Eye of the Ocean Book 3 Ji'jin Station

Eye of the Ocean – Book 3: Ji’Jin Station
back as he untied the robe he still wore and let it drape over his shoulders. He
was watching her closely as though to memorize her. “I do regret your injuries.”
So did she. She put a hand on his thigh, shaping very old words with the
shallow cutting of her nails. Apparently an invitation was going to be necessary.
“A child for the Clan is worth the care,” she said. “I suppose I'll be back on
Zimmer for the birth.”
A bowl was in his hand. His drink or hers? “Which Zimmer?” he said then took
a swallow of the liquid. With a grimace, he looked away. “Our Zimmer? Lord
Gennady's? Or something created totally new? I don't find the chance appealing.”
With an unsteady hand he held the bowl to her lips again, the blue fire spilling.
“They're all the same one,” she said.
Fire on her fingertips, she stroked it onto his skin over the cuts she had made.
His color bands flamed, razor sharp separations between them, the deepest
almost shading to violet as though she were raising yuin. Silver sparkled in his
eyes, quite strange. Would he taste like silver as well as be sasi sweet, all at the
same time?
He lay beside her on the narrow bed, his mouth suddenly covering hers,
sucking her breath. And then gave it back, whispering, “Are all worlds the same?
Are all children?”
And lay back again, laughing softly as he stroked her face with his ra-finger
but with the spurs away from the skin. “Ersi said you wouldn't have dared. I said
you would dare anything.”
She took his hand with hers and turned it, feeling the spurs with her tongue,
the warmer capillary trails, the hormones, catching her teeth on the sharp edges.
Had he bet with his los? And for what stakes?
“Why are we still talking?” she whispered.
- 13 -
Garm capped his ink, leaned back against the wall, and rubbed between his
shoulder blades, easing muscles cramped from bending over his work. He had
chosen his spot carefully: a carved post separated the smooth tiled surfaces. The
junior Scribe assisting him looked up but he shook his head and motioned for her
to continue with what she was doing. A niece of Cion's and fortunately not the
chatterbox the Scribe First was. She was transcribing and modifying Archive
requests, routine things. Most of the kinds of recordings and books they were
looking for didn't exist until the third or fourth asking and then, only bred more
books to ask for.
Laurel Hickey www.2morrow.bc.ca