beard. Beneath it, his chiseled face looked thinner than I remembered...and older, too.
He entered through the same open door to the garden where I had been gazing out at the cherry blossoms only seconds before. He wore a black cotton outfit that also looked vaguely Chinese, but positively Western compared to Voi Pai’s get-up. It reminded me more of the formal costume of the Adhipan, which I’d only really seen worn in sims and through Barrier glimpses at the past I’d witnessed in the Pamir.
Behind Balidor stood Dorje, Jon and Cass. Baguen stood behind them, too, looking even larger inside the carved wooden doorway, with the light from the gardens against his broad back.
“...do you wish us all dead that much?” Balidor added, raising an eyebrow at me. “Or is it only me you’d like to see in such a state?”
I rolled my eyes at him, but I didn’t look at him long. I could feel Revik around me again, although the collar seemed to block most of his light again, mysteriously.
Glancing for only a hair’s breadth at Balidor, I wondered how much of that had to do with him as well.
When I looked back at the woman, I saw her scrutiny trained unmistakably on Balidor. She measured him with her eyes, the same way she had me minutes before. Then she looked between the Adhipan leader and me, and smiled without humor.
“As I said,” she murmured. “Only a fool...”
Her eyes stayed on Balidor a beat longer, then swiveled back to me.
Refolding her arms, she stepped closer to where I lay.
“He is angry, your Death,” she said, her voice matter-of-fact. She looked back at Balidor. “...Especially at you.” She smiled a little, her voice turning coy. “What did you do to make him so angry, Adhipan leader?”
“He shot me,” I said.
Voi Pai smiled wider. She looked again at Balidor, then back at me.
“Is this true?”
I nodded, wincing a little as I straightened up more.
“He shot me in a good way though...right, ‘Dori?”
Balidor’s eyes relaxed. His smile seemed almost genuine.
“It was very well intended, Esteemed Bridge,” he agreed.
“You see?” I told the woman. “One big happy family.”
Voi Pai continued to hold my gaze. I felt her light coil briefly around mine, but didn’t get even a whisper of her thoughts in that rather overly-intimate pass through my al
eimi. Something told me I wouldn’t have gotten much even without the collar.
I was still trying to decide what to say to her, when I found myself staring at the woman walking up from behind her. My chest clenched. I felt Revik react as I grasped the side of the bedposts, gesturing towards Balidor.
“Gun,” I said to him. I stared at the approaching female, backing into the wooden headrest. “Gun, Balidor!”
“They do not let me carry in here, Alyson!” he said.
But I couldn’t take my eyes off the new woman’s face.
Elan Raven stood next to Voi Pai, her striking, turquoise-blue eyes boring into mine. The last time I’d seen those eyes, I’d been in a cage in the basement of the White House, naked and beaten bloody by one of Terian’s bodies, who’d decided to rape me to teach me a lesson after I’d defied him. I stared up at that angular face, and felt my chest clench again, remembering her staring at me with that same expression through the bars of the organic cage.
Revik’s attempts to reach me grew more urgent.
“What is she doing here?” I demanded of Voi Pai, my eyes still on Raven.
Voi Pai looked at Raven, too, then smiled.
“She is my guest, Esteemed Bridge,” she purred liquidly. “...And my cousin. There is no message here, in terms of your safety. She will not harm you...”
At her openly scornful tone, I felt my jolt of fear bleed into something closer to rage. I sat up taller in the cushions, gripping the wooden walls of the bed, my jaw hard.
“And if I asked you to kill your cousin, devoted Voi Pai of the Lao Hu,” I said evenly, still staring at Raven. “...As a favor to the Bridge, one of your intermediaries...would you comply?”
“Al!” Jon said, his voice shocked.
I turned on him, switching to English. “This bitch watched Terian rape me, Jon. She watched me bleed on the floor of a metal cage for hours...and lied about it to the boy to save her own ass. I almost died. I probably would have died, if Nenzi hadn’t come along when he did...”
Jon didn’t at first seem to have an answer for that. He looked at Raven, then back at me.
“Oh,” he said.
Raven glanced at Balidor, and at the seers from the Adhipan who had moved closer from the garden. She studied their faces, one by one, with narrow eyes...then looked back at Balidor, who she seemed to recognize.
I saw fear in her eyes, as she looked at him.
Balidor’s face looked guarded now too. He had taken a few steps closer to the bed, so that he stood between Raven and I.
“Do I have no authority here?” I asked the Lao Hu leader.
Voi Pai studied me clinically, her yellow eyes holding more interest now. Not surprisingly, I seemed to have gone up some in her estimation once I started ordering beheadings.
Raven startled me then. She bowed to me deeply, falling to one knee.
“...I humbly apologize for my hand in your captivity, Bridge Alyson,” she said. Her voice trembled, enough that I almost believed it. “My loyalties at the time may have been misguided...but I assure you, I meant only the best for the Bridge and her mission here. I thought it was advantageous for you to mate with the boy, and you seemed unwilling to do so...”
Her turquoise eyes looked down the length of my body.
Panicking at my hard glare, she looked up at Voi Pai once more, as if for help, and I saw from her eyes that it wasn’t all an act. I’d actually managed to scare her with my threat.
“...Whatever I can do to make amends, Bridge Alyson...I will gladly pay any compensation you deem appropriate. I will do anything, wait on you...serve you...”
“Where is Maygar?” I said.
Balidor and the others looked at me in surprise, and I felt my jaw harden.
I hadn’t told them everything that had happened in D.C. For one thing, I’d been fairly certain Revik wouldn’t be the only one who wanted Maygar dead after they knew he’d been a party to my captivity there.
“Maygar, Esteemed one?” Raven said.
My jaw hardened further.
“...I apologize, Bridge Alyson,” she amended swiftly. “My son is no longer in China, Esteemed One. I meant only to protect him...”
“Where is he?” I said.
“New York City, Esteemed Bridge,” Raven said promptly.
I nodded, folding my arms, then wincing when the position pulled at the half-healed scar of the gunshot wound on my back. Unfolding them more carefully, I placed them again at my sides, feeling like a bird with clipped wings as I stared down at them.
“You are staying then?” Voi Pai asked me, her eyes wary.
When I looked up at her, frowning, she made the respectful gesture again, the one reserved for holy sages, or members of the Council.
“...You are of course welcome to stay, Bridge Alyson,” she said politely, although I heard something else altogether in her tone. “...For as long as you desire.”
I glanced at Balidor. He quirked an eyebrow at me in return, but I saw the humor in his eyes. It struck me that he found it funny that I’d finally realized I had authority over these people.
I considered demanding a turkey pot pie, just to throw my weight around a bit, but instead, I felt exhaustion wash over me.
“Yes,” I said, my voice subdued. “We are staying. For a short time at least. I thank you for your hospitality.” Gesturing to her in the formal seer hand motion, I looked again at Raven. “She may live...for now. I will not tolerate her in any room in which I am again...for as long as I am here. Not unless I specifically ask for her,” I added, thinking I might want to question her some more. Thinking about this further, I added,
“...And she cannot sleep within this construct. She must go, for as long as I am here. I don’t care where, as long as it’s away from me and my people.”
Raven’s eyes flashed with relief.
It occurred to me again, that she really had thought I would kill her.
“Yes, Bridge Alyson,” Voi Pai murmured. She bowed to me, then looked at Raven, indicating with her hand for her to leave.
I watched Raven slink quickly out of the room. She glanced again at Balidor as she left, her eyes nervous, but Balidor only mirrored my warning stare.
Once she was gone, he glanced at me, nodding in understanding at my look.
He would make sure she didn’t come back.
I saw the question there though, and knew I wasn’t off the hook for the Maygar thing. He would want to have a little chat with me about that, once we were alone.
“I need to sleep,” I said, a little louder than necessary.
Voi Pai glanced at Vash, who also had a glimmer of humor in his eyes. Clearly this woman wasn’t used to being told what to do in her own home.
But hell, she kind of forced my hand.
As if hearing me, Vash winked at me. Then he answered Voi Pai’s silent question with a shrug, seer-fashion, indicating with a nod that she should look to me for clarification, instead of him. She turned to face me once more, a smile plastered stiffly on her face.
“Yes, Bridge Alyson,” she said.
I watched as she withdrew from the room.
Patting my arm gently through the hole in the bed’s square frame, Balidor chuckled a little out loud before he turned to leave as well. Jon followed, shaking his head at me, and Cass and Baguen followed them, leaving only Vash.
“Do you require anything of me, Bridge Alyson?” he asked humorously.
“Thank you,” I mouthed at him, exhaling in a sigh before I let myself collapse back on the mountain of silk pillows.
Smiling, he bowed, and removed himself from my presence.
Curling up on the thick mattress, I closed my eyes.
I didn’t have long to wait.
Within seconds, he slid around me again, wanting to know what he had missed. I told him, as best as I could through the collar, wincing a little as the restraint charge off and on kicked in, paralyzing my light before I could finish articulating whatever it was. I felt glimmers off him,
humor at my standing up to Voi Pai and a brief flush of anger at Raven...personal enough that I realized he knew her somehow. I felt a pang of jealousy before I understood the cause; I couldn’t hear his response when he sent some form of reassurance.
More flashes of frustration came off him when he couldn’t see what I described, when he wanted to know more about my location...
I also felt wanting there, a thick pull that was starting to affect me again, even without the stress of what had just happened.
When it intensified, I let him feel how badly it hurt.
His light flinched against mine. He seemed startled at first, maybe at my openness...then his light slid around me once more, trying to reach me in rising flushes of heat. It crossed my mind to be nervous that he could feel me so clearly. Given where I was, in the stronghold of the Lao Hu, he shouldn’t be able to get near me at all.
His light grew cautious, and I realized he’d felt that, too.
“You’re coming, aren’t you?” I murmured.
Soon, I felt him murmur.
Where are you?
Silence. His light remained warm though, close.
Please don’t kill my friends. Please, Revik. I know you’re angry...
I felt more whispers off him...images of Jon, of Cass. I saw Jon’s face, angry, yelling at Balidor, and realized Revik was showing me how he knew that neither of my childhood friends had been privy to the Adhipan’s plan. He knew Jon and Cass had been in the dark, thinking I was dead, too. I nodded to myself, but still felt nervous.
He’d left a lot of names off that list.
Even so, I wanted him there. I couldn’t even pretend anymore that I didn’t.
Emotion curled around me as I felt him react to that, too.
Laying my head back on the pillow, I closed my eyes. As my body started to unclench, I was caught off guard by a stronger wave of longing, so dense it caught in my throat, tightening my hands, then my jaw. I realized that it had come from me, my own light.
I felt him react again...another near flinch.
Then a flood of liquid heat swam over me.
The tug carried so much it left me panting on my back, my skin flushed hot. His emotion swam through me, love that clenched my chest, nearly made me forget where I was. I pulled on him for real, and felt the want on him worsen, until he was fighting to get past the collar when it kicked in, bringing a different kind of pain into my light.
Allie's War Season Two Page 24