Read Online Jenna Starborn by Sharon Shinn - Free Book Online Page B

could hear shouts and clanking noises from the mine nearly a mile behind me. I was more surprised to hear sounds coming from before me, for the first I noticed that I was not alone in my walk was when I heard the breathy, unmelodic sound of someone singing off tune.
    I looked around quickly and finally spied the stranger sitting on a rustic bench installed by one of the hedges. She was badly dressed in a tunic and trousers that neither matched each other nor the oversize boots she had pulled on her feet. Her gray hair appeared to be uncombed, or at least neglected for the better part of the day, and her sallow face bore the evidence of some childhood scar that no one had bothered to pay to mend. All these signs led me to the obvious inferences : poor, underemployed, half-cit. These should not have led me to dislike her on sight, but there was a furtive, measuring expression in her eyes when she first caught my gaze that led me to distrust her instantly.
    â€œGood afternoon,” I said, civilly enough, but tersely. “I don’t believe I’ve seen you before.”
    Her eyes shifted behind me toward the compound. I wondered if she was meeting someone there or if that was where she belonged. “Is that right?” she said. “Well, I don’t believe I’ve seen you either.”
    â€œShould we have met?” I asked. “Do you belong here in Thorrastone Park?”
    A half-smile split her creased face. It did not make her any more attractive. “As well as I belong anywhere,” she said. Her voice had a strange, unplaceable accent, as well as a rusty quality. She did not seem to be a person who often engaged in idle conversation.
    â€œYou work here, then? In the mines?”
    She nodded in the direction of the compound, though the gesture was so vague that it could have meant she worked down in the spaceport, when she bothered to work at all. “Not in the mines, exactly,” she said, “but I do my job over there.”
    â€œYou’re a part of the cooking staff, perhaps?” I pursued.
    She emitted a type of laughter I could only characterize as a cackle. “Efghf!” was her next indistinguishable comment. “As if anyone would eat my cooking.”
    â€œLaundress, then? What exactly is your position?”
    Her smile was secretive and unnerving. I felt apprehension skitter down my spine. “I suppose you might call it tech support,” she said.
    â€œTech support!” I exclaimed.
    She added, before I could go on to voice my disbelief, “Just like you.”
    That stopped me with my mouth half open. It had not occurred to me that I would be known to anyone who was a stranger to me, and I could not imagine how this odd creature could have come to hear about me. “Then we have much in common,” I said stiffly.
    â€œEfghf,” she observed again. “I would doubt it.”
    I glanced around me at the sheer, effervescent forcefield, and thought it looked just the slightest bit paler than it had. “I check the fields every day,” I said, just in case she thought I took my duties lightly. “To make sure everything is holding properly. I never overlook this chore. I hope someone does the same down at the mining compound?”
    She shrugged elaborately. “Someone may,” she said. “It isn’t me. Not my sort of work.”
    â€œYes, well, I’m sure your task, whatever it is, is quite important,” I said, and I could not keep the cold tone from my voice. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll be on my way, continuing with my own work.”
    She waved a careless hand, as if releasing me from an obligation. “Go along with you. I’ll just sit here a while longer, enjoying the fine day.”
    I nodded curtly and moved off, very deliberately stepping to the edge of the fencing. I did not see what she could have done to harm it; theoretically, it could withstand most limited assaults, from