Shadow's Son by Shirley Meier, S.M. Stirling and Karen Wehrstein ...

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Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html On the eighth day the note appeared, specifying which latrine.Right on schedule , she thought.An efficient rokatzk. Well, some nice Arkan bowman had kindly given her the perfect excuse. Using the stick Sova had cut for her, she limped to the appointed copse at midnight. Struggle. Play it for all it's worth. Pain, pain, pain… Putting all her weight on the stick to keep it off the leg entirely, she made an involuntary grunt.Good . Itdid start to hurt worse, aided by the pretense. H'kuritz rokatzk . "You knew damn well I was wounded, and how badly," she hissed, when she heard the cool voice greet her. "Why did you still fish-gutted drag me here?" "Why, to see if you were up to making it, of course," he answered cheerily. "That'll give me an idea of how long it'll take you to heal… you know, in case you decide to tell me any tales, exaggerating the recovery time or such; not that youwould —ofcourse not!—but just as a precaution, you understand." Shit. Turns out today's one of those days in which I reallyshouldhave stayed in bed . "I see." She bit back the desire to be sarcastic; it didn't help.Any other tests? Like dancing a Zurke ? "Do you mind terribly if I sit down? I have to." All she let show in her voice was weariness and pain. The predictable answer came: "Ofcourse not!" She settled to the ground, her breath catching as she jarred the leg. "Look, Arkan, just give me time to heal up. Please? I'll do it for my son's sake, when I can. I swear." "Good. But whenis when you can? How many days? Let's be specific and not have any misunderstandings to leave you convenient outs." She put her hand over her eyes. "An eight-day to heal up. An eight-day to do it. Sixteen days." To her amazement, he said, "That's reasonable. Your oath's on it, then?" "Yes," she gritted. "Yes." "The best of luck to you, then." She could hear a smile in his voice. His loose-clothed shape ghosted away into the night. When she comes back—not if, butwhen—she comes back, I want to ask her something. Sova was squiring for Megan, now; in the secured section's pool of squares, she'd come up for firewood detail. She's a great warrior. She wandered all over Almerkun, being a great warrior, getting greater; like she says, the only real training is the real thing. Then she came over here, to be in a family. I'm going to ask her: where was she happier? Once she'd happened to snap up the first split wood she could find for Megan's fire—that was the good part of firewood detail, eating first—she went back to the splitting place at the edge of the forest. The tang of trees laid open filled the air; a good ten axes were ringing.I don't think I could do that , she thought.I'm too small, and probably too weak, even if I am trained . Most of the people chopping had height and weight on her, though they were all squires, the warriors having orders to rest.But I can't
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html stand here watching, I have to do something . She settled for helping a Yeoli, placing the logs on his chopping block so he wouldn't have to put down his axe. "You want to learn how to do tsaht," a voice close behind her whispered. "Wahtch him, howhe does it, closely, with tseh unthinking gaze, like you wahtch you' war-teacher show you a move." She did for a while; then it occurred to her that she didn't know who the yoice, cracked with age and broadly Yeoli-accented, belonged to, and perhaps she ought to turn around and check. Its tone had been so sincerely friendly and helpful that danger hadn't crossed her mind. It was an old Yeoli man, grinning wrinkly at her with the same expression as his voice had held, bald but for a fringe of thick white curls, and stripped to the waist to show a thin chest stringy with muscle, and arms with veins standing up underloose age-lined skin, the whole marvelous network of them showing. By the sawdust sweat-pasted to his shoulders, he was obviously helping here; but she'd never seen a squire that old. His crystal was tight-tied, close to his neck, not dangling, as Yeoli warriors wore them, but he had no wristlets, and besides he was too old for that as well. "Nye'yingi," he said, sticking out gnarled ancient hands, and grinning wider, the grin going all the way up past piercing pale green-gold eyes, up into his thick-lined forehead. "I'm Azaila Shae-Chila." "I'm Sova. Called Far-Traveler." She'd never taken the hands of someone so old before; they were hard and bony and dry, but had a warm grip. "Good! Pleasedtomeetyou. Look attsaht ." She found her eyes back on the youth with the axe almost without knowing it. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to do what the old man said, stranger or not; he hadn't said it like a command, but more like a little boy calling a little girl's attention to something wondrously fascinating, with an enthusiasm too strong not to share. "You see how he's bending his knees when tseh ahxe comes down? Ahn' whipping his body, with his stomach? It's tseh same as anything, you put you' whole body into it, use tseh best form, it doesn't mahtter how small or weak you arrhe… Well, you cahn't really learn without trying it yourself, ahn' all tseh ahxes are taken; we better do something before we get caught shirking. I need someone for tseh otser end ofa saw, shall we?" As if he were a handsome swain gesturing to the dance-hall; she followed, entranced. He took up the first unused saw to hand, a long arm-length of toothed steel with wooden handgrips at either end, and went to the first felled log whose branches had been hacked off enough to saw.It's not much less wide than the saw is long , she thought.I don't know if I can do this, and what about him, so ancient ? But without a thought the oldster positioned the saw and looked at her, her hands went to the handle, and they started. Don't get out of rhythm with him, she told herself. Easily enough she fell into it, then tried directing her strength at different angles and times in the stroke, until she found the one that made the saw-teeth chew through the wood fastest. Then she enjoyed it. Then her arms were tired; her exercises didn't include any that used exactly these muscles so steadily for so long. Then her arms were hurting, and sweat poured from her face; she wanted to let go to wipe her forehead, but Azaila kept going. In fact he hadn't even stopped grinning.We're going to take a break soon, I hope …He's an old man, he's got to rest. Well , I'mnot going to call a rest until hedoes . He didn't; soon her arms felt near to breaking, and he didn't even slacken the pace.He must've been a lumberjack all his life , she thought, swallowing back tears of pain.I'm notgoing to stop. We're not even halfway through… No, wrong thought, we're almost halfway through. It'll get easier after that . As they worked down to the narrowing bottom curve of the log, just knowing it would soon be finished eased the pain, and she found her second wind. Finally the saw broke through, and the section fell off
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people around for camouflage, and t
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Und now I vind dose two—Celestial
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