Alexandria by John Kaden

Author:John Kaden [Kaden, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
Tags: Fantasy, Young Adult, (¯`'•.¸//(*_*)\\¸.•'´¯)
ISBN: 9780615763187
Publisher: Grist for the Mill
Published: 2012-12-12T00:00:00+00:00

With no pressing deadlines in the shop, the Temple girls laugh and carry on brightly. Since the days of the infiltration, their initial fear has transformed into a kind of exuberant solidarity, spurred on by talk that a larger invasion was suppressed, put down in its infancy by the strength of the ethereal shield that protects them, and that order has been restored and the perpetrators of this vile act safely imprisoned. They feel, at last, that things are getting back to normal.

Narrow aisles run between the tables and workstations and Elise navigates them breezily and settles in with the new apprentices and inspects their simple stitchwork.

“How are you coming, Phoebe? Let me see.” Phoebe hands up the dress. It has frayed, uneven seams and crimps and puckers where none should be. “Hmm, okay,” says Elise, “I think you’re going a little too fast. Let’s try again, and take your time with it, okay?”

“Okay.”

Though her work is fairly lacking, she plucks the needle in and out with unmatched vigor. She makes a face so serious it’s comical and pulls out the thread she has spent most of the morning on and gets ready to start all over. Before long, she is absorbed in childish reverie and she does not notice, and is still far too young to understand, the distrustful glances that are stolen toward her and the other outsiders.

A couple of the native girls start humming together the melody of a spirited anthem from their lessons, sotto voce and only sometimes in-tune. Several others join in playfully and their little singalong gains momentum until they nearly abandon their work altogether to trill out the esoteric chant of their strength and supreme heritage. Phoebe sways with their odd rhythm and belts out the chorus as loudly as her small voice will allow.

Jeneth buries her head in her work. She mouths the words along with them, her face strained and remote. If she were not numb to sensation, she would feel the slipping pin pricks that sting her fingertips whenever her concentration falters. Each meticulous stitch she completes brings her closer to the moment when she can leave the shop, gather Mariset from the nursery, and hurry back to the refuge of her cottage—though even that haven has grown cold as of late. She and Eriem fought about the necklace again last night. The weight of his accusation presses on her still, and she assembles words and phrases in her head she hopes will convince him unquestionably that she is not trading favors with some outside force, assisting the spies or working in concert with her runaway friends to subvert the Temple and its well-being. She will try again to save what they have, though a growing voice tells her it is hopeless, and she dreads another sleepless night, icy and touchless.

The girls reach their crescendo and erupt in ripples of laughter.

“Don’t you like our song?” asks Akena. She gives Jeneth a crafty look from across the table.

“I like it,” Jeneth says, eyes focused on her work.

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