WarriorsandLovers (13 page)

“Are you with this fucker?” Tybor asked, his voice low and
calm and more threatening because of it. The younger man, Huon, stood and took
a step toward Nieko.

“I’m not with him. I’m trying to catch him to take him to
the council. He’s a human.”

“He’s a fucking Gatekeeper!” Tybor growled.

“No!” Eora screamed as she came up to stand shoulder to
shoulder with Nieko. “He can’t be.”

Elijah scrabbled at Tybor’s arm, trying to dislodge it. His
face was red, getting deeper, shading toward purple.

Tybor flexed his shoulders and eased his grip enough to let
Elijah take a gulping, whooshing breath. “I’m going to kill you,” he said,
contempt curling his lip. “Slowly and painfully.”

Huon reached into Elijah’s backpack and pulled out a small
black box. He held it up. “It’s here.”

Elijah’s eyes closed. The raspy wheeze of his breath
stopped.

“What is it?” Eora asked.

“It’s a remote control for a detonator,” another voice
replied. A woman stepped out from behind Tybor. She looked older than both men,
but her dark hair was long and glossy. The hard line of her lips and the cold
expression in her eyes told Nieko that Elijah’s troubles had escalated. “I have
no objection to you killing him, my love,” she said to Tybor, “but not until we
get some information out of him.” She walked up to Huon and took the remote out
of his hand. Huon gave it up without question, put his arm around her shoulders
and pulled her in against him. They stood together, and even in this crisis
Nieko could see how they took strength from one another.

Then she stepped away and with a few deft movements pulled
the black device apart. Her brows snapped together. She walked up to Elijah.
“Where did you get this?”

Elijah tried to speak but only a strangled gasp emerged.

“You’ll have to let him breathe for a bit longer, Tybor,”
the woman said.

“He’s not worthy of the air it takes to keep him alive,”
Tybor replied, but he eased the pressure on Elijah’s neck even more. “If you
make one move to escape,” he warned Elijah, “Huon will catch you before you’ve
taken two steps. No one in this world or the one above can beat him. Don’t try.
If you do, I won’t be answerable for the consequences.”

“My name is Judie Scanlon,” the woman said. “I’m the human
you’ve probably heard about. This device has components I designed. I want to
know where you got it.” She looked at him with total disgust plain on her face.
“I already know what you intended to do with it.”

“It wasn’t something too bad, was it?” Eora asked, her shaky
voice sounding shattered.

Judie Scanlon looked over at her. “As bad as it can get. It
would have released enough poison gas to wipe out everyone in the Underworld.”

Eora whimpered, a cry of pain. “I trusted you,” she
whispered. “I trusted you and you were planning
this
.”

“Not anymore,” Elijah protested. “I was coming back here to
dismantle the device. I swear it.”

“Bullshit,” Nieko yelled. “Every word that ever comes out of
his mouth is a lie. The instant we let him out, he ran like hell for here to
complete his mission.”

“Why would I do that?” Elijah shouted back, his voice rusty
but vehement. “I had a fucking remote. I didn’t need to be anywhere near this
city to set it off.”

“Is it true?” Eora asked.

“It might be,” Judie conceded. “He certainly had a remote
control. He didn’t need to be here to detonate it.”

“It is true,” Elijah insisted. “I was supposed to go to the
portal point, set off the explosion as I teleported out.”

“You can teleport!” Nieko took a step toward him. Eora
grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

“Yeah, I can teleport.” He huffed out a heavy breath. “And
no, I don’t know any other human who can. Hopewood targeted me in particular.”

“Hopewood!” Judie, Tybor and Huon spoke at once.

“Brian Hopewood is dead,” Judie went on. “I killed him.”

“Well you didn’t do a very good job of it,” Elijah said.
“You hurt him pretty badly—his face is a mess—but he’s definitely not dead.”

“Why should we believe you?” Nieko demanded. “You knew we
existed and you intended…” He broke off, too sickened to say the words.

“No,” Elijah replied. “I thought I knew but I was wrong.
Almost everything Hopewood told me about the Dvalinn was a lie.” He lifted his
head and looked Nieko in the eye. “But you
are
telepathic, right?”

“If by telepathic you mean can we read your thoughts, not
exactly—” Nieko said, but Elijah cut him off.

“Can you tell it’s the fucking truth when I say I came back
here to disable this device?” Elijah yelled. “Yes. Or no?”

“If we concentrated, we could tell,” Tybor said silkily.
“Are you sure you want us to?”

“If it will stop you ripping my head from my shoulders,
yes,” Elijah said.

“Don’t trust him,” Nieko said. “He’s still lying.” He turned
to Tybor. “He’s telepathic too.”

Elijah stared at him. “How did you know?”

“You knew exactly where I was going to try to grab you while
we ran.” He felt his face heat again. “And there was one other time.”

Color stroked across Elijah’s cheeks as well. They both
remembered what they’d been doing when it happened. “I wasn’t doing it
consciously,” Elijah said. He hung his head. “I never do it consciously.
Sometimes it breaks through.” He looked around at the Dvalinn. “I’ve tried my
whole life to stop it.”

A small spurt of sympathy stirred in Nieko. He knew better
than most Dvalinn what it was like to have to hide your most basic feelings
from others. Blocking telepathic communication in or out took constant
vigilance. It drained you, body and mind. Sooner or later you slipped. And had
to live with the consequences.

“If you can tell whether I’m lying or not, go ahead,” Elijah
said.

After a moment Huon looked at Tybor and nodded. “I think
he’s telling the truth. At least about his intentions here and now.”

“Then let me go,” Elijah demanded.

“Not a chance,” Huon said. “Just because you intended to
disable the gas vials doesn’t mean you weren’t planning something else. You’ve
got a lot more explaining to do.” He turned to look at Nieko and Eora. “As do
you two.”

Tybor changed his grip on Elijah, grasping his shoulder with
one large hand. He pushed downward. “Sit.” Elijah obeyed. Nieko got the
impression that the person who could defy Tybor didn’t exist.

“You attempt to move and I’ll kill you. Now, tell me about
Hopewood. Everything you know.”

Nieko listened open-mouthed as Elijah related the story of
how he’d met Hopewood. When he tried to explain how Hopewood had overcome his
doubts and his scruples, he became vague, backing up, repeating himself,
finally admitting, “It seems unbelievable to me now. How could I not see that
even if the Dvalinn were a threat, the gas attack was cowardly and
dishonorable? When I try to remember what I was thinking it all seems murky and
unfocused.”

“I feel the same when I try to remember why I did the things
I did when I worked for Hopewood.” Judie stepped forward. “I used to be his
weapons developer. To my shame, I designed devices Hopewood used to cause Huon
and Tybor unimaginable pain. He was planning more ways of killing Dvalinn even
then.” She sighed heavily. “It’s like hypnosis. You know what he says is crazy,
yet you go along with it anyway.”

“That’s how it was,” Elijah agreed.

“Except it wasn’t entirely crazy, was it?” Huon asked.
“Hopewood’s knowledge of us made what he told you believable.”

“He offers you what he knows you most want,” Judie added.
“Maybe he’s a little telepathic. He offered me incredible amounts of money
because it was what I thought I wanted.” She looked at her two companions. “I
was wrong, of course. Wrong in so many ways.” She looked back at Elijah. “What
did he offer you?”

“The chance to save the human race,” Elijah muttered. He
kept his head down and his shoulders hunched.

“I might be the only person here who is not to some degree
telepathic,” Judie said, squatting down to eye level with him, “but I think
there was more to it, wasn’t there?”

Elijah’s chest expanded as he drew in a deep breath. For a
moment Nieko thought he was going to ignore her question. But then, on a rush,
the words spilled out, tumbling over one another. “I’m a freak, okay? Hopewood
promised me the chance to be normal. I hate being telepathic, I hate
telekinesis. I want to be normal. Not a monster like you people.”

Eora’s cry sounded as if she had been stabbed. “You think
we’re monsters? Even now? Even after we…”

“Shit. I don’t know,” Elijah said, looking into the distance.
“By the time we fucked I didn’t care what the hell you were. You were there,
you were hot for it and I was half out of my mind, horny, not sure if I was
going to live to see tomorrow.”

With a roar, Nieko launched himself at Elijah, fists
clenched. Eora had offered sex with joyful generosity. Elijah sullied it and
her.

Before he reached Elijah, Huon, so slender he looked as if a
strong breath could blow him away, stepped between them. It was like slamming
up against a rock wall. Only Huon’s hands clasped around Nieko’s forearms
stopped him from crashing backward onto the hard rock floor. “If you so much as
bump Judie, I promise you won’t like the consequences.” He let Nieko go and
turned to help Judie to her feet.

“I’m fine,” she said, then spoke to Nieko. “Anger won’t
help.”

“I wasn’t trying to help,” Nieko muttered. “I was trying to
beat the shit out of him. He insulted Eora.”

“He did. Eventually he’s going to be sorry,” Huon said. “But
right now he can’t help it.”

“Because he’s human, and humans are shit, right?” Nieko
growled.

“No—some humans are good, some bad,” Huon replied. “But this
human is different. I know how hard it can be to be different.”

“So he’s telepathic and can teleport?” Nieko asked. “How
does that excuse the things he’s done?”

“It’s not an excuse. It’s just…I don’t know, an attempt to
explain. You were going to beat the crap out of me because I called Eora a
freak,” Elijah said. “Well I’ve had that all my life. I never knew my father,
but my mother hated me. She was terrified someone else would find out what an
abomination she’d borne.” He folded his arms across his knees and dropped his
head onto them. “No one ever discovered the truth about me,” he said, his voice
muffled, “because I learned early to keep it hidden. From the time I was old
enough to know I was different, she made me ashamed and frightened of who I
was.”

“
Do
you know who you are?” Tybor asked.

“I’m Elijah Denton,” Elijah replied.

“Denton is your mother’s name. Who’s your father?” Huon’s
inquiry sounded disinterested but everyone tensed.

The question hung there until Elijah said, “I don’t know.
The only time I remember asking about it, she beat me and refused to speak to
me for days afterward. When she died I tried to look up the records, but my
father’s name was blank. I was a home birth and wasn’t even registered until it
was time for me to start school.”

“I imagine we should be able to find out,” Tybor said. “I
think it has some bearing on what’s happening here.”

“How?” Elijah shook his head. “I don’t see…”

“I spent a lot of time on the surface myself,” Tybor said.
“And I spent much of it with scholars. There is a principle, often referred to
as Occam’s razor. Have you heard of it?”

“I’ve heard of it,” Elijah muttered. “I don’t remember what
it is. I don’t see how it’s relevant to any discussion of my paternity.”

“Occam’s razor says when presented with a range of
hypotheses, you choose the one that makes the fewest assumptions.”

“I still don’t get it,” Elijah protested.

“Your ancestry is a problem to be solved. Your mother had an
irrational fear of others finding out about your differences. She wanted you to
hide a range of abilities not found among the common run of humanity.” At a
sound from Judie, he grinned. “I am not saying you are common, my love. I am
just saying Elijah’s abilities are outside those you humans possess.”

He turned back to Elijah. “You became severely disoriented
during the thermo-magnetic storm. Humans are not affected by magnetic
disturbances. You were able to teleport into the underworld through the
Stonehenge portal. You have telepathic ability. When we apply Occam’s razor,
we’re left with the hypothesis with the fewest assumptions. Your father was
Dvalinn. You, therefore, are also part Dvalinn.”

“Me? Dvalinn? No!” Elijah tried to struggle to his feet, his
agitation obvious in his wild-eyed stare and his frantic denials. “You’re mad.
It’s not possible.”

“Of course it’s possible. It shouldn’t be hard to discover
which Dvalinn male went to the surface…what? Thirty-something human years ago,”
Tybor said. “Entry to the upper world has always been regulated. If your mother
was as strait-laced as she appears to have been, she must have had time to form
some sort of relationship with your father. Maybe he went for a single, long
stay, or he might have made multiple visits. It wouldn’t take much effort to
trace it.”

“So who are the monsters now?” Nieko asked. He hoped the
bastard was squirming. He deserved it.

“Leave him alone.” Eora went to stand at Elijah’s side.
“It’s too much for me to take in. I can’t imagine what it must be like for
him.”

“Why are you defending him, Eora?” Nieko wanted to shake
her, to make her understand. She should rage at him. Hate him. “Being half-Dvalinn
makes what he planned to do worse,” Nieko said. “If it’s possible.”

“Yelling at each other isn’t going to fix this,” Huon
interrupted. “Elijah’s being half-Dvalinn is only important at the moment
because it explains how he was able to get himself here.”

Judie cleared her throat. “Hopewood’s alive. Focus on the
relevant things. Elijah’s parentage may be important, attacking him isn’t.”
Every one of them quieted, attention captured by her calm, authoritative voice.