(What is your need, Haras-hatani?)
He might wake one morning and find Duun gone, only because Duun knew how desperately he needed him, and needing him was wrong.
Perhaps Duun was waiting for something. (For me to attack him, for me to start it this time…) But Thorn would lose. Events had proved that. And he nursed a more dreadful suspicion: that if he did not he would lose all the same-for Duun would not abide defeat. Duun would go. He would be alone finally, utterly alone, among all the meds and the strangers they foisted off on him. So he wished only to hold his own. Forever. And not to displease Duun, which seemed mutually impossible.
He played the dkin for Duun. He sat on the riser. (“We’re in the city now,” Duun said, “and cityfolk don’t use the floor except to walk on.” It seemed unreasonable to Thorn. He liked the warmth of the sand and the ability to shape himself a place in it. But Duun said; and he did as he was told.) He played the songs he knew. Duun played him others. This had not changed, and it soothed him and made Duun smile.
I one day wandered down a road that I had never known;
I one day came upon a path that I was never shown.
It wended up and down the hills
And wandered through the dell,
And there I met a clever man
Whose like no song can tell.
I never met a man his like:
I never hope to say
How he was like and unlike me,
This man I met that day.
He had my look, he had my eyes,
He had my ways, for true.
Why, fool, he said, and sang the song
That I’ve just sung to you.
Thorn laughed when Duun had sung it. Duun smiled and adjusted a string. “Let me have it,” Thorn said.
“Ah, there’s no revenge. My repertoire is endless.” The scarred lip twisted. It did that in such a smile. “Damn.” The string had snapped. Thorn winced. “It’s old,” Duun said. “Quite old. I’ll get another tomorrow.” Duun gave the dkin to him to put away, and Thorn took the instrument and put it carefully in its case. “Get some sleep,” Duun said.
“Yes,” he said. And turned, again, on his knees on the riser, for Duun had gotten up and come up behind him, and Thorn was wary of that. He looked up. Duun stared at him a long moment and turned and walked away. The silence left Thorn cold. He snapped the case shut.
(He was thinking something. He was planning something. He meant me to know. Gods, what?)
Duun stopped in the doorway that led back to the other rooms. Looked back again. Walked on.
(Waiting for me to do-what?)
(Does Duun ever do anything without a reason? Does he ever make the least move without a reason?)
(I’m scared of those people. Does he know?)
A confusion of white light and white sand- the gymnasium spun and the sand met Thorn’s back: he rolled and came up on his feet with lights exploding in his eyes.
“Again,” Duun said.
Thorn’s left knee buckled and went out from under him. He landed on his knees in shock, feeling the abrasions. The skid had cost his shoulders too. Sweat stung there. He knelt there and lifted a hand to signal a wait till the daze should pass.
Duun walked over and took his face between his hands, pulled his eyelids back to face the light, felt over his skull.
“Again,” Thorn said. Duun shoved his head free with a force that rocked him, cuffed his ear and backed off.
Thorn got to his feet and stood there wide-legged and wobbling.
“So you haven’t learned it all, minnow. Slow, this time. Step by step again.”
Thorn came, reached out his hand in the slow dance Duun wanted, turned and turned and ended up again in the way of Duun’s slow-moving arm.
“That’s how. Do it, minnow.”
There was a counter for it. It arrived against Thorn’s ribs in slow-motion and he evaded the feigned force of it. Sweat flew from him and spattered the sand, flung from his hair as he snaked his body back. Duun faced him, hands on knees. Duun did not sweat. His tongue lolled at times, his mouth open and showing his sharp teeth. But it flicked and licked the saliva clear. Duun bent now and invited attack. “Keep it slow, Thorn. I’ve still got tricks.”