“Thousand?”
She mumbled, “Million.”
He stopped.“You are...you are not kidding.”
“I am a very inventive half person.”
“This isn’t what your mind felt like last time we met.”
“No.I have had the bad taste, actually, to try to participate in a school project.Your family tree was already there, but mine is stunted, so I went and got the scans done, and that is how I found Nelith and Aluhara.I don’t know how I ended up coming out of that combination, but we were made of the defective cells.They scraped out the genetics and made a whole person somehow, and then I split into two, or Caska split.She was bigger when we were decanted.”
“How did you get all of this information?”
“I raided the Uraddan archives.I can access anything held in a computer.”
“And you think that you aren’t enough?”
“I can’t declare that skill.Well, I suppose I could now.They are allowing my people to go for assessments to determine what activations we actually have.”
“How many do you have?”
She counted on her fingers.“I think six.Pretty sure.”
“Wow.But you are only down as a mechanical talent.”
“Correct.”
“Does Kessie know about Aluhara?”
“No.Nelith was the one at lunch, so that was the easy one.I also look more like Nelith, with Aluhara’s hair.”She leaned against him a little.“I don’t know how to meet her without going to the stronghold.I found the files of what the king had done to Nelith, and the thought of it makes me sick.”
“She might be willing to travel for family.There are three of you plus Kessie, so that is definitely worth a visit.”
“I think we could meet on Daycross.”
Sorooth smiled.“That might be a nice compromise.”
“Good.I hope Kessie can meet her.Mind you, she probably has.”
“She has but not as a grandmother.”
“Then this will be a surprise for her.”
“A very pleasant one.”
They were nearly to the treeline, and he said, “You are wearing a dress.”
“My jeans were covered in metal.”
“Mm.”
“I didn’t want Kessie to get dirty by hugging me.”
“You are very lucky that her minder abilities haven’t surfaced yet.She would be able to spot the lie.”
“Fine.I want her to have a good impression of me to remember when we aren’t together.”
He sighed.“She is very proud of you and has defended your honour a few times in school.”
