Diadem from the Stars Read Online Free Page A

stripping the quilts and sheets away. Aleytys sighed and scrubbed her hands hard across her face. “Huh!” she muttered. “Don’t see how you do it. I hate waking.”
    She edged along the wall and slid her own closet open. Carelessly she rummaged through the untidy mess of bottles and wrinkled ties until she rooted out her own hairbrush. With a gaping yawn, she dropped on the naked mattress and began working the knots out of her fine red hair. “Ai-Aschla!” She jerked on the brush. “Ow! I swear I’ll cut it all off.”
    Twanit chuckled as she folded the sheets together. “How many times’ve you said that, Leyta?” Aleytys smiled reluctantly and began working on another knot. “If you’d just braid it like I do,” Twanit went on. She tucked the bundle under her arm and elbowed the door farther open. “Trouble is …” She gave a tinkling giggle and flapped her luxurious eyelashes. “You’re just too vain, that’s all.” As the brush bounced off the door she whisked away down the hall.
    Aleytys stood up and made a face at the door. She wriggled out of the nightgown and rummaged in the closet for a clean abba. As her fingers automatically tied the closings at shoulder, breast, and waist, she looked around the room. “Twanit’d have a fit,” she said, chuckling. She picked up the gown and tossed it into her closet without bothering to fold it. Then she picked up her brush, pulled a handful of red-gold hair from the bristles, and flipped it into the closet. Whistling breathily between her teeth, she slid the panel shut, dropped the wad of hair into the wastebasket, and strolled out into the hall.
    Zavar backed out of a childroom and stood glaring at its invisible occupants. “Hai! You Mavashi! Get out of those beds. Now!” She shoved her tumbled brown hair back from her small harassed face. Shrill hoots of laughter answered her and she ground her teeth. “Oh, you wait!”
    â€œVari?”
    â€œLeyta.” Her face lit up. “Madar bless. Jorchi and the Kur are impossible this morning. Give me a hand a minute, will you?”
    Aleytys grinned. “Sure. I’ll kick their teeth in while you twist a few arms.” She walked briskly to the door and looked in.
    The two boys were perched on their narrow beds, shrieking with laughter, wrapped like worms in woolen cocoons.
    Zavar pressed her lips firmly together and darted back into the room. When she grabbed at him, Jorchi wiggled away, wrapping himself further into the quilts until all she could see of him was a pair of bright mocking eyes topped with a tangled mop of black hair. “Oh, fash!” she groaned.
    As soon as Jorchi’s full attention was on Zavar, Aleytys pounced on him, winding one hand in his curls. She jerked him out of the covers with a practiced flip while he wriggled and howled and swung at her with his small fists.
    â€œJorchi!” She shook him lightly. “Quit acting like a one-summer’s baby. Stand there and shut up or I’ll put you over my knee and warm your bottom so you can’t sit from Aabkiss to Zebkiss.”
    He squealed and clawed at her arm, flaring up in sudden childish anger. “Let me go! I’ll tell, I’ll tell.… Bitch … red bitch … not ’sposed to touch us kids.… Get your stinking hands off me!”
    Aleytys flinched and opened her fingers. Feeling sick, she rubbed her hand up and down her side staring dumbly at the contorted red face of the boy.
    Zavar gasped. She bounced off the bed and slapped the boy’s face, her hand splatting loudly in the sudden silence. “Never let me hear you talk like that again, you hear!”
    His eyes dropped and he stood abashed at his own daring and startled by the violent reaction from gentle Zavar.
    â€œSay you’re sorry.” Zavar took the back of his neck in her hand and shook him. “Hear me?”
    He