Free Thawed Fortunes by Dean Murray

food.
    "Oh, sorry, Va'del. I don't
know how I could be so clumsy. I guess I'm almost as bad as Alir
was. Always tripping over the little things you find littered all
over the place these days."
    Pretend it doesn't bother
you. Va'del knew he couldn't afford to put
any of them in their place. If he rocked the boat, the Council
might decide against him, and then not only would he likely never
become a candidate, he'd probably end up back in that prison
cell.
    Four collisions later, a tiny boy that Va'del
thought he'd heard someone refer to as the newest candidate, sat
down with his food two seats over from Va'del. It would have been
comical watching someone so small shove food in his mouth so
rapidly, but it made Va'del suspect that the boy had spent at least
part of his life afraid someone was going to come along and steal
his food.
    "Whatcha readin'?"
    The question, heavily accented as it was and
coming from someone who looked so timid, took Va'del by surprise,
but he closed the book and tilted it so that the boy could read the
cover.
    "Oh, I wish I coulda be readin' that kinda
stuff. They're makin' me study law 'n stuff."
    The curiosity flashing across the boy's face
was completely at odds with his retiring demeanor from a few
seconds before.
    "I'm Tim'i, what'chor name?"
    "Hi, Tim'i, I'm Va'del. That's quite the
bruise you've got there. Training accident?"
    Some of Tim'i's earlier shyness returned.
"Um, ya. I'm not ver' good at that stuff yet."
    Watching the boy eat with such abandon
reminded Va'del his own food was getting cold, so he closed his
book and picked up his spoon.
    "I wish I could trade you. I'd gladly do
double weapons instruction and law classes if it meant I didn't
have to try and make sense of what the lowlanders believe when I
don't even know what we believe."
    Tim'i got a faraway look on his face for a
moment and then nodded vigorously. "That'd be a good trade. Ma used
to read the Teachens to us er-night. I don't know forsure what them
others believe, but can't be too much different than the Teachens.
Truth is truth."
    Va'del found himself nodding despite the fact
that what little he understood from the book seemed to give lie to
Tim'i's philosophy. It made a kind of sense. You'd think that an
honest search for truth would result in everyone coming to
essentially the same conclusion, and Va'del was hardly expert
enough to disagree.
    "Ya hear 'bout the new tests?"
    Va'del shook his head. "No, I'm afraid
not."
    The smaller boy shrugged. "That's 'bout all I
know. Some new test 's in theworks. Don't suppose it'll make things
differnt for me."
    "I don't expect it will make a difference for
me either."
    After all, I'm still not even a
candidate.
     

Chapter 6

    On'li picked up a small slice of the mushroom
sweet bread that Mar'li had baked before leaving to help the
healers for the day, and reminded herself to thank her sister-wife.
A pair of quiet claps announced the arrival of someone wishing to
enter the suite of rooms, and On'li called out an invitation to
enter with barely disguised glee.
    "Pavir, I'm so glad that you've returned
safely, and that you were able to come visit so soon after your
arrival."
    The woman who entered the room was unusually
tall for one of the People, with brown eyes that lit up with
happiness at seeing On'li. "Please, as if I would pass up the
opportunity to have some of Mar'li's sweet bread and reminisce with
you about old times."
    "It has been too long. I'm so sorry that we
had to leave you out there like that."
    Pavir waved her hand dismissively. "It isn't
like you had much of a choice, not now that we're all that's left
of the bloodline."
    The offhand remark concealed an incredible
amount of pain. It hadn't been that long ago that Pavir had learned
that the other two families she'd all but grown up with had been
killed.
    "I can't believe we're all that's left. It
just isn't right for us to be around after they're gone."
    On'li nodded. "I have to keep reminding
myself that the