Page 50 of Dark Chains: First Link
Not of what it might reveal about his non-human origins, although that concern was legitimate. He was afraid of the answer.
If the test confirmed that Syssi was his descendant, it changed everything. It meant that he had family here on Earth.
And if the test showed that there was no connection, that Rosa's child, if there had been a child, had not led to Syssi, then the hope that had flared in his chest would be extinguished.
Either answer changed him. And he had spent so long being unchanged that the prospect of transformation, even a welcome one, was terrifying.
Tamira took his hand under the table, and the warmth of her fingers gave him strength the way it always did. She had heard the story of Rosa for the first time tonight, and she hadn't flinched. She hadn't questioned or judged. She had simply listened and then squeezed his hand, which was her way of saying 'I'm here for you.'
Across the green, the music had changed to something with a faster tempo, and couples had claimed the dance area. Ruvon was looking at his future wife the way Eluheed imagined hehad once looked at Rosa in the birch grove, with the absolute, irrational certainty that this person was the center of everything.
"If Syssi is my descendant," he said, "it means that Rosa had the baby, my child survived and grew up and had children of her own. It means something of me continued."
"That's usually how descendants work," Tamira said.
"You know what I mean."
"I do." She turned to face him, and her eyes held more compassion than he sometimes knew what to do with. "You're wondering whether you left something good behind in the wreckage of your relationship with Rosa."
"Did I?"
"Look at her," Tamira said. "She's kind, intelligent, and she can see the future. She married the leader of the clan and gave him a daughter who might be the most powerful seer ever born. If that's what came from your wreckage, I'd say you did fine."
The tightness in his chest eased. Not all the way. Tamira's words couldn't undo a century of guilt, nor could they answer the question that only a genetic test could resolve, but they made breathing easier.
"I'm going to do the test," he said.
Tamira didn't look surprised. "When?"
"As soon as Bridget is available."
"There's no rush."
"No. But I've spent enough years not knowing. I want to find out."
She leaned her head against his shoulder. "Rosa would be happy, knowing that her line led to Syssi."
He didn't know if that was true. Rosa had been many things, but predictable hadn't been one of them. She might have been happy, or she might have been furious that it had taken him this long to find out.
She might have thrown something at him.
19
YAAF
The operation began the same way it had two nights ago. Four pairs, staggered routes, converging three blocks from the security command center at twenty-three hundred hours.
The difference was that this time, Yaaf's mind kept drifting.
Sullha relaxing around him, her old self shining through. The way her face had transformed when she'd talked about Tomek.
We are on vacation.
Focus, Number Three thought.You're leaking.
Leaking was the collective's term for when one mind's preoccupations bled into the shared consciousness and distracted the others. It didn't happen often, because the hive mind was efficient at compartmentalizing individual thoughts, but Yaaf's thoughts about Sullha had a frequency and intensity that couldn't be contained in a designated compartment.
You need to put thoughts of her away tonight, Number Four advised.
