Allie's War Season One (152 page)

Revik nodded politely, bowing as he’d been told.

Then, avoiding eyes, he glanced around the room itself, taking in furniture that looked more than a century old. Love seats with gold embroidered fabric and dark cherry wood matched a king-sized bed with an elaborate headboard of the same wood. The headboard climbed up the wall, ending in a set of snow white drapes hanging down in arcs by the giant pillows.

The room wasn’t particularly big by modern standards, but it wasn’t small, either. The sitting area stretched from the double doors to two large windows with heavy gold drapes that someone had already drawn. A cherry-wood desk stood in one corner, a dressing table with a matching chair sat against the opposite wall. The lamps were on low settings, but the fire in the grate provided most of the room’s lighting.

Revik felt his nerves return.

Keeping it off his face, he glanced at Ullysa, then back at the old human, watching as the latter arranged himself on one of the elaborately carved love seats before the fire, directly across from the seated humans who had been waiting for them.

Revik felt more than saw the door close behind them. He heard the outer locks slide into place, felt the security team outside the door. Nothing out of synch so far. It was all pretty much exactly as Llewelyn told him it would be. Even so, he didn’t move for a few seconds, watching as the old human fixed himself a drink and exchanged pleasantries with several of the humans.

Finally, the Vice President looked at him.

“Are you coming?”

Revik barely hesitated. “Of course, sir.” He adopted the formal tone and posture. “...I was waiting to be invited.”

The man smiled. “You’re tense tonight, Lou...relax.” He patted the space next to him on the couch. “Have a seat.”

After the barest pause, Revik walked over and sat beside him.

He nodded to the humans who seemed to want to engage him, but didn’t quite meet the gaze of any one of them. He was trying to focus again, to get his head back in the game. But he found himself thinking about Allie again, trying not to wonder if she could see anything inside the construct, or if she was reacting to him being there as much as he was to her.

He lost himself in those thoughts for long enough to miss a few seconds of speech from the human.

“...a little under the weather tonight?”

Revik glanced over, bringing the cloak he’d woven of Llewelyn’s energy more tightly over his. “I’m fine, sir.”

“Would you like a drink, Lou?”

Llewelyn had instructed him on this, too. “No...thank you, sir.”

The human smiled. “Have one anyway.”

“Yes, sir.” Following their little ritual, he accepted the glass and took a cautious sip, feeling his nerves rise as the human motioned over Kat. Pretending to misunderstand, Ullysa stepped forward, but the old man insisted.

“No. The blond one. You.”

Ullysa stepped back, folding her hands formally in front of her body.

Revik felt a sharp spike of nausea. He tried to kill it with more swallows of the drink, but all he could think of was Allie again, and what this would do to him if their positions were reversed.

He would lose his fucking mind.

Maybe she wouldn’t be able to see anything. Maybe she would only get a glimpse, and then it would all be over and he could explain to her how he’d done it to get in...how it was the least risky way, how he couldn’t afford to wait when he had no idea how long Terian would keep her here...

Kat knelt in front of him.

Revik averted his eyes as she unfastened his pants, feeling the nausea worsen. He finished the drink, but didn’t put it down. It wasn’t the nausea he’d felt around Allie, which was as much nerves and adrenaline and desire as anything else. Revulsion hit him instead, a feeling that made him actually, really sick...but that didn’t seem to harm his physical reaction any.

He’d sworn to her he’d never do this. He’d told her she’d never have to worry about him, that he’d never do it to her again...for any reason.

He’d meant it. He could feel she didn’t trust him, that it might even be years before she fully trusted him...years where he’d be more than happy to prove to her that she
could
trust him.

Gods. What if he was wrong? What if the boy didn’t come? What if the plans were wrong...if he had some kind of imaging device in here, or found some way to show her through the Barrier? What if it was all for nothing?

Kat started touching him, and his mind blanked out briefly. He was back in the cabin for a few seconds, remembering waking up with Allie’s hands on him. A sharp ribbon of desire mixed with the sickness of having another seer in his light, making the separation pain worse...so bad, he wondered if he’d be able to hold it together at all without ranting at all of them.

Or worse, trying to kill them.

He looked at the other seers...looking for help maybe. But he could feel it already, in their light. He saw it in their faces as they looked at him. He was affecting them. They wouldn’t be able to help themselves.

He looked at the old human. But Travers was already motioning over Ullysa. He patted the back of the love seat to indicate where he wanted her.

Ullysa walked up behind where Revik sat. She laid her hands on his shoulders, exuding calm, and he reached up, clasping her arms. He closed his eyes, and she lowered her mouth to his. They were kissing before he knew he intended to, and instead of distracting him from what Kat was doing to him, it made it worse, until he was clasping at Ullysa’s hair, half holding her against him.

When he ended the kiss, she lowered her mouth to his ear. She spoke Prexci, so the humans wouldn’t understand. She made it sound like lover’s talk, like she was urging him on, but he felt the sympathy behind it.

“...Revi’, listen to me...you can do this...you’re all right...”

He fought back another thick surge of pain. He felt Ullysa react to it, even as Tobias walked up behind her. Looking up at the male, panic hit Revik, a reaction so physical he felt his breath stop, making him light-headed.

“You can do this,” Ullysa repeated, soft, a near purr. “You can...she loves you. She’ll understand...she’ll know why you did this...”

He gripped her tighter, crying out as Kat took him deeper. Then he was holding her hair too, fighting another urge to let his reactions turn violent. Since none of the seers wore real collars, none of their perceptions were muted, either. There was no way for Revik to block or even dial-down the others without calling attention to himself.

Besides, the boy had to feel it.

He needed to feel
him
here...he had to recognize his light.

He forced his eyes up, looking for distraction, anything to pull his mind back from where it wanted to go.

He tried remembering Allie at the cabin, but his pain spiked so sharply, he heard Tobias gasp. His eyes refocused on the chairs across from him. The humans sat there, nearly motionless...more than half holding drinks they seemed to have forgotten. They were reacting to the display already.

A pretty brunette in her thirties seemed riveted to Revik’s face, her eyes drifting down to where Kat had her mouth on him. They would feel it too, the separation...they wouldn’t know what it was, but they would feel it. He caught a whisper of the brunette’s thoughts as she swallowed, staring back at his face.

She’d already decided she wanted to fuck him.

He averted his eyes, holding Ullysa’s arm tighter.

“...Revi’,” Ullysa murmured. “Revi’...calm...remember why we’re here...”

He heard her...enough to fight it. She was right; he couldn’t blow this, not now. Closing his eyes, he tried to cooperate, to focus. He slid deeper into the silver strands, but couldn’t find any stability there, either.

He reminded himself he was playing a part...if he broke down, really lost it, they’d probably think he was dangerous and call for help. It was a thin line for humans, between exotic difference and terrifying other.

Fighting to turn his panic into at least the outer trappings of arousal, he arched towards Kat, but the reaction in her light nearly locked his muscles, right before she dug her fingers into his hurt leg. Then Tobias had his hand in his shirt and he felt sick all over again, trying to incorporate another seer’s light into his as the male massaged his chest, kissing his throat.

Ullysa’s voice remained in the foreground, the only anchor he had.

“She’ll understand,” Ullysa murmured. “She’ll understand...”

He shook his head. “No,” he managed. “She won’t...”

“...she loves you, Revi’...she loves you...”

She had, he thought. She really had before all this.

He’d felt it. A part of him had tried to hold onto doubt, to protect himself maybe, give himself some latitude in case something happened, or she changed her mind before they finished. Even as recently as Sikkim, he’d convinced himself she might not know what she was doing, what she was saying to him. He’d told himself she was just young, inexperienced...that the separation was fucking with her head. But he hadn’t really believed that, either.

She’d loved him. In spite of everything he’d done to her, everything he’d been.

But he wondered if she loved him enough.

28

RESCUE

I JERKED AWAKE.

I didn’t know where I was. I tasted bile in my throat, realized I was sweating. I didn’t know what was wrong with me.

Whatever it was, it was bad.

I rolled to my side...and found that I could. My wrists were chained together, but not to anything else. Even curled up in a fetal position, fighting not to panic from how badly every square inch of my skin hurt...it occurred to me that I was in a real bed. The mattress was thin; the blankets smelled like baby powder.

I let out another gasp when the pain returned...then a moan when it only got worse. Cursing, I rolled to my back, but it didn’t help. Whatever was wrong, it felt separate from the pain of my legs and hips and arms; it lived so far under my skin, I couldn’t pinpoint a cause.

It felt like I was dying.

...or like something was trying to rip off my flesh.

“Fuck,” I gasped. I stared up at the bright white ceiling, holding my belly tighter with my arm, squeezing it into the bed. I felt sick to my stomach...but more than that, like something vile was being forced down my throat. I wondered if Terian poisoned me...then if Revik had died.

I screamed as the thought formed, then choked when the pain worsened, now trying to crush my chest. I was still sweating...and now I wanted to throw up, but couldn’t seem to make it happen.

Curling up into a tight ball on my side, I closed my eyes, groaning.

Somewhere in all that, the door must have opened.

“Allie?” A voice broke through the sickness. “Allie, what’s wrong?”

I glanced up, still holding my stomach, fighting to breathe.

It was Maygar.

Everything came flooding back.

I realized then, where I was...in a makeshift medical facility, part of the same underground series of rooms, but one floor up from my cell. I was still looking at Maygar, when the lights flickered overhead. He looked up, his hand on the headboard above me. Both of us watched the electricity cut in and out.

“What’s going on?” I managed.

“I don’t know,” he muttered.