23

CHALLENGE

 

I GOT UP before dawn.

When I left the empty sleeping quarters and wandered outside into new light, the man with the chocolate-colored eyes was the first person I saw. He sat on a wooden step, smoking a hiri, one of the seer cigarettes, a cup of chai resting by his thigh.

I’d spent the night in a sort of cottage, one of many rimming a wide courtyard just below Vash’s main house. Most of the complex lived in a hill directly beneath the main entrance through which I’d entered the day before. Before me now, the courtyard spread out on a large clearing of grass and dirt below the largest of those street-facing buildings. In the center stood a circle of flat white rocks surrounded by crab grass and white-painted stone cairns. Paths dotted with smaller shrines and shade trees radiated outwards. Even in the dawn chill, milling seers littered those same paths, talking in a mixture of languages and hand gestures.

I wondered why they bothered to speak aloud at all, and why there were so many more men than women...then noticed the man with the brown eyes staring at me.

Watching those eyes linger on my bare feet, I made up my mind.

I approached him deliberately, walking straight up to where he sat on the wooden stoop. He didn’t stand up when I reached him, and I didn’t sit, but we eyed one another silently.

Unwillings, a voice said in my mind.

I jumped a little. “What?”

You wondered why there are no women. They are sold faster. A bigger market for unwillings. You should know that, Esteemed Bridge.

He took a drag of the seer cigarette, blowing out a perfect smoke ring as he waited for me to catch up. His smile turned wry.

And we speak for the same reason all beings speak, Esteemed Bridge. To be heard.

“Do you speak English?” I said. “Aloud, I mean.”

His lips slid upwards in a perceptible smile. “Yes.”

He had an accent, but I couldn’t place it beyond Asian.

He studied my face, right before his brown eyes flickered down over the thin cotton pants I wore, pausing again on my bare feet.

“Did you...” His smile widened. “...Sleep well, Esteemed Bridge?”

I folded my arms tighter. I motioned towards his sidearm, visible under his jacket. “I take it you’re not a complete pacifist?”

“Does this offend you, Esteemed Bridge?”

I ignored his smile. “You know how to fight, then? Mulei?”

He smiled again, nodding once. “Yes.”

“Could you teach me?”

I glanced over my shoulder at the other seers in the courtyard. It hadn’t escaped my notice that a number of them stood closer to us than they had a few seconds earlier, that they continued to inch closer to listen to me and the brown-eyed seer talk. Feeling my jaw tighten a little, I looked back at the smoking seer, shifting my weight on my feet.

“...I need lessons,” I added.

Curiosity flared in his eyes, just visible beneath the amusement. “Why me?”

I sighed, then answered honestly. “You seem like you’d like to hit me. I figured I’d try harder.”

The male seer stared at me. Then he burst into a genuine laugh. He stood up, and while he wasn’t as tall as Revik, I stepped back in alarm.

His smile widened. “Yes,” he said. “I would like to hit you, Bridge. But I need to know if you are worth teaching, first.” He flipped the jacket off his muscular shoulders, exposing a worn gray shirt that stretched over his chest.

When he caught my stare, his smile grew into a grin.

“What do I get, if I put you down?” His eyes flickered down over my body again. He gestured towards it vaguely. “Will you let me take care of that thing of yours? The problem your Rook mate left you?”

I didn’t ask what he meant.

“No,” I said. Thinking, I added, “You’ve got two minutes. If I’m still standing, you’ll teach me. You’ll also stay the hell out of my head at night.”

I hesitated, then figured what the hell.

“...Everything else has to be negotiated separately. Clear?”

His eyes lit up at my words, but he only nodded, stubbing out the hiri with the toe of one threadbare yellow sneaker.

“Okay.” He stepped towards me, bouncing a bit on his heels. “I accept.”

“What’s your name?” I said, when he began to circle me.

“Maygar.” He glanced up from where he’d been looking at my body again. “I should tell you. I was assigned a new job today, Bridge.”

“And what was that, Maygar?”

He darted forward, moving so fast I didn’t see anything but a shadowed blur before my vision went red, then abruptly white. I reeled back, fighting to recover from a solid left cross to my right cheek. I ducked as he went for me again, then kicked out, catching him in the stomach hard enough to push him back with the ball of my foot.

He laughed, but gave me the ground.

When he got closer again, I looked for an opening...any opening.

“...I’m your new bodyguard,” he said, winking.

He darted forward again, even as it occurred to me that I’d just made a really big mistake.

“MORE TEA?” VASH said, raising the dented pot.

I sat cross-legged on the floor beside him. My face hurt. My arms, hands and legs were bruised, too, and even my tailbone where it perched on a bamboo mat. Two seers had brought in a platter covered with tea, cream, honey and a plateful of small sandwiches, laying everything out on a dark red cloth spread between me and the ancient seer.

I fought the impulse to touch my face in places I could feel the flesh rising. I wanted ice, but hadn’t asked for that either.

Looking out at the rain falling lightly over the mountains, I glanced reluctantly at the seers sitting around us in a symmetrical ring.

Against the far wall sat Maygar and his friends. Amusement showed on more than one face. I felt their lights flicker around mine like curious moths, woven through with faint flavors of sexuality. When I caught Maygar’s gaze unintentionally, he winked at me, kissing the air before tapping his temple with a forefinger.

Tonight, he whispered in my mind.

Taking a mouthful of cucumber sandwich, I chewed, gripping a tea cup in my other hand. More than anything, I wished it held coffee.

Vash laughed, startling me.

“Of course! You are American now!”

He glanced at another seer, who rose at once and disappeared through a cloth-covered doorway.

“Is this Indian breakfast?” I said.

His lips twitched in humor. “Elevenses, perhaps.”

Fans rotated overhead with round, leaf-like blades, pushing cool, rain-smelling air through the room.

Vash patted my knee. “How do you like India, dear friend?”

“I like the cows.” I looked around at the smooth-faced seers, avoiding Maygar’s corner. “Am I a prisoner here?”

Vash swept his smile away. “Not at all.” His voice grew troubled. “Do you wish to leave?” Leaning closer, he asked in barely a whisper, “...Or perhaps you would like some ice?”

I glanced around at the expressionless seers. “I want to find my brother,” I said, reddening. I plowed on. “And my friend, Cass. They’re missing.”

“Are you so sure they are not dead?”

He didn’t say it to mock me, or to screw with me, I could tell. Even so, my jaw seemed to stick in my sandwich. Setting my tea cup down on the tray, I forced myself to swallow what was left in my mouth. I cleared my throat, looking directly into Vash’s eyes.

“No. I need to know for sure, though. Maybe that’s stupid, but—”

“Ah.” Vash’s dark eyes grew thoughtful. “I was not implying that.” He paused. “Do they have meaning, these numbers? The ones I see around you now?”

I glanced away from Maygar, looking up at Vash.

“What?” Watching Vash’s nearly black eyes stare intently over my head, I felt my chest constrict, even though I saw nothing but curiosity in his gaze. “No. Well...I don’t think so.” I paused, then tried to be more honest. “Really, I have no idea.”

“Ah,” Vash said. “Pity.”

He smiled at me, and his long, white face erupted in fine wrinkles. “Your husband mentioned to me that your prescience often expresses itself in your art.” He paused, as if waiting. “Is that true, Esteemed Bridge...?”

“My...” I repeated numbly.

“...Husband, yes. Dehgoies Revik.”

He smiled again as I fumbled for a facial expression. I couldn’t help but wonder if he’d misunderstood me on purpose.

His eyes grew kind.

“Of necessity, we spoke often of your latent abilities,” he said, patting my knee affectionately. “Truthfully, we often argued about this, too. He had difficulty understanding why you were not pulled for training sooner.” Noting my bewilderment, he smiled wider. “Ah. This surprises you! Yes. Revik was not always the most forthcoming man.”

Before I could answer, the seer with the bare feet reentered the room, holding a steaming cup that smelled deliciously of dark roast coffee. He set it down by my bent knee, bowing to me with one raised palm, like a salute.

“Thanks,” I said to him, and then to Vash, meaning it. Taking another sniff of the coffee, I raised the paper cup and sipped carefully. “I draw pyramids,” I told him. “Chandre tells me it’s a depiction of the Rooks’ network. You want me to go get them?”

Vash continued to study my eyes. “Perhaps later.”

For a long moment, we just listened to the rain. I sipped more coffee.

Eventually, I cleared my throat.

“So, this Pyramid,” I said. “Can you explain that? Revik, he...” I cleared my throat. “...Dehgoies. He told me some. He said you would tell me more.”

Vash seemed almost to have been waiting for the question.

“A pyramid,” he said at once. “Being a three-dimensional shape, can be only a symbol, of course. The actual network is of the Barrier and contains a form of shifting dimensionality that marries properties of both partial and non-dimensionality.”

My fingers clasped my hurt knee. “Ah,” I said. “Sure.”

Vash smiled in understanding. “The Rooks’ seers live in a construct, Alyson...all the time. Unlike the constructs you’ve seen my people use, theirs is not anchored in the physical world. It lives with a race of beings who aid them from the Barrier.”

“Yeah,” I muttered, understanding that part, at least.

He looked at me inquiringly.

“I met one,” I explained, setting down the coffee. “On the ship.” I held up my hands with hooked fingers, like a movie monster. “Booga-booga...you know. It tried to freak me out.”

“Indeed?” Vash chuckled. “Fascinating.”

He smiled as if I’d just told him I’d solved a Rubik’s cube on my first try.

“We call these beings the Dreng, Alyson,” he said. “They are, in truth, the real Rooks. It would be more accurate to call the seers down here slaves of the Rooks. Or, more generously, their followers. Of course, they call themselves ‘The Brotherhood,’ ‘The Organization,’ or ‘Org,’ for short. They title missions ‘Operation Blackout,’ ‘Operation Great Hope,’ and so on. The Dreng encourage these fantasies. They often frame their goals in terms of the greater good.”

I nodded, listening. “So...they’re brainwashed.”

“In a way, yes.” Vash took a sip of tea, nodding. “In return for the power they provide through the Pyramid construct, the Dreng collect light from the seers in their employ. Those seers in turn parasitize other seers and humans, to supply the Dreng with light. It is the Dreng’s primary motive and function down here, to steal the light of living beings, as they cannot generate their own. The Pyramid collects this light in large feeding pools for use by the construct...but their primary customer is still the Dreng themselves.”

I frowned, picking up images from the old seer as he spoke.

Vash added, “In short-term, everyday usage, the Pyramid provides individual seers with an almost limitless supply of light. Especially those at the top. The shape of the Pyramid symbolizes the hierarchical nature of the macro version of the living resonant construct. It is known by us that the alpha tier shifts at irregular intervals, but—”

“Okay, wait.” I held up a hand. “Time out. Could you at least try to translate that part?”

Vash smiled. “We are unable to see the workings of the structure from outside of it,” he said. “We know it is made up of beings...”

A Pyramid made of silvery-white light appeared in the space above where we sat, a kind of Barrier-generated mirage. Illuminating dots making up the Pyramid’s walls, floors and corners, Vash connected them with silk threads.

“...Represented by nodes. We know that the leadership changes, but not how. Or why. We can speculate on the latter. But we cannot be certain our theories are correct.”

I glanced around, saw all of the seers staring up at the Pyramid, too.

“Those dots are people?” I said to Vash. “Seers?”

“Yes.” Vash nodded. “Incidentally, your husband was quite obsessed with determining the identity of those seers at the top.” Vash highlighted the top spot, the one I’d circled for Revik in my untidy sketch on ship’s stationary.

“He thought he might know the leader of the Rooks on Earth,” Vash added. “But he could not remember. It was a function and condition of leaving the Pyramid that he lost much of his memory of the time he spent inside of it.”

“Yeah,” I muttered. “He mentioned that. Convenient.”

“Yes,” Vash said seriously. “Very. He would never have survived otherwise. As it was, he was quite suicidal. He struggled with those feelings for years.”

“Suicidal?” I didn’t hide my surprise. “Revik?”

“Yes.” Vash took another sip of tea, his expression serene. “Quite a normal response, if you think about it. As you may have gathered from my description, living inside the Pyramid carries some very specific advantages. Servants of the Rooks are in a kind of trance. What they do in that trance makes perfect sense to them as long as they remain inside. But, break the spell, and suddenly they are able to see what they have done in quite a different light.”

“In other words,” I said, thinking aloud. “When he was a Rook, what he did seemed normal. Moral even. And when he left...”

“It seemed less so, yes.” Vash placed his palms on robed knees, nodding. “Further, upon leaving the Pyramid, one experiences a severe loss of power. The Pyramid culls skills and raw talent from all of its members, creating a sort of ‘library’ by which any of the beings inside can access the skills of all the others. Losing access to those shared pools of light and skill can be quite difficult...even painful. It is another reason seers don’t often leave. The Pyramid acts as a great amplifier...and also a distributor according to moment, status and need...of light and its structures, or aleimi, as we call it.”

“So,” I said, fighting to keep up. “Inside the Pyramid, you can access the ability of any seer inside it? Even if you never had it before?”

Vash nodded, taking another sip of tea.

“Wouldn’t that make them all, like...super-seers?”

“In a way...yes.” Vash set his cup on its china saucer, clearly amused by this idea. “There are limits, of course. One must know how to access particular skills in the first place...so knowledge is required, especially for more complex abilities. We strongly believe skill sets are further stratified by the hierarchy itself, with some being reserved for use only by those at the top.

“Your husband was a strong seer in his own right...but he was much, much more powerful when he had access to the light and abilities of tens of thousands of other seers.” Patting my knee once more, Vash smiled. “You can see now, also, why a telekinetic seer might appeal to them, Esteemed Sister...?”

I nodded. “So why did he leave?”

Vash sighed. “Do you really need to ask me that?”

“Well, yeah. If he was brainwashed, then—”

Vash waved a hand. “Suffice it to say, it is possible to experience moments of clarity no matter where you are.”

At my silence, he shrugged.

“...The Rooks have been quite shrewd in recruiting seers who fill out those skill sets they lack. Like any beings, we each have our own gifts and aptitudes, and they vary. Imagine if you could paint like DaVinci, have the mind of a Marie Curie or an Einstein, the oratory skills of a Martin Luther King. For seers, it is much the same. It is a tremendous loss to give this up.” He added, “It can also debilitate the minds of lesser seers to realize that what they had come to think of as their own was indeed never really theirs at all.”

I nodded. “Got it. So as Rooks, they’re über-strong. And if they leave—”

Vash laughed. “Alyson! You misunderstand. I was trying to tell you that this power of theirs is, in the main, illusory. It comes from the symbiotic nature of the Pyramid itself. It does not belong to the individual seers, who are themselves quite ordinary.” Vash gave a graceful shrug, his dark eyes studying mine. “I also wished you to understand something of your husband...and the kind of man he would need to be to leave them, after he had been living inside that structure for over thirty years.”

I felt anger from Maygar’s corner and ignored it.

Outside the open windows, rain pattered on bamboo and slate tile roofs. A golden-colored eagle wheeled past one window, dark against the sky. When I looked at Vash, he was watching me with compassion in his eyes.

I cleared my throat. “If he were reconnected with them. To the Pyramid. Could he, well...be stuck?” My face warmed when the old man’s gaze didn’t waver. “...Even if he died?”

Vash looked up at the ceiling, eyes thoughtful. “It is a good question.” He leaned back in his seat, holding his knees. “What do you think?”

My throat closed. “I don’t know. It feels like he is.”

Vash studied my face. “I see. Well, it would not be ideal to leave him there, would it?”

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?”