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because I wasn't in the mood to play. Val fidgeted the entire time
and looked as though he was trying to decide whether or not to say
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Tanderon by Sharon Green - Chapter 10
something to me, but he had the decision taken away from him. I
walked out of the room on the dot of 2300, and Cambet took me back. I
stripped off the uniform when I got to my quarters, and was about to
get into bed when Olveri walked in.
"I thought so," she said quietly to keep from waking my roommates,
her pinched face wearing a look of satisfaction. "Regulations state
that pajamas are to be worn by all cadets, so get with it, Santee. I
think you've found that being the colonel's daughter doesn't exempt
you from following orders." She waited until I'd gotten the pajamas
out and was wearing them before she nodded and said, "And keep them
on because I'm leaving word for you to be checked on during the
night."
She went out again and closed the door, and I lit a cigarette and lay
down in the dark. I thought about the smoke curling up to the ceiling
and happily nothing else.
The rest of the week floated by in a dark fog that got deeper as the
time passed. I began to think about nothing but Langley's class, the
only reality in a universe of shadows. Every day it was the same,
three times up in front of him, five demerits each time. His face
hung in front of my eyes even when he wasn't there, and I dreamed
about him when I slept - although I wasn't sleeping much. I would
fall into an exhausted sleep after the class at 2, but would wake up
choking a few hours later. I'd begun to chain smoke, and whatever
food I managed to force down my throat tasted like straw.
Captain Ellis had begun to stare at me with a worried look, but
hadn't gone so far as to ask me about what was happening. Morrison
asked point blank, but I was able to put her off. I lost myself in
crowds of cadets to avoid Pete and Freddy, knowing I'd never be able
to stand the distraction of their questioning. And I'd taken to
wearing the knife all the time.
Langley's class became a pit from the depths of hell, Langley himself
a Hadean disciple. I had a role I couldn't break, but he knew nothing
about that and wouldn't have cared even if he'd known. He struck at
me each time with all the strength of his body, no longer minding
that I refused to cry out with the pain. He could see the pain in my
eyes as it reached me, and his pleasure came from knowing he was the
one who caused my agony.
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Tanderon by Sharon Green - Chapter 10
What he didn't know about was the knife only inches from my hand when
he hit me, but in the end it didn't really matter. The discipline of
a job to do held my hand back from the knife, keeping Langley safer
than he would have been with a real cadet. Langley looked forward to
seeing me every day, never knowing how close he was to the sharpened
edge of the end of pain.
On day 5 I was at 2 listening to someone's work when I realized that
he'd stopped speaking some time before. The class had been very quiet
the last couple of days, and even Nalvidi hadn't acted up. Cambet had
tried to make conversation when the trips first began, but he'd given
it up quickly and simply stood at the side of the room every night
without commenting. Now I tried to remember the last words I'd heard
but nothing came through, so I took a breath and stood up.
"Let's save it for next week," I told them, then took my jacket and
started for the door. But suddenly Val was there, standing in my way,
the first time he'd come near me all week. I tried to step around him
but he put up his arm, barring the way, then took my left wrist and
turned it. With my hand palm up he could see that it was black and
blue from wrist to fingertips, and it must have been obvious that I
hadn't been able to use it in a while because of the swelling. Val
raised his eyes to mine, and he looked almost unfamiliar.
"Give it up!" he ordered harshly, some unnamed emotion writhing in
his stare. "Talk to the colonel and give it up!"
Val's face kept shifting in and out of focus, sometimes appearing as
his face, sometimes as Langley's, sometimes a combination of the two.
I stared at him until the face in front of me was his alone, then I
told it "No."
That single word from me had always gotten him angry, I recalled, but
that time the flash of fury in his eyes was so strong it almost
crackled. Possibly his anger was intensified by the way my attention
kept turning inward, toward things he couldn't see. But whatever it
was his hand suddenly came out of nowhere, slapping me so hard that I
nearly went down sideways.
My cheek flamed with the slap, causing something inside me to flare
in response, and when I jerked straight and faced him again the knife
was in my hand and moving toward its target. I wanted so much to
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Tanderon by Sharon Green - Chapter 10
touch Langley with that blade, to see him fall to the ground at my
feet and empty of lifeblood. I wanted it with everything inside me,
and it almost took too long to understand that it wasn't Langley
standing in front of me, it was Val!
The breath caught in my throat when I realized what I was doing and I
forced the knife down again, but Val hadn't even moved! He stood
there with no expression on his face and there wasn't a sound around
us, just as though everyone in the class was holding their breath.
Cambet had started over to us when Val slapped me but he stood frozen
in place now, his shocked gaze on the gleaming knife in my hand. I
stared at it myself as though seeing it for the first time,
resheathed it slowly, then looked up at Val again. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]