Page 7 of Dark Witch Resurrection

Kian walked into the first patient room, where Bridget was still fussing around the prince. "Don't do anything yet. I need Merlin to scan them first. In the meantime, Aru and I also need to discuss a few things." Jasmine couldn't see the doctor because Kian was blocking the entrance to the room, but the silence that followed was telling.

"They don't have much time, Kian," Bridget said. "I can't even hook them up to monitoring equipment because their skin is frail, and it will break if I try to attach anything to it. The sooner we douse them with pure water, the better."

Why was it so important to use pure water?

Jasmine looked around until she located the two containers each with twelve one-liter bottles of mountain spring water. That was all that was needed to revive two ancient beings from stasis?

Surely, they had more containers stacked up somewhere?

"Shouldn't you do that in the operating room?" Kian asked the doctors.

"It won't make a difference," Julian said. "We are not operating on them, and we have all we need in the patient rooms." He ran his fingers through his shoulder-length tawny hair. "I should shower and change first, though." He looked at Kian and then shifted his gaze to Aru. "When will you be ready?"

"That depends on the results of our talk." Aru looked at Kian. "Can we talk in your office?"

"Of course."

What was that all about? What did Aru have to discuss with Kian, and did it have anything to do with the prince?

Jasmine had a feeling that it did.

When the two left, Ella pushed away from the wall. "Coffee?" she asked Jasmine. "I'm sure Frankie has a fresh pot by now."

Julian had ducked somewhere inside the clinic, probably to shower and put on scrubs, but Bridget and the nurse could take care of the twins. No danger lurked down in the depths of the keep, and Jasmine felt it was safe to leave her prince in the clan doctors' capable hands.

The only thing that made her uneasy was the conversation between Aru and Kian, but it wasn't as if she could find Kian's office and eavesdrop.

"I would love some."

6

KIAN

As Kian led Aru to his office, curiosity gnawed at him, but he held off asking the god what he wanted to talk about until they were inside, and he closed the door behind them.

He moved to lean against the edge of the conference table, crossing his arms over his chest as he fixed Aru with a steady gaze. "Let me guess. This has to do with your queen."

"Good guess." Aru pulled out one of the chairs and sat down. "We can't let the Eternal King know the twins survived. The best way to go about it is for me to report that everyone in the pod we found was dead. The problem is proving that to him, and before you suggest it, let me assure you that computer manipulation won't work with Anumatian technology. They'll instantly see through any digital or computer tricks."

"I wasn't about to suggest that. I know better." Kian pulled out a chair and sat next to Aru. "So, what's your idea?"

"It's not mine. It's the queen's. She suggests that we fake a funeral pyre for them like we intend to do for the Kra-ell, but I have no idea how we can do that without actually incinerating them."

Kian drummed his fingers on the conference table. "I wouldn't know the first thing about faking a funeral pyre, but I can ask our media expert for help. After all, they were doing that in movies long before computers and digital manipulation were a thing."

Aru nodded. "That's good. There is another problem that we need to take into consideration. The twins are emaciated, while the Kra-ell bodies are perfectly preserved. The difference is self-explanatory. Being half gods, the twins could enter stasis unaided, while the Kra-ell did not, and that's why their bodies consumed themselves to preserve basic function. Anyone on Anumati will figure it out at a glance."

Trying to figure out a solution to a seemingly unsolvable problem, Kian was silent for a long moment, his brow furrowed in concentration as he turned it over in his mind. Perhaps he should call Turner and Kalugal and ask them for ideas. After all, the queen wasn't the only one who knew that the Eternal King must never find out that the twins were alive, and he could ask their advice without mentioning her.

A thought, or rather a memory, was trying to push itself to the forefront of his mind—something about faking death.

Then it hit him. "I know what we can do. We will wait until the twins have recovered from their stasis so they look as whole as the Kra-ell, and then Bridget will administer a drug that will slow their vitals to a crawl even more so than stasis and make them appear dead to even the most advanced scanners. Once you record their lack of vitals, she will administer the antidote and revive them."

Aru's eyes widened. "If she can do that, it would be perfect. We can forgo recording the funeral pyres altogether. After all, no one expects us to give the Kra-ell their proper funeral rites." He tilted his head with a frown. "Did you base your idea on anything concrete, or was it only a hypothesis?"

"We've done something like that in the past." Kian pushed to his feet and motioned for Aru to follow him. "We needed to infiltrate the Doomers' island. The problem was that getting in was easy, but getting out was impossible. The plan was for our operative to fake her own death by administering a drug, getting out of there in a casket, and then being revived. In the end, her escape happened differently, but Bridget tried the method on her, and it worked."

"Who was your operative?" Aru asked.