Read Online The Fall by Christie Meierz - Free Book Online Page A

until I had more than I could keep in my room. I left them all behind when I eloped with John, but then I could just hold on to him instead.” She picked up the stylus and added tiny lines to the curve of a sculpted plant.
    “Why do you create images which sadden you, my love?”
    “Because memories are all I have left of who I was and what I had.” She laid book and stylus aside.
    “One day you might see those places again.” He leaned back on his elbows and stretched his legs before him, ankles crossed. “I would like to see Earth.”
    She swiveled a startled face. “But you can’t,” she protested. “Wouldn’t it kill a bonded ruler to leave the planet?”
    “It would, but I need not always be bonded to my province. One day I will tire of ruling, and the Jorann will remove my ruling bond so that my daughter can succeed me. Perhaps then we might travel, you and I. Even now Tolar prepares to establish diplomatic relations with Earth, soon or late. Other races, including humans, will come here. Tolari will go out among the stars. We could be among them.”
    Her eyes glistened. “I can’t leave, not while Central Command wants me dead. If they find out I’m alive, even if I never set foot in human space, no one could protect me from the Chairman. And if Central Command gets wind of the Jorann’s blessing, I would become a prize as well as a target.”
    “Do you regret this, then?” He caressed the youthful skin of her face.
    He sensed her barriers begin to close, but then she went still, her emotional landscape whirling with indecision. After a long moment, resolution swept away the uncertainty. She took a deep breath and turned fully to face him.
    “There have been a few times in these last few weeks that I’ve regretted taking the blessing, because it means I can’t see my children and grandchildren again,” she said. “But being with you—no. I don’t regret that. I can’t ever regret that.”
    * * *
    The hilltop opposite the Monral’s stronghold offered both a spectacular view of the sunset and sufficient distance from the troublesome emotions of others to allow the exercise of a sensitive’s more delicate abilities. Normally. Sharana focused her attention once more on the small crawling creature her student compelled to walk in patterns on a flat rock, and fought the gleeful satisfaction coming to her from her beloved, who had secreted himself since midday deep under the stronghold, in a place where only ruling caste and guards went.
    He plots an assassination . She shuddered. He had always schemed, like every member of his caste, but he had usually listened to her… before the Sural humiliated him. Then he had turned inward, and the confidences he once showered on her diminished and stopped, until she had no clear idea if he remained within the bounds of honor.
    Where had her influence gone? Their friendship began in childhood and grew into heart play. He trusted her more than he had his own father— had trusted her, a bitter thought whispered. No longer . The tens of years they spent as pledge-partners, the ten years of their bonding, had vanished like a mist from the far shores of sleep. Now her Monral directly schemed to send another soul into the dark. Her heart shrank back from it, repelled.
    “Scholar? When may I stop?”
    Sharana started, inwardly cursing her wandering thoughts, and brought her eyes back to her student. Despite the cool breeze, sweat stained the girl’s dark green robe. This would not do; her student deserved her full attention, not this half-consideration. “Release the creature and return to your mother’s farm,” she said, her tone sharper than she had intended. Irritated with her inability to concentrate, she pushed herself upright and left the girl roiling with confusion. Explanations could wait until the next lesson. For now, she could not trust herself to maintain a tutor’s proper discipline.
    She trod down the hill, paying little attention to where she