28

SUSPICION

PICKING UP THE headset on the wooden table by the bed, Revik glanced at the time through the VR link and cursed softly. His mental alarm clock hadn’t woken him up for once; it usually got him out of bed pretty much to the minute, if not before he intended to rise.

Instead, he’d woken over an hour late.

He wouldn’t have time to check in on the ground floor. He would have to go straight to the debriefing he’d scheduled.

As he thought it, her arm tightened around his waist, as if sensing he’d been about to get up. Her fingers clenched on his skin and he glanced down, studying her face in sleep.

Remembering the night before, a flush caught him off-guard.

Gods.

He focused on her face, fighting back his reaction, trying to view her objectively. She looked so different now. Her face had matured since he first met her, leaving the features of the person he’d fallen in love with, but transitioning them from a girl’s to a woman’s seemingly overnight.

Her youth had unnerved him a little when they were first married...and made him feel guilty too. The latter had been irrational, he knew. Her soul was older than his. Physically, she’d been well within age, by half a decade according to seer law.

Over a decade, according to the law of humans.

Even so, he wanted her more now. Some of this wrapped into feelings, their history together, having lost any sense of taking her for granted after Delhi...and knowing himself more since D.C. Some came from her, and the changes she’d gone through since those early days in the United States, when she still thought she was human.

Some of it he couldn’t explain at all.

And some, as much as he hated to admit it, came from pure male reaction to stimuli. Her body had grown more curves in the past two years. She was taller...leaner, too, and her hair fell nearly to her waist. She had a natural curiosity about sex, and about seer bodies, including his body...and an interest in learning, down to gradations in subtlety that drove him crazy.

More than anything though, her light did things to him, pulling reactions from his that no one else had come close to. He felt constantly starved to be in her light, even with her living there with him. That probably had more to do with her being Elaerian...but it felt so personal he couldn’t quite make himself reduce it all to racial compatibility.

Menlim had been right. It hadn’t felt like it back then, but it was worth the wait.

As he thought it, he remembered her face from the night before. He was sore...but at a base level, his body didn’t care about that, either. His groin reacted as he looked at her, even as he fought back another wave of possessiveness that bordered on paranoia.

He hadn’t really intended to go there with her in the common room.

Much less to do it the way he had, letting them see her naked, or taking things so far in terms of pulling them into her light. But, despite a faint whisper of anger as he remembered Wreg’s reaction to watching her climax, he couldn’t say he regretted it.

He trusted Wreg. As much as he trusted anyone, really.

But he’d always been a little paranoid about older, more experienced seers, especially those who’d earned enough control with their light that females sought them out.

That had been true even before Balidor seduced her.

At the thought, pain crippled him.

Cutting his breath, it transformed into emotion before he could stop it. Hatred broke somewhere inside his chest, forcing out air in short pants. His fingers curled protectively over his own heart, as if holding something in that might have forced its way out otherwise.

He hadn’t let a thought like that catch him off-guard in awhile.

He waited for it to pass.

He couldn’t look at her until it dissipated. He still got flashes of anger so intense he could barely admit them to himself. The only thing that helped at all was to remember that he’d done worse to her.

But, truthfully, he couldn’t make himself believe that, either.

His transgressions had hurt her; he wasn’t denying that. But in context, he couldn’t see them as remotely the same.

He’d let Kat give him head a few times after he and Allie had first been married. He’d only done it because he thought Allie had rejected him as a mate...he could hardly put that in the same category as an overt infidelity. They’d both been so confused back then. They hadn’t consummated anything between them...they hadn’t talked about anything.

Hell, he hadn’t even been sure he was married back then.

For the same reason, he’d slept with a human on the ship. That essentially had been a trick, someone who picked him up in a bar, wanting to use a seer prostitute to get back at her unfaithful husband.

And anyway, he’d been trying to distract himself from Allie then, too. Not very successfully either; he’d spent most of his time with that human trying to fuck his wife from the Barrier, half out of his mind when she kept pushing him away.

It had been the thing to make him realize he was married though. It also nearly earned him a divorce.

Then there was the op, in D.C.

Whatever she’d thought, then or now, he’d done that for her. She’d walked in, seeing him with Kat, and he could understand why she couldn’t let go of that, especially given their history and how Kat treated her in Seattle. But a part of his mind rebelled at that, too...unable to equate the two things, to put what he’d done in the same category as what she’d done to him.

For the gods’ sakes. He hadn’t gone there to get laid. It had been a damned military operation. He’d used them because it was the only way to get her out.

It wasn’t the same thing, his mind repeated. It wasn’t the same at all.

She’d wanted Balidor.

She didn’t even hint about that part...she told him outright she’d wanted the Adhipan leader. She said she’d wanted him even before, when things had been good with them before D.C. That meant she’d been interested in him in the period before they’d consummated.

Maybe she’d even considered severing things with him, marrying the Adhipan leader instead. Maybe they’d delayed him in Cairo on purpose, long enough to give Balidor time to persuade her.

The pain in his heart worsened, forcing him to shield so it wouldn’t wake her.

She hadn’t said anything to him. She hadn’t even hinted that someone else was in the picture. He’d been worried about Maygar, for fuck’s sake.

The anger wouldn’t dissipate; it seethed in his chest, a hot coil of hatred against the other seer. Maybe a little towards his wife, too.

She’d slept with him, knowing all that. She had sex with a 400-year-old male seer she had a crush on, even after they’d consummated. She didn’t come out and say it, but she’d enjoyed it, too. A lot, from what he’d been able to pick up from the imprints left in her light.

Worse, it had been intimate. Enough to scare her...to make her back off.

And Revik hadn’t felt it.

The reality of that hit him again, making every inch of skin on his body hurt.

Why hadn’t he felt it? How was that even possible?

Balidor must have figured out some way...just like he figured out a way to fake her death. But he couldn’t have had sex with her in that same sensory deprivation chamber Allie told him about. He would have felt that, for sure...the complete absence of her would have been enough to send him over the edge, especially then, so soon after Delhi.

No way the sex happened after Balidor shot her, either...not right away, anyway. And by the time Balidor took her out of that thing, she’d been half-dead.

Revik continued to stare up at the ceiling, trying to wrap his head around it.

He had to get up. He was going to be late.

Forcing the rest from his mind, he started to slide out from under her arm. Her grip on him tightened, however, just before she jerked...then raised her head.

“Hey.”

He watched her face as she woke up.

Blinking against the sun coming through the windows, she squinted up at him, rubbing her eyes and one cheek. The sheet fell off her as she did, and he found himself staring at her bare shoulder and back, down to where it met a round curve of her buttocks...right before she shifted to her side, and he found himself looking at her breasts and belly instead.

His light reacted ahead of his cock...but not by much.

“Hey,” she said again. When he started to move away, she caught hold of his arm. “Where are you going?”

“Salinse,” he said. He avoided looking at her, but kept his light neutral. “I still haven’t debriefed with him about the Registry job, and—”

“Hey!” Alarm pitched her voice upwards. She grabbed his arm tighter, forcing him to turn. “Baby...what’s going on? What’s wrong?”

He hesitated, looking at her face. The endearment disarmed him a little, in spite of himself. Feeling her light slide around his in fearful eddies, he leaned down, kissing her.

“It’s nothing. Promise.”

“Liar.” She yanked on his arm again when he started to pull away. “Revik! You said you wouldn’t freak out! It was your idea, remember? You said you wouldn’t!”

He just stared at her for a moment.

Then he realized what she meant.

Tracing his thoughts back to their origins, he even wondered if she might be right.

He forced himself to exhale, to relax. Settling his weight back on the mattress, he turned to her again, studying her high-cheekboned face. Letting his eyes drift over hers, he fingered the hair off her cheek, opening his light. He saw relief touch her expression, but the worry remained there as she looked from one of his eyes to the other.

“I’m sorry,” he said, soft.

“But why?” she said. “What is it?” She sat up, and he felt his body react again when she sat there naked next to him. She kissed his face, wrapping her arms around his neck.

“I thought it was nice,” she murmured in his ear. “The you and me part...I thought we finally, you know...” She hesitated a half-beat, kissing his ear again, using her tongue. “It felt like things changed with us again. In a good way, I mean...at the end...”

He didn’t move as she stroked his hair and the back of his neck.

He thought about her words, though.

Her fingers explored his chest then, and he felt her light darting out in pale pulses, softening his heart. He let her open him gradually, even as his light followed how subtly she did it, how much more sophisticated she’d gotten at pulling him into her.

“Revik,” she said softly. “Revik...” She kissed his ear, and he felt his groin react, even as his breathing grew more shallow. She shook him lightly by the shoulders, kissing him again. “Revik,” she said softer. “Please. Talk to me.”

He bit his lip, staring out over the view of the canyon.

“Did you mean it?” he said finally.

“Mean what?”

“What you said. About how you’d never fuck anyone else again.”

His voice came out bitter. Harsher than he’d intended.

She flinched, raising her head. Her fingers were on his face then, caressing his neck, and he felt himself softening, in spite of himself.

“Yes,” she said. “You know I meant it.”

He felt his jaw harden. Anger welled up in him again, sharp enough that he couldn’t control it briefly. She must have felt it, because she pulled at it, coaxing it out of him. When it started to slip through his fingers, he looked at her, feeling his chest hurt, throbbing under his ribs. Her eyes met his, their light jade serious in the early sun.

“Why do you want me to feel this, Allie?”

“Because you’ll never get over it until you do.”

“What makes you think I’ll get over it at all?”

“Do you want to hit me?” she said. “Would that help?”

There was a silence while he stared at her, incredulous.

“No,” he said. His eyes flickered to her mouth, then back to hers. “Did it help you?”

“No. Not really.”

He bit his lip again, wanting to yell at her, to tell her everything he’d been thinking before she woke up. More than anything, he wanted to know why he hadn’t felt them together.

Something about that bothered him more than the rest. Maybe if he’d been a part of it, even peripherally...even if it made everything worse at the time. He’d still have something more concrete to work with. Something other than his imagination and the whispers of emotion he discerned in her light.

“Are you pissed off at Wreg?” she asked.

He shook his head. “No.” He paused, trying to smile. “I do want to hit him, though.”

She smiled. “Why? For getting off on watching us?”

“No.” His voice hardened again. “For wanting my wife.”

She rolled her eyes at this, sliding her arms deeper around his neck. “If that’s the criteria...I’d have to punch out your whole squad.”

He continued to look at her, frustrated, and still angry. She watched his face cautiously, and he could tell from her eyes she felt it.

“What do you want me to do, Revik?” she said.

“I want you to have never slept with him.”

He saw her eyes wince, right before they shifted away. She tugged her arms from around his neck, retracting her light.

“I’m sorry,” he said, blunt. He wasn’t though.

“Revik,” she sighed. She rubbed her eyes. “Please. Please believe me on this. He isn’t a threat to you. I swear to the gods, he isn’t.”

“You don’t even believe in the gods, Allie.”

“What do you want?” she said, frustrated. “What do you want me to say right now?”

“Will you be angry with me, if I kill him?” he said.

There was a silence.

She looked up, her eyes widening a little. “What?”

He averted his gaze back to the window, feeling his jaw harden until it hurt. He didn’t want to see her emotional reaction if she thought he might be serious. He’d seen the fear there, in that brief instant, and that had been enough.

“Forget it,” he said. “I didn’t mean it, Allie.”

He felt another whisper of her fear though, and had to clench his jaw to remain silent.

“I have to go,” he said. Without looking at her, he rose to his feet. Feeling her about to speak, he cut her off before she could. “...We’ll talk more later. I really do have to go, Allie. I’m late to see Salinse. It shouldn’t take long...”

After the barest pause, she nodded, tugging the sheet back around herself.

He only looked at her once more before he left.

She hadn’t moved from the bed, but watched him with those jade green eyes, a wary look on her face as she scanned his light.

REVIK BARELY HEARD most of what Salinse said in the first twenty or so minutes of their interview. He spoke, but more in rote, and found himself staring at the fire for a few seconds between each of the old seer’s questions to clarify his words.

He knew Allie didn’t like the old man.

He’d even found it touching in a way...mostly because he’d picked up on a few inklings of her reasons. For one, he’d caught her thinking that Salinse acted like he owned him.

More than anything, however, she hated him because he looked so much like Menlim.

Revik had to remind himself sometimes, that she witnessed a fair chunk of his childhood while studying the Barrier in Tarsi’s cave.

He glanced down at the stone tile floor, focusing briefly on the sword and sun mosaic. Pale blue slate stood beside the gold, marbled rock of the sun’s center. White crystal made up the sword bisecting the middle of the gold circle, patterned with ribbons of some other clear stone. The room itself was almost an exact replica of the rebel quarters of Menlim during World War I.

Glancing around at the antique furniture, he supposed Allie had a point.

Revik frowned a little, shifting in his seat as he folded his arms. Depending on what she’d seen, Allie probably had good reason to feel the way she did. If anyone had treated her like that as a child, he would kill them. No question.

Still, he didn’t feel that way about the old man himself. 

And anyway, Salinse wasn’t Menlim.

He couldn’t say really, why it didn’t bother him more. Maybe because, by the end, he’d understood why Menlim had done the things he’d done. He didn’t condone it, but he got why he’d felt he needed to do them.

Glancing up, Revik found himself studying the face of the old seer.

Salinse really did look remarkably like Menlim.

His eyes shone an opaque white instead of that dark yellow of Menlim’s. He wore a slightly more rounded jawline...slightly lowered cheekbones. Yet Salinse’s face managed to retain every bit of the skeleton-like quality of Menlim’s skin-stretched-over-bone features.

In fact, staring up at him, Revik found himself understanding Allie’s perception in a whole new light. She looked at Salinse and saw the man who’d turned her husband into a killer.

Swallowing a little, he averted his gaze.

“...Nephew.”

Revik realized Salinse had been silent for a few seconds at least.

He turned his head, meeting the old man’s stare.

“...Are you going to tell me what’s bothering you?” Salinse said. “...Or shall I be forced to continue to guess?”

The old Sark re-laced long fingers on the tops of his bony thighs over the long robe he wore. He continued to study Revik’s expression, his own inscrutable, despite the whisper of concern Revik felt in his light. Revik saw the flavor under that concern, too, the level scrutiny in those opaque, white-irised eyes.

“No,” Revik said. “I’m not. Do you need anything more from me, uncle?”

Salinse just looked at him, his white irises unmoving.

“I respect your wish for privacy, nephew,” he said then, softer. “But you are not dismissed. For if you have nothing to say to me, then I have something to say to you...”

Revik felt his body tense. “Can it wait?” He gestured deferentially to the old seer. “...I mean no disrespect. I’m not in the mood for a long talk today...”

“No,” the old seer said. “It cannot wait, nephew.”

He paused, blinking once, slowly, as he stared at Revik’s face.

“...However,” he said. “I will do you the courtesy of being direct, my dear friend.”

Revik felt his jaw harden still more. Still, he motioned an acquiescence. He didn’t really have a lot of choice. He’d let the old man give his lecture or words of advice or whatever couldn’t wait, and then he would go for a walk by himself...look at the cliffs for awhile in the sun before heading back.

Even as it whispered through his mind, he realized he wanted her to come with him. Anger touched his light at the realization, but it didn’t change anything.

Salinse let out a sigh, bringing Revik’s eyes back to his. Clicking in a near-purr that still somehow wasn’t soft, he gestured smoothly with one long-fingered hand.

“...I wish for nothing but happiness for you and your bride, Illustrious Syrimne,” he said, his voice holding regret. If he noticed Revik stiffen, he didn’t react. “...I wish that very much. In all of the time I have known you, nephew, I have wanted that for you, more than anything. I knew how badly you wanted it in your youth...I knew the very idea of her got you through some of those dark times, whether that idea was realistic or not...”

Revik didn’t speak, but felt his throat close a little.

Salinse met his gaze directly. “...Yet she is still a mortal being down here, Illustrious brother. Still fallible. Still prone to certain immaturities and excesses...especially at her young age...”

Revik didn’t answer that, either.

“I watched her too, you know,” the old seer added. “Not as closely as you did, of course, especially in those early years...but I feel I know her in some ways, your Bridge.”

Revik looked away. A surge of emotion caught him off guard, making it hard to hold his expression still. He remembered following her as a child, and again as she got older, and the pain worsened. There were times, even then, even not knowing who she was...but he pushed it from his mind, even as a memory of her, the one time he’d gotten near to her when she was small, swam into the forward part of his consciousness. He’d scared off a group of boys who’d been teasing her. She’d attracted unwanted attention even then.

He remembered her looking up at him, her green eyes catching the sun. She hadn’t been afraid of him. Even then, she hadn’t been afraid.

When the old man didn’t go on, he nodded, wiping his face with one hand.

“You want to say something uncle.” His voice came out blunt. “So say it.”

“I am not trying to distress you, nephew,” Salinse said.

“Just say it.”

Salinse sighed once more, clicking in regret.

“...In all of that time of watching her, nephew, I paid particular attention to her motives. You see, what matters to me, more than anything, is that I understand why my brothers and sisters do what they do...even the intermediaries with whom I’ve been blessed to cross paths...”

He made a respectful gesture with one hand.

Revik bit back impatience, but didn’t voice it. When he still said nothing, Salinse smiled again, his eyes verging on kindly.

“Do not misunderstand me, brother Syrimne. Through the vast majority of the time I’ve observed your mate...at least since she has known her true nature...it strikes me that she has wanted nothing more than to do what is best for our people. Even though I was not always in full agreement with the means and strategies she employed, I believed that. I believed her to be honest...loyal. Well meaning in her intentions. I believed her, in fact, to be a person who acted with a very high degree of integrity...”

He sighed again, his voice still holding regret.

“...I also thought she would have sooner died than betray you, nephew...”

Revik’s jaw turned to stone. His fingers curled into fists under his biceps where he had his arms crossed over his chest. He didn’t move his gaze from the fire, but felt the old seer staring at his face once more.

“However,” he said. “There are things here that do not add up, my brother.”

Revik looked up, in spite of himself, feeling his body tense.

Salinse held up a hand, as if to forestall something he saw in his face.

“I do not blame you for missing it, nephew,” he said. “You are blinded by your feelings for her...that much is obvious, and more than a little touching. None of us wanted to take that from you, not after how much you have been forced to suffer in waiting for her...”

The old man hesitated, his white eyes opaque.

“...And now you are confused, are you not?” he said. “By your attempt to bond her with the rest of your team last night...?”

Revik felt anger spark through his light, until he could barely see the old man.

Clicking mildly, the Sark softened his gaze. “...I understand why you did that, too, my son. I have absolutely no judgment of the event. But you must understand...you were not ready to do this with her. There must be a high degree of trust between mates before they can share light in such a way. She had betrayed you too recently for you to be able to tolerate her sharing her light with other seers...even your own people.”

Lowering his voice, he met Revik’s gaze directly.

“You may have hurt yourself needlessly with this, I’m afraid...”

Revik swallowed. Still, he nodded a little as he thought about the other’s words.

Tilting his hand cautiously, Salinse added, “...However, I cannot help but think it is a good thing...this appraisal you are doing of her intentions with you...”

At this, Revik’s gaze swiveled back to his. His words came out hard.

“I had thought you said you would be direct, uncle,” he said. He felt heat flare in his light, almost more than he could pull back. “You think she’s untrustworthy, is that it? That she’ll betray me? Fuck Wreg? What?”

“No...no, no, no, nephew...” Salinse clicked in dismay, holding up his hands once more. “Please, brother...calm yourself. I am not implying anything about her loyalty to you as a mate...”

“Then what the fuck are you implying?”

Salinse’s face grew unreadable once more. The white eyes met Revik’s.

“Balidor,” Salinse said, blunt.

Revik flinched, feeling his light spark out in reaction.

“You wish me to be more direct?” Salinse said. “All right. I will be. I think you have underestimated the power of this individual, nephew. Perhaps you do not realize the ways in which your wife’s viewpoint may have been manipulated through his not inconsiderable skills as an infiltrator...”

When Revik tensed, Salinse tilted his head, bird like, his white eyes like a doll’s.

“...You know this,” he added. “But it bears remembering. In actual versus potential skills, Balidor is the highest ranked infiltrator of any seer we have living...perhaps any in the generation previous. His abilities in this area exceed those of any seer in this compound...including me. Including you, my son.” He gave Revik a regretful look.

“Your potential may outweigh his, even by a considerable span...but not your actual. Not yet. Nor does that of your wife. He is better than you, nephew. You need to realize this...”

Revik glared at him. “What’s your point, Salinse?”

“...I prefer to think she has been led astray, your wife,” Salinse said, gesturing smoothly with the same hand. “That she has simply been overpowered by a seer whose abilities outweigh her own. If that is the case, then we can certainly help her. Perhaps it is the foolish old man in me who believes this still to be a strong possibility...that the situation can still turn out happily for all of us. I wish that more than anything, my son. I hope and pray that you never be faced with a choice you might regret...if you were to find her to be permanently corrupted...”

At Revik’s sharp look, Salinse made another graceful gesture.

“It is a very faint possibility, my son. Do not trouble yourself with it.”

“What exactly do you mean...manipulated by Balidor?” Revik felt his throat close, and forced himself to speak through it. “...Manipulated to do what?”

Salinse shrugged with one hand, seer-fashion.

“Manipulated to do his bidding, nephew.”

“Bidding in what?” Revik growled.

“...If she were conducting an infiltration op in being here, for example,” Salinse said, his voice growing softer still. “...Infiltrating you on the orders of brother Balidor. Attempting to determine a means of taking our operation down from the inside.”

The old seer met his gaze, his white eyes reluctant.

“Perhaps by converting you, brother Syrimne...”

Pain hit Revik in the chest, before he could think about the words...hard enough that for a moment he couldn’t see the fire in front of him. Before he could recover, tears blinded him, coming too fast for him to be able to pull himself together.

But his mind lagged way behind the emotion that rose in him.

He couldn’t actually think anything about what had been said. He couldn’t think much of anything at all. Pain obliterated all of it.

Pain, exhaustion...a nearly childlike hurt wrapped in a realization that he’d known somehow. He’d known something was wrong, that there was something she wasn’t telling him.

He sat there, letting the tears run down his face.

Before he could even see Salinse’s gaunt, hard-boned features, the old seer sat on the bench beside him. He gripped Revik’s arm...sending a dense, almost hard pulse of light through his aleimi, so strong that it stabilized Revik’s briefly.

“Nephew,” he said softly, clicking in distress. “...I am not saying I have actual knowledge of this. I am not saying that...please do not misunderstand...”

Revik’s words came out thick. “You suspect it...”

“I wish us to speak of it, yes. I wish us to try and reach her, before it is too late...”

“You think she is loyal to him?”

Salinse sighed, releasing his arm. For a moment, the only sound was the wood popping in the flames, letting off a fine shower of sparks.

“I have wondered this, yes,” Salinse said, his voice reluctant. “There are inconsistencies in her light, nephew.” Pausing a bit longer, he added, his voice holding regret, “I have felt the Adhipan leader in some of these...anomalies. Marks that he has trained her in this...in some deep shielding skill...”

Revik didn’t move.

For a long moment, nothing seemed to penetrate his mind at all.

Then he nodded, still staring into the fire. Wiping his eyes, he nodded again, folding his arms tighter across his chest.

“What do you want me to do?” he said.

Salinse purred, a bare clicking sound.

“I want you to ask her, nephew,” he said gently. “I want you to ask her, and to offer her the choice.” He patted the Elaerian’s arm affectionately. “She may surprise you yet, brother Syrimne. She may indeed. For whatever she told herself she was doing here at the outset, I have all confidence that you are affecting her deeply, nephew...”

Revik shook his head, his jaw hard once more, but the old seer cut him off.

“...Give her a chance, brother,” he said, soft. “She wants a reason to stay. She wants it more than anything, I suspect. Give her one.”

“So what do I do?” Revik said.

“Give her one,” Salinse repeated simply. “There is no need to make accusations. Not now. Not until we know where she stands.” The old seer purred softer, stroking his arm. “Ask her what she wants. Offer her alternatives to being the puppet of the Adhipan and the Seven. Beijing was a long time ago, brother Syrimne. You have known her far longer than she has him...whatever his talents. Whatever he has sold her on...” His voice grew soft once more.

“She belongs to you, Nenzi,” he said. “Things will end with the two of you...” He quoted, “...Whatever twists and turns may break their paths, forcing them to rejoin...”

Thinking about this, Revik wiped his face. Feeling his throat close again briefly, he forced out an exhale, letting the hardness in his chest relax, if only a little.

He nodded then, glancing at the old seer.

“Yes,” he said. Nodding again, he wiped his eyes as the old man patted his back. “Yes,” he repeated. “Okay. I can do that...”

The old man just sat there with him, holding his arm firmly in his bone-like fingers.