Page 77 of Dark Destiny: The Fates' Bargain

Areana moved down the room, presenting the rest of the ladies by name: Sarah, Raviki, Beulah, Liliat and Rolenna, and each of them managed a greeting, some warm, some still wary, and the Eight bowed to each one and kept their movements slow and as individual as they could manage.

Tony introduced himself in English but didn't offer his hand because he was carrying a plate of food in one hand and a glass of wine in the other. Tula translated his words into the old tongue with the ease of long practice, probably unaware they understood him perfectly. "This is Tony, and he says that he would shake your hands, but he is load-bearing. He welcomes you to freedom and the good life." She rolled her eyes. "He thinks he is funnier than he is."

"I understood every word," Tony said, in English, to no one in particular. "The eye roll needs no translation."

"We speak English," Yaaf said. "We learned it first in class and then perfected it by watching a thousand hours of movies. That was the Brotherhood's method to teach us how to blend in with the outside world."

"Oh, good," Tony said. "Everyone else is talking in the island language. I caught some of it, and I understand some of what is being said, but I can't string even one coherent sentence together."

Every conversation in the room was running in the old tongue, though.

This is why the scientists were not invited, Ravsoh sent.

Yes,Yaaf agreed.That must be the reason.

It hadn't been an oversight, or a judgment of Dimitri and Petrov and their ladies. The goddess had decided on the guest list around the language so the island escapees could be comfortable speaking in their own tongue. One male with a patient friend to translate was manageable, but the two Russian scientists and their partners would have needed a full-time interpreter or would have sat isolated in a corner.

It was the kind of consideration that was invisible unless someone looked for the design in it, and the collective filed it next to the eight names the goddess had learned and matched to the correct faces.

"And this is Tamira," Areana said, "and her mate, Eluheed."

Tamira stood with her hand tucked into the arm of a lean male with light brown hair. She looked tense, but she made herselfsmile at the eight of them anyway, which the collective noted and respected, because courage was not the absence of fear but the management of it.

Her mate was nervous as well, and for good reason. They wouldn't have recognized him if not for Bowen's warning, but he definitely recognized them.

His aura, though, was familiar, inner walls so old and so smooth that the eye slid off them, and eight memories surfaced at once, from the muddy time, when a careful presence had waded into their chaos with these thick protective walls up and had touched their hive mind and recoiled.

Eluheed did not offer his hand. He inclined his head instead, and his eyes moved along the line of them.

"We have met," he said. "In very different circumstances."

"Yes," Yaaf agreed. "Very different. Before we were stabilized."

Neither of them said more.

Now that the introductions were finally over, the eight of them turned their attention to the glass wall and the view of the clear skies that they had been craving since their arrival at the keep.

That was tense, Camdor said.Glad it is over.

It's not over, Yaaf said. Ican still feel tension from the enclosure women. Something is off.

He scanned the room for Sullha and found her standing beside the buffet, wearing a blue dress and holding an empty plate. She was looking at him, and as their eyes met, a smile spread over her face.

He felt his own mouth curve in response and walked up to her.

"Hello, Sullha."

"Hello, Yaaf."

The collective shrank away, withdrawing to give him space inside his own head, which was the only privacy they knew how to give him.

He picked up a plate. "So, what's good here?"

That was what he'd used to ask her when they were kids, eating at the dining area of the enclosure.

She chuckled. "Everything. Let's pile up." It was the same answer she'd always given him.

As they walked along the buffet together, he leaned down so he could whisper in her ear. "What have we missed? Did Mirumah say something awful again?"