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 in the known world. "They apparently have a king who's hot. He came back out of captivity last summer, made alliances in the nick of time: Laka, Tor Ench, Hyerne, the Pirate Isles—he had friends all over, it seems. Even the Schvait black-shirts hired on their regiments. The way the Arkans broke the Compact and took Haiu Menshir was the last straw for many people. You know the World's Compact— everyone leaves the island alone, since it supplies the world with healers? It doesn't have an official name, actually, it's an unwritten law that's been followed for centuries, but people have started calling it that." "Yes," Shkai'ra said, drawing it out into a thoughtful hiss. "When I was younger I had no qualms about attacking pacifists. I think I've learned somewhat since then." Her pale brows furrowed. Trained in command as well as combat at home, and having wandered as a mercenary for six years, she had a feel for such things. "That's all the eastern powers turned against Arko, the Srian war still going on, the Kurkanians and the Roskati in revolt; and the tribes northwest of the Empire will start to move over the borders at the first chance. I'd be surprised if no one else invaded." She shook her head. "Stupid of Arko, like a peasant in a chicken coop trying to grab all the eggs at once. Opportunity, one way or the other. Quickly in, grab the child, quickly out. The quicker the better;my wanderlust is well and truly burned out." Shyll stood, leaving half his meal untouched, and began pacing the flagstone path beside the fountain. Megan stood up and followed him, knowing what his silence meant. The two had been having more trouble in bed lately, more sudden pullings-away, breathless apologies, tears in the dark.Always my fear , she thought wearily,from what happened when I was a child. Growing worse as I try harder to fight it; worse, not better. Will it ever end ? Under the rose tree, she put her hands on his face, keeping the steel of her claws well clear. "Shyll, I'm not running away from you. I love you." She swallowed, dryly, struggling to say the difficult things, to be honest. "Sometimes I love you too much. I try too much, too fast." He held her as if she were made of spun glass, then turned away and went on pacing. His greathound Inu tried to heel without stepping on too many things until Rilla sent him back to his corner with the bitch Grey and her puppies. "Promise me one thing," Shyll said softly. "That you'll both come back." "I'll do what's necessary." He stopped pacing and drew his hand through his blond hair. Rilla came over and hugged Megan in one arm, the other cradling the baby. Shyll forced a smile. "… pretty damn good when she's got her growth, Megan. She'd learn war-craft much faster practicing." Shkai'ra's voice wasn't raised, but carried clearly through the door to the corridor, where Sova was passing on the way to her room. The Thane-girl slowed, put up a hand to steady Fishhook, who lay across her shoulders purring, and pushed the wing-cat's buzzing nose out of her ear. "I don't want to put her in the way of sharp steel again until she's of an age to choose." Megan's higher voice. "Two years is not too long to wait, and I'm sure there will be fights around here then if she wants them. She needs to Team other things that you don't on raids; you want her to end up knowing how to do nothing but creep around in the dark and bash heads?" "Of course not, what do you think? You usually handle the bookish stuff, though, and you're going to be gone anyway…" A pause came, that made Sova worry about getting caught listening. The carpet was soft under her feet, like home used to be, but decorated in the severe Zak style rather than Thanish
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html bright.I miss the blue or red walls sometimes , she thought, stepping forward; then she stopped again as Sakai' ra's voice continued. "Kh'eeredo, you're treading somewhat on her honor as a warrior." A whisper of pacing feet: Megan, she could tell by the short steps. "No, I'm not. She has thezight of the house and her own behind her and all the pride and honor someone with her potential has. She'll be a warrior when she's of age, two years from now. Wereyou one at fourteen?" "When I came back from my test I was considered one." "Well," Megan said tartly, "I am hardly going to let you give her a knife and a rope and kick her out in the middle of winter—" "Well,Zoweitzum on that!" Shkai'ra broke in. "She's my daughter-of-choice and I don't want to see her get her brains spattered on an Arkan warhammer by mischance or mistake." A sigh. Sova could almost see the shrug. "Right. Right. It's your part of parenting. So she stays here, safe in school." "It's because I love her,akribhan . Books and stability are what I think she needs—especially after what happened." "Now, don't start that again—" "All right, love. But dragging her all over the Midworld is a hurt I don't want to add to the others. The tea water must be boiling now." Their footsteps faded into the kitchen. Fishhook mewed and launched off Sova's shoulder, gliding down the hall in front of her, to thump, a bit of orange fluff, in front of her chamber door. The girl followed slowly. There was a stuffed bear, Sova thought.His brown fur was worn mostly off on his rump, one of his bead eyes was missing. Franc said I chewed it off when I was a baby, but I think he was lying just to annoy me… well, I guess I might have. Babies do that sort of thing . Yesterday little Ness had eaten a sow-bug, before anyone could stop her. Yesterday, just afterZhymata Megan andKhyd-hird Shkai'ra had left to seek Lixand. Sova felt her blade whip through the air with easy ripping speed, saw her wrists, thickened with long daily practice, and a little veined, likekhyd-hird's or a man's.To do as smooth a cut in sparring as I can going through the First Nine Cuts; that's the hard part . When she looked in the mirror now, she saw cheekbones and a sharp chin where before there had once been round baby-fat.I'm becoming a woman . Those lumps on her chest, they were no longer pretenses, but breasts, proper breasts, shaped like a woman's. One day she had noticed her hips and legs were no longer the slightly-fleshed stick-bones of childhood, but flared and curved, as she'd imagined when trying to see herself grown-up in her old mother's big mirror. But her arms and shoulders had bulges that had never been part of the mirror-picture; the arms and shoulders of a teenage boy, it seemed to her, somehow glued onto the trunk of a maiden.
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