"I won't have it!" The cannoneer said loudly. "Our most important person attacked like this. It smells of enemy action!" Wickwrackscar goggled at him. "But how?" "I don't know!" Scrupilo said, his voice a desperate shout. "But she needs protection as much as nursing. Vendacious must find some place to keep her." The pilgrim pack was clearly impressed by the argument -- and unnerved by it. He inclined a head at Vendacious and spoke with uncharacteristic respect, "What do you think?" Of course, Vendacious had been watching the Two-legs. It was interesting how little humans could disguise their point of attention. Johanna had been staring at Chitiratte, now she was looking up at Vendacious, her shifty little close-set eyes narrowing. Vendacious had made a project this last year of studying human expressions, both on Johanna and in stories in Dataset. She suspected something. And she also must have understood part of Scrupilo's speech. Her back arched and one arm fell raised weakly. Fortunately for Vendacious, her shout came out a whisper that even he could scarcely hear: "No ... not like Scriber." Vendacious was a pack who believed in careful planning. He also knew that the best-made schemes must be altered by circumstances. He looked down at Johanna and smiled with the gentlest public sympathy. It would be risky to kill her like Scriber's frag, but now he saw that the alternatives were far more dangerous. Thank goodness Woodcarver was stuck with her limper on the other side of the camp. He nodded back at Pilgrim and drew himself together. "I fear Scrupilo is right. Just how it might have been done, I don't know,
复件 (98) air max1, but we can't take a chance. We'll take Johanna to my den. Tell the Queen." He pulled cloaks from his backs and began gently to wrap the human for the last trip she would ever make. Only her eyes protested. Johanna drifted in and out of consciousness, horrified at her inability to scream her fears. Her strongest cries were less than whispers. Her arms and legs responded with little more than twitches, even that lost in Vendacious's swaddling. Concussion, maybe, something like that, the explanation came from some absurdly rational corner of her mind. Everything seemed so far away, so dark.... Johanna woke in her cabin at Woodcarver's. What a terrible dream! That she had been so cut up, unable to move, and then thinking Vendacious was a traitor. She tried to shrug herself to a sitting position,
复件 (2) air max1, but nothing moved. Darn sheets are all wrapped around me. She lay quiet for a second,
mbt safari,
复件 (40) air max1, still massively disoriented by the dream. "Woodcarver?" she tried to say, but only a little moan came out. Some member moved gently around the firepit. The room was only dimly lit, and something was wrong with it. Johanna wasn't lying in her usual place. There was a moment of puzzled lassitude as she tried to make sense of the orientation of the dark walls. Funny. The ceiling was awfully low. Everything smelled like raw meat. The side of her face hurt, and she tasted blood on her lips. She wasn't at Woodcarver's and that terrible dream was -- Three Tinish heads drifted in silhouette nearby. One came closer, and in the dim light she recognized the pattern of white and black on its face. Vendacious. "Good,
复件 (46) air max2," he said, "You are awake." "Where am I?" the words came out slurred and weak. The terror was back. "The abandoned cotter's hut at the east end of the camp. I've taken it over. As a security den,
复件 (36) air max1, you know." His Samnorsk was quiet and fluent, spoken in one of the generic voices of Dataset. One of his jaws carried a dagger, the blade a glint in the dimness.
mbt safari
Linear Mode
