Dragon: Allie's War Book Nine

by Andrijeski, JC

  On the other hand, it struck me suddenly that maybe refusing him on principle wasn’t the best idea right now. I needed to think like Revik would on this. Strip out the unnecessary bullshit.

  Pure tactical. Nothing else.

  Fighting not to think about him beyond these narrow confines, I jerked my eyes off Dalejem’s, trying to think.

  Maybe he was right. If I was going to trust him, why not actually use him? I couldn’t tell him everything, of course…especially now. But chances were, I’d have to confide with someone in our group. Eventually. At least about some of it.

  And the truth was, I knew he was right.

  I could use him. He was a good infiltrator. I’d seen that much already.

  He seemed to watch me think about this.

  His light opened more, again disarming me.

  “If I don’t go with you, you can be damned sure I’ll watch from afar,” Dalejem added, motioning sharply at the door. “And I’ll involve the others, if I think you are in danger.”

  I let out another disbelieving laugh. “You go from begging me to threatening me?”

  “I will do whatever I have to do, Sister.”

  He started to say more, then bit his lip. Even so, I felt enough off his light to know what he would have said. He would follow me, whether I gave him permission or not. Worse, he would pull the others into it at the slightest chance I might be hurt or killed.

  He could fuck up everything, in other words.

  Exhaling more in irritation that time than anger, I glanced at Feigran, conscious suddenly that he was watching us both silently, listening to us argue. When I looked at him though, I saw his amber eyes focused over both of our heads, as if the conversation going on up there was infinitely more interesting that the one coming out of either of our mouths.

  Giving a low snort in spite of myself, I looked at Dalejem, appraising him openly. After a few more seconds, I conceded defeat, just like I had in Bangkok.

  “Fine,” I told him. “Don’t get in my fucking way.” I glanced back at Feigran. “And keep him alive, brother…I mean it. If he dies, it’s on you. You won’t like the repercussions, I promise you…whatever you tell yourself now.”

  Dalejem was already nodding, relief pulsing off his light.

  That relief came through so intensely that I couldn’t help but pause, staring at him. He didn’t wait, but immediately bent over the weapons crate. I watched him for a few seconds more as he grabbed a Beretta and four magazines, cramming them into the pocket of a vest even as he lobbed that same vest over one shoulder, shoving his arm through the hole.

  Eventually I turned away, walking the rest of the way to get my coat.

  Pulling it off the rack, I slid an arm into one sleeve, still watching in my peripheral vision as he loaded up on grenades, too, noticing only then that he already wore more or less full combat gear, if minus the vest he’d just donned. He even wore anti-grav boots, and I saw a row of flares worn at his belt in a neat row of light-green cylinders.

  Looking at him, I shook my head, clicking softly in spite of myself.

  No wonder he and Revik ended up together.

  But that thought pained me, too.

  Enough that I couldn’t breathe for a few seconds after it passed through my light.

  He joined me at the door in less than a minute, Feigran in front of him, one of his thinner arms held firmly in Dalejem’s muscular hand.

  “Can you tell me where we are going?” he said politely, following my hand with his eyes as I reached for the door handle. “Or is that privileged information as well?”

  Thinking about the question, I sighed. “We’re going on a hunting expedition, brother.”

  Dalejem studied my eyes, his mouth held in a harder line. His voice remained unerringly polite. “And what is it we’re hunting precisely, most Esteemed and Unquestionable Bridge?”

  I flipped my hand sideways, ignoring the faint jab.

  “Maybe another seer in Shadow’s Network.” I hesitated, then shrugged with the same hand. I found myself thinking fuck it, I might as well just tell him everything. “…Maybe an intermediary,” I admitted.

  Dalejem stared at me. “An intermediary.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “But how is that possible?” He frowned. “I thought you had identified all nine of the living intermediaries.”

  “All but one,” I corrected. “Two were blacked out. We only ID’d one of those as Cass. War.”

  “But your daughter is surely the ninth?” Dalejem said.

  I shook my head, clicking sharper.

  “No,” I said. “Well…maybe not. I talked to Tarsi about that…and Kali.” Seeing Dalejem’s eyebrow go up, even as he tightened his grip on Feigran’s arm, I made another expansive gesture with one hand. “Kali thinks maybe there are nine intermediaries down here at all times. Meaning regardless of the Displacement. She wrote down the nine that would be here at the start of the ‘pre-wave’…meaning the events leading up to the Displacement itself. When Galaith died…”

  “It left a spot open,” Dalejem muttered, finishing the thought for me.

  “Exactly,” I said, exhaling.

  “Lily is Galaith’s replacement then,” he said, looking sharper at me. “So there would still be the last spot. The one you never identified.”

  I made another of those vague, more or less signs with my hand.

  “It’s one theory,” I said. “And Feigran told me about another being. The name he mentioned is the same as one of the beings from the pantheon.”

  “And what name is that?” Dalejem said.

  I’d already started to leave through the door.

  Stopping, I started to answer him, then gritted my teeth, deciding against it for some reason. Shaking my head, I clicked softly as I walked the rest of the way out of the hotel room. I didn’t look at him long enough to gauge his reaction, but I felt his stare. I felt him looking at my light too, but subtly, almost as subtly as ‘Dori would have.

  His voice sharpened when he spoke next.

  “Did Revik know? About this other intermediary. Did he know before he left?”

  I flinched. Then I shook my head, once. “No.”

  “You didn’t tell him?”

  “I was going to.” My voice held an edge. “I didn’t get a chance.”

  Dalejem nodded, but I felt a whisper of skepticism off his light. Choosing to ignore that too, I walked, head down, my eyes focused on the patterned carpet.

  I’d committed to bringing him with me.

  I’d already told him more than I’d intended to tell anyone about my real reasons for coming here. He’d just have to fucking deal with not knowing all of it…and stay out of my way, like I’d said. If not, I might end up having to kill him myself.

  I winced at the thought, not wanting to imagine what Revik would say if I killed his ex-boyfriend out in the field, whatever my reasons. Even if he agreed with those reasons in principle, I knew him well enough to know it wouldn’t go over well at all. It might even be one of those unforgivable things, since he’d admitted to me he still loved Dalejem.

  The truth was, I had to think about it that way.

  I didn’t have any choice. We were all-in at this point.

  Everyone was expendable in this.

  Even my husband’s ex-lovers…even the ones he loved still. I was expendable, too…apart from the fact that my life, Revik’s and Lily’s currently all balanced on the same sharp-edged knife. Every seer here was expendable, regardless of how I felt about them or who they were to me. I couldn’t kid myself on that point for any reason.

  So yeah, Dalejem was expendable. Whatever I owed him.

  Whoever he was to Revik.

  Dalejem might have even felt that.

  Right after I thought it, he stopped asking me questions.

  12

  BENEATH, WHERE HE WOULD NOT GO

  Feigran didn’t give me a lot of clues.

  Then again, I would have liked more than six da
ys to grill him on everything he hinted around during that first talk in Bangkok.

  He wouldn’t talk to me in Bangkok itself––not apart from the one time. He’d been insanely paranoid about us being overheard. He remained adamant that he could not be overheard by Revik in particular, not when it came to anything to do with this Dragon creature.

  Revik leaving hadn’t really helped, though.

  Feigran didn’t seem to want to be overheard by anyone monitoring the constructs in Bangkok. He’d been wary of Balidor, of Tarsi, or Yumi…pretty much anyone who wasn’t me.

  I wondered why he trusted me, to be honest, but I didn’t want to ask. My luck, it would’ve just flipped his paranoia in my direction, too.

  Since we got to Colorado, though, he told me a few things.

  More than words, however, Feigran drew me pictures.

  One of those I held in my hands now as I looked down at the nearly empty plain outside of a wildlife park of sorts. The stretch of burnt and dried-out nothing to the east of us housed distant rows of white tent-like structures making up what used to be Denver International Airport.

  Between us and it, I saw only a few hollowed-out vehicles lying in different segments of road. They all looked long-abandoned, even via the binocular setting of my VR headset. Even so, I knew I couldn’t trust that entirely until we got a hell of a lot closer.

  Some bandits had signal blockers that would prevent an accurate scan.

  We’d gotten this far driving a SUV that Dalejem procured a few blocks away from the hotel. It had roll bars and everything, so I wondered where and how he’d gotten it exactly, since it was a vehicle with obvious use in this new world. Also, whoever “donated” it to our cause left us with a full tank of gas.

  I didn’t ask.

  I left information on the infiltration channel that should keep the others from freaking out when they noticed me, Feigran and Dalejem missing…in theory, at least.

  I knew we didn’t have a ton of time, though.

  I’d left strongly-worded orders around not following us, but I knew seers could be unpredictable when it came to their ideas of duty…and loyalty, for that matter.

  Especially with me, I guess just from the whole Bridge thing.

  Revik seemed to think my being the Bridge made them feel entitled to me in some way, even though I was (technically) their superior officer. Which made sense…sort of. It still irritated the crap out of me when it got in the way of something I was trying to do.

  I suspected it irritated Revik for different reasons.

  Shoving that out of my head, I refocused back on that row of white, tent-like spikes.

  The wetlands park gave us some shelter via trees and a few structures, which is why I’d opted to come in from this direction even though it was closer to the Denver suburbs.

  The proximity to Denver made me nervous.

  We’d come across enough land vehicles in use that we didn’t stand out as much as I’d feared, but being outside of the main enclave was risky as hell, even as seers. From what the others told me, they’d spent most of their driving time here ID’ing and pushing humans who were trying to ambush them from barricaded roads and side-roads.

  Dalejem and I had been forced to do the same.

  Even with our distinct advantage via our sight, it was unnerving, to say the least. I’d seen enough images over the past few months to know how these things generally unfolded when they got physical…meaning when the targets were overpowered.

  A lot of these roving bands acted little above animals.

  Holding the drawing up so I could compare it to our view of the airport to the East, I frowned as I looked through the binocular vision provided by my headset via virtual reconstructions of our last satellite feeds. I had to hope the maps were more or less up to date, since we had no way to access current satellite images out here…nor would I risk trying to access them, even if we did.

  Well, not unless I had Garensche with me, and Gar was dead.

  I shoved that out of my head, too.

  Realizing I was doing this the hard way, I took an aleimic snap shot of the drawing, then one with the image capture in my headset. The light one was so I’d have all of the imprints Feigran left on the paper itself, since I noticed he tended to leave fragments here and there on those segments that particularly interested him for whatever reason.

  Using the headset to overlay the image and manipulate it along with the maps, I folded up the original drawing Feigran gave me and stuffed it in my vest.

  “Do I want to know?” Dalejem asked from next to me.

  I didn’t answer directly but shared both the map and Feigran’s drawing with him via our headsets. I included the aleimic snapshot, too.

  Hell, he was here.

  I might as well use his light, too.

  Dalejem had apparently been serious about shouldering the job of guarding Feigran personally. He now had the significantly less-muscular seer tethered to him via a retractable organic cord. I’d watched as Dalejem hooked that same tether to a loop on his belt before he gave Feigran a hard look and tugged on it.

  “You’re with me,” he’d told the auburn-haired seer, a mild threat in his voice.

  Feigran only nodded, his light submissive.

  Weirdly, Feigran seemed to like Dalejem.

  I couldn’t help remembering Terian’s reaction to Dalejem’s pain in Dubai though, and found myself hoping Feigran didn’t like Dalejem too much. I wasn’t super-keen on Dalejem taking over Varlan’s role out here, even if I didn’t have to see it.

  Dalejem gave me a hard look, his green eyes glass.

  I shrugged off his glare, then immediately changed the subject.

  “Where is NORAD exactly…?” I said, flipping my headset back to binocular mode and adjusting it to study the side of the complex where Feigran marked the entrance. “…From here, I mean,” I added. “This isn’t even close to any part of the official complex, is it? We’re still pretty far north of Colorado Springs from here, right? Like close to a hundred miles?”

  Dalejem nodded, once. “Yes. That is correct…perhaps eighty miles, Esteemed Bridge.”

  I exhaled, frowning a bit. I couldn’t feel a damned thing. According to my light the airport was completely deserted.

  I felt Dalejem agree with me.

  He let out a slow exhale when I continued to compare the image Feigran drew to the complex itself. I knew if Revik was here, he’d want to plan this out better. Knowing him, he would have planned it out in minute detail back in Bangkok, before the plane ever left Asia.

  But I wasn’t Revik. And frankly, I didn’t have time.

  Whatever Revik told Shadow or did to try and prove his loyalty to get him to back off me and Lily, I knew it wouldn’t work. Shadow wouldn’t back off. He never would. He might try to convince Revik he had…but only until he could hook into him more permanently, or do something to corrupt his light. Once he’d done that, he would send Revik after me himself.

  Then he’d try to bring Lily and Maygar back, too.

  But he’d never let me live. Not like this.

  Revik was deluding himself if he thought otherwise. I’d tried to tell him that, too, but he hadn’t wanted to hear it.

  Fighting that out of my mind as well, I exhaled.

  It didn’t stop the harder flush of pain from hitting my light. It crushed some less obvious part of me that time, something I’d been protecting maybe, ever since I woke up on that Bangkok roof. Whatever it was, I felt it in my heart. For those few seconds I couldn’t breathe…I couldn’t feel anything else. I hadn’t even let myself think about Lily yet.

  Just Revik.

  Swallowing when my vision gradually returned, I found my eyes had blurred.

  When I glanced at Dalejem he looked uncomfortable. I saw something else there, too. It was fleeting, there and gone, but I winced away from it, anyway…before I’d identified it even. For a few seconds, he just watched as I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. He didn’t avert his ga
ze, but his voice held less of an edge that time.

  “What are we doing here, sister?” he said, his hands on his hips.

  I glanced at him, then back at the row of tent-like spikes making up the main terminal.

  “We’re going inside,” I told him.

  Without waiting for him to respond, I turned, walking back to the SUV.

  Clicking off the binocs as I grabbed the edge of the door and pulled myself onto the ripped leather seat, I used the headset to start the car and waited, watching as Dalejem pushed Feigran into the car in front of him, using the back door on my right side. Dalejem then climbed in after him, walking up between the front seats to sit shotgun. In his case, that was pretty much literal, since he had a semi-organic and semi-automatic Benelli M4 stuck just inside the door.

  Squinting through the light slanting down from the sun roof, I raised a hand to shield my eyes and realized I vaguely recognized the weapon.

  “Is that Wreg’s?” I asked him, putting the car into gear.

  Dalejem glanced down at the gun he balanced against the car door with his booted foot.

  “So?” he said, looking at me. “It didn’t have his name on it.”

  I let out a disbelieving snort, shaking my head.

  “You pick strange people to piss off, brother,” I told him, smiling wryly. “Wreg’s guns are like his children. I think you’d better wear the bullet proof jacket the next time we’re with them, brother…and maybe bring a lot of liquor as a peace offering, too. Not many of my people will be sympathetic if he takes a machete to your hands.”

  “You’re assuming we make it back at all,” he muttered, staring out the window.

  I lifted an eyebrow. “I never assume that.” Snorting, I added, “I still wouldn’t be stupid enough to take one of brother Wreg’s favorite guns.”

  He looked at me directly that time but I didn’t return his gaze.

  I was taking the SUV down the low slope towards the plain between us and the airport.

  From Dalejem’s light, it felt like he might be about to say something more.

  He didn’t, though.

  Staring out over the wind-swept flats as I cranked up the engine, he didn’t change expression even as I drove hard over the rutted and rock-strewn flats, bouncing both of us in the air periodically as I floored it. In the bench seat behind us, I heard Feigran let out delighted shrieks every time I hit a particularly big bump or rock. I glanced in the rearview mirror, clicking softly even as a smile ghosted my lips.