Allie's War Season Three (116 page)

Jon was still lying there, gasping for breath, when Neela released him abruptly, and darted over to where Revik lay on the floor.

The building shook again as she knelt beside him. Jon stared in shock as Neela caressed Revik's face, leaning over him as she seemed to be doing something with her light. His jaw fell when he saw Neela kiss Revik a second later, pressing her face against his.

His mouth still hanging open, Jon glanced at Allie, even as Wreg was unlocking the collar from around her neck.

Of course, by then, he'd figured it out.

Neela was Allie.

Allie was Neela.

Jon had no idea how they'd done it, but he didn't think about that for long, either. His eyes darted to Cass, who had already vacated her chair, standing with Feigran and backing towards the door near the fireplace at the other end of the room. He got to his feet, ready to go after them, but Wreg jumped up, grabbing his arm.

"No!"

"But he's taking her!" Jon yelled, trying to shake off the seer's grip.

"Jon...don't!" Wreg warned. "You heard that fucker, Yosef! They're protected...both of them! If Allie tries to go after them, the same thing will happen to her as what happened to Nenzi!"

"But how did she..." Jon looked around at the other bodies, at Yosef and the guards.

"Balidor," Wreg said, still speaking loudly over the sound of the guns. "After the attack on Nenz, he was able to tell her which of them to avoid with the telekinesis..." His mouth hardened as he stared at Yosef. "Guess he wasn't that valuable, after all..."

Just then, another volley of loud explosions seemed to shake the house. "And what is that?" Jon said, as another shock trembled the building.

"The aircraft carrier," Wreg said. He continued to hold Jon's arm when Jon's feet kept trying to pull him towards Cass. "No, Jon...we have to let them go! The Bridge already made the call..."

"I'm not in her goddamned
army!"
Jon said angrily.

"Yes, you are, brother..." Wreg said, his voice hard. "And she's right. He'll kill Cass if we try to take her...don't you understand?"

"How do you know that? How could you
possibly
know that?"

Wreg nodded towards Feigran, who held a gun to Cass' head. Jon's eyes followed his. He continued to watch them as they made their way to the door by the far fireplace. He saw Feigran do something to the wall panel then, right before he stepped through the opening. Seeing them about to get away, Jon followed at a run, jerking his arm free angrily when Wreg tried to stop him. Wreg followed as Jon bolted after Cass. He reached within a few yards of them before they managed to disappear through the door altogether.

"Cass!" Jon yelled, loudly enough that both she and Feigran turned, just as they were about to let the door swing shut behind them. "Cass...don't do this! Please! I don't know what crazy shit they've been feeding you, but this isn't you. You wouldn't do this...you've been Allie's best friend since we were all kids!"

"Jon," Cass said, her voice hard as glass. "Go home!"

"I won't leave you!"

"You don't have to," she retorted. "I'm the one who's going..."

"Cass!"

"Stop! Do not take another step!" Feigran tightened his fingers around the gun, his eyes nervous as he licked his lips. He glanced at the doorway, then back at Jon. "Please, brother. Don't try to stop us..." he said, his voice worried, openly concerned. "Please. I won't let them hurt her, I promise...but you can't follow us any further. I don't want anything to happen to you!"

"You're out of your fucking head, Feigran!" Jon snapped.

"I will not hurt her, Jon!" he insisted. "But you must go back!"

"Let her go! Please, Feigran! We were friends, weren't we? I was good to you, man...even when everyone else wanted you dead..."

"I know, Jon. I know." The seer's eyes looked pained. "I am so very sorry to be hurting you like this. I know this must be painful for you..."

"Then LET HER GO! Let her go, damn it!"

Feigran shook his head, his eyes holding compassion. "I can't, Jon. I'm sorry, but I really can't." He pressed the barrel of the gun tighter against Cass' head. "I'm sorry, Jon...but you're just going to have to trust me. You can't follow us. She'll be all right, I promise..."

Jon started to jerk after them, but that time, Wreg snatched and held his arm.

"Stop, Jon! He's right!"

"Let me go!" he said, fighting him. "Now, damn it!"

"There's an OBE at the door...you'll get us both killed!"

Jon tried to jerk away again, but Wreg gripped him harder that time, catching hold of both of his upper arms with his muscular hands. Jon dropped his weight, trying to sweep the larger man's legs with one of his own, but Wreg stepped around him, moving with him. When Jon slid under his grasp, twisting enough to get one arm free, he swung at Wreg. The seer blocked him with his forearm, then punched him in the face, knocking him down to the tile floor.

"Goddamn it!" Wreg snapped. "Listen to me, Jon! We have to get out of here!"

He was down on the ground next to him a second later, grabbing him by the arms once again. Staring up at him, Jon felt his throat close. He fought the other's hands, but couldn't get free. Tears filled his eyes again, even as Wreg grabbed him around the back, holding him against his chest.

"You have to let her go, brother," he said, his voice emotional now. He sent a pulse of warmth into Jon's chest, strong enough that Jon couldn't breathe past it. "You have to let her go, Jon...just for now, okay. Just for now...please, brother...please..."

"No." Jon shook his head, still fighting the other's hold. "No, we can't...don't you see? It'll be too late...it'll be too late then..."

Wreg held him tighter, still half-crushing him in his arms.

"It already is too late, brother," he said, caressing Jon's face. "I am sorry..."

I SUPPORTED REVIK with my arm and shoulder, gripping him around the waist as he leaned against me. Jorag helped me on his other side. We really needed Garensche, but I needed him more where he was now, working to figure out the mess of organic controls that powered most of the house, including some of the more tangible of the constructs.

I fought not to think about what I could feel wrong with Revik's light. Balidor was working on him already, along with Tarsi...trying to find and weave back the worst breaks in his aleimi, including whatever had happened to knock him out cold.

I could feel the dead areas though, and the darkness in structures that shouldn't be dark, even with him unconscious.

Whatever they'd done to him, we wouldn't be able to fix it overnight.

But I couldn't think about that now. He was alive. Right then, I cared about that more than anything; it filled me with so much relief it still managed to wipe out all the rest. I fought to hold onto that feeling instead, at least until I could get the rest of us out of there in one piece. For the same reason, I couldn't think about Cass at all, or where she might have been going with Terian when they broke out through those OBE fields before the aircraft carrier had finished pounding the upper walls of the castle and the outside grounds.

It had been more than a little touch and go there, for those last few minutes.

It had taken longer for Balidor and his team to find us within Shadow's construct than we'd hoped...but at least he'd cracked it. They couldn't start firing on the house until they knew where we were, and I couldn't use the telekinesis until I knew for certain I wouldn't end up writhing on the floor like Revik. The risk of all of us getting killed would have been too great for either scenario. Once Balidor had us, though, his orders had been clear. He was to give the signal to the aircraft carrier to attack the rest of the house, especially any weapons they managed to pick up on their sensors, and give me direct pings on anyone I could drop.

The former ended up being a pretty fancy distraction, but not much else.

The latter had gone better than I could have imagined. I could only think they must have dropped some of those retaliatory shields once they had me 'collared.' Either that, or they didn't know my light well enough to neutralize me the way they had Revik.

I leaned against the wall, rearranging my arm around Revik's waist. I fed him as much light as I could spare, keeping what I could in case we were attacked again as we fought to get outside. I had my doubts that we would be, though...attacked, that is. Now that Wreg, Poresh and Gar had the primary organics down in the main living and communal rooms in Shadow's mansion, I could feel past the construct enough to know how empty the house felt.

Still, I sent Neela and Chinja upstairs to check out the rest of the space after Balidor ordered the cease fire. So far, they'd found no one. Nothing. Nada. The house had been stripped, apart from that needed to put on their little show for us. They'd even left all of our weapons behind, in a storage closet on the first floor, to the left of the massive front doors.

Wreg, Poresh and Gar were still working on getting the OBEs down so we could leave without frying ourselves, but I didn't see a lot of reason to stay beyond that. They'd clearly told us as much as they meant for us to know. Why they'd given us Maygar, Chandre, Stanley, Rex and Varlan, I had no idea. I could only guess they didn't care if we had them. Maygar and Stanley were both tagged as intermediaries, but maybe Shadow figured he didn't need them, either, not now that he had Cass. Either that, or Shadow's people had already done something to corrupt their light. They had to know we wouldn't be able to trust any of the ex-captives, at least not anytime soon.

Not after what they'd done to Cass.

But I couldn't think about Cass yet.

I needed to get out of this screwed up place, which reeked of the Dreng and lingering whispers of their light-show from hell. I still couldn't believe we'd managed to get out with most of us alive. Halfway through that whole charade, I was sure we were all dead...especially when Revik went down the way he did. Everything ended for me in those few seconds. It had taken every ounce of my willpower to remain where I was when he first hit the floor, even though we'd talked about the possibility of something like that happening. We hadn't discussed Revik losing control like that exactly, but we talked about his telekinesis...or him...being neutralized if he felt threatened enough to go on the offensive.

It was still one of the hardest things I'd ever had to do.

The cloak and the prosthetics worked better than I would have imagined. Even Jon didn't seem to know who I was, although I'd been worried a few times when I saw him staring at me. Balidor helped with that, refining it in every way imaginable, and I worked a lot with Neela to get mannerisms right, along with both of our speech patterns, even down to what I would say if they threatened or hurt Revik. We'd talked it all through so professionally.

Just like an infiltrator, Balidor would have said.

Gripping Revik tighter, I looked up at his face. His complexion was gray, but his eyes were open, and he seemed to be seeing again. Noticing me looking at him, he gave me a faint smile.

"You did good," he said, speaking in a near slur. "Good...wife."

I clutched him tighter. "Shut up, okay? I don't want to be told I 'did good' when I stood there and let my husband nearly get killed..."

He smiled faintly, gripping my shoulder more tightly.

"Where are we with the OBEs?" I called to Wreg. He and Garensche were just out of sight under the staircase, where they'd found a panel that led into one of the main control panels for the organics of the house. I'd watched Gar pull handfuls of those slimy, tentacle-like connectors out of the hole in the wall before he began separating them out into different bundles. I knew he used his sight on them, a lot more than he did his physical eyes, but it still confounded me that he understood the hardware of the machines, too...if squid insides and hundreds of feet of raw nerve endings wrapped in quasi-synthetic tissue could be called 'hardware.'