He grunted, doubled up in agony and fell out of the path
of the diving Toy. It whirred in frustration, hovered.
He writhed in agony, drawing up his knees, clawing at his shirt, while I
turned on Miellyn in immense fury--and stopped. Hers had been a move of
desperation, an instinctive act to restore the balance between a
weaponless man and one who had a knife. Rakhal gasped, in a hoarse voice
with all the breath gone from it:
"Didn't want to use. Rather fight clean--" Then he opened his closed
fist and suddenly there were _two_ of the little whirring droning
horrors in the room and this one was diving at me, and as I threw myself
headlong to the floor the last puzzle-piece fell into place: Evarin had
made the same bargain with Rakhal as with me!
I rolled over, dodging. Behind me in the room there was a child's shrill
scream: "Daddy! Daddy!" And abruptly the birds collapsed in midair and
went limp. They fell to the floor like dropping stones and lay there
quivering. Rindy dashed across the room, her small skirts flying, and
grabbed up one of the terrible vicious things in either hand.
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