Page 26 of The Gathering Storm

A workout first, then work, and later, another dance.

Schedule settled, she slipped on workout clothes, left her coffee in the kitchen, and threw herself into a rigorous routine usually reserved for preparation for competitions or war.

Three hours later, reheated coffee in hand, Sigrid settled behind her desk in her office on the IECS campus, her mind much clearer. Someone had left a stack of DNA test results in her inbox, each one neatly filed in a color-coded manila folder. She selected the top folder, opened it, and began studying the enclosed reports.

As she’d expected, work absorbed every ounce of her attention, and she lost herself in the possibilities arrayed before her. Which Daughters lines were true, which had been altered over time by lost stories or records and the insertion of speculation. Much of that could only be sorted by comparing the records that had survived against the well-documented lineages of other Daughters. Mitochondrial DNA alone could never answer the question as to which Sister a Daughter could claim descent from, or what that Daughter’s true heritage was, as the distance in time between ancestor and descendant was too short. Mutations occurred only rarely, on a scale estimated at twice the length of time between the modern era and the time in which the Sisters lived. Only a chance mutation in Abragni’s line sorted her descendants from descendants of the other six Sisters, and it, if Sigrid’s hypothesis was correct, had originated in the rumored youngest of the Seven herself.

More testing would confirm that, but only if the eldest of the living elders submitted to the tests.

Genealogical records would aid in the construction or reconstruction of those lineages as well. Sigrid etched a note into her calendar to contact Robert Upton the following Monday, and nearly cursed as a memory popped into her head, of Will telling her of his volunteer work with the Blade’s husband.

A knock on her door interrupted the remembrance. Sigrid looked up and found George hovering in her doorway, file folder in hand.

“Hey,” he said, and cleared his throat. “That blood you found in Director Upton’s house. The one you wanted tested?”

Sigrid stood and eased around the side of her desk. “Do we have results?”

“Yeah, uh. Here.” He handed her the file and stuffed clenched fists into too loose trousers, then launched into a rapid-fire explanation. “I let somebody else run the tests first. One of the new staff members? Just to see what he could do, only a couple of oddities cropped up, so I ran them again. That’s why it took so long to get them back. I’m really sorry about that. I just thought—”

She touched his upper arm briefly, halting the deluge of words. “I trust your judgment, Mr. Howe.” And she did, in genetics above all other matters. There, his judgment could not be questioned. “Walk me through these oddities.”

“Well, first there’s the fact that whoever this blood belongs to is nearly entirely of Near Eastern descent.”

“We have several groups of the People living in that area.”

He shook his head and his eyes gleamed. “No, not like this. Most of those individuals show clear signs of intermarriage. Different ethnicities?”

“But not this one.”

“Nope. It’s like her family originated in the area and never left.”

Sigrid pursed her lips together. “Why is that significant?”

“Because it’s so rare. Don’t you see?”

He shook his head again, jabbed his fingers through overlong bangs, and paced away from her, his steps rapid and light. Abruptly, he whirled and stalked back to her, and his expression was so unlike his normally cowed mode, it startled her.

“Ok, look,” he continued. “We know the Sisters lived about ten thousand years ago, right? And that they originated in the Levant, probably somewhere near where agriculture first arose. Or that’s what I got from the Legend of Beginnings when I read it.”

“It’s probably an accurate portrayal,” Sigrid murmured, though she’d never thought of it quite like that.

“So when the Sisters were cursed, what’s the first thing they did? According to the genetic records and the tales I’ve heard.”

She narrowed her eyes on him. “Have you been digging around in the Archives?”

He shrugged. “Tom has and, you know. He tells us because we’re all in this together, right? I mean, what use is it to withhold information when sharing could expedite the whole process, help us reach better conclusions faster?”

She considered him for a moment, weighing his words. Rebecca had informed Sigrid of her intentions prior to reading the IECS’s resident male scholars in on the People’s largest secrets, but there had been no mention of the men colluding with one another. Still, it was a wise move on all their parts, though she could wish her young assistant had kept her in the loop as well.

Finally, she nodded. “Go on.”

“Ok, so the first thing they did was scatter, or one of the first things. Not right away, no, but within a couple hundred years. Genetically, record wise, and I’m talking oral tales here, passed down until they could be recorded.”

“Of course.” She’d written down several such tales herself after learning to read and write half a lifetime ago, tales of her own life and those passed down from mother to daughter through generations. “You have a point here, I assume.”

“Getting there. These Sisters or their Daughters bred with local populations wherever they landed, diffusing the genetic ancestry of their children. The Sisters and the oldest Daughters died off, those that would’ve been genetically Near Eastern, or as close as we can determine, anyway.”

A budding excitement plucked at Sigrid. She tamped it down, refusing to jump ahead of him in the face of scientific reality. “Ethnicity derived from genetic testing is uncertain at best. The results can be, and often are, incorrect depending on the methodologies used.”

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