Poor World Read Free

habitual mind. What we gift our villains with are ...”
    The exchange had all the flow and timing of lo-o-o-ong habit.
    â€œPocalubes!” Sherry exclaimed happily. Whatever else I’ve done, she maintains that my best invention was the pocalube — which is an insult of creativity and magnitude, never your popular or commonplace insult-word, prefaced by at least seven adjectives.
    â€œOur pocalubes,” Irene declaimed, raising a finger skyward, “are Art.”
    Diana waited till everyone was done before adding, “Friendly but condescending. Something about a proposition to put before you. But he seemed bored.”
    â€œAdult,” Irene sneered in disgust. “Wasting his time with stupid little kiddies. The very worst kind!”
    â€œWhy, is what I want to know,” I said. “I mean, if it’s some state thing, then he ought to go up the mountain and see Clair. Or one of the governors, if it’s not a problem here.”
    â€œI think it’s someone from another country,” Diana said. “Accent.”
    â€œSo he doesn’t know how to get up the mountain the easy way,” Seshe put in.
    Well, there are plenty of signs,” I said. “But I guess I can send him — though I don’t see why I should torture Clair with some sap of a grownup who looks down on kids,” I added, getting annoyed already.
    â€œExcept for the pleasurable thought,” Irene said in her prissiest voice, “of watching how she takes care of them.”
    I pictured Clair’s serious, squarish face, framed by her snow-white hair curling down her back, her smart, kindly grayish-green eyes, and how she manages, ever so quietly, to puncture the biggest blowhards with just a few words. I wished — hopelessly — that I had that kind of self-command. But no, I’m CJ, whose moods jump first and mouth jumps right in after, leaving brain trailing way behind.
    Sigh.
    â€œJust ahead,” Diana whispered, and everyone fell silent so our voices wouldn’t echo ahead through the trees. “With Dhana. She made sure they wouldn’t follow me and find the Junky.”
    One glance at our mystery visitor, and I took an instant dislike — an impression intensified by the hostility in Dhana’s posture.
    The man was tall, and his hair under a jaunty feathered cap was longish and fair. He was dressed in woods-colored clothing — brown and green — but his tunic and trousers were not those of a common working citizen. They were the fabrics of the aristocrat, accented by his expensive high blackweave boots and the fancy hilt on the sword at his side.
    His posture, a negligent attitude as he leaned against one of the trees, completed the impression.
    Not that any of us were impressed. Dhana stood her ground, arms crossed, eyes narrowed. She obviously didn’t trust this gnackle in our forest, and made no attempt to hide her reaction. Knowing what she was like when irritated, I wondered what their conversation had been like — and I secretly hoped, as I crossed the last few paces of the clearing, that she’d gotten some good ones in.
    Not that she seemed to have made much of an impression on the man. He surveyed me from black hair to bare toes, then the faintest quirk of his upper lip into a sneer of contempt.
    I stopped. The girls stopped behind me.
    A couple quick, graceful steps and Dhana took up position at my side, her breathing short, sharp, and annoyed.
    â€œ You, ” the man drawled, “are Cherene Jennet Sherwood?”
    â€œI go by that name,” I said, instantly boiling by the way he’d emphasized the ‘you’ — like he couldn’t believe his eyes. “Why, is it yours, too?”
    He ignored the crack. (Later on I found out that indeed, he’d been on the receiving end of a generous helping of Dhana’s sarcasm.)
    â€œWe have a proposition to make,” the man said. His attitude made it