"Sharon Green - Terrillian 4 - Warrior Challenged" - читать интересную книгу автора (Green Sharon)

The Warrior Challenged
By Sharon Green



Chapter 1

I sat on the carpet fur among the cushions, my eyes closed, feeling the faint,
unimaginative sadness brush at me. As sadness it was no more than mild regret,
about as compelling as having missed that dull meeting you had decided to go
to, but then forgot about. I sighed at the thin-bloodedness of the sadness,
then shook my head.

"That wouldn't be enough to get a blink out of a chronic hysteric," I told him
without opening my eyes. "Try it again, and this time make me cry."

A surge of annoyance and frustration daggered through the weakling sadness,
strong enough to make me flinch if I hadn't been guarding against it, and then
he made a sound that was half growl and half vexation.

"Should it be your wish to weep, wenda, there are other means of achieving
that," he said in that dangerous, deep-voiced way of his. "As my efforts in
this manner fail to please you, it shall likely soon become my duty to fetch a
switch. "

"Threatening the teacher isn't allowed," I answered with a laugh, finally
opening my eyes to look at him. Tammad lay stretched out on the carpeting not
far from me, one big leg bent comfortably at the knee, the rest of his giant
body not as relaxed as it should have been. His swordbelt was conspicuous by
its absence, leaving him nothing but the green haddin he wore wrapped around
his loins, and his leather wristbands. His blond-haired head was crammed full
with feelings of rebellion and resentment, feelings he wasn't used to
experiencing without being able to do something about them, and his blue eyes
said his threat had been only half joking. Tammad was getting impatient with
his progress-or lack of it-and was having trouble controlling that impatience.

"If this isn't working out it's only because you're not trying hard enough," I
told him with feigned calm. Tammad loved me, I knew he did, but if he decided
to look around for something to punish me for, he would not have to look very
far. I'd only gotten my empathetic ability back a couple of days earlier, but
I'd spent a good deal of that time experimenting with the changes I'd noticed.
Tammad didn't like the idea of my experimenting, and if he found out about it
I'd really be in for it.

"If this isn't working out, it's only because you're not trying hard enough,"
I told him as his pretty blue eyes, looked annoyed; I was trying to sound firm
and teacher-like instead of nervous. "And if you're scandalized over being
taught by a woman instead of another man, you have only yourself to blame. Len
was perfectly willing to put you through these exercises, but he couldn't do
it with his head splitting apart. Which was your doing.'