Sharon Green - The Warrior Rearmed

I sat beside the pretty little blue pond, just in the shade of a nearby tree, trying to rid myself of the gray mood of brooding. Constructive thought is almost impossible in that kind of mood, but it had descended on me the night before and I couldn’t seem to shake it. With all the problems I had, I should have been spending my time considering solutions, but all I felt capable of tackling right then was sitting still and breathing in the fresh, clear air.

My mind was so close to being shut down from self-centered consideration, I nearly missed the faint, unfamiliar mind trace. It was near enough to cause me to focus on it immediately, but I hadn’t been wrong in my first, fleeting impression: there was a small, frightened animal somewhere in the grass near me. On that planet it could have been something a lot more harmful, but I hadn’t been as frightened as I once would have been. I’d been growing on Rimilia, but I still had a far distance to go.

In curiosity I touched the mind of the small animal, automatically soothing its fright, and a bright-eyed head suddenly popped up above the grass to look at me, sharing my curiosity. The animal was only a little above a foot long, fluffy dark-red fur covering it, pointed ears above shiny black eyes, a small button nose and mouth. The sight of it charmed me, and when the adorable little thing saw and felt my smile, it moved toward me in small, delicate hops, landing in my lap after quickly covering the ten feet between us. A purring sound came when I began to stroke the soft, thick fur, the contentment in its mind so strong it nearly acted as a balm on my own agitation. I turned to look at the cool pond water as I continued to stroke the animal, and made sure my gray mood was blocked from it completely.

“So there you are,” a voice came a minute later from behind me, breaking into the semi-trance of peace I’d almost fallen into. I wasn’t totally startled, and was able to calm the small animal in my lap before it could panic and bolt. The voice had come from Lenham Phillips, a brother empath of mine, and Len’s calming thoughts joined mine as soon as he realized there was a mind that needed calming. Len’s abilities weren’t as strong as mine, and he wore a wry expression as he came up beside me to lower himself into the grass.

“Sorry about that,” he said, gesturing toward the animal that had turned its head to look at him. “I didn’t realize you had company here. Tammad’s been searching for you, and he’s getting more and more annoyed the longer he can’t find you. I think you’d better head back.”

I just turned my face from him without saying anything, sending my attention back to the tall shade trees and wide bushes all about us. I wasn’t quite used to seeing a man of my world dressed in the haddin of the men of Rimilia, but Len felt as comfortable and natural in the brief body cloth as he had begun to look. The newest addition to his wardrobe was a swordbelt, the wide hilt of the weapon protruding from its top a still-unaccustomed thrill to the blond man beside me. I knew that Len had been given his first lesson with a sword that morning, and although he wasn’t as big or accomplished as his teachers he must have done well enough to please them. Len would have checked the truth of their professed opinions in their minds, and if they hadn’t really been pleased his own mind wouldn’t have glowed as it did.

“Terry, ignoring me won’t change anything,” Len said, stirring where he sat. “Tammad agreed to let me try to find you, but if we don’t show up pretty soon, he’ll come after you himself. You shouldn’t have come out here alone to begin with; once he sees you’re safe and his worry disappears, all he’ll be left with will be anger.”

“I don’t care,” I muttered, tightening my shield even more around my reactions to the thought of Tammad’s anger. No matter how strong I grew I still couldn’t seem to keep from turning pale and shaky at the thought of facing an irate Tammad. The beast had more than one advantage over me—which brought me right back to my original problems.

“The hell you don’t care,” Len snorted, reaching a hand out to stroke the side of the small animal in my lap. “You’ve been jumping from one emotional reaction to another since Tammad rebanded you last night, but indifference wasn’t part of the group. Frankly, I don’t think you’re capable of being indifferent toward him.”

The flash of anger I felt had to be two-thirds embarrassment, but that only made it worse. I’d had enough embarrassments on that world to last anyone a lifetime, and all the feeling made me want to do was strike back. Without stopping to think about it I hurled a command at the little animal I held, and not thinking about it made the action more effective. Accompanied by a growl the animal’s sharp, white teeth flashed toward Len’s hand, causing him to snatch it back with a yelp of startlement. If he hadn’t moved so fast he would have been bitten, and he wouldn’t have been able to move so fast if he hadn’t caught the sudden attack rage in the animal’s mind. The little animal, picking up Len’s burst of startlement and not understanding why it had briefly been aggressive, hopped quickly out of my lap and disappeared into the grass, ignoring my attempts to call it back. The calm I needed to calm its flurried thoughts was beyond me then, and that made me more upset.

“Now see what you’ve done!” I snapped at Len, turning my head to glare at him. “The little thing is gone and it’s all your fault. Why didn’t you leave me alone?”

“My fault?” Len demanded, his blue eyes hardening at the accusation. “You coerce it into attacking me, and its my fault? Terry, if I didn’t owe you for breaking me out of a slave cell in that city, I’d . . .

“You don’t owe me for anything!” I interrupted, not liking the way his mind firmed up behind his stone-hard stare. His thought patterns were more like a Rimilian’s than ever, and I wasn’t used to coping with that sort of reaction from him. “If I hadn’t gotten you and Garth loose that night, you would have been released the next day anyway. You don’t owe me a thing. Not a thing!”

I turned in the grass and started to throw myself to my feet, but somehow Len knew I was going to run from him. His hand might not have been as big as Tammad’s, but it was still big enough to flash out and wrap around my ankle to hold me down. In desperation I kicked at him, frantic to get loose, but his other hand caught my second ankle and I was down in the cool grass on my face, caught the way I was always caught on that world. I struggled and tried to kick out again, but a single twist forced me to my back, and then Len was kneeling across me.

“That’s more than enough,” he said, grabbing my arms to hold me still. “If I hadn’t had some success in copying that shield you developed, I’d be flat on the ground from that whirlpool of frenzy you’ve been leaking. You’re going to tell me what’s bothering you, Terry, and then we’re going to talk it over like two adults. Walking around shielded all the time is too much like being unawakened, and I don’t want to have to do it any longer.”

I stared up at him, feeling the constriction he was talking about, but somehow helpless to do anything about it. My thoughts were like a whirlpool, twisting around and around without going anywhere, dragging me farther down into the depths and taking more of my strength the longer I fought them. I stirred against the unyielding grip of his hands, having not the faintest idea of where to begin, but the spinning had enough ideas of its own.

“Len, it isn’t true that the Amalgamation would sell me, is it?” I blurted, distantly shocked that I’d had the nerve to put that particular problem into words. “They wouldn’t just—hand me over to the first man who had something they wanted, and who decided he wanted me? They’d remember how long I’d worked for them, and that I was one of them, and refuse to turn their backs on me—wouldn’t they?”