49
Kian
A glass of scotch in hand, Kian walked out onto the back patio and sat down on a lounger.
Sundays were usually reserved for relaxing at home with Syssi, but she and Okidu were busy with preparations for dinner.
Thankfully, Kalugal and his people were leaving right after that, and things would return to normal, or as normal as they ever got. There was always something to disturb the peace and take his mind away from running the clan’s business empire.
He liked Kalugal and Jacki, but playing host was exhausting, especially when a visit took over his weekend and he didn’t have time to recharge.
A new week was starting tomorrow, and he needed a clear mind and plenty of energy. It wasn’t easy to drum up enough business so the clan would have the funds needed for all of their ambitious plans.
Or rather his, like building fifty homes for no good reason other than a gut feeling. Until all those children he was hoping for were born to the clan and grew up, those would not be needed.
He was about to light up a cigarillo when Syssi stepped out. “I forgot to tell you, but I also invited Edna.” She sat next to him on the lounger. “She and Rufsur are a couple, and it didn’t feel right to leave her out.”
“I’ve noticed. They are no longer trying to keep a low profile. In fact, Rufsur is flaunting their relationship on purpose, and I’m surprised that Edna is okay with that.”
Syssi smiled. “Who would have thought that Edna would be the first clan female to mate one of Kalugal’s men, and not just any of them, his second-in-command.”
“That’s not a good thing.” Kian took a sip from his scotch. “There is no way either of them can leave to be with the other. Edna knows too much for me to allow her to cross over to Kalugal, and the same is true for Rufsur. Kalugal will never allow him to leave. Unless they can deal with a long-distance relationship, I’m afraid it’s not going to work.”
Syssi wound a lock of hair around her finger. “When a problem seems impossible to solve, it only means that not all angles have been explored.”
Kian had a feeling where she was going with that, and he didn’t like it. “Let me guess. You agree with Annani, and you want to incorporate Kalugal and his men into the clan. Good luck with that.”
“Why do you oppose it so vehemently? You seem to like Kalugal, and his men seem like good people.”
“Even if I didn’t have a problem with that, he does. There is no way Kalugal will give up his autonomy and join the clan, and I don’t blame him. I wouldn’t want to answer to my own sister, whom I trust and admire, let alone a cousin whom I’m just getting to know.”
“But what if he doesn’t need to answer to you? What Kalugal said about you and Sari forming a federation is true for him as well. We can have two independent sections that are self-ruling and cooperate only on certain issues, like security.”
Kian huffed. “Do you think I trust Kalugal and his men with the village’s safety? That’s the last thing I’m willing to cooperate on.”
“So don’t. You can offer Kalugal and his men protection as part of the deal and ask for something else in return.”
“Like what?”
“Kalugal seems business savvy. Joint ventures with him might be advantageous to the clan.”
“I don’t approve of his methods. He uses compulsion to force information out of people, and Fates only know what else. I don’t want any part in it.”
“You can stipulate that he’s not allowed to use compulsion in deals that the clan is involved in.”
“Kalugal will not agree to that.”
Syssi let out an exasperated breath. “If you think that it’s hopeless, then why are you preparing fifty more lots?”
He chuckled. “Because a pushy ghost gave me the idea. Did Nathalie talk to Mark?”
Syssi shook her head. “She couldn’t reach him, which means that it wasn’t him in your head. It was all you.”
“I know. Subconsciously, I must have been thinking that it would be a good way to lure many of Kalugal’s men to join the clan. Now that I know Annani can compel their loyalty, I’m less worried about having them here. Not only that, I hope for an influx of new Dormants from the lists Roberts is supplying.”
Except, the vacant houses in phase two would suffice for that. He had no real excuse for his plans for phase three.
“Yeah, but to start with, we will be getting only males,” Syssi said. “The gender balance is going to get skewed.”
“How is that different from letting all forty-seven of Kalugal’s men into our community?”
“It’s not.” Syssi sighed. “Scoot.” She lay down next to him and rested her head on his chest. “I’m just thinking out loud. We need to get more female Dormants, and I’m wracking my brain, trying to come up with something that we haven’t tried yet. We tested thousands of subjects in the lab, and none scored well enough to be considered. Then we tried to arrange meetups between test subjects and clan members to see if there was affinity, and nothing came out of that either. William’s precognition game achieved nothing as well. I don’t know what else is there.”
Kian chuckled. “It wasn’t all wasted effort. William’s game is a financial success, and the meetups provided a good opportunity for hookups. I didn’t hear any complaints from the clan members who participated in those.”
Syssi pouted. “That’s not what they were for. We need Dormants, not hookups. People can get those on their own.”
He kissed the top of her head. “Don’t worry about it. The Fates will even things up. So far, we’ve gotten many more female Dormants than males, and we were worried about the clan ladies being unhappy. Now, we are suddenly faced with the opposite problem, and we are worried about gender imbalance. Things will work themselves out.”
“Perhaps you are right.” Syssi turned to face him. “I wonder when the Fates will start delivering Dormants to the Scottish arm of the clan. That’s another worry.”
“Maybe Kalugal was right about that, and they need to move over here. They live in relative isolation in their remote mountain castle, and only a few of them have contact with humans. What do they expect the Fates to do? Drop Dormants on them from the sky?”
Syssi laughed. “The forecast predicts a drizzle of Dormants,” she imitated the tone of a weather forecaster.
The good news was that she didn’t seem mad at him. The bad news was that he knew his wife, and Syssi didn’t give up that easily. Next time, she would revisit the subject of unification from a different angle, and he would have to defend his position again.
He didn’t like arguing with her, and even more than that, he didn’t like refusing her anything. But it just wasn’t doable.
50
Vlad
“I started my search with the name you gave me.” Roni handed Vlad a stack of printouts. “Margaret Miller, which was Wendy’s mother’s married name. Since you said that her father was abusive, I figured that he’d been abusing her mother as well. Wendy is from Milwaukee, and you didn’t say anything about her moving there from somewhere else, so I assumed that’s where she grew up. I searched the city’s police records from nineteen and eighteen years ago to see if her mother ever filed a complaint against her father. I found several.”