Allie's War Season Three (133 page)

Rolling my eyes at a smiling Chandre, who only shrugged, I followed Revik’s gaze back to Wreg in time to see a medical tech press an organic patch over the bullet wound the tech had cleaned after removing our somewhat hastily-applied field dressing. He’d also removed the bandage I'd made out of the t-shirt I'd worn under my armored vest. Seeing my shirt lying in pieces in a metal tray where the tech had cut it off, I frowned.

"That was my favorite shirt," I muttered.

I felt a pulse of humor off Wreg at my words, strong enough that I shielded from his light, even as I glanced at Revik again, in spite of myself.

That time, Revik wouldn’t return my gaze.

Wreg must have picked up on some of our back and forth, too. Smiling at me, he rolled his eyes, motioning at Revik with a blood-stained hand. “Don’t be too hard on him, princess,” Wreg advised me. “I know he’s an asshole, but the pup’s got reason to feel sensitive at the moment. He’s only going to get worse, you know, when you––”

“Shut up, Wreg,” Revik growled. “Now. Before you lose something you won’t grow back.” His voice remained biting when he glanced at the medical tech, who was looking between the four of us with some amusement. “You. Out. We need the room.”

The tech’s smile faded, right before he bowed, making the two signs of the Bridge and the Sword as he swiftly backed out of the room. Once he was gone, Wreg chuckled again, deliberately flexing his arms and chest under the bandage.

“I don’t know what you’re so touchy about, Illustrious Sword,” he said. “I mean, who
wouldn’t
want to look at this? I am the stuff of fantasies, am I not...?”

I burst out in an involuntary laugh, unable to help myself.

Revik rolled his eyes, clicking in irritation, but I saw him smile a little that time, too. “You call me an asshole. I’m showing Jon this conversation,” he added. “In detail.”

Chandre gave him a puzzled look, but Wreg only laughed again. A few seconds later, though, I saw a more pained look touch Wreg’s expression, along with a frown that teetered into overt emotionality. I remembered what Revik had said about painkillers, and noticed Wreg’s eyes were glassier than usual, and not only from fatigue.

“Jeez, a drugged out Wreg,” I muttered. “Scary.”

Chandre grunted in amused agreement. Wreg seemed to brighten, though.

“Think of the possibilities, princess,” he said, winking at me. “Although clearly, you’ve done that already, from the way your man is looking at me, yes?”

That time, Chandre burst out in an involuntary chuckle.

"...Let's not get off track," Revik cut in, clearly unwilling to be distracted. Giving me an openly irritated look, he held up a hand before Wreg could say anything more. "Allie is going to tell us something. What is it?"

Wreg and Chan both looked at me with interest, although that flicker of something else passed over Wreg’s expression again, right before he frowned, glancing at me.

“Jon should be here,” he muttered.

I frowned back at him, puzzled, but he only waved me off.

“Never mind.” Sighing a bit, he motioned towards his head. “Probably the drugs. Making me a little crazy...more than usual, that is.”

Deciding to let it go, I nodded, then sat down on one of the swivel chairs that had been bolted to the floor next to a desk and terminal. Glancing around at all three of them, I took a deep breath, clearing my throat.

"Okay," I said. "There's a longer version around the context to all of this that Revik already knows, and that has to do with why we robbed that bank in New York..." I took another breath, glancing at Revik, who frowned, still watching my face. "...But the short version is this. At one point, I went to Feigran for help. I was hoping he could verify or refute some of the visions I kept having. Since he's accurate more often than not, I thought using him might be as good as I could get, given where the information was coming from..."

Wreg gave a humorless snort. Clearly, he wanted me to know exactly what he thought of the idea of using Feigran to validate my delusions.

Ignoring him, I plowed on.

"Okay," I said. "So when I asked Feigran who owned the security box at the bank, he showed me a bunch of drawings he'd done...over half of them in color." I glanced at Revik, then shrugged, keeping my voice matter-of-fact. "I know the consensus is that Shadow just conjured that mirage of Menlim in Argentina to screw with us..." I tugged nervously on my shirt under the armored vest, not looking up that time. "...But I'd swear the drawings Feigran showed me were pictures of Menlim. I even asked Feigran, point blank, and he didn’t deny it. He just said the man in the drawings 'whispered' to him. He called him ‘uncle’ a few times, too..."

Hearing the silence this produced, I swallowed, glancing briefly at Wreg.

"Feigran also said that ‘uncle’ came to him in dreams...asked him questions. He promised Feigran rewards for his obedience...rewards from the Ancestors and the gods themselves. He said that ‘uncle’ promised he would walk with the chosen again..."

Revik flinched. When I gave him a questioning look, he just shook his head.

"He repeated that a bunch of times, actually, like it meant something to him," I added. "He mostly seemed afraid of him, though...Feigran, I mean. He claimed ‘uncle’ put some kind of worm in his brain. He also kept repeating he was here, right here, but I never really got out of him what that meant.” Hesitating, I shrugged. "To be honest, a lot of it was gibberish. He would go into one of his less-coherent states whenever I tried to question him in detail. He'd start using his fingers to draw symbols on the walls...that kind of thing."

There was another, deeper-feeling silence.

When I glanced between them that time, I saw Wreg frowning at me. No, closer to scowling. Revik just stood there, his face devoid of expression entirely.

"Allie," Revik said finally. "We saw him die. Wreg and the others...they saw him dead. Feigran either made a mistake, or someone sent him those images. They did it to unbalance us, like we talked about..."

"Could
you
have made a mistake?" Wreg cut in, the question directed at me. "Salinse and that motherfucker...they looked a lot alike, even back then. Are you sure it wasn't Salinse,
ilya?
The rest of it would have been consistent with him, too. Not only Menlim. The two of them, they talked a lot of the same talk..."

The last person I expected to weigh in, at least directly, interrupted Wreg.

"No," Chandre said. "She didn't make a mistake."

I turned towards her in surprise. It dawned on me as I did, that the expression on her hawk-like face differed noticeably from that of the two men. Only then did I remember that she’d spent time with Feigran, too, at that chateau in Argentina.

"He told you the same thing," I said. "Feigran."

Wreg and Revik's eyes swiveled to Chandre. The hunter sighed a bit, her sculptured lips curling into an expressive frown, right before she leaned against the far bulkhead.

“Yes,” she admitted. “We talked. They kept us all together, perhaps in the hopes that we might influence one another...reinforce one another’s fears. Or perhaps so we would reveal more, in an effort to reassure one another.” She glanced at me, then back at Wreg. Her last look fell on Revik, and I couldn’t help seeing the caution in her eyes. “...Feigran showed us drawings, too. Some were of this ‘Shadow.’ I only met Salinse once, but I would swear it was not him. Feigran claimed to have met Shadow in person, too. He told us that he was negotiating to get the worms out of his brain, if he behaved...”

Revik grimaced openly at that, but still wouldn’t meet any of our gazes.

"He talked about you, too, Esteemed Bridge,” Chandre added, looking at me. “He told the rest of us that you knew the truth. He said you were the only one who believed him, because you were his sister.” Chandre’s frown deepened as her gaze swiveled to Wreg. “He also talked about Jon. He seemed particularly obsessed with Jon. How Jon was doing, whether Jon missed him, whether the rest of us knew how important Jon was. He worried Menlim would ‘find out about Jon’ from ‘the worms.’ He definitely thought Menlim was talking to him in his dreams...and that Menlim and Shadow were the same person. He worried he couldn’t keep secrets from him...”

"Fantastic," Wreg muttered, leaning back on his good hand.

Revik continued to stare at Chandre, as if trying to make sense of what she'd said, or somehow work it into a different explanation. Finally, he shook his head.

"He was lying," he said flatly. "This was
Terian
, remember? He was playing some kind of mind game...consciously or not."

"I thought that," I said, before Chandre could answer. "I thought that, even at the time...but honestly, I just can't see why he'd go there. He doesn't know anything about that part of your past, does he? Not in detail. Not enough to really be able to screw with you about it. Besides, if that was all it was, why talk to me about it? Why not you?"

"I wasn't in there enough––" Revik began.

"That crazy fuck could have found out about Nenz’s past," Wreg cut in. "He was Head of the damned network. Long enough to have access to all of their intelligence. He'd know everything Galaith collected over the years..."

"He was Head, yeah," I agreed. "But would he have found out anything about
Menlim?
I'd be surprised if Galaith knew most of that stuff. What he did know, he kept off the network. We found those books of his, remember? When the boy first appeared, we got all of our intelligence from primary sources, most of them hand-written...?"

I glanced at Revik, but he still wouldn't meet my gaze. His face was like stone, his eyes trained on the far wall. I looked back at Wreg and Chandre.

"...Terian tried to find out things about Revik's past from
me
when he held me captive in D.C.," I added. "He told me he found the boy through an old journal of Revik's, but that he couldn’t figure out what most of it meant. I didn't see anything in Galaith's diary about Revik's past, not in terms of actual details. Whatever Galaith knew, he didn't risk writing down. The few references he made, even about Revik's true identity, were oblique, to say the least."

"Again," Revik said, anger edging into his words. "How do you know Terian wasn't simply
lying,
Allie?
We've seen plenty of evidence that he picked things up, even while wearing a collar...things there’s no way he could have known unless he was reading us right through the damned thing. Even the prescience displayed through the collar, so why couldn't he have gotten information from you? Or Salinse? Or Shadow himself?"

I looked at him. Caution slid over my light when I saw his expression, but I kept my voice noncommittal. "He could have," I admitted. "I didn't say anything because I wanted to be sure. I was going to try talking to Feigran again, after that interrogation with Surli, when Surli hinted something similar about Shadow's identity..." Seeing Revik’s jaw harden more, I shrugged, holding up my hands in a seer apology. "...Look, you heard it. You were there. Then Feigran was taken by Shadow's people, and I didn't get the chance. But after what happened in Argentina, I thought we should talk about it." Hesitating, I went back and forth for a few seconds in my mind, then said it anyway. "Anyway, it feels true to me, Revik. I can't explain why, but it does. Even in my last conversation with him, Feigran didn’t act like someone who was playing games, intentionally or not. He was very curious about you. He wanted to know if the pictures 'uncle' had shown him about you were true..."

Revik flinched outright at that, moving away from me slightly.

Repositioning himself more in the middle of the room, he refolded his arms, not looking at any of us now. I felt the aggression in his light, almost a warning to stay back. I felt a whisper of sickness coil around my light from his, too.

Watching his face, I felt my worry intensify. There was no way Revik would handle it well, if Menlim ended up being alive. He would want to go after him, probably personally...probably to the detriment of all else. He wouldn't be able to be rational about it. There was no possible way he could. Hell, I wasn’t even sure if
I
could be rational about it.

When Wreg spoke next, I glanced over, and saw him watching Revik too, the same thread of caution in his eyes.

"That fucker was old even then," he said. "He has to be dead by now,
ilya.
Even seers don't live that long. And anyway, Nenz...we saw him die."

"You
saw him die?" I pressed, looking between them. "Who did, precisely? You yourself, Wreg? You, Revik? What does that mean, exactly, that you
saw
him die? He committed suicide, right? Pulled a Hitler when they finally broke into that stronghold in the Bavarian Alps?"