Read Online Changing of the Glads by Joy Spraycar - Free Book Online Page A

to get close to you.”  His gaze drifted to the ground, and he picked up a handful of needles, tightening his fingers around them.
    Zalphia cringed, imagining what they would be doing to the inside of his hand.
    “I knew how it would affect me.”  He opened his fist and let the crushed bits fall to the ground, then his eyes met hers.  They darkened, and his brow lowered.  “But I would do anything to rescue you from the horrors of the arena.”
    Inhaling slowly, Zalphia’s chest shuddered and shook as she released the air.  “I... uh.”
    Did he know just what Platy had put her through all those years ago?  She hoped that at least that remained hidden.  She set her jaw.  He didn’t need to know what she suffered at the hands of her trainer.  But inside the arena, there she seldom felt as he had. 
    “I’ve never lost a match.  No, I don’t see that my life has been all that horrible.”
    “Of course.” His head bobbed.  “You would not consider it so as you have nothing to compare it to.  No normal life with a family.” 
    “I had parents.”  Defense seemed the best way to show him she hadn’t lost as much as he assumed.
    “Living as a small child amidst a family hardly constitutes a normal life.  Do you even remember it?”  He didn’t wait for her to answer.  “Of course you don’t.”
    But she did.  She remembered vividly the day her mother delivered her into Platy’s hands.  For months after Platy’s cruelty, she pictured the look on her mother’s face.  The declarations of love as tears were spilled into her hair.  She’d never forget how she pulled away and stood by the trainer, ignoring the last piece of caring she would ever feel.  Did Max know how many times she wished she could go back?  Do it all again?  She would have thrown her arms about her mother’s neck and let her know that she, too, was loved.
    “All you remember is the Glad way of life.  But if I could let you peek into the life we had before, you would do anything to get back there.”
    The babbling brook and droopy tree drove the pained separation of her and her mother from her thoughts.  She closed her eyes, remembering all he had shown her before their bout and the subsequent annihilation of a whole arena full of humankind .  If that had been a glimpse of the past, something the two of them had experienced together, she wished to go back.  She wanted that, that and more of touching lips and feeling his warm bare skin pressed against hers.  But how could they have that?  The Arena Board would never stop hunting them.
    “Oh, Zalphia, it is so wonderful there.  Peaceful, calm, and beautiful.  The place I took you to in your mind, it was our special spot.  And there was the music you played.”
    Zalphia’s eyes flew open.  “What?  Music?  What is that?”
    “You’ve heard it before.  You know the thing Platy put on that machine?”
    He’d seen that?  How?
    “Yes, that is music.  And you used to play it.”
    She shook her head.  “I don’t understand.”
    A slight smile tipped his lip, and he seemed to be looking somewhere far away.  “Your favorite, the cello.  You played an instrument called the cello.”
    A lump formed behind her tongue, making breathing difficult and stealing her voice for a moment before she managed to swallow the obstruction.  Shudders shook her jaw.  “The music... Platy...  I could make that ?”
    He wrapped an arm around her shoulder, lending strength and warmth to the chill that overtook her.
    “You did.”  He closed his eyes and pulled her against his chest.  “Be certain, you were much better than anything Platy played for you here.  What you did was... well... heavenly.  That is what it was.  You brought tears to my eyes.”
    She leaned against his strong arm and let her eyelids slide closed, hearing the soft, deep melodies inside her head.  Need filled her.  She longed to hear the music again.  No, she longed to make it.  But it