Page 2 of Dark Destiny: The Fates' Bargain

"I have been here this long. I will stay until everyone is safely onboard the other vessel. It should not be long now."

Kian nodded. "No, it shouldn't. But if anyone had encountered any difficulty, we would have been notified, so we can assume that everyone is doing well."

She smiled. "As you like to say, assumption is the mother of all mess-ups."

"That's not how the saying goes, but I'll let your version stand."

She arched a brow at him. "I would advise you to adopt proper language instead of using profanities. They add nothing to the essence of what this saying conveys."

He snorted. "I beg to differ. A well-placed f-word carries a lot of oomph."

"Then we will have to keep disagreeing." She leaned back in her chair and offered her cup to Ogidu for a refill.

The banter helped ease some of her tension, but most of it was still very much in effect.

Kian might think the mission was complete, but it wasn't.

They had the chests containing Khiann and his four companions, but until all five chests reached the village clinic and Bridget approved their opening, Annani would not know whether the bodies were truly inside those sealed containers, nor whether one of them was Khiann, nor whether he still lived.

The doctor was right to exercise caution and not allow the chests to be opened without medical personnel and proper equipment at the ready, but that did not make the waiting and the not knowing any easier.

Thankfully, Annani had the best minds available to keep the vigil with her, and if anything happened, they would know what to do.

She was so grateful to Kian, Onegus, Turner, and Lokan, and also to Amanda and Alena, whom she had sent home hours ago. They had not wanted to leave her side, but Annani had insisted. Both her daughters had little ones at home who needed their mommies more than she needed their emotional support.

Ogidu was also a blessing, ensuring that everyone was properly caffeinated and making rounds to deliver sandwiches and pastries to keep them fed. He might not be the best equipped to provide the kind of emotional support that her daughters had, but his familiar presence was still soothing.

For thousands of years, he and his brothers had been the only ones Annani could lean on, and they had become family despite being machines, not people. The biomechanical constructs had been created to serve the gods, but somewhere along the way they had become so much more.

"The women are being pulled onto the boat," Yamanu announced on the comms. "They all made it here in one piece, including the eight soldiers."

Annani released a relieved breath. The chests were already secured in the submarine, and the chemists and their lab assistant had been taken there instead of the fishing boat because of Doctor Petrov's injury. Their equipment, however, would be hauled aboard the boat because there was not enough space for it in the sub.

She was still waiting for confirmation that everyone was accounted for, and then she might take Kian's advice and catch a few hours of sleep. The submarine and the boat would takemany hours to reach Safe Harbor, and there was no sense in her staying awake for that.

It took another half an hour or so before Yamanu's voice came across the comms again. "It's done. Everyone is safely on board. We are heading to Safe Harbor."

"Thank the merciful Fates." Kian rose from his chair, crossed to the side console, and lifted the untouched bottle of whiskey that had been waiting just for this moment. He had said that he would not open it and toast a victory until everyone was safe. Now he broke the seal, and the sound it made carried across the silent room like the promise of a new beginning.

He poured and passed the glasses around the table. The first one he put in front of her, despite knowing that she was not a great fan of whiskey.

Annani looked at the amber liquid, and then at her son's triumphant face, and lifted her glass even though she was not ready to celebrate yet. Not with the chests still sealed and the question of whether Khiann was alive inside one of them still unanswered. But her son and his crew deserved to celebrate their victory, no matter the end result.

They had achieved the unachievable for her.

Kian lifted his glass. "To pulling off an impossible mission once again." He clinked it with Turner's. "To finally bringing down the Doomers' island, even if temporarily." He clinked it with Onegus's and Lokan's. Then he turned to her. "And most of all, to finally bringing Khiann home." He clinked his glass with hers.

Annani drank, feeling the whiskey burn down her throat, and did not let her face betray that the warmth of it could notmelt the knot of anxiety that refused to go away until she saw Khiann's eyes open.

She set the glass down half-finished, watched the tired smiles break across faces that had not dared to smile until now, and she was glad that at least this part of the mission was over and everyone was coming home despite all the setbacks they had encountered.

Operationally, the next part would be the easiest, but emotionally it would be the most nerve-wracking.

She would have to wait while the chests made their way home, and then weeks more while the bodies slowly regenerated, the emaciated forms filling out and the features slowly emerging, until at last she could know which one was her lost love.

Annani was strong.

She had survived, fought, and singlehandedly kept the gods' vision alive, bringing light into the world when darkness did everything it could to extinguish it. But there was a limit to her strength, and she was exhausted, not from the vigil, but from five thousand years of fighting and grieving and hoping, despite it all.