I am back to staring at him, fighting to make sense of what he’s telling me.
“Leave the country,” I said, numb.
“Of course. We can’t stay here.”
His voice is so matter of fact, I can’t think of a response.
He went on in a measured voice. “As to what the Bridge is, that will be explained to you, as well. I am perhaps not the best-qualified person to do so. In short, however, we believe you to be the reincarnation of a being that appears within the seer pantheon.” Glancing at me, he narrowed his gaze, then adjusted his words. “Well. Not precisely a pantheon. Not in the human sense. It’s not believed you are a ‘god,’ per se. You are instead seen as the reincarnation of a particular light frequency, or impulse, only in a manifested form––”
“What?” I blinked, shaking my head at him. “What?”
Exhaling, he shook his own head. His words and speech-patterns grew oddly academic-sounding, as if he were teaching a class on seer mythology.
“As I said, I am perhaps not the best person to explain this,” he said, his voice subdued. “The bottom line is, you are important to seers. You were hidden among humans for that reason. You are a being who only incarnates on Earth prior to a major shift in the historical timeline. Your arrival here signals that this change is coming. You are seen as one who would help facilitate that change.” Still thinking, he shrugged. “…or, possibly, cause it, depending on which interpretation of the myths you favor––”
“What is your name?” I cut in.
He glanced at me, startled. Then he frowned.
“Dehgoies,” he said. “Revik.”
“Your name is Dego-ees?” I pronounced the strange name slowly. After another second, my brow cleared. “Revi’. That man called you Revi’. That’s short for Revik?”
He nodded, once. “It is my given name. In seer naming conventions, the family name comes first. That other seer is called Terian.”
“Terry,” I said. “Short for Terian.”
“Correct.”
“That’s a pretty chummy way to refer to a guy who’s threatening your life, isn’t it?” I said. “Were you two friends? Ex-boyfriends? What?”
The man turned to stare at me, frowning. He shook his head, but not in a no. Instead, he exuded irritation once more. “In a manner of speaking, yes, we were friends. Colleagues, as well. We aren’t now.”
“That’s the second time you’ve done that,” I said.
He looked at me. “Done what?”
“Referred to him in the present tense,” I said. “You killed him, right? Why do you keep talking about him as if he’s still alive?”
The black-haired man frowned. “That’s complicated, Alyson.”
“So he’s still alive?”
“Yes.”
I pursed my lips, wanting to know how he could possibly know that. After a few more seconds where he didn’t elaborate, I shook it off.
“All right. We’ll come back to that, Degho-ees––”
“Revik,” he said, giving me a look. “I just told you. Dehgoies is my family name.”
Staring at him, I bit my lip, clasping my cuffed hands together. I could feel the part of me that wanted to go off on him. I wanted to yell at him. Truthfully, I wanted to do a lot more than that, but I knew that wasn’t exactly going to help my situation, either.
I forced myself to stay silent, but only just.
As if feeling that, too, the man exhaled, leaning back in his seat.
“As I said, the elders are better equipped to talk to you about the spiritual aspects of your role here.” Running a hand through his black hair, he gave me a sideways glance, his mouth grim. “My purpose is simpler. I am to bring you to them. Alive. There are things you need to understand, to better help me accomplish that. The news feeds are not…” He tilted his head, making another vague gesture with one hand. “…accurate. Particularly in terms of their portrayal of relations between humans and seers.”
Once more, he sounded more like a professor than a criminal.
The contradictions were odd enough to frustrate me. I wanted to categorize him, and I couldn’t. Not really.
He resumed in that same lecturing tone.
“Further,” he added stiffly. “Seers are not a single, unified entity. That seer in the diner. Terian. He represents a different faction than I.”
I let out a humorless snort.
Feeling him glance over, I swallowed, not looking away from the window.
He waited a beat, then appeared to shrug it off.
“It is in the interests of both human and seer governments to keep this more complex reality from civilians,” he continued. “There has long been a sort of ‘cold war’ happening between seers and humans on many levels.” As if feeling something from me, he glanced over, then shrugged off whatever he felt. “A trained infiltrator can eliminate their frequency from regular perception in the Barrier, mainly through blending with the lights that make up their environment…”
He glanced over, probably feeling he was losing me.
“…Anyway,” he continued, waving off his own words. “My point is, you will need to be trained. And educated in these things. I can perhaps help with the beginnings of that. It is certainly a more practical way to spend our time together.”
I clenched my jaw, but didn’t answer.
He glanced at me again, then cleared his throat.
“Free seers, meaning those who were not sold into slavery at birth or in childhood, or forced into it in some other way… we have only three real options.”
He went back to staring at the road, taking us precisely around a curve that hugged a steep cliff. As we passed, I stared at the streams of water running down the sides of the dark rock.
“Our first option is to live with traditional, religious seers in seclusion,” he continued. “It is not a bad life, but not all of our people are suited to it, just as not all humans would be. Our second option is to be contractually owned… to sell our sight to humans. This path provides us some freedoms, assuming one is skilled enough to get such a contract in the first place, and has an employer who is fair. But it is risky… a kind of voluntary slavery. And it is not open to all seers, depending on their sight rank.”
He adds, “The third option is to join the Rooks… or ‘the Org,’ as they call themselves. The Rooks are an underground network of seers with an anti-human agenda. Many of them have infiltrated human institutions. The seer you met, Terian, is one of these.”
I noticed he used the present tense again.
“I am also what is known as an infiltrator,” he added after another pause. “That means I am a seer trained to find things behind the Barrier. It is a trade. One that is learned, often at a young age. We work in various capacities in the human and seer worlds.”
“A spy?” I said, looking at him.
He frowned. I distinctly got the impression the term irritated him.
“A human equivalent might be espionage,” he said diplomatically after a beat. “It is how my human employer sees it, certainly. For Rook infiltrators, the designation of espionage is probably more accurate. They do not follow Code and operate under a quasi-military structure, as you see reflected in the spatial representation of their network of seers…”
Again seeming to feel he was losing me, he glanced in my direction.
“The Pyramid, Allie. We call their network the Pyramid.”
I stared at him. I felt the blood slide from my face.
Shrugging, he cleared his throat. “In your art, you have painted representations of the Pyramid, have you not?” He glanced at me, his voice still carefully polite. “Those depictions were quite accurate, as I recall. The fact that you saw so much about this is something that has been a bit of a curiosity among the elders of our kind… it is also another reason the decision was made to pull you out of hiding. There is some question as to whether you have some ability as a prescient. You were also drawing them with increasing frequency.”
Remembering that strange, hallucinatory pyramid image I’d seen over that seer, Terian’s, head, I felt my stomach do another flip. It bit my lip harder, still watching the scenery flash by through the window.
“So you have an employer?” I said, not looking over at him. “Where are they? And how are they letting you walk around without a collar?”
He turned, staring at me. After a pause, I turned, too.
That time, his colorless eyes were cold as ice.
Pausing a beat, he looked away. I could almost see him fighting to control his temper. His frown deepened, right before he went on in that more academic-sounding voice.
“Different permit levels and security designations exist for seers, Alyson,” he said, his voice noticeably colder. “I hold a classification above that of most seers you’ve seen discussed on the news feeds. Because of the kind of work I do, and for whom, I have virtually unlimited rights of assembly and travel, the ability to move freely without a collar. I can carry a gun, and––”
“What?” I stared at him. “You can carry a gun?”
He gave me an annoyed look. “I shot someone, Esteemed Bridge. Right in front of you.”
“Don’t call me that.” I grimaced. “I meant legally. You can legally carry a gun? How?”
He gave me another openly irritated look.
“There’s a lot about this world you don’t know, Esteemed Bridge,” he said, his voice polite on the surface, but colder underneath. “It’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
There was a silence.
In it, he went back to staring at the road.
“It would help,” he added, his voice even colder. “If you would make a conscious effort to remember that you are speaking of your own brothers and sisters when you talk about things like collaring and enslaving seers.” Another brief stare. “You might remember, as well, that you can no longer exclude yourself when talking about such things.”
Those glass-like eyes studied mine.
I frowned right back at him.
“So far,” I retorted. “The only person enslaving me is you.”
Shrugging, he made his voice more academic-sounding again.
“You should know, in our mythology, humans are the third race,” he said, focusing back on the road. “The first is Elaerian. The second Sarhacienne, or Sark, which is us… the name ‘Sarhacienne’ means ‘Second’ in the seer tongue. The third is human.” He glanced at me. “Each race is said to destroy its own civilization at a certain point in its evolutionary cycle, as a means of moving to the next level. Elaerian, the first race, no longer exist outside of the Barrier. It is said that we Sarhaciennes did not have sight before the Second Displacement.”
He paused again, giving me a narrow look, maybe to try and discern if I was listening.
“According to seer history, every race has risen in power, reach and technology until a critical period is entered in their development,” he continued in that deep voice. “There have been two Displacements so far… one Elaerian and one Sark. We believe a third Displacement is coming.” He looked at me. “A human one.”
Images hit at my mind at his words––sharp, shockingly clear.
In them, I see bombs falling. Storms rage on the sea.
A blue-white sun burns cold and bright over the Earth. A brilliant, silver sword intersects the middle of it, blinding me…
When that light fades, I see San Francisco in ruins. I see the White House empty of people, window frames blackened from fire, parts of the domed roof collapsed inward and missing, the white walls peppered with machine-gun holes. I gasp, gripping the chain holding my wrists together. Pain stabs at my chest. I fight to block it, to force the images from my mind.
Red starbursts flash behind my eyes, exploding over a dusty Asian city.
I let out another, sharper gasp––
––when warm fingers clasped my forearm.
“Hey.” He gripped me tighter when I turned.
I blinked up at him, unable to see him clearly at first. His face is strangely close to mine, those glass-like eyes watching me with a sharper scrutiny. For the first time, it hits me how intelligent he is. I can see it in those clear eyes. I can feel it on him; it’s like a tangible shimmer around his form.
He is lonely, though. He is almost painfully alone.
It hurts me, that aloneness.
“What is it?” His voice is sharp. “Are you all right?”
I can only shake my head.
He pulled on me more insistently with his fingers, nudging me with his mind to snap out of it, to come back to the present. When I did, his face clicked back into focus, its angular lines hard, almost predatory. That hardness didn’t seem aimed at me, but it made me reappraise him yet again, this time seeing him as dangerous. I noticed again how tall he was.
His head nearly scraped the roof of the car.
Still, I could see more than just anger there. I felt concern, visible behind his scowl.
“What the fuck was that?” he growled. “Don’t do that again.”
I blinked. The image of him righted once more.
“Do what?” I said. “What did I do?”
“Your light… aleimi…” he said, pronouncing the unfamiliar word carefully. “Your seer’s light. You did something with it just now. Whatever you did, it made your aleimi flare. A flare like that makes you visible inside the Barrier, even when you’re outside of it. You cannot do that right now. You cannot.”
His voice was stern, as if he were talking to a disobedient dog.
Again, I could only stare at him. How he thought I could have done something like that knowingly, much less on purpose, was totally beyond me.
He might have heard that, too.
Letting go of my arm, he put his hand back on the steering wheel, clicking softly with his tongue. When he returned his focus to his driving, his expression remained taut.
After another pause, he cleared his throat.
“The Rooks are undoubtedly looking for us,” he said, his voice subdued. “They will send many seers after us, Alyson. More than I could handle. When I asked you just now, to keep your light dim… it is this that worries me. Not anything you did, per se.” He glanced at me. That time, his voice bordered on apologetic. “Normally, such flares are perfectly fine. I did not mean to imply that you did anything wrong intentionally. I’m simply asking you to try and control such things, if you can, until we reach somewhere safe.”
Leaning against the car door, I frowned.
Turning over his words, I decided it wasn’t worth trying to argue the point, especially when he was obviously trying to meet me halfway. Instead, I found myself battling another wave of exhaustion. I closed my eyes, listening to the thrumming of the car’s engine.
“So they really want me dead?” I said. “These Rooks?”
When I opened my eyes, looking at him, he frowned.
“Yes.” Pausing, still watching my face, he made another of those tilted wing gestures with one hand. “Well. Dead… or with them.”
Remembering the Rook’s words in that diner, I nodded. I thought again about how well the two men seemed to know each other. It hadn’t only been their words, or the nicknames they’d used with one another. I could practically feel that connection between them.
“You worked for them, didn’t you?” I blurted. “The Rooks. You used to be one of them.”
Another silence.
He exhaled in a clicking sigh. “Yes.”
“Yet you still think it would be so terrible?” I said, my voice cautious. “To go with them? Obviously you left. You’re not dead.”
I practically felt his annoyance that time.
More than just annoyance. Other emotions lived there. Embarrassment. Confusion. A kind of conflicted frustration that told me the issue was likely complicated, and he didn’t wish to explain. I even felt something that might have been shame. Of course, I couldn’t be certain.
I couldn�
�t be certain if any of what I was felt was real.
“We should talk about this later, Alyson,” he said finally. “When we are somewhere safe.”
Glancing down at the rough bandage on his arm, I frowned, nodding.
“So what is a Rook?” I said. “Can you at least tell me that? Are they just renegade seers? One of the terrorist groups the news is always talking about?”
He looked at me, his pale eyes catching another slanting ray of light from the sun.
“They are the enemy,” he said simply.
6
TERIAN
THE CORPSE OF a man who died in his early twenties lay with artistic precision on a stainless steel table.
Clear tubes protruded from his throat, from veins in his arms, legs, his stomach. He was additionally fitted with several color-coded sets of electrodes that dotted patches of his bare skin, a computerized headband and the more conventional saline I.V. The organic-looking headband with its soft, skin-like texture blinked rhythmically; it was the only light not coming from one of the four monitors that dominated the walls of the bone-white room.
A technician adjusted settings on a rolling console beside the steel table, utilizing a standard interface and keyboard that projected data and findings to a portion of the organic-coated wall. Fluid coursing through the clear tubes disappeared into the same wall, changing color subtly soon after each adjustment the technician made. Electrodes on the corpse’s head flashed dark blue once the fluid stabilized, signaling that another piece of the organic end of the transfer had been completed.
Fogged pupils stared blindly at the ceiling, irises and whites the same milky gray. As the tubes carried the genetic virus to their host, the irises changed to an opaque yellow, the color of daffodils. Or strong urine, the technician thought.
Over time, that yellow began to brighten.
The skin looked different as well, not flushing with life exactly, not yet, but still somehow appearing less dead.
Rook (Bridge & Sword: Awakenings #1): Bridge & Sword World Page 6