Allie's War Season Four (161 page)

Without that harder thing choking off my heart and light, though, that truth didn’t sadden me, or make everything feel hopeless or wrong, like before.

It just felt like truth.

20

PROPHET

TERIAN DIDN’T LOOK away from the window.

Something in the sand pulled at his mind, swirled his light in concentric eddies. It was too far away from him now to see it, but he watched it anyway, in the darkest reaches of his mind. He watched the sand twist and jerk in imaginary gusts of wind, creating looping, symmetrical patterns. Patterns of tinted glass...patterns he could fall into, that he could almost smell under the heat of the sun on the water and steel and the roofs of buildings.

Behind him, someone cleared their throat.

“Brother,” the seer said, his voice patient.

Terian turned his head, still clasping his hands at the base of his back. His mind clicked forward in that pause...some of it, at least. He left some of it to play in that sand storm he’d built in his mind, to wind up and into the light, into darkness, chasing shadows across the dunes as heat created mirages of mirrored lakes inside dimpled pieces of empty land.

The seer looking at him exhaled, his eyes and voice still patient.

“Are you still trying, brother?” he said gently. “As we discussed?”

Terian felt something twist in a different shape around his aleimi, a broken, snaking current like a hose shooting water, with no hands to hold at the squirting end.

Perhaps that part of him was thirsty. Perhaps it needed a drink.

His mouth and face bent into the expected positions, however.

“Of course, father,” he said, smiling, nodding his head. “Of course.”

The tall, skeletally-thin seer watched Terian’s face without changing his expression, his scrutiny overt, almost openly skeptical now. Terian felt his light flinching and flickering around that, too, even as he made his aleimi submissive once more. Pliable. Easy to imagine. He would do whatever father wanted. He would do anything, really and truly.

Waggy tail, happy dog,
he thought, smiling wider at the narrow-faced seer with his skull-like face, and long, iron-gray hair.
Waggy, smiley dog, who will do anything, anything, anything, master...who will lick your cock and fetch your slippers and wag his tail and bark when you say bark, as long as you don’t smash him...as long as you don’t set him on fire...

Menlim let out a patient-sounding sigh, followed by a series of clicks.

“Do you have everything you need here, brother?” he asked then.

Terian looked around where he stood, confused at first by the question.

He looked at his leather couches, his sunken living room, the fireplace that needed air conditioning to balance its heat, the original paintings and glass sculptures. The servants he knew he could call in here to suck his own cock, or beat one another to death if the mood struck him. The jacuzzi bathtub. The walk-in closet filled with clothes that was actually a modified bedroom now filled with racks of designer garments and shoes.

Looking at the solid gold wall-hanging of the sword and sun over his bookshelf of original books, with leather spines and real paper pages, Terian smiled again, gesturing fluidly with one hand across the expanse of the high-rise apartment.

“What is to need, father?” he said.

“Do not humor me, brother,” Menlim warned, still watching Terian’s amber-colored eyes. “This is too important.” He paused, then his voice grew more meaningful again. “I will deny you nothing, my brother, as long as you retain your loyalty to me.”

Terian smiled wider.

Smiley, waggy dog...

“You wish them back, don’t you?” Menlim said, his voice warning as he broke into Terian’s light. “Your sister, War. Your daughter, little Kani.” Menlim paused, still studying him with those oddly cold, oddly lifeless, yellow eyes. “...Your brother, the Sword? You want him back, don’t you? You want him to be your brother again?”

Terian flinched, almost without meaning to.

“Of course, father,” he said, chastened that time.

“Then you must
try harder,
brother,” Menlim said, folding his own hands at the base of his back. “You know I would do this myself, if I could. You were given a gift, my precious brother. One you cannot squander due to conflicted loyalties about your family...not when they have made their own loyalties so demonstrably clear...”

Terian nodded again, feeling the sharp whispers of silver light as they coiled around him, looking for secrets, pulling at him from the dark...

He wanted his secrets. He wanted to chew on him, gobble him up...

“We need you, brother Prophet,” Menlim said, softer. “You must know that, too. They have one like you now, you know.”

An image flickered past Terian’s face. Green eyes, but not the Bridge. Black hair. He remembered her in Saigon, the Vietnamese-style dress she wore there...the way Revi’ panted after her. The way he wanted to stick his dick in her, even then...

“Kali,” he muttered, feeling that hardness in his light worsen.

“You know she will tell them things,” Menlim said, his voice more gentle that time. “Things that could harm us. Things that could harm you, my brother...”

Terian did know that. He knew that cunt, all too well.

He owed her some things. Promises were made. Vows, even.

Vows she was long overdue to collect.

“You remember what I told you, Terian?” Menlim said, his voice softer that time, more gentle.

“You said you would give her to me,” Terian said, feeling that heat spread through his limbs, temporarily blotting everything else out. “You said I could have her, when this was done.”

“I did,” Menlim said, inclining his head. “I vowed it, brother. I vow it still...with every element in my light. With the light of my own son, I vow it...”

Revi’. He meant Revi’.

Thinking about this, about Revi’ and that bitch who took him away...

Terian felt pain course harder through his light, giving him an erection.

“Bring them to Dubai, beloved brother,” Menlim said, softer. “There is still some chance they will turn away from this. Bring them to Dubai...and then bring them to me.”

Terian nodded, feeling that pain worsen, heating knots in his belly and chest.

It had been so long. So long since he’d seen his brother...since he laughed with him, been with him in any way. So many things had happened since then. So many changes...

So many things had been broken and lost.

He needed him. They needed each other.

“They will come,” Terian said, his voice firm that time. He looked up at the aged seer, his voice holding certainty time, and a strength that had been absent from his words before. “They will come, brother,” he said, echoing that same density of truth. “I will make sure of it. And I will find them, before they can leave with what they want.”

Menlim nodded, his expression unmoving.

Terian felt some flicker of approval there, but wariness, too. Not quite skepticism, in the sense that he thought Terian was lying, or keeping more secrets, or even afraid. More like the old seer wanted something more concrete. He wanted more than vague assurances and placations, something that wouldn’t simply make his wantings sound more likely.

He wanted certainty.

Absolute certainty. Without a doubt certainty.

No waggy, smiley dogs. No pretend nicenesses. No speeches with swelling music and pounding cannons. No emotional catharsis and tearing eyes...

Mathematical certainties.

Perceptual shifts based on hard data and reliable equations...

“How do you plan to do that?” Menlim said, even as Terian thought these things, chasing them like rabbits in the deeper recesses of his mind. “What do you intend, my brother?”

Terian did know, though.

He knew exactly what he would do.

He knew Revi’, after all. He knew what Revi’ cared about...what motivated him. Even that prescient bitch with her lying words and whispering lies wouldn’t get in Revi’s way, not if Terian went after what his old friend
really
cared about.

Anyway, he knew something else.

He knew what the little bird would do.

He wished his sister, Alyson no harm...he loved her, too, so very, very much...almost as much as he loved Revi’ himself.

She was his Bridge...his precious Bridge...

Feeling a coil of colder anger off the old seer’s light, Terian suppressed that thought, too.

Daddy didn’t like sister Alyson. He didn’t like her one bit.

“You know she cannot be allowed to survive?” Menlim said, his voice dangerous that time. “We are clear on that, Terian? Because we have discussed this before, too.”

Terian frowned, but he nodded.

That pain in his chest worsened, but he nodded again.

He did know. He knew.

He knew lots of things...

“You mustn’t let yourself get confused, my wise brother,” Menlim said, softer. “I understand that your light feeds you more information than most. I also understand what family means to you. Truly. It is important to me, as well...more than you can possibly know. But you mustn’t let these things confuse you, beloved Prophet. Betrayals cannot be tolerated, my brother. Disloyalty and selfish agendas are the rot that eats civilization from its roots. There must always be that core of loyalty and sacrifice for the greater good that runs through us all...”

Terian continued to frown, thinking about this.

Menlim knew things, too. The father. He knew everything.

He knew more than Galaith.

Terian couldn’t hide things from the father. He knew he shouldn’t. He’d be a bad man, too, if he did. Like Revi’. Like sister Alyson.

The thought created a panic through Terian’s light, a momentary tilt that pulled him off his axis, leaving him walking in some other place...leaving powdered footsteps on the moon. He could see everything from up there. Everything.

Uncle-father-daddy...he was right.

He could see too much.

He could see his sister and brother, even, in that other place. They were struggling now. Power and love, light and truth. They looked for that truth inside their own minds, inside one another’s bodies...inside their skins and lights. They looked for it in Lily, in their friends, in their love for other people. They felt responsible.

They felt responsible for protecting their people, creating a future...

Pain whispered through Terian’s light.

He was all alone here. All alone.

Father was right.

He was lonely here. He needed his family.

Terian looked out the window, at the sun glimmering off the ocean, at the sand he could imagine he saw, swirling in eddies on the beaches across space and time.

He knew what she would do...Sister Alyson. Bridge. Light between worlds. Destroyer of
the way things had been.
Bringer of truth. Half-awakened prophet of her own.

It wouldn’t be long now.