Shadow (Bridge & Sword: Awakenings #4): Bridge & Sword World

by JC Andrijeski

  “Revik.” Sighing, he leaned his back against the wall next to him. “You think when she was born was her fault somehow? That she didn’t come soon enough?”

  “Forget it, Jon. You’re not a seer. You wouldn’t understand.”

  “No… I get it.”

  “I said forget it, Jon.”

  “But that’s it, isn’t it?” he said. “You think she abandoned you down here. Left you with uncle Menlim and Merenje because she couldn’t be bothered to come get you?” Jon watched the other’s face, seeing it tighten under his scrutiny. “Or maybe it’s some intermediary thing?” he said. “Some grand, cosmological scheme that just didn’t factor you in? Or deem you as all that important, maybe?”

  “Jon… please. Just drop it, okay?”

  Jon couldn’t help but stare at him though, his voice incredulous.

  “That’s deeply crazy, man. You know that, right?” He caught hold of the seer’s arm again, squeezing his shoulder. “I don’t give a damn what race you are. That is some seriously crazy shit, Revik. To blame her for something like that.”

  “I don’t blame her.”

  “The hell you don’t.” Jon gave a short laugh. “You do, Revik. Flat out.”

  “I said it didn’t make sense. Anyway, that’s not the point––”

  “But it still pisses you off.”

  Revik exhaled, clicking as he continued to stare at his feet. After another pause, he closed his eyes. Jon watched his face tighten again, just before he nodded.

  “Yeah. It still pisses me off.”

  “Did you actually tell her that?”

  “No.” Revik met his gaze, jaw hard. “What good would it do? It doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t fix anything. And I don't want to get on this fucking merry-go-round with her again. I told you, it doesn’t make me better. She doesn’t make me better. I should be alone, or with someone who doesn’t make me crazy. She should be, too.”

  Jon leaned against the wall, shaking his head.

  “You need to tell her, man. You can’t just end a marriage and not tell a person why.”

  “That’s a courtesy, Jon. Not a reason.”

  “Isn’t it reason enough?” Jon said.

  Revik’s eyes clouded briefly. He shook his head.

  “I don’t want to talk to her, Jon. I really don’t.”

  “Well, that’s good, man. Because I doubt she’s coming back here for awhile.”

  At the other’s irritated clicking, Jon sighed, closing his eyes as he leaned his head against the wall. “Jesus, Revik. Do you really want her out of your life totally?” He looked at him, turning his head. “She told me to get you a prostitute. As many as you wanted, actually.”

  Revik gave him a narrow look. “She said that?”

  “Yeah, man. She said to give you your choice. ‘Let him pick a flavor,’ she said. She authorized funds and everything.” He watched the Elaerian’s eyes cloud as he stared at the floor. “If you think she’s sticking around for that, you’re high, Revik. My guess is, you won’t be seeing her for awhile, man. If ever.”

  There was another silence.

  Then Revik shook his head, clicking under his breath.

  “She’s better off.”

  Looking at the seer’s closed face, Jon felt a sudden swell of anger.

  “Bullshit she’s better off,” he snapped. “I knew her before, man. You might have been creepy stalker guy, but you obviously missed a lot.” His voice sharpened when the other only shook his head. “And bullshit that you were better off, too. You were half of who you really are. That might be easier, but it’s hardly better.”

  “Really, Jon?” Revik looked up, his mouth hard. “You remember me before the op in D.C. Tell me, was I ‘better’ then? Was that the lighter, more forgiving and rational part of my nature you saw? You can’t even blame it all on the Syrimne thing. She made me insane before I shot that kid. I was already falling––even before. You know it. I know you do.”

  Jon stared at him, his mouth pursed. After another pause, he shook his head.

  “Revik, man. You must have known it would be hard, dealing with all this. You can’t blame that on Allie. You can’t.” The last of his anger left him when he saw the tired, empty look return to the other’s face. “Anyway, it wasn’t all the marriage. Having that kid uncollared and so close––that had to be affecting you. You were already dealing with the Syrimne part of yourself. Even before you shot him.”

  Revik’s eyes grew distant. Gesturing vaguely, he rubbed his face with a hand, leaning his head against the wall.

  “It doesn’t matter now anyway, Jon,” he said, his voice hollow. “She can’t be gone for that long. Not while I’m in here. Like you said, we’re bonded. She leaves for a few weeks, and we’re both going to feel it. More than feel it, if it’s anything like last time.”

  Jon just looked at him for a moment.

  Then he sighed, leaning his head on the wall next to Revik’s.

  “I’m sure she can find a way around that, man,” Jon said. “Her ‘dim-wittedness’ aside, she’s always been pretty good at making things happen that she wants to happen.”

  The seer shrugged with a hand.

  “She can’t beat the bond, Jon.”

  “No, man,” Jon said, looking at him. “But she can probably beat you.”

  The seer looked over at that, his clear eyes narrow.

  “I’m not trying to ‘win’ anything, Jon.” He focused on the far wall. “I knew I wouldn’t be able to handle being married again. I knew it as far back as the ship. I did it anyway. You’re right, it’s not her fault, but that doesn’t change anything, either.”

  Jon smiled humorlessly, shaking his head without taking it away from the wall.

  “Revik,” he said. “You’re lying to yourself. And you don’t know her as well as you think. You can convince yourself she’s a doormat or whatever as much as you like, but you’re stupid if you really believe that. You have no idea how fast she cut Jaden out of her life, once she knew it was over.” His voice grew warning when he looked at the seer. “I haven’t seen that look on her face in a long time. But I saw something a lot like it today.”

  “Great.” Revik gave a low grunt, clutching his hair in his hands again. “Now I rank with some human punk she was fucking.”

  “Yeah,” Jon said, clenching his jaw briefly. “A human she was in love with––for longer than she’s known you. When she was done, she was done, man.”

  Revik clicked to himself softly, giving a humorless laugh.

  “She tried to cut his new woman,” he grunted. “She couldn’t have been that over him.”

  “Yeah,” Jon said, nodding. “She did do that. And then, a week later, she got out of jail, and she had that look on her face I saw today. She cut him out of her life––and I mean totally. He tried repeatedly to apologize, to at least keep her as a friend. She never spoke to him again, as far as I know. He was still trying when you showed up and took her out of there. She moved out of their place while he was out of town, and that was it.”

  Revik looked at him, his expression cold.

  “Is that supposed to scare me, Jon?”

  “It should, man. Yeah.”

  “Well, it doesn’t. It’s good. She needs to move on. The sooner the better.”

  For a moment, Jon only looked at his face, watching the seer’s expression close.

  Realizing the conversation was over, he removed his hand from the other’s arm, sliding backwards on the tile.

  “Okay, man.” Leaning against the wall for balance, Jon regained his feet. “Fine. Let me know how that works out for you.”

  The seer’s mouth curled into a frown. Jon thought for a moment he might be angry enough to answer, but he didn’t.

  Instead he stared back at the silver chain still clutched in his hand.

  44

  RESIGNED

  I DON’T USUALLY get motion-sick.

  Even when everyone around me is puking their guts out, like the on
e and only time I went deep sea fishing with Jaden and his band buddies, I’m usually the person who’s more or less okay.

  I had it bad now, though, pretty much the entire flight to Beijing.

  Before that, I felt sick all during the drive to Amritsar, and on the shorter flight from Amritsar to Kolkata. Granted, the mountain roads wound in sharp loops for miles, narrow, rough and steep, but I’d made similar trips before without any problem.

  Those last days I spent in the compound weren’t my finest, but at least they went by fast.

  I had business to take care of first, which helped. I took care of all the logistics before I spoke to anyone, and before I let any of them try to talk to me.

  Balidor tried anyway, of course. So did Jon. It surprised me more when Vash knocked on my door, and after him, Tarsi.

  I didn’t sleep much.

  Truthfully, I don’t even remember trying.

  I knew I was in an endurance push at the end, just trying to force myself through, to make it out before something in me collapsed for real. I was running on a kind of manic energy at that point, probably the last of my adrenaline.

  I wrote a lot, during those days.

  I wrote out instructions, passwords to bank accounts, advice, observations. Most of it was probably worthless, or close to it. Vash and Tarsi had taken their hands off the steering wheel with the Revik thing a few weeks in, but they’d kept following the transcripts and vids, offering advice or guidance when I asked for it.

  I knew they didn’t really need my help in understanding where he was at, or my inexperienced thoughts about what might be going on with him at this point. Between them, they probably had over a thousand years’ experience working with seer light, including Revik’s. There wasn’t anything new I could tell them.

  I did it, anyway.

  Maybe I did it for closure, in the hopes it would make it easier to let go, to pretend some kind of handoff or transition had taken place.

  Before I did that, I took care of Revik’s money. Once I got my name off everything, I handed all of that stuff over to Jon and Dorje to manage. Jon said Dorje would work out some sort of single-entry terminal system if Revik needed to access any of it for some reason, meaning before they let him go.

  I also set up everything I needed for when I left.

  I worked with Tenzi to get skin patches, prosthetics, contact lenses, clothes, weapons. By all rights, I probably owed them a ton of money by then, but I didn’t argue when Balidor and Vash insisted I simply take whatever I needed. I couldn’t afford to argue, given that my total assets pretty much equalled whatever I could carry with me when I left.

  By the time I finished packing all of that stuff, it took up more than half of my luggage.

  I’d shed a lot over the past few years.

  Even before then, I’d never really owned much.

  Then again, I’d never really had much money.

  Now I had a few T-shirts left from that time, my combat boots, a couple of half-filled sketchbooks. I didn’t have much in the way of jewelry, nothing but what Cass bought me in the markets of Seertown. I didn’t even have the stuff Mom and Dad left me, because I hadn’t been wearing any of it the day I left with Revik.

  Whoever I’d been before all this was pretty much gone.

  The first few conversations were relatively easy, being more or less strategic.

  Someone had to go deal with the Cass thing, and Voi Pai asked for me. No one seemed surprised when I said I would go there first. It wasn’t until Balidor repeated that I couldn’t come back to the caves after I left, that we really got into it.

  Jon seemed less surprised than the rest of them, but he was the one who cried, and who tried the hardest to get me to stay. Vash said very little. Balidor hadn’t seemed to comprehend what I was telling him. I tackled him, Vash and Tarsi as a group, and he just stared at me while I told the three of them what I intended to do after I left Beijing. Through most of the time I was talking, Balidor’s arms were folded over his chest, his lips pursed.

  But the look in his eyes had been close to bewilderment, maybe disbelief.

  “You’re… what?” he’d said when I finished.

  “It’s pretty clear, ‘Dori,” I told him. “I don’t know how I could be any clearer.”

  He’d just stared at my eyes, his own holding that dense aggregate of confusion.

  “In no way is this clear to me, Allie,” he said.

  “I’m quitting, ‘Dor,” I said. “You need to appoint a new boss. I’m done.”

  “You’re quitting… what, exactly?” he said. “Being the Bridge?”

  “I guess so, yeah.”

  He continued to stare at me, his gray eyes just blurred enough that I had to assume he was scanning me, maybe to determine if I was serious. Or sane.

  “What does that mean?” he said.

  “It means I’m leaving, ‘Dor. I'm not just laying low for awhile with your people while Tarsi and Vash finish with Revik. I’m actually leaving. I’m not coming back.”

  When he opened his mouth, I held up a hand.

  “Look,” I said. “Please… at least try and be logical about this. I’m not any good to you anymore. Half the seers on the planet want me dead. I have no battle experience, no political experience. Hell, I wasn’t even raised seer. Half of your people think I’m brainwashed. It’s better if I just do something else. Disappear.”

  “What about what you said to me before?” he said. “About the refugees? The Chinese?”

  “I’m going to try and deal with the Chinese,” I said. “We’ve already covered that. I’ve got a meeting set up with Voi Pai. I’ll do what I can to negotiate the release of the Rebels, and of course get Cass and Baguen out of there. I’ll be safe with the Chinese. And I won’t be coming back here, like I said, so I won’t put any of you at risk.”

  “How much leverage do you think you will have with Voi Pai,” he said flatly. “As the ‘non-Bridge’?”

  My jaw firmed. “I don’t plan to tell her that, actually. As far as she knows, I’m negotiating on behalf of the Seven. She’s seen me in that role, so it may actually help you. Although with Voi Pai, you can never tell. In any case, she didn’t seem wiling to speak to anyone but me, so you’re stuck with me, regardless of what I do after.”

  “And the refugees?”

  I looked at him for a moment, then shook my head, clicking softly.

  “Alyson,” he said. “You have an obligation.”

  My eyes flashed up at that. “‘Dori, I’ve heard enough guilt trips on being an intermediary to last me a lifetime. It’s not the right argument to try on me right now.”

  “What about simple compassion then?” he said. “You used to care what happened to your people, Allie.”

  My jaw hardened more.

  Seeing my expression, he clicked under his breath, averting his gaze. I felt regret on him then, a kind of angry frustration at his own words. Sighing, I combed my hair out of my eyes with my fingers, feeling my anger deflate back into that heavier tiredness.

  “I can’t help with that, ‘Dori. I’m sorry, but I can’t.” My voice grew flatter. “Anyway, most of those refugees want me dead. I doubt I’m the right person for that job.” Shrugging, I folded my arms. “I was thinking Chan might be able to help you with that. She spent time in the camps, and you said she’s got connections in SCARB. She can probably help you sidestep the Sweeps until you get most of them relocated. I don’t really see a lot I could contribute to that end, honestly. Sympathy, yes, but I can do that from a distance.”

  Balidor’s frown deepened, but I saw that scrutiny trained on me again.

  “And you will go… where?” Balidor said.

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “You don’t know?”

  I sighed. “Look, I wouldn’t tell you if I did. You get that, right? I’ll need to find a place to hide, obviously––and find a job, some way to make money where they won’t know what I am. I've been talking to Poresh and some of the oth
ers about how to establish a human identity. If worst comes to worst, there are places in the mountains––”

  “Which mountains?” he said, staring at me in disbelief.

  Letting out a humorless laugh, I threw up my hands. “I’ll send you a postcard when I get settled, okay, ‘Dor? As long as you promise not to visit. In the meantime, I’ve been offered a few safe houses, just to get me on my feet––”

  “Where?”

  I just looked at him. “Balidor. Let it go, okay?”

  “Let what go?” For the first time, anger reached his voice. “Alyson! You cannot possibly believe that it’s safe for you out there! That you will find some mythical location where you can just ‘blend’?” His voice burst out louder. “A fucking job? Are you serious?”

  Sighing, I laid my hands on the table. Glancing around at the rest of them, I realized the conversation was going nowhere.

  “Look,” I said, frowning as I took in facial expressions. My gaze stopped on Balidor. “Just… deal with it. Okay? I’m not going to fight you on this, Balidor. I’m not.”

  Pushing back my chair, I regained my feet.

  I didn’t look back, but walked out of the room, heading down the hall for my quarters.

  I barely got ten yards before I heard him coming up behind me.

  “Allie! Wait.”

  I didn’t slow until he caught hold of my arm.

  Reluctantly, I turned. Seeing his expression, I sighed.

  “‘Dori... I heard you, okay? I heard you, and you’re right, and it doesn’t change anything. I’m a liability to you now. You’ve got to see that. You don’t need mythical beings starting riots every time they show up in a major city.”

  At his frown, I let out a low snort. “Hell, join the modern world. Elect someone. Someone most of the seer community doesn’t hate. Someone who can reason with the humans… and the other seers. Someone who can help you rebuild Seertown and mend fences with the Rebels and the Chinese.” Grunting, I met his gaze. “You know it should be you, right, Balidor? It always should have been you.”

  I started to pull away, but he tightened his grip.