[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.Don t know why he didn t make herabort me, or boot her out or something, well, yes, I do, it wasn t that wewere family, we were property and anyone who laid a hand on us was robbinghim.My sire, that oof narc, he scuttled like a rat, he knew he was a dead manif he stayed, it wasn t that that made Mama so mad, it was because he didn teven ask her if she wanted to get out with him, she was still furious aboutthat the day she died.Wouldn t ve gone, she said, but at least he could ve asked, anyway, what gotme on this was Vagnag, when I got old enough to talk, Grandda used to keep mearound like his dogs, long as I had sense enough to stay quiet, said I washis mascot, brought him luck.He had this thing about gam-bling games, Vagnagespecially, he wanted to work out a way to win consistently withoutthe down-and-dirty cheat-ing which could get you killed in the company heliked to play with.I got SO bored.There was nothing to do but watch him andhis sharks going at it, so I learned the games they played. She sighed,yawned. Big mistake.One day he caught me playing my own version of Vagnagwith the Chateau boys, taking money off them, because I used to win most ofthe time, and it wasn t because they were let-ting me win, I was just theChateau bastard, even the sweep was more respectable than me, at least he hadreal family, family to claim him.Anyway, I was about six, regular littleprodigy.A natural mimic with a trick memory.Impressed the hell out ofGrandda, which surprised me, scared me, actually.He wasn t an easy man withkids, and I d heard nasty stories all my life about the kind of things he didto people when he was mad at them, so I didn t like it much when he startedpaying real attention to me.Besides, lifewent sour on me after that.He brought in men, women, had them teach meeverything they knew about playing all kinds of games, especially Vagnag.Fifteen years of hell, that s what it was, Kuna, hour after hour, day afterday, manipu-lation, math and aerobics and weightlifting, took all that andmore.I ran away a couple times.He jerked me back.Third time was thewinner, he was just settling in at a new place, moving up, using me to getwhere he wanted, I ran when I got a smell of a chance and this time, Igot clear.Had a pretty good life for a while, yeh, walking the knife-blade,you can understand maybe what I felt; finally free of Grandda and his strings.Well, after a wild ride, I fell off the blade.I ran into this oof narc whothought he was hot stuff, papa was a local bigass with a lot of pull.Theoof narc lost, accused me of cheating and tried to jump me, real loser, Ididn t mean to kill him, I was trying to keep him off, clumsy cretin, it waslike he threw himself on the knife, the other players disappeared, I only knewtheir handles and gambling was illegal anyway on that world, so they wereoutta there.I hadn t a hope in hell of getting off, it was the Strangler sCord for me, I was so damn scared, I was almost ready to yell for Grandda, notthat he would ve come. She stopped talking and lay gazing dreamily atthe shadow-play on the ceiling.Kikun shifted on the cushions. What happened? Huh? Jolted out of her drowse, she turned her head to look toward the shadowin the chair.Page 112 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html How did you get out of that? Oh. She pushed up, swung her legs over the edge and sat with her head in herhands. It wasDigby, he sent one of his Ops to make a deal.Hah! She straightened up. TheOp would spring me if Ieither paid Digby s fee or went to work for him.Digby I mean. She pushedonto her feet, grabbed a robe off the foot of the bed. I m for a bath.If I mgoing to get into a game at the Shimmery I can t be so ripe no one will sitnext me. 2The door was three massive planks with a dalbir jug carved in low relief headhigh in the center plank.She pushed the door open and stepped intoa long room with bare roof beams and smoky lubrinjah-oil lanternshanging from those beams.It was a warm and rosy room, the amberlamplight waking amber and crimson lights in the smoky oily wood and thecrimson leather on the stools.Funny, she thought, all the worlds I ve been on, a bar is a bar is a bar.There were groups of men sitting at tables, others on stools at a long solidcounter by the inner wall.It was built atop a knee-high platform that was just wide enough for thescatter of stools.They must lose a lot of drunks on that, she thought, falloff and break their necks.Oh well, that s their problem.The low mutter of talk died away as she moved into the room, picked up againas she strolled to the bar, relaxed and easy.For the first time on this worldshe was in really familiar territory
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
