Rook (Bridge & Sword: Awakenings #1): Bridge & Sword World

by JC Andrijeski

  The hard plastic had already cut into my skin. I tugged on the ring anyway, feeling the connecting points for how to unlock the plastic knot. I fumbled with the end, realized a key fit in there, albeit a small one.

  I opened the glove box, moving papers and the oil rag as quietly as I could, looking for something sharp. All I found was a broken pen that leaked ink, a used up book of matches and a condom so old the wrapper had cracked in the heat of the engine. I felt around under the seat, looking for anything that might saw through the thick plastic.

  “Does it hurt?”

  I jerked back, slamming my head into the open glove box lid. When I glanced up, rubbing my head, his pale eyes shone orange in the fading streetlights.

  “Did you have to scare the piss out of me?” I snapped.

  He didn’t answer, but leaned forward, reaching into his back pocket.

  My eyes followed his hands as he pulled out a rectangular piece of featureless, black metal. He unfolded the blade housed inside. Before I could fully absorb the reality of the knife, he bent to my ankles. Without warning, that pain and nausea leapt.

  Holding the plastic off my skin, he cut through it with a single tug.

  I was still reacting to the relief of that pressure being gone when he pulled off the hard coil, letting it drop to the floor of the car. Once he had, he traced the red line on my ankle with his finger. When he did, that pain in my chest surged, catching me off-guard.

  Swallowing, I looked away, forcing my eyes towards the window.

  “Is it all right?” His voice was gruff.

  “Yeah.” I drew my feet away from his fingers. “Thanks.”

  “I should have taken it off,” he said.

  “It’s fine. Forget it.”

  I watched him look at me.

  Studying his clear eyes, I couldn’t help remembering what he was.

  Even in early adolescence, one of the main stereotypes I’d heard about seers was that they had, well, issues with sex. Supposedly they were born with abnormally high sex drives. We were cautioned about that even in school, told that the males would rape or manipulate women into sleeping with them, that the females couldn’t say no, no matter who asked.

  I guess I always figured it was b.s., a way to scare girls off the males at least.

  Looking at him now, I wondered.

  There was definitely something weird about him, and my reactions to him. If that was his sexuality I was feeling, it came with an added component of some kind.

  Whatever that added component was, there seemed to be a lot of it.

  Averting his eyes, he sank back to his seat. After he refolded the knife and replaced it in his back pocket, he shoved his hand in his front pocket, extracting the keys.

  “Did you sleep?” I said. “Or were you faking before?”

  Ignoring me, he started the car, gunning it slightly to blow out the exhaust. “Are you hungry?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Can I call my mom?”

  The look in his eyes flattened. “No.”

  He put the car in gear. The wheels crunched through gravel and garbage as he drove to the edge of the parking lot. We bumped over the low curb as he pulled onto the road.

  “Where are we?” I said.

  “Washington.”

  I stared at him. “Washington? What happened to Oregon?”

  “You slept through most of Oregon. I took us to the main highway.”

  I gazed out at the gray-looking town, feeling my stomach start to cramp.

  “Why?” I said finally.

  “I’m more familiar with the cameras up here. And I wanted to make some time. There is a safe house in Seattle. I thought—”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head. “Why can’t I call my mother?”

  His fingers tightened on the steering wheel.

  “You must know of a safe way to make a call,” I said. “You seem like you know these things.” Remembering my dream, the fire-red mushroom clouds over the glass and steel structures, I swallowed. “Can’t I call her just once? Say goodbye?”

  He shook his head. “The Rooks will have infiltrators with your people by now.”

  It took a few seconds for his words to penetrate.

  Not seeming to notice my silence, he exhaled, clicking in a dull anger. “They will use them to gather imprints on you. To track you.” He pointed to a sign with missing marquee letters. “I could get us food there. It’s off the camera grid.”

  I was still staring at him. My mouth was open now, my mind turning in disbelief.

  “You said they’d let them go,” I said. “My brother. My mom. What do you mean the Rooks will be there? What does that mean for them? Are they safe?”

  He focused on a field beside the road, a stretch of waving grasses dotted with wildflowers. Cows grazed there, in the early morning light.

  “Revik!”

  My tone jerked his eyes over. His fingers tightened reflexively on the steering wheel.

  “What does that mean?” I said. “Are they going to hurt my mom? My friends?”

  After a flat beat of time, he looked back towards the window. Frowning, he glanced back at me, shifting the car into a higher gear.

  “We will eat later. This clearly isn’t a good time.”

  He turned onto the ramp for Highway 5 North. The Plymouth made a growling noise as he accelerated from the base of the hill.

  In my defense, I didn’t know I was going to do it.

  I didn’t plan it, which is probably why he didn’t look over until I already had my fingers on the handle of the car door.

  By the time he lunged, I was in mid-motion.

  My weight followed with a hard lurch as my fingers snapped the latch.

  His foot slipped on the clutch. He miscalculated where he aimed his hand as a result, snatching at the edge of my ripped shirt, getting the blanket instead. I slid off the seat and into cold, rushing air as the blanket unraveled around me…

  There was a silence.

  In it, I felt free, an odd rush of joy.

  Then my body smashed inelegantly into the ground.

  I hit, bounced, rolled, scraping arms and elbows and face as I tumbled down a rock and weed and garbage-strewn slope beneath the ramp.

  My cuffed wrists smacked against my chest, then my face. I finally used them to slow my fall, digging the metal rings into the dirt as I slid on my stomach, my legs partly splayed.

  Coughing gravel dust and dirt, I stumbled drunkenly to my feet at the bottom, my ankles still stinging from the plastic bindings. I still didn’t have a plan exactly. But that dream mixed with the thought of my mother being surrounded by terrorist seers more or less made up my mind.

  I had to turn myself in.

  I had to.

  Not only for my mom. The dream still colored the world behind my eyes, even more than the image of my mother’s face, or my brother, Jon’s. On the faint chance Revik was right, I was better off being dissected in a lab somewhere than living with seers who wanted me to help them blow up the world. I might not be a fucking saint, but I wasn’t about to go down in history as the greatest mass-murderer of all time.

  I wasn’t interested in ending human civilization, not for anyone.

  Gritting my teeth, I limped barefoot towards the main road. I began crossing it without looking back, wincing as my feet landed on sharp rocks and small shards of glass.

  On the ramp above, the GTX came squealing to a stop.

  I glanced back right as another car slammed into it from behind, knocking it further into the middle of the ramp. Cars careened in angled stops, making a rough line behind the first, and promptly began to honk.

  Revik got out. Ignoring the other drivers, he walked to the edge of the ramp and looked across the road at me. A young guy in a stained shirt and cap got out of a rusted pickup and started walking towards the Plymouth.

  “He’s a seer!” I screamed, pointing at Revik. “He kidnapped me!”

  I didn’t do it to get him caught.

  I kn
ew he wouldn’t get caught, not after what I’d seen him do with his mind already.

  Well, not unless SCARB got here a lot faster than I thought they would.

  My goal wasn’t to get him locked up; I wanted him to run away. I wanted him to get back into the GTX and leave me here.

  He didn’t run, though.

  He only stared down at me, his long form making a black silhouette against the sky.

  The guy in the baseball cap looked at me, then at Revik. His voice rose in excitement. “Call the cops, someone! Terrorist! Bona fide terrorist here! Call 911!”

  Revik turned his head.

  The boy with the stained baseball cap stopped in his tracks.

  His face went into a childlike slump. After the barest pause, he turned around and shuffle-walked back to his truck. He climbed into the cab and sat there without moving. The two other people who’d gotten out of their cars also returned to them obediently.

  Come back here, Alyson. Immediately.

  I jerked my eyes back to Revik, feeling my breath stop.

  “I won’t do it!” I said, shouting up at him. “Just go! Go! They won’t catch you if you leave now! I have to do this!”

  His mental voice rose in a cold snarl. You would give yourself over so easily to the dark, Allie? he sent, staring at me with those glass-like eyes. You would so willingly become a pawn of the Rooks? Do you know how many have died, trying to keep you safe from that very fate? And now you expect me to just leave you here?

  He was angry.

  Really damned angry.

  My throat constricted as I took in the expression on his face. I hadn’t been afraid of him before. I probably should have been, but I hadn’t been, not really. I was genuinely afraid of what I felt off him now, even as my physical vision slanted out.

  “It’s too late!” I yelled. “Just go! Go now!”

  Something in his words to me echoed in my mind, though, making me doubt suddenly, what I’d been about to do. When I looked up the hill again, I saw Revik coming after me, taking long strides through the sliding shale and sand of the hill.

  I felt myself starting to panic, when––

  Everything around me disappears.

  8

  BARRIER

  DARKNESS DESCENDED, ROSE and deep blue.

  I see Revik through that darkness, flickering in and out, outlined in pale sky, shadowy and lean at the rise in the road, then stark in the negative, a brilliant light against indigo clouds. Gold and red sparks meet and pool through lines that make up his arms and chest.

  I know I’m in that place he calls the Barrier, even as I take in his sharp, structured form.

  I have barely wrapped my mind around this, when…

  His arm surges with a fire-like light.

  The light brightens, turns blinding, right before it leaves his fingers. Before I can think what it might mean, the starburst spins down upon me, aiming straight for my chest. I don’t think, don’t form a single conscious thought.

  Instead, I step aside, even as a part of me reaches up, takes the fire-like ball and sling-shots it back at him in one smooth, reflexive motion.

  I realize what I’ve done, only after I’ve done it.

  I watch, bewildered. It’s going to hit him, I think. I just threw something at him, and I have no idea what it will do to him. Just before the fiery burst touches his outline, however, a white density of light materializes around him.

  The starburst hits the shield, glances off and dissipates.

  It all happens so fast I barely comprehend what just occurred.

  When it’s over, I feel something off him. Surprise, yes––but another feeling follows close behind. It’s not quite pleasure, but a sharp flicker of interest, like a part of him wakes up.

  The predator raises its head.

  He focuses on me intently, like a wolf meeting its own kind.

  My eyes snap back into focus, and I see him in the physical again. His pale, light-filled eyes are watching me, and I see the predatory stare there, too.

  “Hey!” I hold up a hand, panicking. “No! No! I didn’t mean it.”

  He starts walking faster down the hill.

  “Revik! Please! Just let me go! The cops will already be on their way!”

  He doesn’t slow his steps.

  My fear bursts out as anger, panicking me, throwing me back and forth into that other place, so that his image flickers, positive to negative. I feel that anger sliding through me as sharp waves of heat, as if something in what he’s done makes me want to hit him back, using another ball of that sparking, electric light.

  The predator’s interest flares in him again when he feels it.

  That time, I feel him deliberately rein his instincts in.

  His stride lengthens, and he is coming towards me faster now.

  You are not going to get the outcome you desire, doing this. His light flashes back to gold, exuding reassurance, calm. You are more likely to harm people under the Rooks than you ever would be under the elders of your kind. The elders love peace, Esteemed Bridge, not war.

  He is still walking when he adds,

  I apologize for this. This is my fault, Esteemed Bridge. I told you too much. I am not qualified to talk to you about these issues… nor about your true role here. Walk to me, Allie. I will take you to people who can help you understand. Then, with full knowledge of your options, you can decide what part you wish to take in this.

  I back up in equal measure to his steps, but I’m doubting myself now, feeling my fear worsen as I realize I believe him. I believe what he’s saying.

  Come to me, Allie, he sends, still exuding that calm. He holds out a hand, and I can feel the fear on him now. Please, Allie. Let me take you to your people.

  He stops then, mid-step, as if listening to some far off voice.

  When he returns, the predator is completely gone.

  Allie, I am not playing anymore! Come to me… now! There is no time!

  The fear in his words disarms me, then confuses me.

  Making up my mind, I start to walk towards him, then to run, even as another negative image of him inside the Barrier fills my vision.

  I stumble towards the road, stub my toe on a rock and half-fall, pick myself up.

  My limbs move muddily but I force them faster, fighting the rising sickness in my gut as his light reaches for mine. He is trying to dim my light now, to make me less visible, to hide me. I feel the good intention behind it, I know he isn’t trying to hurt me, but I feel it almost as a physical invasion as he slides into some part of me I can’t see.

  I make it to the road when the scene around me vanishes.

  Blind, I try to manage my limbs, can’t.

  Out of nowhere, a hard thud collides with the meat and bone of my physical body. Pain rockets up my leg, pools in the point of contact.

  The pain brings me abruptly back to my body.

  My eyes snap open, and the Barrier is gone.

  I find myself staring into the chrome grill of a car, on my knees, holding my stomach. Nearby, a car door opened, and the sound is so loud it deafens me. I stared at the dotted dividing lines in the road, garnished with yellow reflectors.

  “Get out of the road!” a man yelled at me. “Are you crazy, girl? Trying to kill yourself?”

  Fear lurched me back to my feet. The light must have changed; the road was full of cars now. My knees were bleeding but dread eclipsed all of it. I could feel it somehow, even as the throbbing in my temples began to turn into something closer to a migraine.

  Something bad was coming.

  Whatever it was, it was coming fast.

  I pushed past the old man with the angry face and bushy eyebrows, seeing his expression change as he took in my appearance, my hair matted with blood and dirt, my cut feet and hands, the ripped up waitress uniform and handcuffs.

  “Girl.” He called after me. “Hey… girl! Are you all right? Where are you going?”

  I didn’t look back.

  I looked only at
Revik now.

  He’d reached the bottom of the hill. He slid down the last of it on leather boots through dusty gravel and broken glass. I ran towards him, feeling each bare foot hit hard at the pavement. I darted into traffic, and again cars honked, swerving to avoid me.

  I slammed into the bumper of a red compact and it screeched to a stop.

  The woman inside stared up at me, wide-eyed.

  I ran on. People on the sidewalk reacted slowly, staring as they realized something unusual was happening, something they probably shouldn’t ignore.

  Then, right when I began to think I was going to make it, something took me down.

  HE WATCHES HER from the Barrier, willing her to run faster.

  He has totally fucked up.

  He has frightened her, broken her trust with his honesty about the Rooks, or at least his refusal to lie. He has confused her with his clumsy explanations on what it means to be the Bridge. He is glad he chose to tell her less, rather than more, about Terian, and about what the Rooks truly represented behind the Barrier.

  He does his best to shield her light, to keep her in her body, out of the Barrier.

  When she runs into the street, he sees interest dawn on the faces of watching humans. It is too many for him to push. Worse, her light sparks in panicked waves that remind him that she is the Bridge, not just some fledgling seer with poor light control.

  When she is hit by the first car, he starts after her, his heart in his throat. He splits his consciousness, leaving a lesser part to steer his physical body and jumping the rest out.

  Then a silver-white cloud descends over both of them.

  A darting, lightning-like bolt comes out of it, aimed at her.

  It knocks her completely out of her physical body.

  Right in front of a speeding truck.

  No! he yells at her through that space.

  But she can no longer hear him.

  She collapses in the middle of the road, even as the truck heads her way.

  TIME LURCHED BACK, bringing him back along its narrower lines.

  The driver saw him and then her and slammed on the truck’s brakes, careening cab and cargo to a slanted halt a few feet from them both.