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

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"I remember. The better trained you are the better you can deal with what comes up. But…" Under
ash-blond brows, the hazel eyes rose to meet Shkai'ra's. "It all depends so much more on whether you
happen to be on the winning side than how well-trained you are." Those eyes fixed on hers, with a
twisted smile. "I should know that, shouldn't I,khyd-hird ?"
"Point taken. Though forgive me if I point out you're not exactly working in a mine, right now."
"No, but I wasn't just thinking of myself—the only one of my blood, probably, who's alive."
Shkai'ra turned to face her, brows furrowing. "Sova, I've been in many, many fights. But it's along time
since Ipicked one. If peopleinsist on fighting me, the consequences are on their own heads,nia ? Neither
Megan nor I went out of our way to pick that fight in Brahvniki; we'd have been more than content to
pass on our way—"
Sova shrugged, looked out to sea again. "Thatsyour story."
"It's the truth as far as I know it."
"You think you know everything, but you don't!" Sova's eyes flashed.
"I do know what my own motivations were,nia ?" She slid a little of the saber free and touched the steel.
"I swear it and I do not lie: that fight was none of our choosing. Further, I'll tell you so under that fucking
truth-drug, if you insist. I think I can liberate a little of it."
"There's a reason we don't talk about this around the dinner table," Sova said coolly. "Something to do
with language, perhaps." The sort of thing Megan would say; even the tone reminded Shkai'ra of Megan.
But it was herwho brought it up , she thought. Then the girl went on to say that which could not be left
unanswered. "Onlyzhymata knows everything that was going on."
"You picked up this Yeoli custom, what do they call it,chiravesa ?" Shaki'ra snapped. "Pretending to be
the other side? Right, be us for a moment. We're passing through Brahvniki. Megan—entirely within the
law— takes back her property, the agency for the Sleeping Dragon,paying for it to boot. She took no
other action against a man who had been hired to kill her, and had sold her for a slave—ask her about
that sometime. He challenged her, and thencheated on the challenge. Maybe he needed the money real
bad; was thatour responsibility? Should we let him kill us—and all the other people who depended on
Megan—because he'd dug himself a hole too deep to climb out of? Everything I've said is true as the
word of the gods, and can be proved. Who started it, then?"
The girl's face had gone livid, the cheeks, always pale, now bone-wnite. The eyes wore the same
flatness they had looking at Francosz's killer. "No one who loved me," she said quietly, the Thanish
accent strong, "vould say dis."
"Unless they respected you too much to lie to you," Shkai'ra replied. "You're not a child who rages
because the world isn't as she would have it; I'm telling you my mind, as one adult to another. Return the
favor, please."
"You say you do not lie, and zo callme andhim liar. Like everybody who doesn't see your way. Dat's
not respect.Chiravesa ." She saw the girl bite the inside of her cheek, and take a long deep breath, to
muster control. "Alwaysboth vays."