Free Missing Elements (The Lament Book 3) by P.S. Power Page A

that had a cold
look about her, being a light blond, with a blank expression, almost totally
ignored Pran, staring with total absorption at the other Judge.
    "Brown. I'd heard about the
attack. You seem to be doing well enough..." No matter how distant she
seemed, there was empathy in the words. It nearly rang from the lady in white.
    Her desk was nearly as large as
the one Clarice had, and there were neat piles and stacks of things on it, all
organized for whatever it was that she did. That, it turned out, was handle appointments
for Judge Sims. The High Judge Councilor.
    Who had an appointment with Judge
Brown at the moment, since that's how they did things here, it looked like.
Pran shrugged, then smiled and took his arm.
    "Good enough. I need to see
to some things anyway and it might be related. Let's go in?" It was true,
but she kind of expected the woman at the desk to tell her to get lost and not
be so pushy. Except that, being what she was, the desk woman read her for
truth, found it, and simply nodded.
    "I'll announce you. You
are?"
    "Pran." She forgot to
add the part about being an Apprentice on purpose. It seemed more important
that way. Like she might be in charge of something.
    Other than making the tea, that
was.
    It didn't take long to get in,
and when they did, she was a bit surprised to see the woman behind the desk.
She was tiny , for one thing. A good foot shorter than Pran herself,
making her nearly a midget, if not one in truth. Her features were a bit
squished looking, but her light blue eyes were pretty enough. The rest of her
just seemed off. Like something had gone wrong in the making of her mold, and
the artist had failed to toss her out in a timely fashion.
    Still, she was the High Judge,
and that didn't take size or strength. Not even good looks really. No, Judges would be honest enough to put forward whoever the best person for the job was.
That the package she came in was different wouldn't influence them all
that much. Pran decided not to let it do that to her, either.
    The woman spoke first, her voice
a bit high pitched and piping.
    "Brown, are you well?"
It was clear that she noticed Pran, but her eyes went to the older man, his
short gray hair a bit messed up on one side.
    He let his chin drop, just a tiny
fraction and spoke clearly. The door had been closed, but a person at the door
might just make out what he said.
    "Except for the eyes, I'm
well enough. A bit of a sore back, but that's due to sitting too much. My
guess, based on what my Doctor told me, is that I'll be four more months
healing up. I came to see about finding something to do, in order to occupy my
time."
    There was no calling out that he
was telling the truth. The tiny lady, Sims, looked over at Pran then, her face
totally controlled.
    "And you, Pran?" She
didn't ask for an explanation of anything, but she got one. Lying to the head
Judge was probably just as useless as doing that with any of the rest of them.
They practically read minds, after all.
    "I'm Bard Clarice's new
Apprentice. I'm also working on the problem, with the current attacks? From the
techno-cult? I could use a Judge to help verify people's intent and words. I
was thinking that Brown here would do that very well. I know, his eyes are down
a bit, but we don't need perfect. We need unassuming. People can talk in front
of him and think they might get away with a lie. Especially if we make it seem
like the damage is worse than it really is." She paused, then spread her
hands. "I also have about ten other things that I'm doing. The main one is
meeting people and making friends. There's a shipping deal too, a special trip.
Do you have need of anyone to head toward O'Brien from Gladstone? I could use
the tax break on it, since I'm stealing money from the High Energy Councilor as
part of the deal. Technically it isn't real robbery, of course. I'm just
grabbing part of the percentage that I told her about, without letting her know
the real deal that I made for it