Free Book 3 - Water Sleeps by Glen Cook Page A

long.
“You’re all right, Swan. Long as you behave. Long as
you answer questions when you’re asked. Hell, I got to save
you. There’s a bunch of guys buried under the glittering
plain that want to talk to you about that when they get
back.” Might be interesting to watch him talk it over with
Murgen.
    “They’re still
alive?
” The idea seemed to stun
him.
    “Very alive. Just frozen in time. And getting angrier by
the minute.”
    “I thought . . . Great
God . . . shit.”
    “Do not speak so on the name of God!” Slink
growled.
    Slink was Jaicuri Vehdna, too. And much less lapsed than I. He
managed prayers at least once a day and temple several times a
month. The local Vehdna thought he was a Dejagoran refugee employed
by Banh Do Trang because he had done the Nyueng Bao favors during
the siege there. Most of our brothers endured genuine employment
and worked hard to resemble pillars of the local community.
    Swan swallowed, said, “You people ever eat? I ain’t
had nothing since yesterday.”
    “We eat,” I said. “But not like you’re
used to. It’s true what they say about Nyueng Bao. They
don’t eat anything but fish heads and rice. Eight days a
week.”
    “Fish will do right now. I’ll save the bitching till
my belly’s full.”
    “Slink,” I said. “We need to send a kill team
down to Semchi to watch the Bhodi Tree. The Protector’s
probably going to try to smash it. We could make some friends if we
save it.” I explained about the Bhodi disciple who burned
himself and Soulcatcher’s threat to turn the Bhodi Tree into
kindling. “I’d like to go myself, just to see if the
Bhodi non-violent ethic is strong enough to make them stand around
while somebody destroys their most holy shrine. But I have too much
work to do here.” I tossed my cards in. “In fact, I
have work to do now.”
    I was tired but figured I could study Murgen’s Annals for
a few hours before I passed out.
    As I walked away, Swan whispered, “How the hell does she
know all that? And is she really a she?”
    “Never checked personally,” Slink said. “I
have a wife. But she’s definitely got some female habits on
her.”
    What the devil did that mean? I am just one of the guys.
     
----

----

11
    T hese were
exciting times. I found myself eager to be up and outside, where
things were happening. The impact of our boldness would have
reached every cranny of the city by now. I gobbled cold rice and
listened to Tobo complain, again, that his father had paid him no
attention.
    “Is there something I can do about that, Tobo?”
    “Huh?”
    “Unless you think I can go back there and tell him to
shape up and talk to his kid, you’re wasting your time and
mine bitching about it. Where’s your mother?”
    “She left for work. A long time ago. She said they’d
be suspicious if she didn’t show up today.”
    “Probably would be. They’ll be real edgy about
everything for a while. How about instead of fussing about
what’s happened already, you spend some time thinking about
what you’ll do next time you see your father? And in the
meantime, you can stay out of trouble by keeping notes for me
whenever anybody questions the prisoner.”
    His glower told me he was no more excited about being offered
work than any boy his age would be. “You’re going out,
too?”
    “I have to go to work.” It would be a good day to
get to the library early. The scholars were supposed to be gone
most of the day. There was supposed to be a big meeting of the
bhadrhalok, which was a loosely associated group of educated men
who did not like the Protector and who found the institution of the
Protectorate objectionable. Jokingly, they referred to themselves
as a band of intellectual terrorists. Bhadrhalok means, more or
less, “the respectable people” and that was exactly
what they thought they were. They were all educated, high-caste
Gunni, which meant, right away, that a vast majority of the Taglian
population regarded them