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John headed for her study and paused in the doorway. Sitting at her desk, Wellsie was surrounded by a collection of old books, most of which were laid open. The sight of all those splayed, bound pages reminded him of eager dogs on their backs, waiting for belly attention.

She smiled. “You look tired.”

I’m going to crash for a while before Havers comes, he signed.

“You sure you’re okay?”

Absolutely. He smiled to give the fib some juice. He hated lying to her, but he didn’t want to go into his failures. In another sixteen hours he was going to have to have them out on display again. He needed a break, and no doubt they were exhausted, too, from having had so much airtime.

“I’ll wake you up when the doctor gets here.”

Thanks.

As he turned away, she said, “I hope you know that no matter what that test says, we’ll deal with it.”

He glanced at her. So she was worried about the results, too.

In a quick rush he went over and hugged her, then headed for his room. He didn’t even put his laundry in the chute, just dropped his bags and lay on the bed. Man, the cumulative effects of eight hours of derision was enough to make him want to sleep for a week.

Except all he could think about was Havers’s visit. God, what if it was all a mistake? What if he wasn’t going to turn into something fantastic and powerful? What if his visions at night were nothing more than an overactive Dracula fixation?

What if he was mostly human?

It would kind of make sense. Even though the training was just beginning, it was clear he wasn’t like the other pretransitions in the class. He flat-out sucked at anything physical and was weaker than the other guys. Maybe practice would help, although he doubted it.

John closed his eyes and hoped for a good dream. A dream that would place him in a big body, a dream that would have him strong and…

Tohr’s voice woke him up. “Havers is here.”

John yawned and stretched and tried to hide from the sympathy on Tohr’s face. That was the other nightmare about training: He had to screw up in front of Tohr all the time.

“How you are you doing, son—I mean, John?”

John shook his head and signed, I’m fine, but I would rather be son to you.

Tohr smiled. “Good. That’s how I want it, too. Now come on, let’s rip this Band-Aid off about the tests, okay?”

John followed Tohr to the living room. Havers was sitting on the couch, looking like a professor with his tortoiseshell glasses and herringbone jacket and red bow tie.

“Hello, John,” he said.

John lifted a hand and sat in the wing chair closest to Wellsie.

“So I have the results of your blood test.” Havers took a piece of paper out of the inside of his sport coat. “It took me a little longer, because there was an anomaly I didn’t expect.”

John glanced at Tohr. Then Wellsie. Jesus… What if he was wholly human? What would they do to him? Would he have to leave—

“John, you are a full-bred warrior. There is only the barest trace of nonspecies blood in you at all.”

Tohr laughed in a loud burst and clapped his hands together. “Hot damn! That’s great!”

John started to grin and kept going until his lips totally disappeared into a smile.

“But there’s something else.” Havers pushed his glasses up higher on his nose. “You are of the line of Darius of Marklon. So close you could be his son. So close…you must be his son.”

A stony silence overtook the room.

John looked back and forth between Tohr and Wellsie. The two were frozen solid. Was this good news? Bad news? Who was Darius? Going by their expressions, maybe the guy was a criminal or something….

Tohr burst up from the sofa and took John into his arms, squeezing so hard the two became one. Gasping for air, feet dangling, John looked over at Wellsie. She had both hands over her mouth, and tears were rolling down her face.

Abruptly Tohr let go and stepped back. He coughed a little, eyes shimmering. “Well…what do you know.”

The man cleared his throat a number of times. Rubbed his face. Looked a little woozy.

Who is Darius? John signed as he sat down again.

Tohr smiled slowly. “He