“Allie,” he said. “What is it going to take to get you to stay?”
I blinked a little, fighting to keep my expression still.
“What?” I said.
He smiled, but it didn’t touch his eyes. The intensity there grew more and more unnerving.
“The question was pretty clear,” he said. “And forget the Salinse stuff. Don’t use that as your excuse, please.” Hesitating, he continued to gauge my face. “What do you want from me, Allie? What would I need to do, for you to stay with me?”
Again I stared at him, at a loss.
“Have I said I’m leaving?” I said. “What makes you think you need to do anything?”
His eyes narrowed. I felt my nerves rise when he scanned my light overtly, then focused back on my face.
“Allie, you’re not acting like someone who’s staying,” he said. “You haven’t since you got here. You act like someone who’s on a temporary pass...”
“A temporary pass?” I said, aware suddenly I was repeating half of his words back at him. I heard nerves in my voice. “Revik, jesus—”
“You know what I mean.” His jaw tightened a little. “What do you want from me? Or is it not something I can fix, in your eyes?”
When I just stood there, staring at him, he looked away. I saw emotion color his face, and had to fight not to react when his eyes returned to mine. His gaze grew intense again, and it struck me suddenly that those were almost tears in his eyes.
Closing the gap between us, he stood in front of me.
His voice softened as he caressed my cheek with his fingers.
“Allie, please. Please. I can feel you pulling away from me. I don’t know if it’s Salinse...or what happened in Brazil...”
I shook my head, feeling my throat close. “Revik, no...I’m not.”
“I don’t know if I can handle us being apart,” he said. “...not after this. I’m willing to compromise a lot. Probably a lot more than you realize, wife. I’m willing to do just about anything to get you to stay...”
Pain wound through my light.
I couldn’t hide it from him. I closed my eyes, willing it to go before I tried to answer. It only seemed to get worse, though. My mind went places I hadn’t let it for weeks...even before we started planning for the trip to São Paolo.
Even before I’d seen him in that square in Beijing.
“Allie...” He laid a hand on my arm, gripping it almost tightly. “Please,” he said, his voice quieter. “What if I put you in charge? What if you made all the decisions about what we did or didn’t do?”
I stared up at him. I’m sure my shock showed on my face.
He gestured at the others in the hangar. “They wouldn’t mind. Hell, they’re probably expecting it. You would have control over the construct...no one could fuck with you in it, I promise.” He caressed my cheek. “Allie, I know you don’t believe in the Myth...but they do. They expect the Bridge to lead them. They expect me to do as you say.”
I continued to stare at him, still sure I wasn’t hearing him right.
“...The ban would be permanent then,” he said. “All the missions would go through you...means and ends. I’d work for you, Allie.”
“Revik...” I stared at him, at a loss. “Are you talking about combining operations?”
He hesitated. Then he shook his head, clicking softly.
“They won’t acknowledge the authority of the Seven here, Allie...” His jaw tightened, enough to push out his cheek. “...Or the Adhipan. It’s too late for that.”
“But what does that mean? That I can’t consult with Vash or the others?”
Revik shook his head. “I didn’t say that—”
“So what, then?” I said, hearing my voice tense. “I’d need to defer to Salinse?”
“No,” he growled. “I just told you, no. If he really has a problem with you, I’m leaving.” He hesitated. “But I honestly don’t think he does, Allie...”
I shook my head again, gripping his arm. “That’s not what I meant...not exactly.” I met his gaze directly. “What about the Dreng, Revik?”
His expression tightened a little.
I saw him looking between my eyes, as if trying to think around my words. Finally he sighed, clicking a little. He stepped back, running his fingers through his black hair. I watched as he pulled the velcro end of the strap from his wrist, unwrapping one of the long, cotton wraps from around his hand.
He didn’t look up as he spoke. He didn’t meet my gaze.
“Allie, they’re providing a lot of resources,” he said. “Resources we frankly wouldn’t have, if we refused their help. They haven’t interfered—”
“Interfered?” I gave a short laugh. “Why would they? You’ve done everything they’ve asked you to do...and more, really.”
He glanced up from where he’d started unwrapping his other hand.
His jaw tightened more. Then he shrugged again.
“You didn’t use them for your shield...” he said. Seeing my blank look, he elaborated. “...In São Paulo, Allie. During the Registry job. You disengaged the Dreng’s shield. You used your own. They didn’t interfere...”
I gave another humorless laugh.
“Of course they didn’t,” I said. “They’re trying to woo me right now...as much if not more than you are. They won’t refuse me anything right now...”
“Alyson...” he said.
“What...do you think I’m an idiot?” I heard emotion thicken my voice. I went on anyway, before I could slow myself down. “...Or do you really not get how this works? So you’d be my second in command, right? And you know damned well I’m going to try and help other seers...especially after what I saw in Brazil.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing, Allie,” he said.
My jaw hardened, even as I felt another sharp wave of pain.
“So how long, Revik?” I said. “How long before I hear, ‘well, they’ve improved this shield, Allie...we’ll just try it this one time, for this one op.’ And then you’ll want me hooked into their construct, drinking the same damned Kool-Aid. There’ll always be some tactical reason, of course. Some reason I have to do it their way, for my safety...or better yet, the safety of some poor innocent who’ll die if I don’t...or get beaten, or tortured, or killed. There’ll always be some reason I can’t just do it myself...that we have to cut corners...”
“Allie!” he growled.
“You’ve known all along, it would come to this!” I said. “Damn it, Revik...you’ve known! You want to know what you need to do to get me to stay? Swear off the fucking Dreng! Try helping your people without a crutch for once. Without some fucked up ‘patron’ that’s only using you for their own twisted agenda...”
He stared at me.
I found myself swallowing a little, and realized I hadn’t been holding back anything when I’d said that.
I’d spoken to him like I would have spoken to the old Revik.
For the first time in months, I could hear the difference in my voice.
I felt him hear the difference too. I felt him thinking about it then, putting it together with how I’d sounded at other times.
“Why haven’t you said this before?” he said finally.
“I didn’t think I had to!”
“You didn’t?” His jaw hardened further. “What the fuck do you think I’m doing here, Allie? What did you think I wanted to happen at the end of the six months? I’m trying to build a goddamned marriage! I’m trying to make things work with us!”
His lips pressed together, as if stopping him from saying something else.
I felt him struggle for a moment before he turned away, gesturing vaguely.
“...You tell me now, after all this time, that this is what matters to you?”
“You’ve known this mattered to me!”
“Bullshit!” Pain rippled off him.
I stared at him. Seeing the look in his eyes, I felt a whisper of fear. Understanding deepened around him, even a
s I felt him fighting it, fighting what he was seeing now as he looked at me.
“You’ve been lying to me!” he said. “How much, Allie? How big has the lie been? You didn’t mean to say that just now...did you?”
I could only stare at him, feeling my heart beat harder in my chest.
“I never meant to lie to you, Revik...”
“But you didn’t mean to tell me everything either, did you, wife? You didn’t mean to tell me what you said just now...” His voice turned harsh over the emotion I heard under it. “I can see it on your face, Alyson...you were going to go along with whatever I said, weren’t you? What was going to be the next thing? Where we lived? If your friends could come to stay here, too? What was the next step in yanking me around?”
I felt my stomach go cold, looking at him.
How had I not seen it? Salinse had said something to him. He’d noticed something, and he’d planted some seed in Revik’s mind. Gods. How had I not seen it? He’d been different since that morning. I’d known it, but I hadn’t wanted to know.
Silver light flickered around his, turning his aleimi hard. Looking at him now, I remembered him in Delhi, and his heart felt just as far away from me now as it had then. He felt lost to me again, unreachable, and as I looked at his face, I felt my throat close, even as I saw understanding reach his eyes...as I felt it filter down into his light.
“Gods,” he said. “I’m a fool...”
“Revik, no,” I said. “Jesus. What are you saying right now? Do you really think, with everything that’s happened—”
“Did you even intend for things to work with us, Allie? Or was this just a way to distract me for a few months? Are you fucking infiltrating me right now, wife? Collecting data for your boyfriend in the Adhipan?”
I felt my chest tighten. “Revik—”
“And whose fucking ideology is this anyway, Allie? Is it yours? Really?”
He was breathing harder. I saw the light in his eyes flicker into a pale life.
I felt pain on him too, and flinched back, without taking my eyes off his face. I was still staring at him when he took a step towards me. He loomed over me before I could step away. I saw him fight to control himself...just before he folded his arms, staring down at me. If anything, he looked even angrier.
“You said you were confused about the ideology, Allie. I believed you, I really did.” His throat moved again. “Was that a lie, too? Are you as brainwashed as you accuse me of being? Because I wasn’t lying to you...”
“Revik, I honestly don’t know what you mean...”
“Is this more Seven bullshit? What Vash and my aunt told you to believe?”
His eyes turned to glass, even as his pain hit at me again.
“Or is this what your precious Balidor taught you, while you were fucking him in that cave?” he said. “Because I thought you had your own mind, Allie. I thought you wouldn’t be so easy to manipulate...”
“You taught me this!” I hit him in the chest, hard, with the palm of my hand. “You did, goddamn it!”
Revik stumbled back a step, staring at me.
His eyes looked openly startled.
I felt others in the room turn at my raised voice, but I no longer cared.
“I learned this from you, Revik! Or had you forgotten that you weren’t always a spineless pawn of the Dreng?” I hit him again, harder, fighting tears. He stepped back, but didn’t get out of my way. “What is it really, Revik? Is it the money? The fancy organic equipment? The hordes of followers? Are you afraid you might lose the war without all of your toys and your private fucking jet?”
He stared at me, his eyes stunned.
I felt my chest tighten, like a block of ice sitting there had started to melt, for the first time in months. But instead of warmth there, I felt heat, an anger I could barely see past...and more pain than I could swallow.
“You fucking left me!” I snarled. “You left me for the goddamned Dreng! You put me through that...shit...in D.C. I didn’t even know if you were alive afterwards...I didn’t know if you got out of there before they bombed it, or if you died with Terian in that bunker. I waited for you outside the White House until they drugged me and forced me to leave! And I still didn’t know what happened to you! Not until you showed up in the Pamir, wanting sex, of course...”
Tears spilled down my cheeks, but my voice came out harsh.
“...Then you leave again...for months...only to show up in Delhi...like all’s okay, like you’re the same guy...like we’re having ‘political differences.’ Meanwhile, half the reason you seduced me that time was so I wouldn’t get in the way of your revenge fantasy bullshit...”
I fought to breathe, feeling that thing in my chest burn, like it might rip me apart. I bit my tongue so hard I tasted blood.
“Gods, Revik! What the hell did you think? Did you think you could switch sides and I’d just jump over the line with you? I fell in love with you when you were fighting the Dreng! When you hated everything they stood for! Do you remember what you told me, when I first asked you who the Rooks were? You said they were the enemy! Those were your exact words! Now you’re fucking working for them? Tell me...how does that happen? Explain that to me!”
I fought to breathe, tears still running down my face.
I tried briefly to stop them, to hold back what had been sitting in me for months now, for what felt like more time than I’d wanted to be alive in that past year since D.C. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t even make myself want to.
Words came out of me before I could stop them.
“You asked me if I loved Balidor,” I said.
“No,” he said. He held up a hand. “Allie...don’t.” His eyes met mine, and I saw a heat there, more pain than I could take in. “Alyson. Don’t. Don’t fucking say it—”
“I do love him,” I said, my voice breaking. “You know what I loved about him? He reminded me of you, goddamn it! He reminded me of who you used to be! It was the closest I could get...to being with you how you were before.”
His pain rippled out at me. For an instant, it nearly crushed me.
I bit my lip, averting my eyes from the expression on his face.
“I still love you more, Revik,” I said. “Even now, I love you more. More than I could ever love him or anyone else. More than I can possibly tell you...more than you’ll ever believe, especially now. I want things to work with us, so badly it hurts. So much, the rest of them told me I was completely deluded, when I said I wanted to try and get you out of here...”
I swallowed, feeling another hard pulse off his light.
“...away from these fucking assholes who tortured you as a kid...”
He stared at me, still putting things together as I spoke.
“...So much that I was willing to lie to you,” I said. “For months, Revik. Just to get close enough to you to see if you might remember who you used to be...”
I fought back another wave of pain, shaking my head.
”...But I can’t be with you like this,” I said. “I can’t. The old Revik would have known. The old Revik would have killed me before letting me come back to you, the way you are now...”
I felt my throat close, but I held his gaze.
“...Just like Balidor said he would,” I finished.
Revik’s face was a mask. He stared at the floor, his eyes glowing points in a countenance that looked like marble.
I felt pain there...but it wasn’t just pain. The boy lived there...and the man, too. Every betrayal, every person he’d loved who’d ever turned on him, who’d been someone other than who he’d told himself they were. Everyone to whom he’d ever given his trust.
Menlim. His wife, Elise. Galaith. Vash. Tarsi. Balidor.
Light pulsed off him. It expanded over me like heat, like the dry air from a hotly burning fire...crackling over my skin, vibrating the blood in my veins. I felt so much emotion off that single pulse that I couldn’t let most of it in. Hatred, but more than that. A kind of despairing grief, like I�
�d died...like I’d become someone else to him.
It crossed my mind for that split second that I was dead.
Revik’s eyes met mine, more devoid of feeling than I’d ever seen them.
Then, right as I felt the heat around him brighten, he turned.
Dropping the hand wraps on the mat, he walked out of the ring. He didn’t stop walking, aiming for the metal door in the wall before I could make my feet move, before I could utter a single sound. The door opened, and closed with a hollow clang.
I found myself standing there, alone, breathing so hard I was nearly hyperventilating. I clutched my chest with one hand as I fought to breathe, to control my mind.
I felt the other seers in the hangar staring at me, their minds and aleimi totally still, almost invisible...but I couldn’t move.
I felt like something in me had broken. I felt like something in me had died.
I could only stand there, clutching my chest, waiting for it to be over.
It wouldn’t be long now, I knew.
30
ENDPOINT
JON WAITED ON the other end of the line.
Holding the old-fashioned receiver to his ear, he cleared his throat, fidgeting with the twisting black cord and its rotary dial. He’d seen phones like this of course, in antique stores in San Francisco. For awhile it had been the vogue thing, to convert these old dinosaurs so they could house a wireless queueing console inside the old-style receiver.
But San Francisco had always liked holding onto stylish remnants of the past.
When the receiver got picked up on the other end, he nearly jumped. The voice alone was enough to throw him, even through the tinny connection.
“Yes? Who is this?”
Jon hesitated, though there was no question as to who had spoken.
“Revik?” he said. “Is that you, man?”
There was a silence.
“What do you want, Jon?”
“I wondered if I could talk to Allie.” Jon hesitated again, thrown in spite of himself. He contemplated not saying it, then said it anyway.
“Are you okay, Revik? What’s wrong?”
For a second, he thought the seer might answer.
Allie's War Season Two Page 50