Allie's War Season Three (94 page)

MY EYES SWIVELED immediately to the couch.

I found myself still struggling to see through the dim light from the closed curtains, and wondered why it was taking so long for my eyes to adjust. The glare outside had been bright; those high clouds could be blinding when the sun reflected hard enough, but that didn't fully explain why my seer eyes couldn't make the transition.

It dawned on me then that the curtains weren't just closed.

The windows had been boarded. Not a single ray of actual sunlight made it through that layer of closed panels, with the exception of the opening in the front window that Garensche had used to look out at Jon and Neela.

As I watched, the pirate-looking seer returned a flat panel to that open spot as well, covering it neatly and seamlessly, without leaving so much as a single crack of light. Staring at the panel as it fit perfectly back into place, I realized they hadn't placed boards on the windows, precisely...but organic panels, and likely bullet-proof.

"Is someone going to answer me?" the same voice said. "...Or am I just friggin' talking to myself, as usual?"

"Calm down, Tina," said another voice, that one a lot more familiar.

I felt Revik stiffen next to me.

Then his eyes swiveled in the same direction as mine. I knew he was a lot better at seeing in the dark than I was, from all of the night combat training and whatever else. I was still trying to focus my vision more precisely when someone ignited a lamp on a low coffee table I recognized. In fact, I'd painted that table myself, covering it in that exact swirl of black and white patterns that made it resemble a wood-cut drawing of mountains with high clouds.

Floating above those clouds hovered a mechanistic-looking pyramid surrounding by lightning-like rays of light. Staring at it, I looked for the image of the boy in the corner of the field. When I found it, I squeezed Revik's hand almost without knowing I did it.

Feeling strangely more like myself again, I looked back at the couch.

That time, I found a pair of blue eyes staring at me that shocked me. The last time I'd seen those eyes, in person anyway, had been in this very room.

Jaden stared back at me, the look on his face somewhere close to shock. He looked at me like he didn't know me, or maybe like he didn't quite believe his eyes. I found I couldn't hold his gaze more than a few seconds, and even that was too long for pouty lips, who smacked him on the arm, hard enough that he flinched.

"Are you seriously checking that bitch out?" she demanded. "You mother
fucker!"

I looked away from the two of them, at the nearest inanimate object my eyes could find, which happened to be the oil lamp. With its green and orange copper cover carved in Halloween-style faces and covered in smears of melted candle wax, the lamp looked eerily familiar, too.

"You have no electricity," I said then, looking at Deklan, who had been the one to ignite the flame. He lit a couple of candles around the room as well while I watched, nodding in acknowledgement.

Like the others, he looked surprised to see us, too...but especially me.

"What are you doing here, Esteemed Bridge?" Garensche said, crossing the room in a few strides to stand in front of me. "Did you not receive our warning? We sent that infiltrator back...Surli. He said he would warn you not to come!"

I stared up at him, feeling my chest clench.
"You
sent him? Surli?"

"Of course!" Garensche said angrily. "Did he not tell you?"

I felt my jaw harden, right before I looked up at Revik.

"Must have slipped his mind," I muttered.

Revik only frowned. I found myself wanting to calm him down, to reassure him in some way, even though I still couldn't tell what exactly was going on in his mind. Maybe I could just feel him, taut as a stretched wire, where he held me against his side.

Garensche looked at Revik too, his eyes openly accusing.

"Sir, we didn't think you'd let her come here in a million years," he said. "That Lao Hu fucker has been
waiting
for her to show up. He's had a tag on this house for over a week. We've sent out every communiqué we could, trying to convince him and others that there was no way in hell either of you would ever come here..."

When I glanced up at Revik again, his jaw had tightened.

"Why didn't you tell Balidor that? In one of the transmissions?" I said to Deklan.

Gar answered me, clicking in irritation. "That fucker Ditrini has a tap on all of our communications," he said, practically spitting the name. "It works in part using key words. We tested it, once we realized...your name in any form sets off sparks for about a hundred damned miles,
ilya.
We sent Surli instead when he approached us in quarantine...we thought when Balidor told us he was there that you'd gotten the message..."

I just swallowed, nodding.

When I glanced at Revik again, his eyes looked positively murderous. I didn't get closer to his light to find out the cause. I could guess, anyway; he probably wanted to strangle Surli with his bare hands. Right then, I couldn't even say I blamed him really.

He didn't let go of me, though, but continued to hold me tightly in his hands, flush with his body. I felt the possessiveness in his light, too, a near-aggression happening somewhere in the less-conscious parts of his aleimi, and realized suddenly that Jaden was affecting him, too. Glancing back at the crushed velvet couch, the one that Jaden and I had thought was too funny
not
to buy when we found it at a yard sale one afternoon in the Castro, I found myself looking at Jaden himself. Pouty-lips, the groupie I'd slashed at with a broken bottle in a bar one night, what felt like a million years ago now, was still glaring at me.

"I'll ask again," she snapped furiously. "What is that psycho
bitch
doing in my house?"

Gods almighty, I hoped her name wasn't on the list.

"It's not," Garensche said, glancing at me and smiling a little. That strain remained around his eyes, but I could see now that at least part of that was exhaustion. "...And you're not the only one thanking the Ancestors beyond the Barrier for that one, believe me,
ilya..."

Laughing, I moved away from Revik long enough to grab Garensche in a hug.

The seer clutched me back, and I felt the gratitude in his hands.

"Do not think we are not glad to see you either,
ilya,"
he said, kissing me on the cheek. He glanced at Revik then, giving him an apologetic smile. "...Even if we are all more than a little pissed off that you didn't wait for us on the wedding so we could come, too..." Garensche grinned at me, raising his eyebrows suggestively. "I hear it was quite a party...."

As if noticing something, he glanced at Jon then, curiosity in his hazel eyes.

With the appraising look that drifted down Jon's body came a heated pulse that had to be pain.

I smacked his arm, pointing a finger at him warningly.

"You don't want to be going there, brother Gar," I warned him. "Trust me on this."

When Garensche looked at Revik, I saw Revik nod, giving a wan smile in Jon's direction before he made a conciliatory gesture with one hand.

"She's right," he said. "You'd better feel strongly about it, if you do, my brother. Because you're in for one hell of a fight..." he added, softer.

Jon looked annoyed. Shaking his head, he clicked at all three of us, then folded his arms, glancing around the candlelit room as if trying with all of his being to pretend we didn't exist. I could tell, though, even in the lamplight, that his ears were turning red again.

"I hear from Jax that your cousin is quite the sexy little thing..." Garensche added to me, as if to dispel the tension. "Am I allowed to seduce her?"

I smacked him on the arm again, laughing.

"I'm glad you're all right, you pervert," I told him, smiling. "But leave my cousin alone, okay? And Jax has a big mouth, if you ask me..." When Garensche only gave a shrug at this, smiling, I added, "And sorry for not filling you in beforehand, but we had no choice."

I glanced at Revik, who still seemed to be watching Jaden warily on the couch. Feeling my stare then, he glanced at me, his expression softening slightly before he gave me a nod, indicating with one hand for me to keep going.

"We had a reason for coming like this..." I said, looking back at Garensche.

He glanced at Revik, all business again, hands on his thick waist. "I figured. Got tired of everyone pissing in your punch, eh?"

"Yeah. Something like that," I said, rubbing Revik's chest briefly as I sent him a pulse of warmth. "He sucks at playing the mouse..." When I smiled at him, a pulse of pain left his light, even as he took my hand in his.

"So what's the plan then?" Deklan said, walking closer.

He looked tired too, I noticed, as did Poresh...but I could feel both of them starting to relax, as if a less-tangible tension had started to loosen over the room. They'd definitely been due for some reinforcements, whatever they said about not wanting me there.

At Deklan's question, I glanced at Revik, who made a gesture with one hand that it was okay for me to tell them. Before I could start, another voice rose, this time from the nearer couch in the room, the one directly under the now-covered bay window where I used to sit for hours sometimes, drawing and staring out the window at the park. This voice was more plaintive than aggressive, but I couldn't help but jump at its familiar tones.

"Hey!" it said. " ...Is anyone going to tell us what the hell is going on? Or are we just like...the furniture or something? Jesus H..."

I looked over in surprise.

Staring at me with a round face and dark eyes above with a patchy goatee was Sasquatch, the Samoan cook from Lucky Cat, the diner where I'd worked for an embarrassing number of years. He and I had engaged in more than one drinking contest in the back kitchen while closing up, doing shots on the metal counter while he made passes at Cass, who he'd had an enormous crush on for at least three years.

Now he sat with his mouth slightly open, stiff as a poker, his side flush with that of a small Japanese girl with green-streaked hair whose face also hit me like a punch to the gut. She wore combat boots under a black frilled skirt that looked like a bona fide antique. Tattoos covered her bare arms and most of her neck. Seeing the tattoo of the bridge symbol on her arm, right next to the golden lotus I'd done for her myself a few years back, I gaped at her a little.

I hadn't seen my friend Frankie since I'd done my last job at Fang's, a tattoo parlor on Geary where both of us did freelance designs back before...

Well, everything.

I looked between her and Sasquatch, feeling suddenly like I'd walked through some kind of time portal. Somehow, Jaden and his groupie girlfriend had been easier to ignore.

"Jesus H..." Sasquatch said again, swallowing. "That really is you. What the hell happened to you, Allie-baby? You look like...all amazonian...like
über
-buff...Xena-tastic..."

"Allie?" Frankie said. "Is it Allie...right?"

Before I could answer, Sasquatch burst out, "What the hell is the deal here, anyway? Did you send these seer goons to collect us? Round us up like cattle? Prime rib for roasting when you're done getting your rocks off with the deadly virus thing...?"

"No," I said, still looking between them. "No...no, I didn't. We were trying to protect you guys, I swear..."

"Did you seriously
grow?"
Sasquatch said, looking around at Jaden and the others. "Am I the only one seeing this? She's taller, right? Like...
mondo
taller...?"

"She's definitely taller," Frankie agreed, still staring at me. Only she seemed to be looking at me like I was some kind of celebrity, or movie star. "Is that
him,
Allie? Is that Syrimne?"

"Jesus H," Sasquatch breathed. "You're really fucking Syrimne. Like...
that's
the guy you play hide the salami with. What the
hell,
Allie-cakes?"

I glanced back at Revik, who raised an eyebrow at me, suppressing a smile.

At a loss, I looked at Jon. "You might have to handle this, Jon."

Jon frowned. "Really? You're putting 'subdue the natives' on my list of job duties now?"

"It says 'command', right?" I said, gesturing a little sharper. "Command means command, Jon...as in, these are your people. They fall under you..."