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

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"But!" This was getting almost exasperating.I can't say what I'm thinking. Well, yes I can. Why not ?
"You're hiding something from me! You know more about him!"
The old man's grin went sheepish. "Ayo, 'tax, yes. You caught me. I know his weak points like my own
wrinkles. I only been trying to train him out of tsem for seventeen yearrhs,
Spirit-inmse-me-for-tseh-sake-of-Yeola-e."
"You're hiswar-teacher ?" Somehow Sova had never imagined an Invincible could have one.
"Yep." The log delivered, they turned back to the woods, and Azaila cast a glance over his shoulder, his
light old eyes full of affection. Chevenga was holding a double-weight axe, with both hands. "Good lahd,
heart of crystal. Love him like my own child. His kind you got to keep in line." The old man skipped
ahead, like a boy. "Tsere's more wood, Sova Far-Traveller! A few more pieces like tsaht ahn' we'll
hahve done our share, I think." Sova followed, numb.
He said nothing as they sawed the next log, and neither did she, her head bursting with thoughts, so
many she hardly noticed the agony in her arms. Her old refrain rang over and over in her mind, cracked
like a bell with doubt.
She'd first learned it from her father:The strong eat the weak . And it was true, the one common thing
she'd learned from both homes, that ran like a song in her head: "Pa hits Mooti, Mooti hits 'Talia, Franc
and I hit Piatr,khyd-hird hitsme !" She'd learned it deeper and wider as she'd got older, found reason for
her old questions. What had happened to her had nothing to do with fairness; it was only children who
expected that, askhyd-hird kept saying. Her adopted mothers had just been better climbers and archers,
that was all.So they kicked us good , and the world would now say that they were better people, the
hardest kick. The strong wrote history, she'd learned that, too. She had another rhyme: "Arko kicks the
rest of the world, one by one. But we gang up on Arko, and Arko's ass is done!"
Yet by the same principle, no one should be able to kick Chevenga, least of all a skinny old man who
said, "We small weak people," meaning himself as well as her, who'd let her call him by his name and
speak freely.
He's one of those legendary Yeoli masters who live up on mountains and can kill people with one
finger and that kind of thing, she thought, as they rolled the next log to the splitting-place.He mustbe,
teaching the semanakraseye.Should I… Why not? People probably ask him things like this all the
time . "Azalia, sir," she'd said, as they rolled the fourth log. "I… I have to decide something. My
khyd-hird says I could be a…" Out of modesty she chose against the word "great."
"… a really good warrior."
"Yep," he said casually. "She right."How does he know? He's never seen me spar… has he ? The
thought was terrifying.
"But I'm learning other things, as well, for other trades. I have to choose which to do. How do I
decide?"
She thought he'd think for a bit, but he just said, "Simple. Ahsk yourself two questions. One: does duty
require it? Duty means, whaht's best for yourself ahn' tsose you love."
She remembered what Shkai'ra had said, that there would be fighting in F'talezon. She wasn't sure she
was going to stay there, though, when she grew up. "I… don't know."