“Something like that, yeah.” Wreg leaned back on his heels, staring at him. “I would have thought you would show more interest. Given who your wife is.”
Revik felt something in his stomach grow cold.
Wreg smiled. “A reaction. At last. Hallelujah.” His smile turned colder. “Where is she, Revik?”
“You’re asking me that? Your goons said you’d help me find her.”
“Yeah,” Wreg said. “...They did. But I need you to explain a few things to me, first.” Looking between Revik’s eyes, he said, “We hear she took out one of yours. Little shit who tried to claim her before you got your cock in her...”
He smiled when Revik averted his eyes.
“...Eye witness told us she threw him about sixty feet. Nearly killed him, too, from what I hear.” He paused, studying Revik’s face. “...Is that true?”
Revik stared at the large-boned seer, but didn’t answer.
Folding his hands between his knees where he crouched, Wreg shrugged.
“Apparently, we’d been vastly misinformed,” he said. “Someone told us she was untrained.” The broad face creased in another smile. “Funny. I wonder who could have trained her?”
Revik didn’t answer. Staring at the cement floor, he fought to process this, to catch up. They had someone there, at Seertown, probably in the Guard. They knew about Allie. Did they think he’d trained her? The thought to try had crossed his mind, sure...especially after Maygar...but he’d had no idea where to start. He’d been playing with a few things, to distract himself mostly, those nights they sat in front of the fire at the cabin. Ironically, he’d been trying to map the boy’s structures from memory, to see if he could figure out which he used for telekinesis so he could show Allie.
Pain hit him.
For the first time, he let himself remember, to really feel what had happened over the course of however long they’d been together. Despite how he’d brought her there, in the end, it had been her who seduced him...and even after, her who kept pushing him to go further. She told him things. Once he’d made it clear he wanted her to, she told him whatever he wanted, even when he continued to hide behind silence.
He’d been trying to find ways to match her in that, too.
They hadn’t finished. He’d been consciously aware of that, even at the time. He’d looked forward to more, to drawing it out. There had been that thing with her light, that thing that drove him half-insane with wanting, that turned both of them nearly violent. She’d been pushing him with that too, asking him for it even after he told her he couldn’t, that he was afraid he would hurt her if they kept trying.
She hadn’t cared.
He remembered the way the boy had looked at her, and the pain turned into overt fear, intense enough that he barely heard Wreg’s next words.
“...Needless to say,” the Sark added. “We couldn’t find this Maygar. But the rumor is, he’s alive.” He grunted, hands resting on his thighs. “I guess the wife’s got a forgiving nature, eh, runt? Come to think of it, why didn’t you kill him? I would have...if someone pulled that shit on my mate.”
When Revik didn’t answer, he prodded him with a foot.
“We found her, Dehgoies.” He waited for Revik to look up, then smiled a little at his expression. “You should have told us that ex-Pyramider has her...Terian. We now know he has the boy, too.” He gave Revik a half-smile. “You want to tell me again how you don’t know who he is?”
Revik stared at the floor of the cell without seeing it.
He didn’t think he was moving until his wrists started to hurt, and he realized he was grinding the chains together, his heels dug into the floor.
“Are you going to tell me where she is?” he said finally.
“Ah.” Wreg smiled. “A bit touchy about the wife. I have to say, that surprises me. Back in the day, you seemed pretty willing to stick your dick in anything that didn’t try to cut it off. I guess even shit-bloods like you can grow up...a little anyway.” He straightened fluidly.
“That’s good,” he said. “That’s really good.”
Before Revik could answer, Wreg kicked him, hard, in his good leg.
Revik sucked in a breath, gasping. The kick caught him off guard, so it hurt like hell. When he looked up, fighting to breathe, the other seer was appraising him again, his opaque eyes expressionless.
“You ready to cut the crap now, Revik?”
“Why am I here?” he said, still gasping in breaths. “If you knew about Terian, why take me? I’m not with them anymore. I haven’t been for years!”
“Maybe it’s not you we’re after.”
“Terian won’t trade me for her. And I can’t help her, not if you’ve got me locked up here. Let me go. I’ll find her...”
Wreg smiled. “Think you can rescue the missus, Dehgoies?”
“He’ll kill her.” Revik met his gaze, hearing emotion leak into his voice. “He could do it on accident. She’s never worn a collar before. She won’t know when to stop...and he jacks up the limits too high. If what you say about the telekinesis is true, he’ll be afraid of her, so he might overcompensate...”
“What makes you think we care?”
Revik looked around at the others in frustration, but met only blank stares. His gaze paused at the door, focusing on the young seer guarding it.
He said, “I may not remember specifics, but I know who you are...I know what you want. You want the Bridge...alive. Let me go, and I’ll get her back.”
“You don’t strike me as all that battle-ready, friend.”
Revik bit back fury, glancing at the door.
“What do you want?” he said. “What do you want for my release?”
Wreg smiled. “Now you’re asking the right question...finally.” He picked the hiri up from where he’d left it on the floor, taking a drag and exhaling sweet-smelling smoke.
“Salinse wants to see you,” he said.
Revik looked up, feeling his breath stop. “Salinse? He’s alive?”
Wreg smiled. “Yes...he is.”
MINUTES LATER, REVIK was limping down a passageway carved from solid rock. He focused on moving his legs, testing the limits of the one with a hole blown through it, hopefully without damaging it further.
It was something to think about, anyway...something to do.
He’d given up trying to remember how he knew these people. He didn’t care. He’d been a kid during WWI, so whatever happened, it was either while he was with the Rooks after WWII, or in the period he’d operated out of Germany before that. In any case, it didn’t matter to him.
He knew a little about Salinse. Of course, it was more than that, this half-scent of memory that whispered around this place, and around these seers...but he focused on what he could catalogue with his mind.
He’d studied Salinse and his people while working for the Seven, along with any seer terrorist cells big enough to show up in the security documents he had access to while working for the British government. He’d retained a curiosity about what went on in Asia, maybe moreso because he wasn’t allowed back. That Salinse’s Rebellion may have had ties to the Rooks of the Pyramid had been a pretty well-substantiated theory of the Adhipan’s.
Yet the exact nature of those ties had remained unknown. They’d never been absorbed into the Pyramid. While they claimed to be the remnants of the group that had fought alongside Syrimne in WWI, there was little to prove that, either, other than Salinse’s bloodline, which seemed to be relatively solid.
He was first blood cousin to Menlim, the seer believed to be Syrimne’s handler.
Menlim, who was believed to be the true mastermind behind the original rebellion, built its hierarchy to minimize the risk of infiltration, using a design that had striking similarities to the Pyramid itself. Cells of personnel rotated in and out of the highest rungs, with those in the upper tiers exchanging places with those below and to either side in a pattern dictated solely by the person at top. Under such a system, knowledge was transitory
; strategies, pieces of strategies and even individual ops were held by different cells.
No one knew when they were being sidelined...or, for that matter, when they weren’t. They might conduct elaborate ops that were mainly diversionary. Conversely, they might perform seemingly trivial ones that were strategically critical.
Menlim’s structure had been less multi-dimensional than the Pyramid itself, of course, but only a seer could have designed something like it, given the complexities of the transitions and their connections to one another.
Revik focused on the range of his leg and cast, thinking about the rest in the background. He tried walking normally until it hurt, then went back to shuffling the foot attached to his shot leg.
He had maybe a full minute of regular gait.
He could increase that with time if he didn’t overdo it. His arms were still cuffed behind his back, along with his wrists. He let his eyes blur on the rock walls, fighting his anger, the feeling of powerlessness that lay under it.
He knew Terian...he knew exactly what he’d do. The first thing, anyway.
He bit his tongue, hard enough to taste blood. He couldn’t let himself feel, not now. He needed his head straight. He’d listen to the old Sark, tell them whatever they needed to hear, give them whatever they wanted.
Until they let him go.
The seer in front of him halted, keying in an access code on a wall panel. Organics. Old, but definitely alive...the seer used a DNA scan to activate the final sequence. Revik was peripherally aware of two more guards at his back. As the door lock went from red to green, the lead guard glanced at the Wvercian, the same one who had ridden on horseback with Revik from India.
Revik knew they were speaking to one another.
After a pause, the Wvercian shrugged.
“Do as he says,” he said. “He’s the boss.”
Frowning, the guard hesitated only long enough to blink at the giant Wvercian. Then he looked at Revik, motioned sharply for him to turn around.
Wary, Revik did as he was told. He felt the seer doing something to the collar he wore, and stiffened.
Then it popped off, leaving the skin of his neck oddly light.
Revik stood without moving for a few seconds, in shock.
Then he turned, looking at the three guards and the old Wvercian, until the first guard motioned for him to turn around once more. The guard unlocked both sets of manacles...the ones at his wrists, and the heavier ones clamped around his upper arms. Revik exhaled sharply when his arms came free, wincing as the circulation came back to his wrists and elbows.
He glanced at the closed door with its green light, then back at the three seers.
The first one indicated for him to enter the room. Then, giving Revik a short bow, he turned, walking back the way they’d come. The two other guards followed. After a short pause, the Wvercian gave him a wan smile and did the same.
Revik swallowed, nervous suddenly. He took a few seconds to scan for Allie, but still couldn’t feel her. He tried again.
Nothing. Not a trace of her light.
He contemplated just leaving...walking out. But with his leg, he wouldn’t get far, at least not in a hurry. The construct here felt secure. Military grade secure. They were watching him, even now. Waiting for him to make up his mind.
Touching the wall lightly for balance, he limped over to the door. As soon as he stood in front of it, the thick panel opened, disappearing into the rock wall. Without looking inside, he limped over the threshold and into the new room.
The door immediately began to close behind him.
Once it had, he checked the organic panel at once, found it unlocked.
Exhaling slowly, he turned, taking in the new space.
He remembered this room, he realized in some surprise...or one a hell of a lot like it. Something about the layout and feel was instantly and intensely familiar, despite the lack of a clear memory to accompany it.
In contrast to the cement cell and hewn-rock corridors, the floor consisted of marbled stone tiles, covered over in intricately handwoven rugs. The largest of the latter, filling the center of the room, depicted a blue and gold sun intersected with a white sword.
Despite the familiarity of the symbol, Revik felt something in his heart react as he stared at it here, in this context. If Salinse’s people were telling the truth about who they were, the older seers in his army may have worked side-by-side with Syrimne. Possibly Wreg. Possibly even the old Wvercian.
Being here, Revik could almost believe it was true. These people weren’t like the make-believe terrorists that lurked around Seertown. They didn’t feel like they were playing a game. They felt like the real thing.
It wasn’t the same, when they ran his flag.
A grated fire burned in a stone pit in the center of the room, below a round hole in the ceiling with a long chain to what was probably a flue. A series of padded benches ringed the pit itself. More had been pushed up against the dark rock that made up walls on two sides.
A terrain map of Asia hung above a heavy, rectangular desk of polished dark wood. The wood itself looked old, and seemed to be from an unusual type of tree, like it had traveled a long way to sit in this cave. Papers lay scattered around an organic monitor, along with a few tallow candles and a number of hand-helds, also organics. A silver sculpture of the sun and sword dominated an organic shelf behind the desk.
It looked like someone’s office. Maybe it doubled as sleeping quarters.
Revik glanced at a nearby glass case filled with guns. Most didn’t appear to be working models. He saw a few Austrian Mondragons though, a Ross rifle, Mausers, Lugers, even an old Nambu pistol from Japan—
“Hello, nephew.”
He stiffened, turning towards the voice.
A figure rose from the shadows by one set of padded benches.
The Sark’s dark robe blended perfectly with the wall. He had been sitting so still and silent that Revik hadn’t seen him. He hadn’t felt him in the Barrier, either, even un-collared and sharing the same construct.
Revik’s heart beat faster as the other’s features emerged.
The long, gaunt face had an ageless quality; its color and shape cut into the darker rock, smooth and white, perhaps from too many years underground. Revik could sense immediately that the seer was very old. Yet all that gave away his years was his light...and his eyes, which had sunken somewhat into his head.
Revik’s heartbeat continued to accelerate as he looked at the emaciated face. His heart hurt, grew heavy in his chest. He couldn’t breathe. He felt cold and hot all at once...claustrophobic.
He reached for Allie in reflex, panicked when he couldn’t find her.
He didn’t realize he’d taken a step backwards until his back connected with an outcropping of rock by the organic door. He fought to control himself, to pull back his light...realizing dimly he was having what amounted to a panic attack. He clutched his chest. His heart hurt, his lungs. He wanted desperately to run, but couldn’t breathe well enough to move.
He watched the Sark cross the room, realized the other seer was taller than him, by at least a few inches. The difference stretched, grew into feet in his mind. He saw concern in those clouded, pale eyes, and felt about fifteen seasons old.
“Get away from me,” he managed.
He watched helplessly as everything around him began to gray.
Consciousness slid from him so quickly that he didn’t have time to reach for the door, or even to send out a final call for help.
22
FALLING
REVIK OPENED HIS eyes. He stared up at a gaunt face, sure he was dreaming. As he met the dark, yellow-tinted gaze, all he could think was that those irises were the color of urine...only the urine of someone sick, or extremely dehydrated.
Then his vision clicked back into focus...and the eyes above him were an opaque white, the color of bleached bones.
The Sark reached for his arm. His smooth voice held concern.
“Nephew
...nephew, are you all right? Breathe, my son. Breathe...”
Revik fought to work his tongue. He pushed the wasted hands back, not wanting to touch them, struggling to pull himself off the floor.
The Sark immediately got out of his way.
He watched Revik with those ghost-like, white-irised eyes, unmoving as Revik pulled himself to a seated position. He clasped long fingers in front of his robe, as though waiting.
Revik leaned against the rock wall, not looking at the Sark as he brought his breathing under control. Pulling his body upright, he slid his back up the stone wall to get himself off the floor.
Then he just stood there, supporting his weight on the wall as he tested his balance.
He forced his expression flat.
What came out of his mouth still sounded aggressive.
“Are you Salinse?”
The gaunt seer tilted his head in assent. He continued studying Revik’s face. Whispers of concern flickered around Revik’s light, but he avoided them, fighting the impulse to cringe from the old man’s aleimic touch.
Salinse said, “Do you remember me, nephew?”
Revik’s throat tried to close. The familiar manner in which the old seer spoke to him...even the dialect he spoke hit him strangely. It was Prexci, but unlike any Prexci he had a conscious memory of hearing. He assumed it was from when he’d been a Rook, but, looking around, doubt tugged at him.
“No,” he said. “I don’t remember you.”
The Sark surveyed his appearance.
Revik felt the silver light touch him again and recoiled...even as parts of him responded to that touch.
“You don’t look well, nephew,” Salinse said. “Even apart from the leg. Have you been ill?”
“No.” Revik stepped sideways, putting more distance between them. “If we have some familial tie, you have a hell of a way of renewing acquaintanceship...”
He started to say it, then couldn’t bring himself to call the old seer ‘uncle,’ even though it was the correct form of address given his age and the fact that Revik was technically a guest in his home.
Allie's War Season One Page 83