Allie's War Season One (58 page)

I didn’t answer. After another beat, he laid a hand on my leg.

“Alyson,” he said. “I understand from Chandre you have found the Head of the Rooks’ network.” He paused, his silence questioning. “Is that true?”

I looked up. Glancing around, I was a little startled to see fear...even wonder...in the eyes of the seers sitting in a wider circle behind Vash. Even Maygar stared at my face, his expression showing a kind of dumbfounded shock. Only after I noticed the eerie glow of reflected light on the surface of my coffee did I realize how I had managed to scare all those seers so badly. My eyes glowed the same iridescent green I’d seen reflected in Revik’s more than once.

“Yeah,” I said, without looking up. “Yeah, I did. More or less. I don’t know who he is outside, though. Outside the Barrier, I mean.”

“Could you show us?” Vash said.

I sighed, feeling incredibly tired suddenly. I looked at Maygar, and saw the skepticism that had returned to his eyes.

“Yes,” I said, watching him stare at me. “Sure I could. Why not?”

24

HUNT

LESS THAN AN hour later, I lay on a beat up recliner in the same building, staring up at a water-damaged ceiling. Beside me paced Maygar. Another seer attached electrodes to my face and arms. I winced as he pressed down on bruised parts of my skin.

“Tell me something,” I said. “This war...?”

“It is the most likely of outcomes,” Maygar said, giving a dismissive wave.

“So not inevitable?”

“No.” He gave me another look, that one slightly less hard. “I would have said differently before. I would have said it’s not about death, but rebirth. That the Bridge doesn’t
cause
war. That her being here merely signals it’s time for it to begin.”

He ran a thumb lightly over his bicep. I noticed a tattoo there, what looked like writing. His knuckles were bruised too, probably from connecting with my face.

He cleared his throat. I looked up.

He was focused on my mouth, not hiding the meaning behind his stare.

When I rolled my eyes, he only smiled.

“There’s even some who say Death comes,” he added in a light voice.
“Syrimne d’ Gaos
...‘Sword of the Gods.’ It’s where that other seer got his name, the one during World War I. It’s also the meaning of the sword and sun you see drawn on the temple door. And on me...” He lifted his shirt’s sleeve, showing me a tattoo of the bisected blue sun on his arm. “This is a terrorist’s mark, Bridge. A real one.” He grinned at my unimpressed look.

“The real Death,” he added. “The real Syrimne...he’s supposed to be a creature like you.” He gestured with one thick hand.

“...A brother, as it were.”

My hands tightened on the chair.

Maygar didn’t notice, but only shrugged again, his voice bored. “I’ve also read interpretations that perhaps
he’s
the one as causes the shift,” he added. “But Bridge, the end of every cycle is a mystery. There are too many variables...and even humans have free will.” He glanced to where James, the robed follower from reception, stood talking to Chandre by the door, smiling at her with obvious adoration in his eyes.

“...In theory, at least,” he muttered.

I frowned, glancing at James, too. “So what are you doing to fight the Rooks? Your people...the badass terrorists?”

Maygar snorted a laugh. “You wouldn’t understand, Bridge.”

“Try me.” When he raised an eyebrow, I said, “Unlike you, I don’t have some macho trip going, Maygar. And it’s not just revenge for me, either, despite what you seem to think. I want them gone. I want a break in the clouds. A real one.”

He just looked at me, then gave another grunting laugh.

“A break in the clouds...I like that, Bridge.” His face opened a bit more, until his expression turned almost friendly. “If you really want to know, right now, we are trying to crack their hierarchy...the one Vash described to you. We look for ‘the break in the clouds,’ too.” He smiled down at me. “There are rumors that an order exists behind the rotating top tiers. That the succession order is mapped...not random. Do you understand this?”

I shook my head. “No.”

Maygar’s eyes grew sharper when they met mine. I recognized that look from Revik; it was a hunter’s look. Moreover, it showed more perception than I’d given him credit for.

Realizing I had been holding back on him a little, I shrugged.

“Eliah might have mentioned it,” I said. “The succession order. When he found out I was screwing around with the Rooks’ network, he seemed convinced that’s what I was after.”

Seeing Maygar’s eyebrow go up, I rolled my eyes.

“I still don’t know what it is, Maygar,” I said flatly.

He gave me another half-smile, shrugging with one hand.

“It is exactly what it sounds like, Bridge,” he said. “It is a map of the succession order for the Rooks’ hierarchy. A map of the succession order would detail when and how each individual Rook ascends in that hierarchy to the spot above. Like when your American president dies...there is a list of who takes his place, right?”

“Sure,” I said, annoyed at his condescending tone. “Whatever.”

Maygar smiled wider, clicking at me softly. “This thing you seem so uninterested in, Esteemed Bridge...it is something every Rook in the network would pay all of their fortune to obtain. Hell, any in the Seven would.”

“Why?”

Maygar rolled his eyes. Unfolding his muscular arms, he used his light to draw an image of the Pyramid in my mind. Thrusting it forward invasively, he highlighted the node at its apex.

“The Head, understand?” When I nodded, he said, “This man at the top, he is the only one who connects directly to the Dreng. The
only
link between the Dreng and Earth.”

I nodded again, to show him I was following.

“He connects the rest to the Dreng,” Maygar added. “He also distributes the light, the skill sets, everything. To randomize the succession order, it is his protection, right? Without that, what’s to stop one of the other Rooks from stealing this top spot from him?”

I waited, figuring it was a rhetorical question.

Maygar smiled again, maybe because he heard me.

“The top of the Pyramid, it has a rotating hierarchy.” Using his light, Maygar highlighted the top tiers. They began a jerky dance.

I recognized that, too.

“You see how at any moment,” Maygar continued. “...A different seer falls into the position directly below the Head?”

I nodded again.

“This is to prevent assassination, Bridge. If you are big number two Rook, and you kill the Head but don’t take his place, you can bet whoever does is going to take you out. But...” He lit up the top tier once more. “...If you know the succession order, you can
coup
the big honcho right when you are about to take his place. Or make a deal with the one who does.”

He smiled, clicking again softly.

“But Bridge,” he said. “...We could do the same. There is a gap after the Head dies, when the Dreng are not connected to our world. The Pyramid is vulnerable then.”

“How long?” I said.

“Two...maybe three minutes to connect the new Head.”

At his meaningful stare, I sighed.

“Two minutes isn’t very long,” I pointed out.

Maygar laughed. “It was long enough for me to smack you down this morning!” When my face warmed, he smiled. “Of course, for any of that to be feasible, we would need to know who the current Head is. That is his other protection, Bridge. Anonymity. We think very few Rooks know the Head’s true identity in outside.” He pointed at me, his lips curling in a frown. “This is where you come in. Providing you can deliver what you say. Your Rook husband never could...despite all his bullshit.”

My jaw hardened. “I already said I don’t know who he is in outside.”

“Well, you should, if you found him in the Barrier.”

“Who the hell are you, to tell me what I
should
know?” I said. “From what I can tell, none of you jackasses could find him at all. And I’m untrained, worm-raised Bridge girl...so what does that make you?”

Maygar stared at me, his dark eyes holding disbelief.

Vash’s voice rose in my mind, clear as a loudspeaker.

We are ready,
he said.
You are on point, Maygar.

Maygar leaned closer to me. His voice grew soft.

“A little touchy about the husband, aren’t you, Bridge?” he whispered.

Alyson?
Vash said.
Are you ready?

Maygar straightened back to his full height, a grin tugging at his full lips. His eyes met mine, a dark eyebrow quirking in a silent question.

“Yeah,” I said, swallowing my anger. “Fine. Let’s do this.”

SLOWLY, THERE ARE stars.

Earth appears, a pale blue dot.

It zooms closer, until it dominates my view. But I barely look at the Earth on its own; instead, my mind finds the Pyramid, and the larger beings I feel behind it. Even now, above all else, it is their presence I feel...for they are why I have come. Metallic threads cross and intersect over land masses in thick, silver piles. The Pyramid moves like a mechanical toy, deceptively peaceful despite the pain and deprivation I feel within. I watch the dance as the pieces change hands, change places, until I hear a faint whisper of—

Well?

The voice startles me. I had forgotten I am not alone.

Maygar floats beside me.
We are waiting, Bridge.

It happened differently before,
I explain.

His tone turns acidic.
Is this your first jump?

No,
I say, unthinking.

Then you should know nothing happens the same way twice in the Barrier,
Maygar says, his thoughts cold.
For that to be, all other creatures would need to be static. You must do as we do. Follow the thread, Bridge. Hunt.

By the end, he is indulgent, condescending. It sparks a faint anger in me, in my light, until I realize it is because he is reminding me of Revik.

But I have done this without Revik.

I’ve done it without Chandre or Vash...or this asshole, Maygar, who wants sex with me and to beat on me only because he has some kind of monster grudge against Revik.