Page 57 of Dark Destiny: A New Thread in the Tapestry

Nobody argued with that, because nobody knew what to do with it.

"Anything from you?" Petrov asked Dimitri.

Dimitri looked at Mattie. "What would you like to add?"

"We want our own homes," Mattie said. "Anita and I both want that. We want to have families."

"I want a garden," Anita said. "I've never had a garden."

Dimitri put his fork down and wiped his mouth with a napkin. "Put me down as a scientist who wants a serious lab that isn't in a kitchen."

"That's all good," Bowen said. "Now let's compile the second part of the list. What can you bring to the village that Kian wants?"

"Intelligence on the island," Ravsoh said. "But we don't have to be in the village to provide that. All I can think of is our enhanced strength and other abilities that we bring as protectors of the community." He smiled at Bowen. "No offense, but each of us is worth at least four Guardians, and you've told us that the clan is short on them."

"None taken, and you are right. That's the strongest point in your favor, but also the one Kian fears most. He has no way to ensure your loyalty."

"That's so untrue," Bardov said. "We have no one else. We left the Brotherhood behind, and there are no other communities of immortals. This is the only place where we can be accepted."

"That's good." Petrov wrote it down. "Next."

"We can thrall other immortals," Camdor said. "Nobody else can. We can compel through a thrall, which is supposed to be impossible."

"Yeah," Bowen said. "That one is not an asset. That's why you're spending weeks on probation."

There it is, Ravsoh said.

Yaaf sighed. "Everything we can do for the clan is also the reason they won't have us."

"Pretty much," Bowen said.

"Then what is the point of the second list?"

Petrov set his cup down. "The point of the second list is that you're thinking about it backward. You keep offering him gifts, but that's not what he wants. He's afraid of you, and he's right to be."

"What can we do? We can't help what we are, and we don't want to."

"You need to offer him safeguards." Petrov put his pen down. "In my country, when we wanted a permit to do something dangerous, it wasn't enough to show what we could do and what could be done with it. We had to show how we could be stopped if something went wrong, and who would hold the key to the switch."

"Oh," Ravsoh said.

Yaaf nodded. "We don't ask him to trust us. We hand him a leash."

"And that's the easy part." Petrov lifted his pen. "Dimitri and I are the on/off switch. Without us, you can't function for more than seventy-two hours."

Yaaf grimaced. "We solved that problem easily enough when we compelled you both to keep making the drugs for us."

Petrov set the pen down and leaned back in his chair. "They can build us a lab that is inaccessible to you and that they control with a switch."

"It's a simple solution that Kian will like." Bowen turned to Petrov. "Scan that page and send it to me. I'll clean it up and send it to Kian with your request."

The solution might be simple, but it didn't sit well. The collective wanted to be accepted and appreciated for what it had done and what it could contribute, yet it couldn't control what was feared, and those who excelled were seen as a threat rather than an asset.

It was a sobering realization that to be accepted and liked, it was better to be average than exceptional.

21

KIAN