Three Hands for Scorpio Read Online Free PDF

Duty’s visit, was our joint thought, been made to assure that we would be present?), and a moment later our mother swept in bearing her guise of great lady, seldom used when we were alone. Upon occasion she could summon such an aura of power as daunted most persons involved in her dealings.
    We curtseyed as she came into the full light of the lamps and seated herself in the chair Cilla had hurriedly placed to face us. We did not dare to reseat ourselves until she pointed with her closed fan to the chest by the bed. There we settled, one squeezed against the other, like three errant children awaiting a knuckle-rapping for shared mischief.
    â€œYou know what you have done,” she began. “Your father’s plans are now in such a snarl-up as he may not be able to untangle. These Gurlys are hotheads, either by temperament or choice, to further matters of intrigue. So far, at least, Starkadder has not summoned his men and ridden forth, vowing dire retribution for insult, but who can say what will chance in the next days—even hours?”
    It was Bina, usually the most prudent of us, who replied: “My lady Mother, would you have a Scorpy so insolently bespoken and make no proper answer?”
    Surprisingly, Mother shook her head. “Yes, that brutish boy should take the first blame. I must be honest with you: he is fit meat for steel. And”—she paused—“our blood never takes kindly to insolence.”
    â€œWas he”—I leaned forward a little to center our mother’s attention—“perhaps ordered to do what he did?”
    To our amazement, we were favored with a slight smile. “You show well your training, Tamara. Am I right in believing that you also, Drucilla, Sabina, share this astute guess?”
    We nodded, daring to feel slight relief. Surely we had been summoned for punishment, as we had gone directly against her orders. However, the
tone in which she addressed her last question was the one she had always used at lesson time when she was pleased with how well a particular subject of instruction had been absorbed. But before she spoke again, our father was with us. Once more we rose to pay him full honor.
    He bowed slightly in return and pulled up another chair to join our mother. Perhaps he had been appointed to be our judge in this matter.
    â€œTamara,” our mother ordered, “give us again this suspicion you hold.”
    I repeated my words as Father listened.
    â€œSo,” he commented when I had finished, “you have concerned yourselves with peering behind outward action to find causes. Indeed, it well becomes Scorpy minds to interest themselves with strange ways that may lead into the Dark.”
    â€œFirst,” he held up his right hand, turning the fingers under and using only the thumb to keep record, “Lord Starkadder remains under this roof. Two or three of his major kin have argued with him, and he told them to ride out if they wished, but he was not calling for his mount.”
    â€œSecond”—forefinger arose beside thumb—“that graceless son of his sought out the king’s man, Udo, but the Chosen did not appear to welcome him with either trumpet or drum. It was also plain that Starkadder himself did not find his whelp’s action acceptable. One of his lesser retainers was sent with an order which, like a hound’s leash, brought the cub back to his sire fast enough.”
    â€œThird”—Father’s middle finger added to the tally—“such musing as you have just voiced, my daughters, is given greater strength by what I have heard during the past months of my striving to arrange a Border court. Rumors are flying, some of them outside belief, but others easily latched to the actions here.”
    â€œFourth,” and his ring finger straightened, “Starkadder has continued to agree to the court. I voiced a way to save face—I suggested that his son had perhaps been