"Come, girls!" said Sorpiala. She regarded Si'Wren contemptuously. "It
is our proper duty to see that justice is speedily executed! Let us go
and report this new outrage at once!"
"Aye," and "At once!" agreed several others almost in unison.
As one, the group of women turned and hiked up the slope, away from
edge of the pond where a trembling Si'Wren sat watching helplessly with
tears in her eyes.
"You know, she never could talk clearly, even before," said one
indistinctly, as their figures disappeared over the rise.
The last thing Si'Wren heard from them was a sudden chorus of more of
that awful, catty, girlish laughter. Then they were gone, leaving her
in her torment and abject sense of total abandonment, in the very
thrall of terror over what to expect next.
Eyes stung by salt tears, she averted her head abruptly from their
departing voices, and found herself staring at the peaceful stream
through blurred vision. Rising to her feet, she approached the water
unsteadily.
She cleared the water again with a sweep of her hand, and dipped up
some of it to wash her face.
Kneeling there, she beheld herself in the water's reflection.
There, like a stranger, she beheld the oval face of a timid-looking
girl of twelve years framed in long straight dark hair, an orphan who
had never known her parents, whose beauty, unperceived to her own
as-yet childish understanding, was as the beauty of the fruitful land
itself, even as the stars at night, or the radiant moonglow at it's
softest.
Pages:
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156