Allie's War Season One (51 page)

“Please, Terry. Don’t hurt her...”

Terian grinned. He couldn’t help it. He patted the other seer’s arm.

“Now, now, brother Revik. No need to beg this early in the game. We’re all friends here. I won’t hurt your best girl...”

The light eyes met his. His voice half-filled with liquid, a near whisper.

“I’ll kill you. Turn if I have to. Rip you apart. Feed you to yourself...”

Terian flinched, drawing back in spite of himself.

“I’ll remember,” the pale-eyed seer breathed. “All of it. I’ll find Feigran. You were afraid of me once...”

But Terian had heard enough. Using his headset, he activated the pulse.

Two, needle-like prongs slid out of the collar around Dehgoies’s neck, sinking wetly into the flesh at the base of his skull. The sensor lit up, the metal vibrating against white skin. Dehgoies blinked rapidly, wincing in pain as the prongs dug deeper into his neck. He tried to move his jaw.

Then he cried out.

The irises of his eyes ignited, like a spark to a pool of gasoline. The faint, almost invisible glow brightened rapidly to a shocking hue, turning a sharp, pale green that flickered like candle flames in the dim hall.

Cries sounded in the corridor as the other infiltrators reacted.

Terian heard yelled instructions, movement as guns were raised, but he couldn’t take his eyes off the glowing eyes of his downed friend.

Just when it occurred to him that the collar might not hold...

Dehgoies collapsed, as if all of his muscles in his arms and shoulders unclenched in the same instant.

The silence in the narrow hall grew deafening.

Terian glanced up. White faces stared at him from against the corridor walls. Several hunters stood with guns raised, fingers frozen near triggers.

“His eyes,” one said. “Did you see his eyes?”

“He’s mate to the Bridge...”

“He can’t be Sark, not with eyes like that...”

Mutters erupted from the group. Terian saw a few gestures warding off evil. He snapped his fingers at the techs.

“Stabilize his vitals. Now,” he added sharply, when they didn’t move.

Movement erupted around him as his words sank in.

Terian rose to his feet, glaring around at the group until guns lowered, and the murmuring ceased as they went back to work. The seer medical techs hunched back over the unconscious Dehgoies, fighting to keep him alive.

Terian watched as Varlan approached where he stood. An older seer, he had a wide, Asian-looking face that sported a long, jagged scar in a diagonal line from his chin to his almond eyes. He was one of the old ones, an infiltrator since before the time of humans. Terian had even heard rumors that Varlan was once trained by the Adhipan.

“General Advisor, sir.” Varlan eyed Dehgoies’s crumpled form. “You must be aware. Galaith had a particular interest––”

“Tell him he’s dead.”

Varlan didn’t blink. “And if he survives?” he said.

Terian gazed out over the group of infiltrators clustered by the far wall. His eyes came to rest on a tall Sark who stood at the back among the rest of the extraction team. Squinting up at the seer’s body proportions, he motioned him forward.

“What is your height, Endre?”

“Six-foot four, sir.”

“You have a clan tattoo?”

“Yes, sir.”

Terian plucked Varlan’s Mossberg casually from his fingers. Pointing it at the tall, black-haired seer, he shot him in the chest.

The hollow bullet blew out the back of his spine, spattering the wall with blood and bone, right before the seer crumpled, falling to his back.

One of the techs cried out in shock.

They stifled their own cry, getting a hard look from Terian. The others moved quickly out of the way, leaving Endre’s body alone in a cleared space of floor.

Terian handed the rifle back to Varlan.

“You have your answer,” he said. “I’ll take care of the labs, just make sure you destroy his face. Remove his teeth, if you can...and his hands.”

Terian saw Endre’s fingers convulse for his weapon. Stepping forward, he kicked away the gun, motioning to one of the other seers, who raised his own weapon, shooting Endre in the head. The seer’s arm stopped moving.

“Make sure he’s got the clan mark,” Terian added, glancing over his shoulder at Varlan. “That’s documented somewhere...and the sun and sword too.”

Varlan bowed, his eyes expressionless. “Yes, sir.”

Terian looked down at Dehgoies, frowning at the blood, the pallor of his skin.

He faced the others.

“Get him ready to be moved.” His eyes darkened as he stared around at faces. “I’ve decided my friend will survive this ordeal. You will make certain that he does.” His voice grew cold as ice. “If he dies...you all die.”

21

FIRE

I LIMPED DOWN a darkened aisle, head low. I’d picked the movie theater because it was dark, and close to where the crew stairwell let out on the first floor deck.

Now I felt a little too Lee Harvey Oswald.

I reached a side exit, glancing up at the movie playing on the white screen as I grasped a door handle. I opened it, only remembering then that the light on the other side would make my outline visible to every person sitting in the dark theater.

I needn’t have worried. The attack didn’t come from behind.

Strong hands grabbed me, pulling me through the opening before my eyes could adjust, swinging me around and slamming my back against the wall. I heard the door close behind me with a bang.

The seer holding me turned me around, shoving my chest against the wall to bind my wrists. I jerked my elbow back, missing his face and he smacked mine against the same wall, stunning me. I managed to kick backwards a few seconds later, but he grabbed my leg and deliberately bent my hurt knee the wrong direction.

I screamed. Before I could get very far, he clamped a hand over my mouth, shoving me to the floor. I fell hard to the deck, sucking air.

It all happened so fast I couldn’t move at first.

Standing over me, he reached over his shoulder, pulled out a black metal rod. An arc of current sparked from one end.

Staring up at it, I gave a kind of choking laugh. “Jesus...” Gripping the floor with my fingers, I tried to crawl away. He kicked me in the stomach. As I crumpled to a fetal position, gasping for air, he lowered the prod, aiming it for my back.

Shots echoed in the small corridor.

Two volleys followed, one after the other, barely a breath between them.

I flattened myself to the deck, flinching as bullets pushed air in a rush over me. The guy who’d been on the verge of jabbing me with a cattle prod lay sprawled on his back. I didn’t have to look for long to know he was dead.

Down the hall, another seer lay on the floor, one I hadn’t seen, although he must have stood there, watching as I failed to fight off the first guy. He lay on the floor too, holding his chest, making choking sounds. I stared at his blood-covered hands.

Then I turned. Briefly, my heart lifted, sure it would be him.

But the man who lowered the gun had two different colored eyes. His full lips curled into a frown as he released the empty magazine from the still-smoking Berreta, replacing it with a fresh one. Locking it into place, he motioned for me to get up, holding out a hand.

“Come on, love,” Eliah said. “No time to get teary.”

I tried to comply, but my knee wouldn’t cooperate. I got halfway up before it crumpled, and I let out an involuntary cry.

Walking closer, Eliah slid a shoulder under my arm, still holding the gun. He brought me to my feet, then through a side door marked “Crew Only.”

I stumbled onto a metal, mesh deck that started just past the door.

“Where’s Revik?” I said.

Eliah gazed at a fork in the corridor, surrounded by exposed pipes. He paused only long enough to glance at me.

“Sorry, love. He's gone.”

I felt the world gray, like it had in Vancouver.

My breath stopped as I forced it back, biting my tongue until the lines sharpened once more.

“Gone? What does that mean?” I said.

“Quiet.” He said in a whisper, “I’ll tell you everything. But you have to be quiet now, love. Or we’re dead.”

He waited for me to acknowledge him when I didn’t answer, shaking me until I nodded. Then he brought me through the narrower of the two passages and down several flights of stairs. I let him support most of my weight as we passed through a few more sets of doors to emerge in the main storage bay of the ship’s stern. Still holding me up, he led me through a long, towering row of boxes and covered crates, between one-seater forklifts and bolted-down vehicles being transported to Anchorage and the Russian coastline.

He finally stopped at a low ramp that ended in a massive roll door.

Leaving me by the pulleys on one side of the segmented metal sheet, he jogged to the bottom of the ramp and hit a red button. I gripped a segment of wall in my hands and just watched as the massive door opened, gears grinding, with a rattle of rusted chains.

Churning ocean roared through the gap.

The opening sat low enough in the water that curls of spray shot up the sides of the ship, wetting the deck and me along with it. Wind and spray plastered my shirt to my skin. Pale light framed the clouds, illuminating edges.

Unbelievably, it was nearing dawn.

Eliah looked at his watch. He held one of the chains by the roll door, swaying slightly in the motion of the ship. He caught my eye, smiled reassuringly.

“You all right there, love? That knee looks like it smarts some.”

“Where’s Revik?” I said, loud enough to be heard over the wind.

He hesitated. Letting go of the chain, he walked over to me, digging a hand into the front pocket of his dark pants. Once he had whatever it was, he held out a hand, motioned for me to take what he held.

“Go on.” He motioned for me to hold out my hand until I did, palm up, under his.

Something cold fell into it.

I focused on the silver ring.

He didn’t have to tell me where he’d gotten it.

“I’m sorry, love,” he said again.

I stared at the ring, unable to make my mind react.

“He was ambushed. Five of them, at least. It looked like they tried to save his life after they shot him down...probably to bring him in alive. But he was dead when Chan and I finally broke through.”

When I didn’t speak, Eliah caught hold of my arm, his eyes serious.

“Allie...love. I know this is a shock. I know it. But I need you to focus right now. Put him out of your mind, love. Just for now, okay?” When I still didn’t answer, he shook my arm lightly, forcing my eyes up to his. “If it gets down to the wire, you and me, we might have to jump. Now I know you’re wounded, but you’re a seer, so that’s not as bad as it sounds. You’ll live, easy. But it’ll hurt. And that cold’ll be something you remember to your grave...”

I stumbled when he released me, catching hold of one of the hanging chains.