Читать книгу Red Sister онлайн | страница 29

‘She’s eight, Partnis!’

‘So her father said. She looks fifteen to me.’

Giljohn grabbed Saida’s arm and pulled her forward. ‘Feel her wrists!’ He pushed her head forward and ran a finger over the vertebrae knobbling the back of her neck. ‘Look here!’ He straightened her by her hair. ‘Fathers lie, but bones don’t. This one’s a prime at the least. Ain’t seen a gerant to beat her this trip. Could be full-blood.’

Partnis took Saida’s wrist and squeezed until she whimpered. ‘She’s got a touch, I grant you.’

‘Touch? She’s no damn touch.’

‘Half-blood if you’re lucky.’

And so it went on, Partnis allowing some of the children might be a touch or even half-bloods, Giljohn insisting they were all primes or even full-bloods.

Nona and a boy named Tooram he claimed showed clear evidence of hunska bloodlines. He slapped Tooram, then tried again and the boy interposed his arm before the blow could land. When he tried it on Nona she let him slap her, the hard length of his hand impacting the side of her head, leaving her ear buzzing and her cheek one hot outrage of pain. He did it again, with a scowl, and she scowled back, making no effort to avoid the blow which took her off her feet and replaced the grey sky with bright and flashing lights.

‘… idiot.’

Nona found herself on her feet, her shoulder in Giljohn’s iron grip, blood filling her mouth. She remembered the force of the slap, how her teeth had seemed to rattle.

‘You saw how fast she turned towards me.’

It was true – Nona’s lips felt four times their size and white spears of pain lanced up her nose. She had faced into the blow at the last moment.

‘I must have missed that part,’ Partnis said.

Nona swallowed the blood. She let the pain run through her – the cost she paid for taking money from Giljohn’s pocket. Some of the children, sold by their own fathers, almost saw the child-taker as their replacement. Stern, certainly, but he fed them, kept them safe. Nona took a contrary view. Her father had died on the ice and what memories she kept of him warmed her in the cold, tasted sweet when the world ran sour. He would have known how to treat a man like Giljohn.