12. Annani
ANNANI
L ife continued while history was being made.
Annani scanned the village square, which looked exactly as it did on any ordinary evening.
Across the open lawn, two Kra-ell children chased each other around the base of the climbing structure while their mothers sat on a bench.
The outdoor café was packed even though the kiosk was closed, and only vending machine fare was available.
Somewhere in the pond among the reeds, frogs were making a ruckus.
It was all so pastoral, so ordinary, or as ordinary as it got in a community of immortals, Kra-ell, humans and gods. There were five gods total, six if she included Areana, and only a few were aware of what was about to transpire.
"Where would you like to wait?" Kian asked. "Inside the clinic or in the café?" He nodded toward one of the café's outdoor tables.
He had also offered that they wait for the chests' arrival in the underground garage, but that seemed silly since the ones they were welcoming would not be awake for the welcome.
"The clinic," she said without moving.
"Okidu reports that he is turning into the tunnel." Kian tapped his earpiece. "You can still change your mind about waiting in the garage."
Okidu and Onidu had participated in the mission, and Ogidu had driven the bus to the airstrip to collect them, but Okidu considered the bus his, so she was not surprised that he had taken command of it upon his return.
She could picture it rolling to a stop between the concrete pillars, the doors opening, and the Guardians distributing the chests between them to carry to the elevators that would take them up to the glass pavilion.
From there it was only a short walk across the square to the clinic, too short a distance to justify a golf cart, so even though the chests were heavy, they would be carried by Guardians.
"Do you want to go in now or wait to see them arrive?"
"I want to see them come out of the pavilion," she said.
They didn't have long to wait. The procession came into view, rounding the office building, two Guardians to a chest, five simple, wooden chests that looked like crates of ammunition but held cargo far more valuable.
The Guardians walked briskly but carefully, their expressions projecting the solemnity of the moment.
A woman at the café stood halfway out of her chair to look, then sat back down, sensing that she should not approach.
Anandur led the procession, and when his gaze landed on her waiting at the entrance to the clinic, he dipped his head.
"Evening, Clan Mother, Kian. We come bearing gifts, but regrettably, the presentation leaves a lot to be desired.
Okidu refused to make a stop for us to get red ribbons, flowers, and balloons.
He said that you want us to hurry and bring Khiann to you, and that you don't care about decorations.
" Anandur shook his head. "I told him that a celebration of this magnitude demands it, but he would not listen.
" He leaned closer to Kian. "Yamanu forgot to transfer ownership to me, so your butler didn't feel obligated to follow my commands. "
"I'm glad he didn't," Kian said. "Let's keep moving, people. We don't want anyone to accidentally drop a chest."
Annani appreciated Anandur's attempt at lightening the mood, but she agreed with Okidu's assessment.
She waited by the door as the Guardians passed her by, dipping their heads in greeting. When the last chest was in, she and Kian followed them inside.
The Guardians maneuvered the first chest into the elevator, and Annani and Kian took the stairs instead of crowding in alongside it.
Bridget and Hildegard stood by the elevator doors, the doctor bracing one hand against the small of her back and the other resting on the curve of her belly.
"Clan Mother. Kian." She inclined her head.
The elevator was slow, arriving only now at the basement level. As the doors opened, Hildegard began directing the Guardians to the converted operating room where they were to deposit the chests.
"How are you feeling?" Annani asked as they followed the procession into the place designated for the resurrection.
"Like a whale," Bridget said. "A beached one, most days. Turner keeps offering to carry me places, and I keep telling him that this is not my first baby. I'm pregnant, not incapacitated, though some days I'm not sure I mean it."
Annani smiled. "I remember that feeling.
I could barely move when I was nearing my term.
My babies were all big, and I am even smaller than you.
I blamed their fathers, who were all big men.
" She sighed. "I have a type. They all had something of my Khiann in them, not that any mortal could measure up to a god, but as much as was possible. "
"I know what you mean. Julian's father was a big man as well, and Julian weighed almost ten pounds at birth. I was miserable."
"I was not. It was glorious, and I cherished every moment."
Seven children, the prophecy had promised Annani.
She had delivered five into the world, each fathered by different mortal men, who in their own way carried an echo of Khiann in the shape of their kindness or the breadth of their shoulders or the particular tilt of their smile.
Five children whose eyes she had searched for a flicker of the god she'd lost and had found echoes of him in each of them, again and again.
Five children born and only four remained. The memory of Lilen was a wound she kept behind a wall in her mind and tried not to visit too often because the abyss waited for her there, ready to swallow her again. That left two more owed to her, if the blind seer's second sight had been true.
Two more children were yet to be born.
Would she have them with Khiann, restored and whole?
The thought bloomed too fast and too bright, full of giddy hope that had no business existing yet, not tonight, not before she even knew if Khiann would open his eyes again.
She shook her head.
"Mother?" Kian asked. "Is everything all right?"
"Yes." She composed herself. "I was allowing my imagination to get ahead of me. One thing at a time."
"Where did it go?"
"Never mind." She waved a hand at Bridget instead. "I want to see where the magic will take place. Take us to the converted operating room."
"Of course." Bridget led them through a set of double doors into the large room.
The bones of an operating theater were still visible in the high, adjustable lighting overhead and the drainage grates set into the polished floor, but the surgical equipment had been cleared away, and in its place stood five hospital beds, evenly spaced, each flanked by its own bank of monitoring equipment, cables coiled and ready, screens dark and waiting to be woken.
"This was the only room in the clinic large enough to hold five beds and five arrays of medical equipment, with adequate space to work around each one," Bridget said. "Still, it's going to be crowded in here."
"Is it enough?" Annani asked. "I mean, do you have enough people to take care of five simultaneous resuscitations?"
Bridget nodded. "We'll manage with what we have.
For the critical early hours, when each chest is opened, I want one qualified set of eyes assigned to each patient specifically, so nothing gets missed in the chaos of five simultaneous procedures, but later we can rotate.
" She tilted her head to look at Annani from under her red eyelashes.
"It would have been better to stagger it, but I assumed that you would want it done simultaneously. "
"Not if that means taking unnecessary risks."
Bridget let out a breath. "We can handle it. We will open the chests one after the other to check that we have five live ones, and then we will take them out of the chests one at a time without rushing. It's going to be okay."
One by one, the chests were set down, each beside its designated bed, until all five stood in a row down the center of the room.
"This one is nailed shut," one of the Guardians said, crouching beside the nearest chest and running his fingers along the seam of the lid. "I'll need a crowbar."
"I'll get one," Anandur said.
Still more waiting. It was unbearable. She had waited for so long that these few extra minutes should not count, but it was getting harder now that she was so close.
"We are almost there, Mother," Kian murmured, close enough that only she could hear him. "You need to hold on for a few minutes longer."
"I am holding."
She let the air out of her lungs in a long, unsteady stream and drew in another, then did that again, and again, until Anandur returned with a crowbar in his hand.
He crouched beside the first chest, working the flattened end beneath the lid where the nails had been driven through. The wood groaned in protest, then gave, nails shrieking free one by one until the lid came loose enough for him to lift it away.
Inside was another chest.
This one was finer than the crude wooden crate that had housed it, ornate, plated in tarnished metal that might once have gleamed gold. Its surface was worked with patterns that Annani could not make out from where she stood, but that spoke of considerable craftsmanship.
Was this ornamentation significant?
Had someone, five thousand years ago, chosen this particular chest to carry someone particular, someone whose worth demanded finer housing than his companions received?
Then she realized how unlikely that was.
Khiann and his four guards had been placed in these ornate chests at a time when such craftsmanship had still mattered, when artisans still labored over metalwork for patrons willing to pay for beauty rather than mere function. All five chests were likely similarly elaborate.
The gold plating told her nothing about who lay within.
"The inner container is not sealed shut," Anandur said, examining it, "but the hinges are rusted through. Give me a moment."
He worked at the hinge with careful, patient pressure. The ancient metal resisted, then slowly yielded in small, grudging increments, flakes of rust falling away with each attempt until, finally, the lid shifted.
Annani could not see what lay inside from where she stood because Bridget and Julian were blocking her view.
Their examination took a long time, and she knew it was because a heart in stasis did not beat frequently, and when it did, it was very faint.
She heard the sigh first. Relief.
"He's alive," Bridget said, without turning around. "Faint. Very faint. But there's a heartbeat."
Annani's knees would have given out beneath her, but Kian steadied her with a hand on her elbow.
"Don't move him yet," Bridget said. "We'll check all five before we do anything else."
The second chest came open more easily than the first, the third faster still, the Guardians and the small medical team finding their rhythm.
"Two," Bridget said after examining the second body in stasis.
"Three."
"Four."
By the fifth chest, Annani felt so faint that she needed to lean on Kian for support.
Bridget straightened and looked at the row of chests. "All five are alive."
The room did not erupt into celebration. There was no whiskey here, no toast, and even though it was incredible that they were all alive, it was too soon to celebrate. The hardest part had not yet begun.
"We need to move them to the beds." Bridget turned to Annani and Kian. "You'll have to excuse us. All nonessential personnel need to clear the room for this part."
"Do I need to leave?" Annani asked, hoping for a different answer than the one she was about to get.
"Yes, Clan Mother." Bridget's voice was gentle but without room for negotiation.
"They're in a very fragile state and moving them from the chests to the beds is delicate work.
We need our full concentration on them, not on managing an audience, however dear that audience is to us, and however important these males are to you. "
Annani wanted to argue. She wanted to plant her feet on the floor and refuse to move until she had seen with her own eyes what remained of the five males in those chests, but she needed to step back and allow the professionals to do their work.
"Of course," she said. "We will wait upstairs. Please let us know when they are all stabilized."