The Defector

by J. C. Andrijeski

Thinking about her words, he felt his frown deepen.

  Meeting her gaze directly, he let her see the frown, even as he shook his head.

  “I’m not comfortable with this, sister. I think I should go.”

  Kali released him with a sigh, but he saw the knowing look in her eyes. “Because you are in love now?” she asked him gently.

  Revik felt his face warm.

  Glancing behind him, at the blank wall of curtain at his back, Revik clicked under his breath, hearing the faint irritation in the sound he made.

  “Stop picking on him, wife,” Uye said from the bed. “I’d just as soon he not have an interest in our daughter just yet, if it’s all the same to you.”

  Kali rolled her eyes at her husband, her mouth firming, then looked up at Revik, studying him more carefully with her leaf-colored eyes.

  “Brother,” she said gently. “I am happy for you. Truly.”

  Revik shook his head, but more because he didn’t know what to say.

  He glanced at the bundle on the bed, in spite of himself.

  For the first time, he opened his light, just a little.

  Just enough to feel… something.

  Maybe to convince himself he wouldn’t feel anything at all.

  Instead, that pain in his heart worsened, grew unbearable.

  He felt the familiarity there.

  He felt it, and found himself fleeing from it.

  “I have to go,” he said.

  Hesitating, he leaned down, kissing Kali on the cheek.

  “I wish you all health and happiness, sister,” he said, and meant it, even as he closed all three of them out of his light. “I am sorry I did not try to thank you sooner, for what you did for me in Saigon. And to apologize for my behavior there. I am sorry. It was inexcusable, the way I behaved, Rook or no.”

  Hesitating, he looked up, meeting Uye’s gaze. “I am sorry to you as well, for my behavior with your wife, brother. Truly. I was sorry even then, even in that state.”

  Uye grunted, but his blue eyes softened somewhat.

  “I appreciate that, brother,” he said, once again caressing the arm poking out of the bundle on the bed.

  Revik hesitated, then nodded, looking down at Kali. “I should go.”

  She nodded, a faint sadness in her eyes as she looked up at him.

  “Brother… before you go.” She laid a hand on his arm before he could move away. “I must remind you of something, now that your mind is clearer than it was when we last met.” She paused, still studying his eyes. “Remember your promise to me. You cannot tell her.”

  Revik frowned, staring down at her. “Tell her? Tell who?”

  Kali clicked at him, even as Uye made an amused sound from the bed. Kali gave her husband an annoyed look, pushing her long, dark hair out of her face.

  “I apologize,” she said to Revik, glancing again at her husband. “My husband says I always leave out about ten words out of twelve…”

  When Revik’s confusion only worsened, Kali clicked again, seemingly at herself.

  “Our daughter, brother. You will meet her one day, when she is grown, and when you do, you cannot tell her about us.”

  “Why not?” Revik said, bewildered.

  She shook her head. “You just cannot. She cannot go looking for us. It would be very dangerous for her. I don’t mean to sound melodramatic, but if it were to happen too soon, it would be dangerous for all of us. So you cannot tell her. You cannot. You promised me, before you left me on that pier, that you would not tell her.”

  Revik felt his confusion worsen. He looked between the male on the bed, and the dark-haired woman standing in front of him.

  “Look for you?” he said. “Why wouldn’t she know where you are?”

  “None of your business, pup,” Uye growled from the bed.

  Kali clutched Revik’s arm, giving her husband a warning look.

  “Be polite, husband,” she scolded him. She looked back up at Revik. “I cannot explain it all, brother. I really cannot––or I promise you, I would. Just remember that I said this, and vow to me that you will do as I ask. If you truly want to repay me for what I tried to do for you in Vietnam, then promise me you will do this for both of us.”

  Looking down at her, Revik exhaled in a sigh, nodding.

  “Of course,” he said, making a seer’s gesture of a promise. “I vow it.” Hesitating, he continued to look at her eyes. “Is there anything else you want of me, sister?” He glanced at Uye. “…Either of you?”

  From the bed, Uye let out another half-laugh.

  Kali only shook her head, smiling at him.

  When Revik turned to go, however, she stopped him again, clasping his hand.

  Revik turned.

  He was shocked to see tears in her eyes.

  “You are loved, brother,” she told him softly, clasping him tighter. Her words turned almost fierce. “I hope you know that. You are very deeply loved.”

  Revik nodded, feeling his confusion worsen, along with a denser pain.

  He didn’t understand what she meant.

  He didn’t want to understand.

  Feeling another pulse of light off the bundle on the bed, he found himself struggling to breathe, feeling suddenly claustrophobic again.

  He wanted to get the hell out of there.

  At the same time, he didn’t want to jerk his hand away from the female seer. He glanced at Uye, and saw the male watching the two of them, no expression on his face. Giving the Bridge’s father a last nod, Revik turned to go, disentangling his fingers gently from Kali’s.

  “I should go,” he said, softer.

  Kali only nodded that time, releasing him.

  Revik turned, reaching for the cloth door, when Uye raised his voice.

  “Revik!” the seer said.

  Revik froze, then turned, his hand already grasping the organic curtain. He met the gaze of the male seer on the bed.

  The blue-eyed seer stared at him, zero compromise in his ocean-colored eyes.

  “You may be loved,” he said, his voice holding a soft lilt of humor. “But you hurt my daughter, brother, and I will hunt you. You’d better hope to be dead before I catch you, too.”

  A pulse of that protective light shimmered off his prone form, even as a smile touched his lips. “…No offense.”

  Revik swallowed.

  Then, tightening his grasp on the curtain, he nodded.

  Feeling his face warm, he gestured to the seer that he understood.

  Then, pulling back the organic cloth with a sharp jerk…

  He fled.

  Twenty-Seven

  Fear

  Revik waited outside, on that rough boulder, after Dalejem disappeared inside the hut.

  He waited for a long time.

  It was getting dark then, and still he waited.

  He found himself wishing he had a packet of hiri with him, even though he hadn’t smoked the seer cigarettes since he’d first gone to stay with those monks in the Pamir.

  They tended to mellow him out, and calm his stomach, when he felt like this.

  Looking up, he watched the stars begin to appear between the branches. He watched as they multiplied in the sky, moving slowly on their tracks. He fought not to mark time with his light or his eyes, but some part of him did it in rote.

  Even when he didn’t attach numbers to that time, he felt the length of it.

  It felt like Dalejem had been in there for a long time.

  Far longer than Revik himself had been.

  Then again, Revik hadn’t really tracked how long he’d stood inside that curtained space, either, not until he got outside and saw that the position of the sun had changed.

  He watched the humans whose village it was cooking over their fire pit, boiling something in a large, cast-iron pot. He watched them talk, listened to them laugh with one another as they gathered around the light.

  Revik had been sitting there long enough by now that he didn’t garner more than the occasional curious stare. H
e saw an older male on the far side of the clearing, apparently doing his own thing. Whatever it was, it didn’t look cooking-related.

  He burned some kind of plant as Revik watched, chanting over a stone basin.

  Revik reached out his light tentatively to what the man was doing, asking permission from the Barrier if he could see what it meant.

  Immediately, the space opened.

  Revik saw beings there, connected to the Earth, and again got a strong feeling of protection. He felt love there. Real love.

  Love for Kali and the Bridge.

  With that love, he felt something that evoked a kind of pact.

  Revik’s eyes clicked back into focus.

  He saw the medicine man looking at him, once he could see again.

  Revik raised a cautious hand in greeting, signaling his thanks, and the old man laughed, shaking his head as he turned his attention back to his offering smoke.

  Wrapping his arms around his ribs, Revik averted his gaze, wishing again he had the hiri, or maybe just something to eat.

  He kept his light away from the hut.

  He hadn’t let his light go anywhere near it, not since Dalejem disappeared inside.

  Even so, he felt pain in his heart a few times, seeing flickers of that bundle on the bed. He could feel other things now, too. Protection. Love. A kind of silent guardianship that felt deeper than both of those things. A dense, golden light stood over this place, shrouding it in a living, Barrier mist. Something about that light opened his heart more than he really wanted it open.

  Revik could feel the parts of him that it pulled.

  All of those things made him want to stay farther away, not get nearer.

  He was starting to get restless again when a figure appeared at the door.

  Revik blinked, then made out the form of Dalejem, and stood up.

  The other male saw him when he did and walked directly up to him.

  “Come,” he said, avoiding Revik’s eyes. “Let’s go.”

  “What?” Revik said, staring at him. “What did she say to you?”

  Dalejem paused that time, looking at him directly.

  In the faint light from the distant fire, Revik saw a glimmer of emotion there. It was too dark for him to get more than a fleeting glimpse, but he couldn’t unsee it. He also couldn’t catalogue it in a real way, nor could he use his light to comprehend what it meant.

  Then Revik realized why.

  Dalejem had his light shielded.

  For the first time in weeks, he was keeping Revik out. Dalejem looked at him now, studying his face from behind what looked and felt like an infiltrator’s working mask, even as he exuded warmth from his heart.

  Then he inclined his head, aiming it towards the path back down the hill.

  “Let’s walk and talk,” he suggested. “I’m hungry.”

  Revik just stood there.

  He felt a pain building in his chest.

  Turning his head, he stared back at the darkness of the opening into the hut, feeling an anger coiling in his heart, shimmering hotter before he could pull it back. He felt himself losing control over his light, but he couldn’t make himself care about that, either.

  “She told you,” he said, his voice an open accusation. “She told you. Didn’t she?”

  “Brother, calm down.”

  “Fuck you with your ‘calm down’! I don’t want to calm down. Just fucking tell me what she said to you, Dalejem!”

  “Not here,” he said.

  “Yes, here!” Revik snapped. “I want to talk about it here! Right now!”

  “Brother.” Dalejem’s voice grew warning. “This is not a good place for this.”

  He pinged Revik’s light, nudging his eyes towards the fire pit.

  Revik turned at the impulse, unable to help himself.

  Once he had, he saw that all of the humans sitting there had fallen silent, including the medicine man by the stone basin. Those nearest stared at him and Dalejem from the flickering light of the flames, their expressions still, almost forbidding in that warm, orange light.

  “We cannot fight here,” Dalejem said, soft. “They won’t permit it. Not this close to her.”

  Revik felt his jaw harden.

  Feeling the shifting mood of the clearing, he didn’t speak.

  When Dalejem tried to take hold of his arm, however, Revik jerked it away. He took a full stride backwards, once again struggling to breathe, fighting not to yell at the other male. His jaw hardened as he stared at Dalejem through the dark.

  Then, realizing he was on the verge of striking him, he turned, abruptly, and began walking down the path into the jungle.

  He closed his light, but he knew the other seer followed him.

  He knew it without turning his head.

  Twenty-Eight

  Love

  Revik considered picking a tent at random to sleep in, avoiding the other seer altogether.

  He didn’t eat with him, although eating alone was almost worse.

  He felt eyes on the two of them, whispers of speculation about what had happened.

  A few of them frowned at Dalejem, probably because they could feel Revik’s anger at the other male from where he sat on the opposite side of the fire, eating chicken and rice without looking at any of them.

  He had no idea how Dalejem himself reacted.

  Even so, Revik fought with what to do when he’d finished eating.

  Finally, he realized he didn’t have any appetite left, and walked the plate over to a bucket they had been using for scraps. Dumping the remainder of his chicken inside he washed the plate in the plastic bin, then put it on a rack to dry.

  He considered just walking, disappearing into the jungle, but when he turned around, Dalejem stood directly behind him.

  Without speaking a word, he took Revik’s arm roughly in his hand. He started pulling him towards the tent they’d been sharing, walking fast.

  Revik considered fighting him.

  Then he considered yelling at him.

  In the end, he didn’t do either.

  Dalejem tugged him inside the tent flaps and Revik braced himself, sure the seer would try to force him to talk. Instead, Dalejem closed the flaps to the tent, then turned around and promptly started to undress him.

  Revik felt his pain spike when the other yanked the shirt off his arms, then tugged roughly at his belt, unhooking it without preamble, then unfastening his pants. Revik only stood there, fighting back anger, nausea, what felt like a black hole that lived somewhere in his chest.

  Something about the abyss that lived there felt more familiar than even her light.

  The familiarity of both things crippled him somehow.

  They also made him want to erase himself, to cease to exist. That darkness wanted to annihilate him from the inside out, to stamp out the last part of him that felt anything, that gave a damn about anything.

  He didn’t know he was crying until Dalejem caressed his face.

  “Brother,” he murmured, kissing his tears. “I love you, brother. Don’t do this. Please.”

  “You’re leaving me,” Revik said. It wasn’t a question. It was barely coherent. “You’re fucking leaving me… because of that bitch.”

  He didn’t know what he was saying.

  He barely knew which of them he was talking about.

  The other seer pulled him deeper into the tent, then down onto the mat.

  Revik barely knew where he was, what was happening, and then the seer was inside of him, pinning him to the ground.

  He felt something in his heart give out.

  He closed his eyes, right as Dalejem let out a heavier groan.

  “Gaos,” he panted. “Gaos. You’re so fucking open right now… your light. It’s so beautiful, brother.” He arched into him harder. “I love you,” he murmured against his neck. “I love you… please. Please hear me.”

  He cried out as his light swam over Revik’s, fighting to open him more, to pull him apart from the inside.


  “Gods, don’t do this brother,” Dalejem pleaded. “…Please. Please. Let me in. I can feel so much of you right now. Let me all the way in, please.”

  Revik closed his eyes, blinded him with pain, even as he fought to block it.

  “I love you, brother,” Dalejem murmured, softer. “Let me in, brother… please.”

  Revik only stared up at the roof of the tent.

  He felt like his chest had been hollowed out with something like a broken bottle.

  He lay there, gasping out tears, even while he came, groaning when the other male managed to open his light enough to get him there. Then Revik just lay there, unable to move as he spasmed against the other seer. He felt desire building again in Dalejem’s light by the time he’d finished, and Revik clutched the other seer around the neck.

  His chest started to hurt all over again.

  “I hate you,” he told him, clinging to him tighter. He gripped Dalejem’s hair, his hands in fists. He knew how young he sounded, but he didn’t care. “I fucking hate you.”

  Dalejem stroked his face, kissing him, sliding his light deeper into his.

  “I know, brother,” he said, soft. “I know.”

  “I hate you.”

  Dalejem pooled even more of his light into him, cradling him in his arms.

  Biting his tongue, Revik gripped him harder, fighting to breathe.

  He pressed his face against Dalejem’s shoulder as the other seer wrapped him in his light, tugging him open gently as he stroked his hair.

  Revik didn’t remember them talking after that.

  Truthfully, though, he didn’t remember much of anything after that.

  Twenty-Nine

  Alone

  Kali and her people left the next day.

  Revik barely listened as Balidor addressed the entire group.

  The Adhipan leader spoke through the Barrier, using the construct so he didn’t have to shout to be heard over the sounds of the jungle and the rustle of clothes and murmurings of the over one hundred infiltrators gathered in the main area of camp between the several dozen tents, and roughly centered in the area of the main campfire and mess tents.