In Solitary Read Online Free PDF Page A

normally overawe me unless it is accompanied by passion and fury. Stella looked about to fly at me tooth and nail. However, she merely shifted the baby’s position from one hip to the other. I watched the process, licking my lips nervously.
    ‘My father,’ she said finally, and very slowly, ‘was one of the five men who terrorized the mudwalkers for six months. The Soal eventually caught them together. They were boiled alive and then thrown to the crabs.’
    I found this difficult to believe, and felt she was over-dramatizing the execution of the men. So I said, ‘That sounds extremely primitive for the Soal.’
    Matter-of-factly she answered, ‘Perhaps they thought they needed to put out a strong warning?’
    I gave her a sideways look – in some ways Stella turned more soil with one thrust of a spade than I did after a long ploughing contemplation. Perhaps all women were naturally as astute. I had no way of knowing.
    ‘But five men? They could not be afraid of a gathering of five unarmed mudwalkers.’
    She gave me one of those superior smiles I had come to associate with female smugness and I realized that it was true – for a gathering of just Stella, myself and the baby girl would cause great alarm on the vat walks. Five men would amount to insurrection of no small nature. A thought occurred to me which I voiced out aloud.
    ‘The Soal must have very weak defences.’
    Stella smiled again.
    ‘You should know about that. You’ve lived there.’
    I said nothing for I was ashamed of the fact that the Soal defences, if they had any, were an unknown quantity to me. I had never had occasion to ask about them, and I doubted I would be informed if I had done. My violent thoughts had all been directed towards Endrod. It is difficult to entertain thoughts of revolution with only one head. These things need discussion. Revolution is forged out of many minds – at the most a single mind merely produces that substance from which the forging begins.
    ‘Stella …’ I was about to admit my failure whenshe held up a warning hand. I realized what was wrong and said rather superfluously:
    ‘Quickly, put distance between us. Someone’s coming. I told you we should not have walked together.’
    However, before I could move a few paces Stella called out, ‘It’s all right. It’s a human. I would know if it was the Soal.’
    She pointed and I followed the finger. A long way off a man was plodding on mudshoes towards us. We waited, expecting him to veer off when he saw us but he continued using us as his target, and the nearer he approached, the more anxious I became – not because of the Soal Law, but because of Stella’s reaction. She was watching him through narrowed eyes that bore obvious knowledge of the person they viewed.
    ‘Who is it?’ I asked quickly. I had a large blockage in my throat and my stomach was turning circles.
    ‘A friend,’ she said simply and then glanced possessively at the baby, which confirmed my suspicions.
    ‘Will I,’ I said, as casually as I could manage, ‘will I have to fight him?’
    Stella looked round, the eyes now widened. ‘What for? Besides he would kill you.’
    The man was quite close now and I saw what she meant. He was like a walking hill, huge and round, but not with fat – the muscles stood out in chunks on the broad expanse of his abdomen as he walked. Unlike my own, which hung free, his testicles were tied up between his legs. I guessed they were probably his only vulnerable piece of anatomy. Slung about his shoulders were two intricate fish traps.
    When he was about ten metres from me I unslung the crossbow and wound the mechanism. The balding giant stopped short.
    ‘That far and no farther,’ I warned.
    Stella slapped me hard across the arm with her free hand.
    ‘Don’t be stupid,’ she shouted.
    But I was resolute.
    ‘I’ll kill him before he makes another step,’ I barked. ‘Before he gets within arm’s reach.’
    The hill in front of me cracked across