Watching his face, I felt my worry intensify.
There was no way Revik would handle it well, if Menlim ended up being alive. He would want to go after him. Personally, that is––and possibly to the detriment of all else. He wouldn’t be able to be rational about it. There was no possible way he could.
Hell, I wasn’t even sure I could.
When Wreg broke the silence, I glanced over, and saw him watching Revik too, the same thread of caution in his eyes.
“That fucker was old even then,” he said. “He has to be dead by now, ilya. Even seers don’t live that long. And anyway, Nenz… we saw him die.”
“You saw him die?” I pressed, looking between them. “Who did, precisely? You yourself, Wreg? You, Revik? What does that mean, exactly, that you saw him die? He committed suicide, right? Pulled a Hitler when they finally broke into that stronghold in the Bavarian Alps?”
Wreg made a “more or less” gesture with his hand.
“Yes,” he said, exhaling. “That is right. So? Are you saying he contrived to make his light leave his body? That he created a body double of some kind? Pulled some kind of Barrier trick to convince a dozen or so high-ranked seers that he could shoot himself in the roof of his mouth, blowing out most of the back of his head, and somehow survive this thing, ilya?”
“Does that seem in character to you?” I said. “The suicide?”
Wreg frowned. For a moment, his eyes looked blank. Then, I saw reluctance in his eyes, doubt, right before a sick look crossed his expression.
“No,” he admitted. “No, and to be truthful, I wondered at the time, but––”
I opened my mouth to speak, but Revik cut us both off.
“I felt it,” he said, looking at me. “I felt him die, Allie. I may not have been there, but there was no mistake. I felt it.”
Even so, something in Wreg’s words seemed to hit at Revik, too, enough that I caught him staring off, a different layer of meaning coloring his clear eyes. I could almost see him thinking through everything I’d said, everything he remembered, as if mapping a different scenario somewhere in another part of his mind.
I wanted to ask him what it was, but I didn’t dare, not yet. I could tell he didn’t want to talk about this––parts of this, anyway––not in front of Chandre and Wreg.
Maybe not with me, either.
“Are you both saying Menlim wasn’t capable of a Barrier trick of that kind?” I said, my voice cautious. I aimed the question at Wreg, but my focus remained primarily on Revik. “I can think of a few things we already know he was experimenting with back then, that might have aided him in something like this.”
“The host body cannot die,” Wreg growled, impatient. “If he did that corpse-riding trick of Terian’s, he couldn’t kill his original body. That is true now. It would have been even more true then, with the tech being so new––”
“And you know for sure that was the original body?” I glanced between them.
The silence deepened.
I found myself watching Revik again, seeing him frown as he stared at the metal floor. All of us seemed to be looking at Revik, but he didn’t look at any of us. I watched him go somewhere else, still staring at the far wall, his hands in fists where his arms crossed over his chest.
“You’re the only one who would have known for sure,” I said to him, softer. “You were already gone, baby. Galaith had you, along with the Adhipan. You would’ve been on your way to the Pamir by then, so you couldn’t have verified that he’d really died.”
“Allie.” Revik stared at me, voice hard, his accent strong. “I went over the Barrier records meticulously. If you think I would risk making a mistake about something like that––”
“Revik, no. I don’t. I really don’t. Not intentionally. But,” I reminded him, my voice quieter. “…He would have known that, too. Right?”
“So? You’re saying he managed to…” He trailed, shaking his head angrily. A hard coil of energy left his light, bright enough to make me flinch. “…It’s bullshit,” he snapped, controlling himself with an effort, his accent thicker. “This is all bullshit, Allie. Even he couldn’t have pulled this off. This is fucking ridiculous, that we’re even talking about this––”
“You’re probably right,” I said, still watching his face. “Except for one thing, Revik. You were worried about it, too. This isn’t the first time it’s crossed your mind he might be alive. You went after him in Argentina without a second’s hesitation. The instant that mirage appeared, you tried to kill him. Why wouldn’t you assume it was a trick, if you really believed he was dead?”
At his deepening frown, I hesitated, adding softer,
“You told me once, that you had doubts. You said that a part of you never quite believed that he was gone––”
“Because I was afraid of him, Allie!” he snapped, staring at me with his pale, colorless eyes. “That was trauma, not logic. Gaos! To use that against me!”
“I’m not using anything against you! Jesus, Revik––”
“The fuck you're not!”
“Isn’t it better to know the truth? Whatever it ends up being?”
“I know the truth! He's dead, Alyson! He’s fucking dead!”
Silence fell in the room.
None of the rest of us looked at one another, but I felt nerves shiver off Wreg and Chandre’s lights as they watched Revik. As if he felt some of that himself, Revik exhaled in frustration, running a hand through his black hair.
“He’s been dead for almost a hundred years,” he said, his accent worsening. “In all that time, I do not feel him? Not even once? Not once, wife? That is some magic.”
When I didn’t answer, he clicked angrily, motioning in a jerking wave.
“If you think I’m going to question that because of something Feigran said, you’re out of your fucking mind…”
He trailed, as if running out of words, his eyes hard as glass.
“Gaos,” he growled, almost to himself that time. “Di’lantente a guete… ends of the darkest earth, and this is what I’m contemplating. Like we don’t have enough crap to deal with right now… I have to think about this.”
Gripping his hair in one hand, he muttered a few more phrases under his breath, that time in a language I didn’t know. Even so, his eyes never lost that faraway look, as if he were arguing more with himself at that point, or maybe with someone I couldn’t see.
In any case, gauging his eyes, I didn’t answer.
Chandre and Wreg didn’t say anything, either.
I saw Wreg frown, as if thinking. I saw his eyes blur, too, and wondered if he was going over his own memories of what had occurred, trying to frame them in this new light, even through the painkillers.
After another pause, where Revik wouldn’t look at any of us and Chandre watched Wreg, I let out a sigh of my own.
“Anyway,” I said. “We don’t know anything. And you’re right. A lot of my information on this came from Feigran––Terian. So maybe me telling you this doesn’t actually bring us any closer to the truth about Shadow, but I thought I should tell you anyway. Given everything, I thought the rest of you should at least look at it.”
I watched Revik's face.
“It bears looking at, right?” I said. “I mean, if it’s actually Menlim we’re dealing with, particularly in terms of this Barrier-based network, we need to know. You all mentioned we might be talking about multiple anchors in the physical. So we’ll need to ID these people.”
Pausing, I continued to watch Revik’s face.
“…Didn’t you and Wreg say they’d have to be really highly-trained seers to act as anchors? Adepts of some kind? What if it was him and Salinse and this Xarethe person Balidor told us about? Would that be enough, do you think?”
I tried to make my voice businesslike that time, in the hopes of engaging Revik’s more practical, strategic side.
It almost worked. At least it got him to glance at me.
I could see him thinking about w
hat I’d said. A few seconds later, his frown deepened, but that look I’d seen building behind his eyes seemed to have faded.
“Yes,” he said finally. “We can try a few more combinations. The most we’d gotten to were three, though, and it still didn’t work, Allie. There are still too many structural instabilities without a framework like the Pyramid for sharing light.”
His eyes met mine, and briefly, the expression I saw there clutched at my heart. The dead look behind his eyes made it difficult for me to breathe for a few seconds.
“We’ll need to get ‘Dori to take a look at this,” he added. “…and maybe Varlan, since it seems he’s decided to stay. Of course, Tarsi will look, too. So will the rest of the infiltration team, along with anyone else we have with a high enough rank in actual who would have been active back then.”
His jaw firmed as he continued to look at me warily.
“You were convinced by this, when you spoke to Feigran?” he said. “Something in you and Terian’s connection made you believe it?”
I nodded, stifling the impulse to walk over and touch him. Whatever he was feeling, he was keeping it locked behind his light’s shields, but enough of him leaked through the connection we shared that I found myself fighting tears.
“Yes,” I said, clearing my throat.
“Then we’ll need to do scans on you, too, Allie. We’ll need to see every second of each interview. All of them, all right?”
His voice grew less hard towards the end. Seeing his expression soften as he looked at me, I nodded again, wiping my face with my hand.
“Of course,” I said.
Looking around at Wreg and Chandre, I fought my voice clear.
“I hope I’m wrong,” I said. “I hate that son of a bitch more than I can possibly put into words. But that’s all the more reason to be sure. If there’s even a chance that what Feigran and I felt is based on something real…”
Trailing, I glanced at Revik, making up my mind even as my jaw hardened.
“I want the bastard dead,” I said, colder. “It has to take priority. Above everything else. Even Cass. If he’s alive, we take care of that first.”
I saw something in Revik’s eyes change, growing softer, right before he nodded.
“We need to know,” Wreg agreed, equally decisive. He looked at Revik, as if measuring him with his eyes. “I’ll round up everyone who fought with us the first time. See how many knew that fucker’s light well enough to track him. We’ll conduct interviews and run scans on everyone who was there when he died. Declan was there. So was Jorag. For the death rituals, at least. Neela was with me when we found the body.”
Revik nodded, once.
His eyes were still harder than usual, but clear now; I could see him there again. Looking at him, I felt some of the tension starting to leave my body and light.
“We’ll pull a meeting together when we get back,” Revik said, sounding like the military commander he was. When he looked at me that time, I saw a faint apology in his eyes. “But first, we’ll conduct preliminary scans on Allie, Jon, Chan, Maygar, Stanley, Varlan, Rex, and whoever else. Hopefully, we can get something of a composite on Feigran’s light during that time, so it’ll serve a dual purpose by providing a map we’ll need for tracking.”
Briefly, his mouth turned grim. That time, it wasn’t aimed at me.
“At least we know now, one possible reason they might have been so determined to get their hands on Feigran. If his ability really did give him eyes into Shadow, he probably could have helped us map the network, too. He could have seen this thing coming with Cass.”
“Oh!” Chandre said suddenly, making all of us jump.
We all turned, our eyes swiveling towards her.
“I forgot,” she said, her voice more subdued. “Perhaps he did… Feigran. Perhaps there are diagrams of this mapping already? I am told there are drawings, correct? Feigran spoke often about drawings he’d left behind in New York. He was concerned they might be lost.”
Wreg was already shaking his head.
“I’m sorry to say, those were almost completely incomprehensible, sister,” Wreg said. “I had my people look at all of them. Feigran didn’t so much as doodle a smiley face that we didn’t double-check for imprints or anything that might gain us some intel. We found nothing of value in any of it.”
“But you couldn’t have seen all of it,” I said, looking first at Wreg, then at Revik and Chandre. “You didn’t see the images of Menlim… or the bank. So he must have hidden some from you. The cameras weren’t on all the time, were they? Especially towards the end.” I gave him and Revik apologetic looks. “I had them turn them off a few times, too. The cameras.”
Wreg frowned, looking at Revik with a quirked eyebrow.
Before either of them could speak, I added,
“Also, you didn’t know what you were looking for back then. You didn’t figure out this network thing until we got to Argentina. Maybe you didn’t realize what you had––especially if he only drew parts of it. You didn’t have Revik look at most of those, did you?”
“We gave him a few,” Wreg said, but he looked at Revik, too. His eyes narrowed as he seemed to be thinking about my words.
“You would have given him the ones that resonated with the old network, under Galaith,” I said, once I saw his expression clear. “You wouldn’t have just given him random Barrier diagrams… the ones that made no sense without the context of this new design you and Revik have been mapping. Most of your people on that detail were younger, right? They wouldn’t know how to look for anything to do with Menlim or World War I. They wouldn’t have even picked up on the resonance.”
Wreg's frown deepened, but he looked at me, a faint gleam in his dark eyes. The look there turned briefly into something else, a near appreciation.
“Damn. Your girl is smart, Nenz,” he said.
I snorted, folding my arms. “His girl?” I rolled my eyes, even as Wreg grinned at me. “I believe that’s ‘Esteemed Bridge’ to you… peon Wreg.”
“None of this matters,” Revik said, gesturing for us to cut it out. Leaning his weight on the exam table opposite Wreg, he looked at the other male. “They took all the drawings, right? You said the books were all gone the night Feigran disappeared.”
“The recent ones,” I broke in, before Wreg could answer. “But he gave Jon, what? Four or five of the older books, at least. They wouldn’t have known to take those.”
“What?” Wreg’s previous amusement vanished. “That piece of shit was giving my boyfriend presents?”
“Boyfriend,” Chandre muttered, looking between the three of us. She didn’t look all that surprised, but I saw a frown touch her lips anyway. “…Ah.”
I laughed; I couldn’t help it. “Feigran had a huge crush on Jon, Wreg. Don’t tell me you didn't know?”
“I didn't know that scrawny freak gave him presents.”
Revik held up a hand to silence us. His eyes remained hard as glass.
“Does he still have the drawings?” he asked me. “Jon.”
“I think so. That must be what Feigran was complaining to Chan and the others about.” I glanced at Chandre and saw her nod, then smiled a bit at Wreg. “I think Jon said he hid them under his bed. Probably so his man wouldn’t freak out.” Seeing Wreg’s frown deepen, I waved off my own words. “…Either of them.”
“Under the bed,” Wreg muttered. “Wonderful.”
Again, I grinned. Maybe the tension earlier made it easier for me to want to siphon it off in some way, and Wreg was the easiest target.
“Speaking of beds, what are you two doing about living arrangements when we get back?” I raised an eyebrow at him. “Neither of you has their quarters in a private construct. Or do you plan to just keep torturing the rest of us for the next however-many months?”
Even Revik laughed at that, his face clearing briefly. Something in his light remained hard, however.
Wreg, as if taking my cue, rolled his eyes. “Your protectiveness of yo
ur brother is bordering on creepy, princess. Are you really so worried about glimpsing us in the throes?”
“Damn straight, I am,” I said, giving an exaggerated grimace. “I get that there’s a certain karmic appropriateness, but there are definitely things I would rather not know… much less see… about either of you.” I smiled at him sweetly. “Especially you, Wreg. I don’t need your inner sex-maniac confirmed, thank you very much.”
“Who said it’s inner?” Wreg said, giving me a mock predatory look until Revik smacked him on the arm, making him wince. Smiling, Wreg added to me, “Why so squeamish? Are you afraid you’ll fall madly in lust with me?”
I rolled my eyes. “Yes. That’s exactly it. It has nothing to do with the fact that it happens to be my brother you’re molesting.”
When I glanced at Revik, his eyes looked thoughtful once more, and slightly tense. Not in the way they had before, but enough to pull me up short anyway.
Looking at him, I realized it was something different.
What? I asked him, shielding from the others.
I’ll tell you later, he sent back. Just be careful how much you tease Wreg about Jon. He’s going to find out eventually, you know.
I looked at him blankly for a few seconds.
Then it dawned on me what he meant.
In that few seconds of pause, more than one set of images popped into my mind that could get me in trouble with either or both of them, even as my light retracted abruptly, jerking violently back around my form.
Feeling my cheeks warm, I glanced away from Revik.
I blanked my mind, throwing up a real shield that time.
“What? Is the Esteemed Bridge actually blushing?” Wreg leaned back on the exam table, grinning. He glanced at Revik. “You pervert. What did you say to her?”
Revik smiled at me, his clear eyes bordering on predatory, although I saw the more subtle look underneath.
“Wouldn't you like to know?” he murmured, still looking at me as his eyebrow rose.
Wreg laughed, but Revik didn’t take his eyes off mine.
14
CRATE
WE DOCKED THE sub at the only open port on the entire eastern shore of Manhattan.
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