Shield (Bridge & Sword: Awakenings #2): Bridge & Sword World

by JC Andrijeski

  He was first blood cousin to Menlim, the seer believed to be Syrimne’s handler.

  Menlim, 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. Ops, pieces of ops and even entire long-term strategies were held solely by one or more delineated cells.

  No one knew when they were being sidelined––or, for that matter, when they weren’t. They might conduct elaborate operations that were mainly diversionary. Conversely, they might perform seemingly trivial tasks that were strategically critical.

  Menlim’s structure had been less multi-dimensional than the Pyramid, but only a seer could have designed something like it, given the complexities of the transitions and their connections to one another.

  Of course, knowing all this didn’t explain the half-scent of memory that whispered around this place, and around these seers… but it gave him a starting point.

  He focused on the range of his leg and cast. He tried walking normally until it hurt, stopping before he risked damaging it more.

  He had maybe a full minute of regular gait.

  He could probably 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 him whatever he wanted 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.

  Revik watched him do it. 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. Then he looked at Revik, motioning 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.

  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. He started with the ones at his wrists, then moved to 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.

  When Revik just stood there, the guard gave a short bow and 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. 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. He also wouldn’t get anywhere in a hurry, especially if this site was as isolated as it felt. 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 spending a lot of time 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.

  It was still unlocked.

  Exhaling slowly, he turned, taking in the new space.

  He remembered this room, he realized in some surprise… or he remembered 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 Syrimne’s 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. More had been pushed up against the dark rock walls on either side.

  A terrain map of Asia hung above a heavy, rectangular desk. The wood of the desk 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 a stone shelf behind the desk.

  It looked like someone’s office.

  Maybe it also 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 Revik hadn’t seen him, 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 in 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. He realized 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.

  He watched the Sark cross the room, realized the other male was taller than him, by at least a few inches. The difference stretc
hed, 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.

  REVIK OPENED HIS eyes.

  He stared up at a gaunt face, sure he was dreaming. As he gazed into the dark, yellow-tinted irises, all he could think was that those irises were the color of urine… only the urine of someone sick, or extremely dehydrated.

  His vision clicked back into focus.

  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. He struggled to pull himself off the floor.

  The Sark immediately got out of his way.

  He watched Revik with those white eyes, long fingers clasped in front of his robe as Revik pulled himself to a seated position.

  Revik leaned against the rock wall, not looking at the Sark at all as he brought his breathing under control. Pulling his body upright with his hands and his good leg, he slid 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?”

  When Revik glanced over his shoulder, 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 Revik strangely. It was Prexci, but unlike any Prexci he had a conscious memory of hearing.

  This must be from when he’d been a Rook. It had to be.

  Looking around though, doubt tugged at him.

  “No,” he said. “I don’t remember you.”

  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 observed, still looking him over with those white eyes. “Even apart from the leg. Have you been ill?”

  “No.” Revik stepped sideways, putting more distance between them. “Do we know one another? Is the ‘nephew’ more than ceremonial? If we truly have some blood-family tie, you have a hell of a way of renewing acquaintanceship.”

  He started to say it, then couldn’t. He couldn’t bring himself to call the old seer “uncle.” He knew it was the correct form of address in the old system, given his age and the fact that Revik was technically a guest in the old Sark’s home.

  He still couldn’t do it.

  “Salinse,” he said instead. “Why am I here? What do you want from me?”

  The old Sark exuded mild distress. Letting out a purr that amounted to a sigh, he turned on his heel and walked back towards the fire pit.

  Revik stayed where he was.

  He noticed for the first time that the old man was barefoot. He watched as Salinse sank gracefully to one of the padded benches around the hole housing the fire, then motioned for Revik to join him at an opposite bench. Hesitant, Revik stepped deeper into the room, conscious of the limp, of how slow he was moving.

  He’d just passed out cold. Jesus.

  Wiping sweat off his forehead, he scanned every corner, looked for more doors, not only in the walls, but in the floors and ceiling. He noticed a trapdoor in one wall and put himself between it and the old Sark. He contemplated a bench nearer to the trap door, then decided it didn’t matter. He wouldn’t be able move fast enough anyway.

  He sat stiffly across from the old seer and stretched out his leg.

  Salinse smiled. His cultured voice gentled, holding a near-kindness.

  “I understand your caution. Revik, is it?” When he received no response, he went on as though he had. “I heartily apologize for how you were brought here, as well. I regret that I could not afford the usual courtesies, and that I was forced to rely on Wvercian… how do you say… ‘the muscle?’” He smiled, but the milky eyes remained still.

  “…There was simply no time. I heard about the attack on Seertown, and immediately suspected they might be after your mate.”

  He paused at Revik’s flinch.

  He added, “I hope you know, I do not myself have the same opinion of you as does Commander Wreg. While I am sympathetic to his passions, I understand very well the circumstances around which you left us.”

  Revik tightened his hold on his light, feeling the Sark’s probe. The intensity and subtlety of the scan unnerved him.

  It also made him feel soft, out of practice.

  Salinse’s eyes shimmered faintly.

  “You caused quite a stir, I hear,” he said. “Marrying the Bridge. Of course, I did not know who you were, when news of the happy event first reached me.”

  He gestured delicately with one hand, crossing his ankles.

  “I had heard the name Dehgoies Revik, of course. You have a reputation even within your assumed identity. I knew the basics of your story, and your record as an infiltrator. But other than a fleeting thought that you might one day make an interesting recruitment opportunity, I had no cause to think about you beyond that.”

  Revik didn’t speak. He found himself listening though, trying again to place the familiarity of the room, of the old Sark.

  “An auspicious event,” Salinse said, smiling. “The Bridge taking a mate… it is auspicious indeed. Such a thing could not help but be an occasion for gossip. And it is important who is chosen, certainly.”

  The old seer grunted, folding his robed arms.

  “Those clan seers of Seertown. I suppose they think she chose badly? Or that you forced her in some way?”

  Revik felt his jaw harden. “Again. If this is a social call, I have to question your timing. And your tact, Salinse.”

  The Sarhacienne inclined his head. “You are right, of course. We must discuss business.”

  Once again, he studied Revik’s face.

  “This… Terian. He has a grudge against you that is personal, is that true? If grudge is really the word, with one so obviously insane.”

  Revik made a “more or less” gesture with one hand. “Yes. But that’s not the main reason he would have taken Allie.”

  Salinse continued to study his eyes, as if lost there.

  “Yes… of course.” He clicked softly, as though rousing himself back to the present. “Well, I suppose we cannot waste time.”

  He turned that odd gaze back on Revik.

  “What do you need? You are welcome to any amount of weaponry, of course… and air transport. We have intelligence we could share. But what do you think would be wise, in terms of numbers? You have dealt with him before. Is he likely to overreact?”

  There was a silence.

  Then Revik nodded, almost to himself. “I appreciate that,” he said, and meant it. “I think a moderate-sized group for the main assault, with an equal or larger force as backup. Maybe…” Out of habit, he asked for more than he thought he’d get. “…Forty?”

  “Done.”

  Revik blinked. “I’ll want to leave at once.”

  “I assumed so, yes.”

  Revik nodded again. “Fine. Do I need to agree to terms now, before we go, or can we settle that later?”

  The old Sark smiled. “You do not wish to know what we want from you?”

  “Not really, no,” Revik said. “Now that I’ve married the Bridge, everyone seems to want to recrui
t me for something. Whatever it is, it’s fine.”

  He began to use his hands to push himself back to his feet, but Salinse signaled for him to remain where he was. It was the polite form of the gesture, but Revik felt the command behind it. After a pause, he acceded reluctantly.

  “You can do better than that, nephew,” Salinse said.

  Revik felt his jaw harden.

  After another pause, he gestured assent.

  “Fine,” he said. “I’m assuming you still believe the Seven’s claim to leadership is ‘illegitimate’… ever since their treaty with the humans after the wars? So you want me to, what? Swear off my allegiance to them and fight for your side? Provide intel, use my position as the Bridge’s mate to gain access to the Adhipan? Recruit from their ranks?”

  His anger swelled, darkening when Allie’s face whispered past his sight.

  He let a pulse of light reach his eyes.

  “…You’re probably thinking I married her to gain some kind of leverage, maybe even to get my penance revoked. You’d be wrong about that, but since I’m assuming that’s what most in the Seven think, I don’t hold it against you. If you think I’d turn on her, you’d be wrong about that, too. If you ever give me reason to think you pose a threat to my wife in any way, I’ll kill you.”

  He paused, then gestured in a conciliatory way.

  “But I’m assuming you suspected that already,” he said. “Or you wouldn’t be using her to get to me, and vice versa. If you know me as well as you pretend, you also know I don’t much care what you want, as long as you give me a gun first and let me go after my wife. I’ll accept any terms, as long as they don’t harm her in any way. I can’t speak for her, but I’ll relay any message you have.”

  The Sark’s narrow lips formed a near-smile.

  “Ah. Yes. I see you are still a pragmatist. You want your wife back. This is you ‘playing along,’ yes? You don’t much care about anything or anyone else… or even whether our intentions are ‘good’ or ‘bad’ in the wider scale of things. Not until your goal is reached.”