Shadow's Son by Shirley Meier, S.M. Stirling and Karen Wehrstein ...
Shadow's Son by Shirley Meier, S.M. Stirling and Karen Wehrstein ...
Shadow's Son by Shirley Meier, S.M. Stirling and Karen Wehrstein ...
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Generated <strong>by</strong> ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html<br />
that's the only reason. Look,please , give me another eight-day, <strong>and</strong> I'll do it, I give you my word. I<br />
swear …"<br />
"Another four days," he said, putting the usual ice into his voice. Like a strict father, then:"It had better<br />
be." Professionally brisk: "Enough said." She limped away. He prayed.<br />
XXI<br />
For a city as big as Arko, it was an unusually dark night. Theokas women halted with weary<br />
nervousness, pulling the light h<strong>and</strong>cart behind her. The clerks had said the campground for refugees was<br />
down at the end of the street, but she must have missed the turning. He had talked so fast, gabbling <strong>and</strong><br />
biting off the ends of his words, like a city man; she sniffled, wishing her man was with her. Thesolas had<br />
taken him, just after they left their farm; him <strong>and</strong> her son, her only surviving child.<br />
"Yar, 'e war too yang," she mumbled. Only fifteen summers. Taken for the war. She shuddered again,<br />
remembering the horrible tales of what the black-haired barbarians would do, the columns of refugees<br />
past her village. Still, she might have stayed if the soldiers had left the men. The master's bailiff had run,<br />
but then he had all the master's beautiful things from the manor to protect; the villagers would have<br />
stayed, <strong>and</strong> run to the woods <strong>and</strong> hills until the enemy soldiers passed. But not without her man; a woman<br />
alone needed protection. Uncle Permas had been with them most of the way, on the Imperial highway<br />
that such as them would never set foot on in proper times, but he had died of the spotted raving-fever<br />
two days ago.<br />
She shivered again, looking around at the deserted, darkened alleyways. It wasblack , the crescent<br />
moon sending only glimmers through between the tall buildings—most or them four stories, think of<br />
it!—<strong>and</strong> no lights showing in the windows. The cracked concrete of the pavement was nearly covered <strong>by</strong><br />
the layers of solidified garbage, <strong>and</strong> there was a sour stink worse than any farmyard midden. There was a<br />
noise, a tall shape in the laneway to her right; where it ran off the street she followed.<br />
"Who you?" a voice asked. The peasant woman cowered back against her h<strong>and</strong>cart; the accent was<br />
even less comprehensible than most she had heard in the great Dilla, "wife o' Kinnas Togas,okas ,<br />
mayitpleaseyer," she babbled nervously.<br />
"About fucking time," the voice said. Something struck the side of her head, <strong>and</strong> suddenly there were<br />
stars.<br />
"Baiwun hammer me flat,twenty muggings before I get the right one," Shkai'ra muttered, pulling the<br />
h<strong>and</strong>cart into the laneway beside theokas woman.<br />
She had stuck carefully to refugees, looking for one whose bumpkin accent would be thick enough to<br />
disguise her own;okas , because they were not expected to be able to read. The fiasco at the Edifice of<br />
Post was fresh in her memory. Of course, once she had spoken to them she had to lay them out.<br />
Nobody was going to listen to a hysterical refugeeafter the fact, but it wouldn't do to have them raising<br />
the hue <strong>and</strong> cry immediately. Shkai'ra whistled through her teeth as she dragged the body further back<br />
<strong>and</strong> measured it roughly; not much difference in height, which was fortunate, since Arkans considered it