Allie's War Season One (113 page)

He’s held it back for so long.

When it finally goes he laughs and laughs and can’t stop laughing...

I SAT HUNCHED over a cup of chai, staring into the fire.

My mind felt excavated...spent. I could no longer think about anything outside of our jumps. I lived there now. Both relief and irritation accompanied my every break between immersions. It was like a drug.

It frightened me a little, to know I was living vicariously through the boy. I was exercising that part of myself through him...siphoning off the excess, so to speak, like watching porn instead of having sex.

I was aware enough to be disturbed by that idea.

Day followed day, mostly the same since that first introduction to the boy in the woods beneath that older version of the Himalayas. Tarsi and I weren’t any closer to finding the connection to the current day massacre, if one even existed to be found...but I felt like I needed to scrub my brain with steel wool and Comet for about a month.

I don’t think I fully knew it was morning until the old woman came in, holding an armful of wood. Stacking the pieces by the stone fireplace, she turned and looked at me, her eyes appraising.

“You need break,” she announced in her choppy English.

I nodded, vaguely grateful. The irritation came a few seconds later. I pushed it aside, glancing hopefully at the pile of skins that had become my bed.

“Yeah,” I said.

“Good.” She smiled. “Husband here. Waiting for you.”

I stared at her for several full seconds, unblinking, until her words sank in.

“Revik’s here?”

“You got different husband?”

Taking a long drink of the tea, I set down my cup, noticing only then that my hands were shaking. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t felt him.

Then, thinking about it, I could believe it.

But that made me wonder again why he hadn’t come before now.

He hadn’t felt angry the times I’d managed to touch his light, but he hadn’t felt exactly...normal, either. Tugging my boots closer, I shoved my socked foot inside the first one and began knotting it up. I blanked out my mind.

“He mad at me,” Tarsi said cheerfully. “He say he no leave until he talk to you.”

My nerves worsened. “Great. Okay. He’s out there now?”

“He no leave,” she repeated. Her pale eyes smiled at me.
Take the yak skin. And keep the clothes. I’ll get them from you when you come back.

Once I got my second boot on and tied up, I stood, letting the blanket drop to the floor as I looked for where I’d left the coat. Finding it by the door, I fumbled into the arms, and then I felt him, looking for me. A sharp ribbon of pain sliced through my chest, sucking in my breath. I lay a hand on the whitewashed stone, fighting to keep the chai down.

Once I’d recovered enough, I looked at Tarsi.

That time, I saw kindness in her eyes as well as humor.

“Do I need to come back here?” I said. “I do, right?”

She gestured fluidly with a wrist flick up, a seer’s yes.

She added, “Go with him now. Both of you are useless.” Smiling, she went on in the more cultured tones of her mind.
It is better that we let the two of you be married for awhile. You are both becoming a liability in your current state...him even more than you.

At my skeptical look, her eyes sharpened.

“...You need to tell him something, Bridge. Before you leave. I’ll know if you don’t. I’ll come after you, tell him myself.”
Use my exact words,
she sent.
Before you go anywhere with him. He won’t hear it later.

I nodded, but that last part puzzled me. I finished fastening the coat, standing by the door.

“Okay. What is it?”

She told me. Her words didn’t clear anything up, so I repeated them a few times in my head, trying to make them make sense.

“What does it mean?” I said.

Alyson, tell him exactly what I said.

“But you’re talking about me, right? Why can’t I know what it means, if—”

She clicked at me, loudly enough that I fell silent.

Alyson,
she sent.
I am not playing games. Tell him...or I will.

After a slight hesitation, I nodded. But I wasn’t happy. Reaching for the wooden door handle, I stopped a last time, looking over the interior of the small cottage. It had become my whole world in the past few weeks.

“Say goodbye to Hannah for me,” I said. “Tell her thanks.”

“You stalling, Bridge?” She smiled.

I sighed. “Maybe.”

Steeling myself, I jerked the door open and entered the clearing, putting the old woman and the stillborn images of war and glass shattering and dead children out of my mind...for a short time, at least.

I SHOULD HAVE known he wouldn’t wait in the open unnecessarily.

And yet, it still made me pause when I couldn’t find him right away with my eyes. I scanned shadows, half-using my sight, and made out his tall form, standing unmoving by a clump of dark, hard-skinned trees. He stood at the opposite edge of the clearing, not far from where I’d last seen Chandre.

He wasn’t looking at me.

He had been waiting for me to locate him, however; I felt that much, but no more. He hadn’t been so heavily shielded around me since we’d been together on the ship. His visibility behind the Barrier existed only in what wasn’t there, not what was...his outline constituted an empty spot in the living light of the forest.

As soon as I thought it, his light changed.

Within a blink, his light matched that of the woods with an exactness I couldn’t help but find impressive.

I began to walk. His long form remained motionless as I crossed the grass. Shadows stretched alongside strips of early morning light, dappling his face under the trees. He didn’t look over as I approached, but continued to focus on the sky past the edge of the cliff. It occurred to me he must have left in the middle of the night to get here at this hour.

When I stood directly in front of him, he turned his head, but still didn’t quite meet my gaze.

For a moment, we just stood there.

It was almost easier to be with him like this, with his light so closed. I looked up at pinkish clouds, realized I hadn’t been out of Tarsi’s hut much in what must have been a few days at least.

When I looked over next, I caught him watching me. His eyes traveled down my body before he felt me looking and averted his gaze. His face was blank, the mask I remembered from when we first knew one another. He had a bruise on one cheek, dark enough that I knew it had to be a few days old at least. Tentatively, I tried to read what was going on behind the mask.

He didn’t exactly push me off, but I felt him move, sidestepping my light.

His voice made me jump. He spoke English, his accent thick.

“Are you staying?” he said. “Here. With Tarsi.”

I took a breath. “She said I could go.”

He didn’t meet my gaze, but nodded. “What will you do now?”

I hesitated, suddenly unsure.

“I’m leaving,” I said. “...With you. Aren’t I?”

I saw his shoulders abruptly unclench. His light remained firmly closed. He seemed about to say something more, then looked away again.

“Are you ready?” he said. “Do you have everything you need?”

I studied his eyes. “Yeah,” I said. “Revik, your face. What...”

He shook his head. “Not here.” He held out a hand. He didn’t try to touch me, but stopped, palm open, offering it to me. I stared at it for a moment, seeing my father’s ring on his index finger.

Feeling him react to, and misunderstand, my hesitation, I reached out, but before our fingers touched, I hesitated again, retracting my arm.

“Wait,” I said. “There’s something...something I’m supposed to tell you. Before we leave.” I felt my face warm, and realized I was embarrassed. I wasn’t sure why I was embarrassed, but I fought to block my reaction. All I ended up doing was looking away, towards Tarsi...or at least towards her door.

When I turned back, I saw him waiting.

“It’s ridiculous,” I said. “But she wanted me to say it word for word.” His face remained patient, so I ran fingers through my tangled hair, sighing. “Okay. She wanted me to say this: ‘He lied to you. In Cairo. She doesn’t know. I...’”

I hesitated. His face hadn’t moved a muscle.

“‘...I agree with you. But you need to be...careful.’”

I felt him waiting still, so I held up my hands.

“That’s it,” I said.

He didn’t meet my eyes, but I saw him look towards Tarsi’s house.

For a moment, he didn’t move. His light remained tightly shielded, but I felt some kind of conflict on him, or maybe it was an emotional reaction of some kind.

Hell, he could have been talking to her.

He nodded a second later, seemingly to himself. I saw his throat move in a swallow, just before he offered me his hand again, giving me a bare glance.

“Okay.” He cleared his throat. “Are you ready?”

“Revik.” I studied his eyes. “What does it mean?”

He shook his head. “We can talk about it later.”

“Is this about Maygar? Because he didn’t...” I saw him flinch and stopped.

Pain rippled off him. For a moment he didn’t move.

“No,” he said finally. “It’s not about that.” He looked me full in the face. “Allie.” He struggled with words. “Allie...are you all right?”

He had opened his light, so much so that I found it difficult to hold his gaze. Grief spiraled off him, but worse than that...guilt, and a pain that was hard to deal with.

Looking away from that expression, I tried to smile, backing off.

“I’m fine.” Still trying to get that look off his face, I joked, “...I’m pretty sure
he’s
not.”

He didn’t smile back. When the feeling on him intensified, I caught hold of his arm.

“Hey,” I said. I bit back the flare in my light when he looked down. For a moment, I could only return his stare. “...I want to go with you,” I said. I released his arm, taking a half-step back. “I’ve missed you like crazy, and we can talk about whatever you want. But I really don’t want to go back to Seertown. Much less the compound, or—”