Dragon: Allie's War Book Nine

by Andrijeski, JC

  The truth was, I was hurting. I had been for awhile.

  Chan had zero to do with that, and he knew it. Or he should know it.

  I’d been hurting since before Dubai.

  He’d barely let me be alone with him since he’d regained consciousness. We hadn’t kissed. He didn’t touch me at all if he could help it, nor would he let me touch him. He rarely even looked at me these days I was realizing. When he did, it wasn’t for very long.

  So yeah, maybe my eyes lingered on him longer than they should have.

  I could tell he’d been fighting at some point that day.

  He’d been working out obsessively again, pretty much since he’d been cleared by the medical techs following that mess in Dubai. Even before we got to Bangkok he’d been running on the ship’s deck. Fighting a few hours a day. He’d been lifting…even swimming.

  Wreg told me Revik approached him the day he got cleared by the techs and asked for his help in designing routines that would push him more than he might push himself. The combination had him lean but hard, which was apparent even through the loose clothes he wore. His work pants hung on him, a dusty black, also probably from fighting in the ring earlier.

  Or maybe running, if he really had been running fully clothed.

  Exhaling again, I forced my eyes off his body.

  Then I held up my hands, palms up, a seer’s gesture of defeat.

  “So?” I said. “That’s it, then? We’re not going to talk?” I bit my lip, then said it anyway. “And clearly…you’re not going to touch me. Right?”

  He exhaled too, clicking more angrily than I had.

  “Alyson, for fuck’s sake. If you think I want to touch you after what you just did––”

  “Don’t pretend this is about Chandre,” I cut in, angry. Looking away from his glare, I fought to control my voice and failed. “You’ve been avoiding touching me for weeks, Revik. This isn’t about Chandre. So let’s just have the conversation, okay? The quick and dirty version. Just tell me. Tell me to shut up about it, Revik…I’ll shut up. Hell, I’ll move to a different room if that’s what you want…”

  “Fine,” Revik said, his eyes glass. “Get the fuck out.”

  I stared at him.

  I felt my face harden as his words sank in, as his expression refused to waver. Then I was fighting not to react for real.

  “Do you mean that?” I said finally.

  He exhaled nothing but anger. “I honestly don’t know.”

  I bit my lip, shaking my head as I stared out the window.

  Now I really didn’t know if I should leave. I knew if I did, I might really be sleeping somewhere else that night. Maybe for a lot longer than just one night.

  When I looked back at him that time, my mind fell silent.

  His expression shocked me.

  But it was more than that, too.

  I knew a part of it was my human upbringing, which in some ways remained pretty danged ingrained…in some areas of my psyche at least. I knew male seers were different than male humans. I knew one of those differences had to do with cultural norms around demonstrating emotions. I knew that, and I’d known it for a long time now. Even so, I never really expected him to cry, no matter what I said.

  Part of it was him. His whole soldier, fighter thing made the contrast even more dramatic. I expected him to yell at me, to get angry, but not to fall apart.

  So when he did cry, yeah…it always floored me.

  It also rendered me pretty much speechless.

  Like now, I just stood there, unsure if I should try to approach him or not. I waited until he’d pulled it back, watching as he wiped his face with the heel of his hand, avoiding my eyes. He was leaning against edge of the thick glass window. He looked out it periodically even as he cried, probably to continue avoiding looking at me.

  I watched him fold then refold his arms. I watched as he continued to fight with his own light. And yeah, damn it…I wanted to touch him. I wanted to touch him so badly I felt a swell of frustrated anger that made me want to yell at him. I wanted to immerse myself in his light, badly enough that I was on the verge of begging him to let me.

  But I knew he wouldn’t.

  Worse, it might just shut him down more.

  “Allie,” he said, his voice rough. “I don’t understand why you don’t see this…”

  I deflated even more.

  “I do see it,” I said, softer.

  “I don’t mean about Chan…”

  “I know what you mean. Revik, I get it…I swear I do.”

  “I don’t think you do.”

  I shook my head, clicking, but he wasn’t finished.

  “…I don’t want to hurt you,” he said. He looked at me, his eyes still overly bright, despite the hardness of his mouth. “I fucking tried to kill you, Allie…” At my silence, he looked away. “No one will even tell me what I did,” he muttered. “I can guess…of course I can fucking guess. But I can’t see it. You block me whenever I try…”

  I winced. Then, thinking about his words, I shook my head slowly.

  “It’s not going to help you to see that, Revik,” I said. “Anyway, you can guess, like you said. Whatever that trigger is, you thought I was the enemy. Imagine what you’d do if you thought that of anyone.” I shrugged at his incredulous look. “It wasn’t you, Revik. Do you think anyone here is confused about that? Anyone at all? Besides you, that is?”

  “What difference does it make, whether it was ‘really’ me or not?” he said, his voice still holding that incredulous note. “Allie…why would you want to risk that?”

  I sighed, combing the hair out of my face, fighting not to react.

  I gestured around the small room, sighing again.

  “Revik. We’re in the same room now. What’s the difference? If you’re right and Menlim can jerk your puppet strings whenever he wants, why doesn’t he just kill me now?”

  “We have gas hooked to this room,” Revik reminded me.

  “And the gas’ll be on if we fuck, too…” I said, exasperated.

  He winced. Probably at my word choice.

  Seeing his closed expression, I sighed in frustration.

  “Revik. What’s the difference? Seriously? We’ve been in the same room off and on for weeks. We’ve been alone together. We’ve been alone when there wasn’t gas…or ‘Dori and Tarsi watching. We’ve been alone with Lily.”

  “Maybe we shouldn’t be,” he said, his jaw hard. “I told you I should wear a fucking collar, Allie. I’ve been saying that since day one…”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head. “No…don’t play dense about this. I’m saying why is sex the thing you’re fixating on? Why touching me? Why is that where you’re drawing the line?”

  “Because I can’t fucking control my light when we have sex!” he snarled.

  His words and light silenced me.

  It felt like getting hit. Close to, anyway.

  It was intense enough to bring me up short. And cause me to retract my light, which I hadn’t realized until then was all over his.

  I felt his anger around Chan in that. I felt his frustration…the pain on him that he’d been blocking from me, too. For weeks, I realized.

  I felt the two things mix.

  I felt him wanting to beat the fuck out of Chandre.

  I felt the utter lack of rationality around that, too.

  His face darkened in that silence, but I didn’t feel any kind of apology in his light. He took his weight off the wall by the window, but he didn’t move any closer.

  “Gods,” he said. He wiped his face with a hand and turned, staring at me like he couldn’t fathom where I was coming from. His German accent grew more prominent again, making it harder to understand him. “I’ve never been able to control my fucking light with you. I can’t change that now, no matter what you and ‘Dori and whoever else teach me. It’s fucking impossible for me. It will be worse now, because we’re separate. I can barely keep my light under control around you as it is.”r />
  His voice grew colder, even as his eyes brightened again.

  “You pulling these passive-aggressive seduction games doesn’t help…wife.”

  I swallowed. Even so, a near relief washed over my light, I couldn’t help it. I felt like I was seeing him for the first time in weeks.

  “…And you’re right,” he growled, staring at me. “I don’t want to be here right now. I didn’t want to come here even before I saw you stick your tongue down Chandre’s goddamned throat. I don’t want to be in this fucking room and have to watch you try to seduce me…I can’t fucking stand it, Allie. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were trying to get me to go to a prostitute for real. Your utter lack of empathy on this with me is unbelievable…”

  I felt the hurt in his light. So much so it closed my throat.

  I forced myself to take in his words, too. Not only the ones about me being an insensitive ass. The ones about why he’d been avoiding me.

  Maybe he was right. We’d both practically been in a fugue state before the Dubai thing, even after we found out Terian had been screwing with our light. Knowing the cause of the problem hadn’t done jack shit in terms of helping us control the symptoms.

  We wouldn’t be any different now.

  In fact, he was right…we’d probably be worse.

  Revik knew it. Why was I pretending I didn’t?

  He struggled briefly, as if trying to stop himself, but his voice only grew harsher.

  “How can you be so fucking cavalier about this?” he said. “It’s our daughter’s life, Alyson…not just yours. I know you don’t give a shit about your own life, but did you forget about Lily? Do you really want to get off that bad that you’d risk Lily?”

  At the last thing he said, something in my light stuttered.

  It stuttered…then it closed.

  Like, really closed.

  Maybe for the first time since all of this crap started after Dubai. All the fights over this shit. All of the endless discussions. For the first time, all of my sympathy and good intentions dropped from my light.

  Like a fucking stone.

  I knew he was upset. I knew he was jealous about Chan. I knew he was hurting, a lot more than he’d been letting me see or feel. I knew this was one of those things he’d feel bad about saying later. I didn’t care. Right then, I really didn’t care.

  I had to be the one to walk away.

  I had to get away from him. Now.

  I made it most of the way to the door when suddenly he was between it and me.

  “Alyson…stop…”

  I started to push past him, but he caught hold of my arms.

  “Allie…gods. Stop. Stop…please…”

  He shocked me then, yanking me towards him. His arms were around me before I’d even looked up. He crushed me to his chest before I could take a breath.

  “Allie,” he murmured. “Allie…I’m sorry I said that. I didn’t mean it.”

  He held me tighter. He held me until I bit my lip, fighting to remain silent, to at least try and control my light. Mostly I just wanted to cry against his chest, tell him everything I’d been thinking and trying to do that day, tell him I was done with playacting these damned roles, no matter what the reason. It took me another few seconds to pull all of that back, and then mostly because I couldn’t help but feel him again, with his body and light so close.

  His light coiled around and through mine, almost like he couldn’t help himself.

  I felt pain on him, enough to take my breath, but more than that, I felt grief, a kind of crushing, dense grief I didn’t know what to do with.

  It made it almost impossible to hold on to my anger, especially when I felt the love woven into that grief, and the fear that nearly choked that pain in my light.

  I understood. I really did.

  He was coping with it by staying away from me.

  I was coping with it by obsessing on being with him while I still could.

  All of the things we’d been talking about for the past few weeks washed over me, forcing me to remember even as my resentment of the whole mess worsened. Then my throat closed for real, bringing tears to my eyes so quickly I could barely keep from choking them out. I closed my eyes, maybe to block it out…or at least push it back, so it wouldn’t be in the forefront of my light. I couldn’t lose control of my light, either.

  Even now, in the midst of everything else, I didn’t forget that.

  I couldn’t lose control. Not even for this.

  For a long moment, we only stood there.

  Revik held me tighter the longer the silence stretched, but I could feel him struggling over what to say, too. I could feel him hating that he couldn’t trust his own light, that he couldn’t even talk to me about any of it without us risking we’d be overheard. I felt his fury about Chan, the fact that he could taste remnants of her light in mine.

  I understood. I understood all of it…but I hated it.

  I really fucking hated it.

  When I spoke, my voice was gruff, almost too quiet for me to hear.

  “What if I can’t?” I asked him. I cleared my throat, fighting the tightness there again. “What if I can’t do it?”

  “You can,” he said, his voice equally quiet.

  I shook my head, but I didn’t try to argue with him.

  There was no point.

  “It’s not about the sex,” I told him.

  “I know,” he said, softer. “Allie…I know it’s not.” His voice hardened. “Even when I want to kick you out of our room for kissing other seers.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, my voice close to a whisper. “I’m so sorry, Revik. I had my reasons for going there to talk to her. I wish I could just tell you––”

  “You can’t.”

  I nodded, feeling the warning in his light sharpen.

  He sent more warmth into me then and I closed my eyes. A few seconds later, I looked up at him, trying to think, to see past both of our shields, knowing even now that either Tarsi or Balidor might be monitoring Revik’s light.

  “I want you to trust me,” I said. Biting my lip, I shook him a little, gripping his back. “Trust me, damn it. Please. Please trust me…”

  He nodded. I saw tears in his eyes again, but he only nodded.

  “Okay.”

  “Do you mean it?”

  He clicked at me softly. I saw emotions flicker behind his eyes, indecision, but that warmth coming from his chest strengthened.

  “I do,” he said. He exhaled as he said it, almost in defeat. “I do mean it, Allie.”

  Relief flooded out of my light, even as I gripped him tighter.

  “I love you,” I said, my voice fierce. “I love you and Lily more than anything. No one will get in the way of that. Not for me. Not ever.”

  I felt him relax still more.

  That time, he met my gaze. “I know.”

  I swallowed, closing my eyes as I pressed against him. Feeling him stiffen, starting to close his light again, I looked up.

  “I’m sorry I’ve been pressuring you,” I said. I swallowed again, watching his eyes. “I’m sorry I’ve been selfish. I mean it when I say it’s not about sex…not in that way. It’s just…we all have to leave here soon. All of us. We have to…”

  I trailed, realizing I didn’t know how to say what I wanted to say without saying too much.

  I shook my head, fighting tears again. Looking down, I pressed my face against his chest, closing my eyes.

  “Are you really not going to be with me at all?” I asked him, softer still.

  I didn’t say the rest of it. I didn’t add that we both knew we might not have the chance for much longer.

  I didn’t have to add that part. He knew what I meant.

  I felt it on his light as soon as I spoke the words…right before his body tensed. His fingers tensed, his hands. Even his legs tensed against mine, his shoulders, his chest. I felt that grief worsen briefly, but I could also feel the fear there, the holding back, all of the thi
ngs he wasn’t saying, that he wouldn’t say to me right then.

  Something in that must have gotten me to open more too, because suddenly his light was all around me, practically suffocating mine. I could feel the conflict on him, the decisions wavering in all different directions…that fear that wanted to choke my throat.

  I felt the love there, too.

  Love for me. Love for Lily. I felt the intensity behind that.

  I also felt the determination. That will he’d already hardened towards protecting the two of us, no matter what that ended up meaning.

  Something in that resolve, maybe just the sheer amount of him I could feel behind it, scared the shit out of me.

  I hated this. I really did.

  I felt another warning pulse off Revik’s light, even as he caressed my hair with his hand and fingers. He stopped long enough to grip me harder, holding my head against his chest. Again, I felt so much love off him I thought my heart would break.

  “I hate this,” I mumbled into his shirt.

  He held me tighter.

  I felt another pulse of that warning, but softer that time. I felt misgiving too, and what might have been…I don’t know. Indecision? The longer I felt it, the more I realized that in addition to everything else, he wanted to talk to me about something. Maybe ask me something. Something that definitely made him nervous.

  Even so, it was something smaller than what was bothering me.

  When I felt another plume of nerves off his light, I looked up.

  “What?” I said.

  His light eyes studied mine. Glass-like. Or really, more like lightly-tinted crystal.

  He’d told me once that some people found his eye color unnerving, even off-putting. Lovers of his had found them difficult to focus on. He’d been told they were cold, lifeless…dead-looking. Machine-like.

  I thought they were absolutely beautiful. I always had.

  He closed them after I thought it, longer than a blink. A plume of heat came off his light, along with more pain than he’d let me feel since he woke up from Dubai. It was enough to stop my breath, and maybe my heart, for a few beats at least.

  “I want to have sex,” he said, gruff. “I want to so badly I know I should let you go right now…I should leave, Allie. Now…before you start trying to seduce me for real.”