Terian stared down at me with those unnerving yellow eyes.
“Don’t fret, love,” he said. “We can’t kill him...not anymore. Personally, I’d like to bring him along, but I’m afraid Nenz here won’t stand for it.”
I struggled backwards, my cuffed hands digging into my back.
There was no place to go. I tried to fight the Scandinavian off, but agony ripped through my body when he grabbed me by the collar, yanking me to my feet. The drug made my legs wobble, but still hadn’t knocked me out.
He shoved me towards the door, still holding the collar. I stumbled across a floor half-covered by rumpled wool rugs, littered with plates, clothes, a towel, what might have been broken glass.
“Busy little bunnies you’ve been...” Terian muttered.
He used the collar to steer me towards the living room, and straight for the front door.
It occurred to me only then that I was naked. I struggled against his hands, but he barely hesitated before forcing me outside. He shoved me down the wooden steps, holding the collar to keep me from falling.
Then I saw him.
Revik lay in a heap on the dirt below the wooden stairs. He was naked, too. His skin looked white but for the tattoos and his catalogue of scars...as well as what I’d done to him over the past however-many days. Four men stood over him. They must have drugged him, either before or after they shot him in the thigh.
I saw the collar on his neck as his eyes met mine.
“No!” He screamed when he saw Terian holding me. “No! No!”
He fought in an open panic, struggling to get to his hands and knees.
One of the seers kicked him in the side and I shrieked, fighting like a wild person against Terian’s hands. Half picking me up when I attacked him, Terian turned me around, yanking me backwards by the metal cuffs.
He caught me around the throat, holding me against his chest.
“Revi’!” Terian shouted. “Revi’! Calm yourself!”
“Get your fucking hands off her! Get your hands off her!”
“Do you want her to kill herself? She already tried once inside!”
“Let her go! I’ll swear to gods I’ll kill you—”
“Did you hear me, Revi’? You must see reason, my friend!”
“LET GO OF HER—“
“Calm, Revi’! Calm!”
“I’ll kill you! I’ll fucking kill you if you hurt her!”
Terian held me tighter. I felt tension in his hands.
“We will not hurt her!” he said. “...But we can’t have the two of you ripping yourselves apart, do you hear me? You know it’s a risk...you know it! Will you make her die for you?”
He waited for that much to penetrate, for Revik to be looking at me again.
Once it had, I felt Terian relax, but only marginally.
“Good. Yes.” He took a breath, his voice still loud, but calmer. “You’ll get your chance, Revi’,” he said. “I promise you that. The boy doesn’t want you with us. We can’t kill you, which means we have to let you go. I’ll even call your friends in the Adhipan once we’re safely away...”
“No!” Revik struggled to get up, but one of the seers placed a foot on his shoulder, forcing him down. “Don’t take her! Please...gods, I’ll give you anything you want...anything!” He fought against the seer holding him. “I’ll help you rebuild it! I’ll help you, Terry!”
He looked at my face, then back at the Scandinavian holding me.
“I’ll do whatever you ask! Anything...I’ll fucking work for you, Terry! As long as you want! Don’t take her...please! Please, goddamn it!”
Tears were running down my face. I felt Terian’s fingers tighten at his words, but I couldn’t take my eyes off Revik. The panic in his face debilitated me, even when I couldn’t feel his light. The collar he wore was hurting him; I could see it...but he barely seemed to notice. When he began fighting openly again, Terian slid a hand around my waist, holding me against him more deliberately.
With his other hand, he cupped my breast.
“Revi’...behave yourself! Or I’ll give you reason to complain.”
Revik froze, his body taut, animal-looking once more.
But it was the boy who spoke first, making me jump.
“Get your hands off her!”
The blond Terian turned his head at the same time I did. I stared at the boy, bewildered at the fury I saw in his eyes...well before it occurred to me to be grateful. He was staring up at the tall Terian, hands clenched at his sides.
Terian hesitated a second longer. He looked between Revik and the boy.
The boy stepped in front of him.
“Let go of her,” Nenzi hissed. “...or I’ll kill you.”
There was the barest pause, then the Scandinavian-looking seer took a step back. He released every part of me but the collar.
“Thank you,” Revik said. “Thank you...”
The boy looked at Revik, his fingers still balled into fists.
“You...you disgusting shit!” His words held so much hatred I flinched. Like Terian had, I looked between the boy and Revik. “You don’t say anything about her! I should kill you for touching her...” He looked at me, breathing harder, then back at Revik. “Rapist! Fucking pervert rapist! I saw you hurt her...!”
“Nenzi!” I said, stunned. “He didn’t hurt me!”
Revik looked at me. His eyes grew liquid once more, just before they ran down the length of my body.
“No,” he said, hoarse. “No...I didn’t mean to.”
“Yes, you did! Look at her!”
“He didn’t hurt me!” I said, angry. I turned on Revik, my voice warning. “Revik..look at your own body before you start complaining about mine!”
My words seemed to snap him out, briefly at least.
“How do you know this kid?” he said.
“Tarsi...it’s a long story...he shouldn’t be here...”
“Shouldn’t be here?” Revik said. “What does that mean?”
“Stop talking to her—” the boy began angrily, but I cut him off.
“Nenzi!” I said. “He’s my husband!” Terian chuckled a little behind me, but his eyes held a sharp interest when I glanced back at his face. He was looking between Revik and the boy and me, listening to us. I kept talking, struggling to balance on my toes.
“...Nenzi...you’re the one hurting me. You and this psycho friend of yours! If you cared about me at all, you’d let Revik go. You’d kill this sonofabitch and let us both go!”
Nenzi remained focused on Revik.
“I know what you did,” he said. “I saw it.”
Revik snarled, “Listen to her, you little psychopath! If you really want to help her—”
“Is this why you had me imprisoned? To steal her from me?”
“What?” Revik stared from me back to him. “What are you talking about?” He looked at me, and stopped, pain softening then hardening his features...until both of us were lost there. I saw his eyes blur, realized he was still trying to reach me. Pain stood out in his eyes as he strained against the collar. Eventually he stopped, gasping, as the collar shocked him harder.
His gaze dropped to the one around my neck...right before he lunged. A male seer caught him by the hair, holding him back. Fear exploded over his features again as he looked at me, a panic he aimed at the boy.
“Boy, please!” Tears came to his eyes. “He’ll hurt her!”
“No. He promised.”
“He’s a fucking liar! Are you really that stupid?”
The boy’s eyes glowed brighter. Staring at his round face, I realized I recognized that look. I’d seen it at Tarsi’s.
“No!” I screamed. I fought Terian, trying to get between the boy and Revik. Terian released me and I managed to get down to my knees, in front of the boy.
“No! Don’t hurt him! Nenzi, please. I’ll go with you. Just don’t hurt him!”
Revik’s face contorted in pain. “Allie! Baby...don’t!”
I tore m
y eyes off him to plead with the boy. “Please, Nenzi,” I whispered. “I’ll go with you. Just please...don’t hurt him...please...”
The boy continued to stare at Revik, but I saw the light in his eyes flicker, then dim, just before he glanced at me. Looking down at my body, he took in the length of me, his lips pressed together. He seemed about to say something, when he turned towards Terian, his gaze suddenly sharp.
“No,” he said coldly, in response to something Terian had thought.
The Scandinavian Terian’s voice grew cautious. “They’ve consummated. I assume you won’t want to test that by letting him die of exposure...”
“Boy,” Revik said. “Please! Listen to her! You can’t trust him!”
Nenzi caught hold of my arm, gripping it tight enough to hurt. I winced, avoiding his eyes as he looked at my body again. His dark eyes shifted up, meeting Terian’s behind me. His voice grew cold as ice, and suddenly much older.
“You touch her like that again, and I’ll cut off your cock and make you eat it,” he said. His black eyes glimmered a faint green. “Understand?”
“Of course, my friend...of course. It was only to annoy Dehgoies.”
Nenzi looked back at me. The expression there made me nervous.
“He’ll come after us,” Terian said. “He won’t be able to help himself.” His voice grew cajoling. “If you bring him with us now, we could control him. You would still get what you wanted, my young friend...only safer. For her, too.”
Nenzi gestured an emphatic ‘no,’ still staring at me.
“He doesn’t have anything I want,” he said. “...Not anymore.”
I met Revik’s gaze, trying to think past the screaming in my mind. I couldn’t decide if there was anything I could do, anything I could say that would make a difference. They had him chained to the steps. He’d been shot in the thigh. His face contorted in pain whenever he tried to move...or use his sight. He was bruised, beat up, overly thin. The wound in his leg looked like a lot of blood, especially against his pale skin.
Terian said he wasn’t going to let him die.
I saw Revik looking at my face, almost as if he’d guessed what I was thinking. His eyes filled with tears again. His voice thickened.
“No...Allie.” He shook his head. “No...please, baby. Please...”
Terian grasped me by the collar from behind. With a single, sharp pull, he yanked me ungracefully to my feet. I cried out, losing my balance so that I hung from his fingers. The boy grabbed my arm, glaring up at Terian.
“Stop hurting her!”
“If you’re not going to bring him, we have to separate them!” Terian said. “It’s time to go. Now, Nenzi!”
Nenzi looked at Revik, then at me. He nodded towards Terian.
“All right.”
“No!” Revik screamed, fighting the hands holding him.
Jerking me sideways by the collar, Terian began dragging me towards the gate and the field. I heard Revik’s anguished cry and nearly lost my mind. Craning backwards to look at him, I let out a scream as well, struggling against Terian. The scream turned into a sob as I saw him fighting the other seers.
Terian dragged me forward despite my struggles. In a matter of minutes I couldn’t see Revik anymore, though I could still hear him. I willed my light, every part of myself in his direction. Half dragged and half shoved through the thigh-high grass, I eventually opened my eyes on what looked like a jeep parked on one side of the field, a few dozen yards away.
Something in me broke.
I lunged against Terian’s hands, leaping off my feet to throw him off balance. He caught me around the waist, dragging me forcibly through the grass. I lunged again at each step, fighting harder the further we went, trying to get free...until he gave up and simply picked me up. Slinging me over his shoulder, he held my waist with one arm, clamping my legs with the other. When he motioned to one of the guards, I felt metal on my ankles as he chained those together, too. The boy followed, but this time, he didn’t protest.
I glanced down, found him staring at me, his eyes still holding that faint glow. The look in them remained hard from his conversation with Revik.
I begged him to let me go.
When that didn’t work, I begged Terian.
The latter forced me into the back of the jeep. One of his men cuffed me to the far door with a third set of handcuffs.
The boy sat next to me, his hand on my leg. I stared at his small fingers, then back at the cabin, screaming when Terian started up the jeep’s engine, throwing myself against the metal cuffs. I watched the cabin get smaller in the distance.
Terian ground gears as we bounced over holes and hillocks in the field, until he pulled up alongside the helicopter parked in a flat area by the river, I burst into another sob, fighting until my wrists bled. The boy tried to stop me, but I elbowed him off me angrily.
It was the same place Revik and I had picnicked the first day we’d taken out the horses. By the time Terian unlocked me from the jeep, picking me up and carrying me across the grass and through the helicopter door...the drug was finally taking its toll. I managed to keep my eyes open while he locked me to the bench in the back of the military helicopter. In the front seat, I saw a woman with black hair and the bluest eyes I’d ever seen.
She smiled at me, but those eyes remained cold as ice.
“Everything go okay?” she asked Terian.
“Well as could be expected,” he grunted.
She looked me up and down, still smiling faintly. “She’s a little underfed. Pretty, though. I suppose that’s why you forgot her clothes?”
Terian smiled. “The boy didn’t seem to mind.”
The woman chuckled, exhaling smoke. “No, he doesn’t seem to.” Glancing back at the boy sitting next to me, she motioned towards me with the hand holding the hiri. “...Dehgoies?”
“He’s alive.” He shrugged. “Not much I could do. They’d been fucking for at least a week.” He put on headphones, raising his voice above the cycling blades. “I left Nax and David to patch him up. I’ll call when we get a little farther...”
She nodded, but a hardness touched her mouth.
I watched, numb, as the boy slid closer, leaning against my side.
A few seconds later, the rotary blades got louder as the helicopter began to lift off the ground.
I managed to stay awake for a few seconds more as we rose over the fields...until the river looked like a winding snake through the plexiglass window near the metal bar where I’d been cuffed. I could no longer see the house. I was crying, but I held on to what I’d heard Terian say. Those seers were patching him up. He would call, and someone would find Revik before he bled to death or died of exposure under those stairs.
Feeling eyes on me again, I turned.
I found the blue-eyed woman staring at me. Her eyes examined my body in detail...lingering on different parts of my skin. Barely glancing at the bruises she was focused on, I leaned back on the cushion. More tears ran down my face, making it hard to breathe.
Not long after that, I must have passed out.
19
WVERCIANS
REVIK WOKE UP in the dirt, unable to breathe.
His arms felt wrenched out of their sockets. His throat hurt...his head felt like it was being crushed in an iron vise, his pulse throbbing against the skin of his temples from whatever drug they’d given him.
He looked up to where the cuffs he wore locked to a chain that wound around the bottom supports to the wooden stairs. Looking around where he lay, he tried to scan in reflex. The organic collar shot pain up through his skull, temporarily blinding him. It was nothing like the pain he’d endured under the collar he’d worn in that glass and tile dungeon in the Carpathians...but with how he felt, it briefly knocked him out.
The second time, he was more cautious.
Extending his light, he tried to find the boundaries of where the restraint kicked in, trying to get a sense of what type of collar it was, where the limits had been s
et. The second jolt was less severe. It broke him out in a sweat, temporarily blinding him, but didn’t knock him out.
Even so, it was effective. He couldn’t get past it.
He tried anyway, testing it again, using a number of different kinds of scans...fighting for glimpses through the restraint, any means of sending out a flare to someone who might be looking for him. He couldn’t tell if any of it worked, but he doubted it, based on what he could feel in the collar.
All he knew was she was gone...and he wasn’t ready to feel that yet.
He tried to move, to sit up, and liquid fire shot down his spine, hurting him enough to make him sick, nearly blacking him out again. He threw up, vomiting bile on the dirt from his empty stomach, just before he crumpled back to his side.
He’d forgotten about the leg.
He needed water...food.
He was too weak to do much of anything for long, if he didn’t deal with those two things. Staring up at the lightening sky, he fought not to feel, ignoring the smell of his own vomit. No matter how many times it tried to rise, he forced the image of Allie, collared, naked and covered in bruises, out of his mind.
Minutes passed with him lying in the dirt, fighting to control his mind, before he realized that the seers had bandaged his leg before they left. So they’d only meant to hobble him after all...not kill him. He supposed he had Terian to thank for that, too.
He wondered if he’d actually called the Adhipan, like he said he would.
He also wondered why Terian hadn’t sent someone back to collect him yet. The boy must have him on a short leash. He’d obviously been displeased with the kid’s decision to leave him behind.
He tried to think through scenarios, if only to occupy his mind. Terian might take her to a cave, like he had with him and Jon and Cass, but Revik doubted it. He would feel safer in the United States...most of the Rooks in Europe and Asia would be off the grid still; some would still resent him for his coup of Galaith, if not blame him outright for the demise of the Pyramid. Galaith, whatever his faults, always had the gift of engendering loyalty.
Terian did not.
The sun rose over the valley. Revik watched every incremental movement of its path up and off the horizon, feeling his breath come short.
Allie's War Season One Page 78