Chapter 77
Something fluttered in the periphery of his vision. A bird flying by the window front of his Moscow office. Before he could even think about it, Kaleb rose and watched the creatures flight over the city. The bird in flight reminded him of Alja. Like everything else, these days. He almost expected it to plummet at some point. But it didn't. Maybe Alja would have reacted to it. He risked a glance at her, where she was sitting in the comfortable armchair he had teleported in for her. But she looked straight at the wall before her. No sign she had even noticed the movement outside the window. Hope had flared once again last night just to be crushed, when she had finally moved on her own. He had awoken when he'd felt her stir and leave his side in the bed and headed straight out of the room. He had followed her to the unfurnished living room, where she had sat down on the carpet, right in the middle of a perfect circle of singed fibers as if she remembered the moments of far more than just physical intimacy they'd shared in that spot. But when he'd tried to speak to her, looked into those eerie eyes the reaction was the same as it had been since the moment he'd pulled her from the treatment room at the Center: none at all. How much pain could a heart bear before it simply stopped on its own accord? More than he had ever imagined, Kaleb found out as he saw her right there in that place that meant so much to him, with that utter emptiness in her gaze. Still he had to tear his mind away from the memory, because there also had been that insidious hope that she might remember, that she might come back.
When he looked back out of the window the bird was gone, lost somewhere over the roofs of Moscow.
For his mind it didn't matter. It had already found the next memory of Alja in the room: He had pressed her against that window, threatened her just before she confessed about her empathy for the first time. He had put a knife to her throat and still she had begun to love him. That thought alone sent a spike of excruciating pain through his chest. Yes, she had fallen in love with him in spite of everything he was, in spite of everything he'd done. He had always believed she didn't see it. Had even accused her of looking away of ignoring that part of him. But he'd been wrong. She'd accepted him, all of him, right from the start. Alja didn't look away.
He remembered their first walk in the grove behind the truckstop. Where she had marveled at the dewdrops in a spider web. Just for a few moments her eyes had lingered on the tiny thing, before she had shared one of her unique views on emotion. Or later, when he'd shown her his cabin in the Altai: The way she touched the wisps of Russian sage as if she'd never touched anything before, the way she, traced the veining of a leave with her fingers, it had made him jealous of the damn plant.
It was just who she was. She always payed attention to every detail as if every little thing mattered. And she couldn't tune out the suffering of anyone. And as painful her decision to sacrifice herself was to him, for Alja it had been logical. Because she had looked all too closely. And she had been right. I would've destroyed the world for you. For her he wouldn't have cared if he turned into the monster that had been sleeping inside him for so long. He would've betrayed his own oath never to become like his mentor. And Alja had done the one thing she had left to try and keep him from going down that path.
And that pain, that guilt, they almost killed him.
CRACK.
A loud noise broke his thoughts. For a moment it reminded him of the cruel sound of breaking bones that haunted him in his nightmares. Then he saw what it had been. The bulletproof glass of the window front bore a gigantic crack all the way across.
He'd lost control. Again.
By now it was nothing new to him. But it showed him that he needed a failsafe. He mustn't risk pulling the whole world with him, when he finally dropped into that abyss. For her –
"Sir." Silver's voice startled him. He had neither sensed her coming on the physical nor on the mental plane. He turned towards her. Saw her eyes flick to the unmissable fissure in the window pane. She didn't comment on it however. "I have the stock market report. I thought you might want to discuss it in person."
"Send it to me, but give me a summary."
She obeyed the order at once. And Kaleb found himself wondering why. She must've noticed what a thin line he was walking. Had he scared her into submission just like anyone else? Anyone but Alja… Did she fear the monster? But no… those thoughts were useless. He had to stop this. And he did just in time so he didn't miss the most important parts of her report.
"Your corporations lost twenty percent on average in the course of the last week. That's not much more than most others lost." A few months ago that would have been devastating. But now the war had hit the world for real and it didn't stop at the economy. "The outcome could be much worse considering what happened. My guess is that so far no one really knows how to deal with the situation. But the market is fluctuating heavily. It is unpredictable how it will develop even in the next few days."
"It's fine as long as the damage stays limited to the same degree the market is hit. The resources for what is to come are located elsewhere and unaffected by the business world. Keep an eye on it, but only alert me if there are major changes."
She nodded and turned to leave. But for once she suddenly stopped. "Sir?"
He raised his head, alert.
"There's something else." She waited for him to raise his brows in expectation. "What you did for my sister. And when you gave my family that 'head-start'…"
That wasn't what he'd expected. "It was well earned. Your family has been very helpful, more than once."
"Just know: Whatever happens, –" a pointed look at the cracked window this time "– the Mercant family will stand with you."
No it wasn't what he'd expected at all. Probably Alja would have. She'd understood these things, loyalty and maybe something else. "Thank you," he replied before he lost himself to his memories once more.