Starpilot's Grave by Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald

Author:Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald [Doyle, Debra & Macdonald, James D.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: (¯`'•.¸//(*_*)\\¸.•'´¯), Speculative Fiction
ISBN: 9780812517057
Publisher: Tor
Published: 1993-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

The darkness in Klea’s head had weight and pressure to it; it pushed her down relentlessly toward the floor. At the last minute she felt Owen catching her before she hit.

“Klea—are you all right?”

“I don’t know. My head hurts.”

“Here. Sit down. I’ll get you something to drink.” She let him help her over to the room’s only chair, a cheap metal foldable with wobbly legs and a dented back. When her vision cleared, she saw that he was busy over in the kitchen alcove, making up a mug of Nutli’s Instant Ghil with hot water from the tap.

“Offworlders,” she muttered. “Don’t you people know that you’re supposed to use boiling water?”

Owen looked back at her over his shoulder, still stirring. “Does it make a difference? I never can tell.” He brought her the mug. “So you’ve guessed my secret. Was it the ghil or my accent that did it?”

She sipped at the lukewarm ghil, taking comfort from its familiar gritty taste. The mug had a chip in its rim; she wondered if Owen even had another. He probably found it in the cupboard when he moved in, she thought.

“It wasn’t much of a secret,” she said. “You just never mentioned it. But there aren’t any Adepts on Nammerin that I’ve ever heard of.”

“Not these days, anyway,” he said. “Are you feeling better now?”

“I’m doing all right.”

“Good,” he said. “Exactly what happened to you back there in the ShadowDance? Can you describe it for me?”

“I think so.” She spoke slowly, searching for the right words to describe an experience that hadn’t really felt like something words could describe. “I was doing the movements, like you said, and trying to keep my eyes open without seeing anything. It wouldn’t work at first, and then it did—everything sort of slid into place, and I was there—and then I wasn’t again.”

“Nothing unusual so far,” he said. “In fact, that’s about how it is for most beginners. Go on.”

“Well … just after I dropped out but before I touched the ground, if you know what I mean—”

Now it was his turn to nod. “I know. What happened then?”

“Then something hit me.” She grimaced, remembering. “It was like—like having somebody throw a bag over your head and smash you on the skull with a rock at the same time. Or going straight from feeling-no-pain drunk to hell’s own hangover with nothing in between for a cushion.”

He winced at the comparison, and Klea thought back to how she had found him lying facedown and bloody in the alley mud.

“That was what happened to you, wasn’t it?”

For a moment he didn’t say anything, but regarded her with a considering expression in his hazel eyes. “Something like that. Only what hit you was accidental.”

“It sure didn’t feel like an accident.”

“It wasn’t aimed at you on purpose, though,” he said. “You just happened to be in the way.”

“Happened to be in whose way?” she demanded. “Whatever was going on, you’re not going to stand there and tell me it was part of a plot to do somebody good.

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