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Knives [Darkover series]
by Marion Zimmer Bradley
Category: Fantasy/Science Fiction
Description: Marna was being badly abused at home. But she was only thirteen--not old enough to take the oath. Would the Renunciates believe and help her when her own mother would not?
eBook Publisher: Marion Zimmer Bradley Literary Works Trust, 1985 Free Amazons of Darkover
eBookwise Release Date: June 2007
 
46 Reader Ratings:
Available eBook Formats: OEBFF Format (IMP) [29 KB]
Words: 5784
Reading time: 16-23 min.
Marna shivered on the cold steps as she heard the bell jangle somewhere inside the house--this strange house which she had never expected to approach. The sign, she knew, said that this was the Guild House of the Comhi-Letzii; but Marna could spell out only a few letters. Her stepfather had told her mother that there was no point in teaching a woman to read more than enough to spell out a public placard, or sign her name to a marriage contract. Her own father had had a governess for her, insisting that she should share her brother's lessons. She swallowed hard, the pain like a knife at her throat, remembering her father. He would have protected her, when even her mother would not. No, she told herself, she would not cry, she must not cry.
She wondered which one of them would open the door; maybe the tall one she had seen at Heathvine, riding astride like a man, her little bag of midwife's supplies on the saddle behind her. I could have spoken to her at Heathvine, Marna thought. But then she had been too frightened, too intimidated. Her stepfather would surely have killed her if he had suspected.... She winced, as if she could feel his hard hands on her, the knife again, sharp at her throat. He had forbidden her to speak to the Amazon midwife, and emphasized the threat with heavy pinches which had left her upper arm bruised and blue.
She looked around apprehensively, as if Ruyvil of Heathvine might come around the corner at any moment. Oh, why didn't they open the door? If he found her here, he would surely kill her this time!
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