"I have a good feeling about it."
She looked up at him. "You want him to transition?"
Esag shrugged. "I want you to be happy. And you want him to be around for your child. So yes, I want him to transition."
They stayed for another hour, mingling with friends, accepting congratulations as if they were the ones who had accomplished something. Tamira and Elias stopped by to chat. The other harem ladies circulated through the crowd, more comfortable in social settings than Tula had ever seen them, and she let herself drift, soaking in the warmth of community.
This was what she had missed for five thousand years. Not just freedom, though that was part of it, but a sense of belonging.
Tula sent a silent prayer to the Fates.Pleaselet Tony transition. Let him be there for our child.
The Fates didn't answer.
But then, they never did. They just wove their threads and let mortals and immortals alike stumble along, hoping they were heading in the right direction.
18
SYSSI
Syssi entered Allegra's room as stealthily as possible and lowered herself onto the carpet while glancing at the crib.
Her daughter didn't stir. She lay on her back, arms flung wide, lips slightly parted, her eyelashes fluttering gently with the quiet motion of her dreams.
Thankfully, Allegra was a sound sleeper, and she wouldn't wake up for at least another hour. Syssi needed the amplification her daughter lent to her visions. She didn't understand the mechanism, but the results were consistent. Visions summoned near Allegra came through clearer, stronger, and more detailed.
Syssi crossed her legs and settled her hands on her knees. The baby monitor sat on the dresser, its small red light blinking steadily. Kian was in their bedroom, watching the feed, ready to intervene if something went wrong.
She closed her eyes and began the process of emptying her mind.
Breathe in. Hold. Breathe out.
The familiar meditation technique had taken years to master. Quieting the endless chatter of thoughts, the to-do lists, the various worries, and all the things that demanded her attention.
All of it had to go silent before she could open a portal for the universe or the Fates to speak to her.
Breathe in. Hold. Breathe out.Please show me how to find Khiann.
The room faded. The soft sounds of the house grew distant, then disappeared entirely.
Darkness. Stillness. Waiting for the request to float into the void, a message in a bottle cast into an infinite sea. Her call was almost always answered, but her questions were often ignored, and she was given a vision of something else that the powers that be wanted her to see.
For a long moment, nothing happened.
Then it began.
It came slowly, gently, like dawn light creeping across a landscape. Colors bled into the darkness, but they were sterile white and clinical gray, the cold gleam of metal and glass.
A laboratory materialized around her.
Syssi hovered above the center of it, invisible, incorporeal, a ghost observing a world that couldn't see her. Equipment lined the walls—centrifuges, spectrometers, and other devices that served chemists.
A young man was working at one of the stations. He had his back to her, but from his posture and the full head of hair, she guessedhe was in his late twenties, maybe early thirties. It fell across his forehead as he bent over a microscope.
The door opened, and Syssi's perspective pivoted to face it.
Eight men in uniforms walked in.
They moved in perfect unison, each step synchronized, each head turn identical. Eight bodies operated by a single mind.
