“There she is,” a voice came, a rough voice under strict control. “Sitting and enjoying the view after making us lose half our insides. A good job well done.”
I jerked my head around at the sharp bitterness in Garth’s voice, seeing him standing with Len and Tammad less than ten feet away. I was only just beginning to be able to detect their emotions, undoubtedly due to the way I’d drained much of my strength. Len and Garth looked terrible, the emotions coming from them matching perfectly, but Tammad only looked angry; as soon as he got closer, though, I changed that description to furious. They stopped about a foot away and stared down at me, and I felt a sudden need to say something.
“I really didn’t mean to include you three in on that,” I told them, resting my head back against the tree as I looked up at them. “You ought to be more careful of the company you keep.”
“That’s very amusing,” Len said, trying to stand straighter. “You have a great sense of humor, Terry—and don’t feel the slightest trace of guilt.”
“I don’t see a need for guilt,” I answered, the hardness in all their thoughts beginning to make me uneasy. “It was an accident that the wave caught you three, not something done on purpose. Why should I feel guilty?”
“How about for the way you’ve been manipulating people all day?” Len demanded, his handsome face twisting in anger. “Well, well, now I can see the guilt, but only a small flash, not very impressive. You’re not sorry about what you did, only sorry that you got caught.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” I snapped, moving my back away from the tree. “And with a talent like yours, I doubt if you know, either!”
“That was unnecessary, Terry,” Garth put in as Len reddened and stiffened in insult. “Len’s talent may not be as strong as yours, but he’s strong enough to know when people have been twisted around. When we stopped to think about it, we found that almost all of us have been touched—even Tammad.”
My eyes were immediately and irresistibly drawn to the barbarian, who stood to the left of the others, his arms folded across his chest, his fury still under his control but also still growing. He hadn’t said a word yet, but that didn’t mean he was unconcerned.
“Well, why shouldn’t I touch you?” I stormed, glaring at all of them as I got to my feet. “You three get a lot of fun out of pushing me around, but you don’t like it as much when I start pushing back, do you? If you three can do what you like with me, I can do the same with you!”
“No,” Tammad said, the single word overriding the protest coming from the other two. “The picture you show with your words is a false one, a thing designed to justify evil, and I will not accept it.”
He unfolded his arms and moved closer to me, the anger coming from him strong enough to make the other two men retreat a step. I retreated too, back up against the tree, but he was still much too close.
“You feel yourself badly treated,” he said, his words as harsh as his eyes were hard. “And yet, that which was done to you was done with your full knowledge, allowing you to resist as best you might. We, ourselves, were not accorded this privilege, instead being attacked in cowardly fashion, from a direction invisible to us. This was not the treatment received by you at our hands.”
“You sound so damned sanctimonious,” I said, frightened but unable to hold the words back. “Do you really think it makes any difference whether or not I can see what you’re doing to me? How am I supposed to stop you, any of you? I’m as helpless as a child against your strength, just as you’re helpless against my talent. It’s an even trade, damn it, an even trade!”
“No,” he said again, this time shaking his head. “Should we give you discomfort or pain, it is an unfortunate occurrence in our attempts to aid you to happiness. The same does not hold true for your attempts. You seek only to avenge that which need not have been, had you only been willing to heed and believe in that which was told you. When I took you as my woman, I wished only to share the happiness brought me by your presence. I now find there is no longer happiness to share.”
“That isn’t true,” I whispered, my voice ragged because of my attempts to hold the tears back. “You weren’t trying to share happiness with me, you were trying to force it on me. And I don’t care if you don’t like this side of me. If you want the dagger, you have to take both edges.”
“But one need not be cut on either edge,” he said as Len stirred and got ready to come closer. “Your displeasure was with me. It should not have reached out to give pain to others. It is primarily this for which you will be punished.”
“No!” I cried as he wrapped his hand around my arm, cutting off whatever Len had been about to say, cutting into Garth’s exclamation of surprise. Pulling against his grip was worse than useless, as the effort caused him to tighten his hold. I cried out again as he pulled me back toward his pavilion, finding it as impossible to touch his mind as it was to deny the strength of his body. I was too tired from the projection to reach him, his anger too thick to work through. I was dragged stumbling and struggling back to his pavilion, amid knots of angry, glowering people, pulled inside, then roughly relieved of the imad and caldin. I ranted even as I shivered in the warm air, trying to tell him how wrong he was, but one look at the switch took all the words away. I backed away across the fur as he came closer, shaking my head, too well aware of how determined he was, then backed into the drape which divided the pavilion. Drowning in panic, I jerked the drape up and half fell behind it, trying to find a way out, but there was none. He found me again even as I tried to scramble past him, began beating me even. as I begged him not to. I didn’t want to be punished, it wasn’t fair that he punish me when nobody punished him, but that didn’t stop the beating. He switched me until I cried, until I projected my pain and fear, until I tried frantically to make him believe I was sorry. At that point I was sorry, desperately sorry, and he finally seemed to be satisfied. He left me crying hysterically in my furs, straightened the drape, then sat himself down in the front half of the pavilion.
It was a long time before the sobbing quieted down enough to let me do more than know how much I ached. Even the warm, gentle furs touching me hurt, but I found that the beating had somehow clarified and illuminated exactly what I’d done so that I understood it. As a child I hadn’t understood what experimenting with people meant, but as an adult I should have known better than to let the poison get a hold on me. Sure I could control people and sure it was easy—as long as no one found out about what I was doing. The anger of the other people in the camp was a really frightening thing, and I’d forgotten all about that part of it until I’d been dragged through it. The switching seemed to have rubbed my nose in the truth—the truth that I might have been hit with rocks and fists for what I bad done instead of just getting switched. I shivered as the thrill of fear increased, sending me a picture of my body lying on the ground instead of in warm, comfortable furs, broken and bloody and lifeless instead of throbbing painfully from a beating given in punishment. Whether he knew it or not, Tammad had saved my life again, and I stirred in the furs, wanting to go to him, but I couldn’t go to him and pride had nothing to do with it. Where the barbarian was concerned I had very little pride left, and if I went to him I would beg him to hold me and comfort me—a luxury I couldn’t afford to indulge in. He still wanted nothing more than my talent, and I couldn’t live with that. If I went to him I would begin wanting to please him again, and that would be the end of me.
I was left alone so long I fell asleep, and when I awakened the evening meal was ready—along with the rest of my punishment. Garth, Len and Gay had joined Tammad in the front of his pavilion, and I was made to serve and apologize to each of Tammad’s guests individually—without my imad and caldin. I was told to begin with Gay and I did so, burning with embarrassment, but I should have been watching her emotions rather than my own. I was expecting nothing more than scorn and humiliation from her, but when I extended her bowl of food and opened my mouth to apologize, she shrank back in fear before a single word was spoken. Her green eyes were wide and terror-filled, her skin was pale, and her mind was on the verge of being paralyzed with fear. It was clear she hadn’t come into the pavilion voluntarily, and I did some shrinking back myself from the deep revulsion and horror she projected. Len turned to her with concern on his face, his mind trying to soothe hers, but before he could break through the emotional barrier she had erected, she jumped to her feet, looked around wildly, then raced out of the tent.