Crecheling by D. J. Butler

Author:D. J. Butler [Butler, D. J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781614753032
Amazon: 1614753032
Publisher: WordFire Press
Published: 2015-02-25T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

“I’m armed,” Dyan warned the Magister. “I could cut you down where you stand.”

“Then I’ll sit,” Zarah said. “If I am to die, I’d like to do it comfortably.” She settled carefully onto an arm of the same ridge of stone against which Dyan leaned.

“I could yell,” Dyan told her, “and warn the others.”

“So could I,” Zarah agreed. “And if we are to tell of all the tragic and terrible things we might do, for that matter, I could have simply killed you in the darkness before you noticed me.”

Dyan hesitated. Zarah didn’t sound like she’d come to arrest Dyan. “How can you talk about tragic and terrible things so lightly?” she asked. “Do you know what happened to Wayland?”

“He was cut in half,” she said instantly. “I was almost caught in the same trap myself, only Deek noticed the whip. Very clever.”

Dyan was silent, remembering the sudden weight of Wayland’s torso slamming into her body and the smell of his blood.

“If Cheela is to be believed, it was your doing.”

“It wasn’t,” Dyan said. She wasn’t sure she should be talking to the Magister, but she had to admit that if Zarah’s purpose in coming had just been to kill her, she could have done it before Dyan noticed a thing. “And she isn’t.”

“I know.” The moon shone on Zarah’s face where she sat, giving it a soft, silvery glow. “She’s in love with Shad, I see it. Young people do crazy things for love.”

“I thought I was in love with Shad, once. It seems like a long time ago now.”

“If ever you were in love with him,” Zarah said softly, “then, on some level, you always will be.”

Dyan bit back a sudden sob, managing to twist it into something like a cough. “Is it like that for everyone? That’s terrible.”

“Not for everyone,” Zarah said. “But it’s like that for some people, and I know you, Dyan. I’ve been watching you.”

“You’ve been my Magister for four years.”

“I’ve known you for longer than that.” Zarah chuckled. “I knew you in the nursery, when you were a chubby little thing who wouldn’t pick her feet up, so static electricity kept your hair standing nearly vertical.”

Dyan laughed, slightly. She didn’t want to wake Jak and Eirig. “I don’t remember that.”

“You wouldn’t. Do you remember that you were the most tactile child in the nursery? That you insisted on touching all the other children, all the time?”

“No.” Dyan lost herself a little in the images that Zarah was producing.

“The combination was a disaster.” Zarah slapped her own knee in silent mirth, shaking. “You’d shuffle from child to child, shocking each of them in turn.”

“That sounds like I was a mess.”

“You were a human being. The difference can be difficult to spot.”

Dyan didn’t know what to say. She felt like she was being led into a teaching moment, but the point of it still eluded her.

“You’re the kind of person who will love forever, Dyan,” Zarah said. “You’re also the kind of person who will always love easily.

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