"She asked the
watchdragon to wake her at daybreak Telgar time. She wanted to get there before their
workday started or she'd have to drag her parents back from a mine-face. Tarvi Telgar
drove his people as much as he drove himself.
"'To forget Sallah', her mother had once told her daughter, her
face drawn down in mournful lines.
"'Everyone knows that', Torene replied, but
she'd been little more than nine or ten when she asked why Telgar worked such long hours,
esepcially when that deprived her of her parents' company.
"'Ah, but dushka', her father had said in his
deepway-down bass voice, 'not as he knows it and lives with it. Eh, Sonja?'
Volodya Ostrovsky would cast a knowing glance at his wife and fellow mining engineer.
"'To us the tragedy is that it is after
that he realized that she was the jewel she was', Sonja replied, her voice doleful. her
mother's expressive face and voice had always fascinated Torene: she ran such a gamut of
emotions throughout a day.
"That morning Torene and Alaranth arrived at
her parents' cavern just as Sonja was pouring Klah and, to her daughter's astonishment,
she was pouring it into three cups." |
"The next morning, having
asked the watchdragon to wake her at daybreak, Telgar time, Torene arrived at her parents'
cavern just as Sonja was pouring Klah and, to her daughter's astonishment,
she was pouring it into three cups, and there was a third bowl of steaming porrige set at the
table." |