THE PERFECT TEN (Boxed Set)

as winning a gold medal in the International Alliance Games that had replaced the Olympics after the K’ryan Syndrome. SEOH would love to know if Rustaad really had anything to do with the “accidental” death of his closest friend–another gifted swimmer–as the rumors suggested. According to the media, Rustaad’s childhood friend had posed the only threat to Rustaad’s winning his last two titanium medals in swimming.
    My kind of man.
    Undeterred by SEOH’s foul mood, Rustaad went on to say, “With the threat against TecKnati children–”
    “I still don’t totally accept that our children died from some power woven into the treaty. ” SEOH could only admit that brutal truth within the soundproof walls of his private sanctum, and even here he resented the need to speak of the unspeakable.
    “But the evidence shows–”
    SEOH held up his hand, cutting off Rustaad. “That our three TecKnati children died as a result of vengeance and a traitor inside our group. Has to be someone who alerted the MystiKs of our complicity in the deaths of their three children, then assassinated ours.” 
    SEOH’s opinion hadn’t changed in the past thirteen months that Rustaad had wisely not brought up the topic again, until now. Damn him for his persistence. SEOH understood collateral damage in any war–and make no mistake about it, he was at war with MystiKs–but he hated losing those three TecKnati teens who’d shown such brilliant potential.
    No loss being greater than the death of his oldest son, one of his three most prized possessions. SEOH still couldn’t believe his perfectly healthy seventeen-year-old boy had clutched his throat, gasping for air as he’d played his holo games. The security vids in SEOH’s home had recorded the entire event.
    Screw the furkken treaty.
    If not for Furk, the decrepit TecKnati who’d been the tiebreaker on the board of twelve before he’d finally died, there wouldn’t have been a treaty. Furk had wanted to leave a legacy, and he had, in a way. His name had morphed into a curse used by TecKnati and MystiKs. Fitting.
    Rustaad still had the stubborn jut to his chin he’d walked in with this morning and continued undeterred. “My investigation has been thorough and the results speak for themselves, SEOH. There’s no way the MystiKs could have known fast enough about the deaths of their children–that I personally eliminated–for them to retaliate so quickly. Each of our three teens collapsed in identical manners. Asphyxiated. No weapons involved, as stated in the penalty clause the MystiKs added to the treaty.”
    “Words on a vid screen.”
    “Words written by the hand of a Hy’bridt, initially on lambskin that was blessed by the rulers of all seven Houses and ratified by you,” Rustaad amended, bowing his head to remove some of the sting of his words. He added, “Your media campaign was exceptionally successful, but some MystiKs continue to circulate word that they warned us this was how the Damian Prophecy would come to pass. They claim the prophecy begins with the deaths of three children on each side of a battle line.”
    Prophecy garbage.
    But after losing his oldest son, SEOH had taken measures to protect his youngest, the fourteen-year-old future TecKnati prodigy who would follow in SEOH’s footsteps. Until the BIRG Con meeting with the MystiKs, Bernardo would be kept under heavy guard with a medical team on hand. His son might be unhappy, but no one, not even a prophecy, was touching one of his only two remaining male children.
    As for his middle son, well, the less thought about him, the better. 
    Rustaad pressed on. “Much as I hate to give them credit, the MystiKs can stand in the way of our future.”  He clasped his hands behind his back, tone even and dry as old bones, an influence of being raised in a TecKnati boarding school with AI instructors. “Twenty years ago, I wouldn’t have thought the MystiKs could become this dangerous, but I have disturbing reports that confirm what we only suspected months ago.”
    “Go on.”
    “The young MystiK G’ortians, some of whom are in line to be the next leaders, intend to unite the Houses and, when they do, the MystiK power is purported to become ten times stronger when joined together against one target.”
    “Damned new generation.”  Accepting that supernatural abilities could interfere with science went against everything SEOH believed, everything he’d been taught.
    He grunted, glancing