What #Price Would You Pay For #Freedom?

Hey Everyone!!

I'm back with another peek at what Petri and her friends are up to. It seems there may be light at the end of the tunnel, but nothing good comes without a price. ;-)

Excerpt from book two of the Petri Dish Chronicles:
Chessie shook her head. "What do you think the Arcanum are going to do now?"

"I don't think. I know."

"How?" asked Daji.

"When I attacked the Collective, I broke through all their barriers. I saw what they are planning."

"You saw all their plans?"

"Yes. I don't understand them all, but I saw them. And I know what they're going to demand in exchange for letting us go."

"You think they will let us go, now that you have attacked them?"

Petri nodded firmly. "Yes. No one was killed or permanently harmed in my attack, and the Arcanum have really strict rules against killing people they consider sentient. They won't kill me, and they won't want to try to hold me against my will anymore."

"So what will they do?"

She sighed. "When I told you before that everything the Arcanum told me was common knowledge among them, that wasn't completely true. Most of what they told me was, but I had to trade to get the information about the Hatari. That's something that only a few of the oldest of them know."

Chessie reached out and gripped Petri's hand. "Will they be angry that you told us?"

Petri shook her head. "No. They don't consider you people, so they don't care what you know or don't know. It would be like if Daji told one of your secrets to Kivuli. You wouldn't care."

Looking over at the tessa in question, Chessie relaxed and let go of Petri's hand. The animal responded to the sudden attention she was receiving by preening and wrapping even more of Sadaka's hair around herself. The silent child reached up to pet and settle the animal down, and the adults at the table smiled, the small injection of humor cutting the tension in the room.

"All right, then, hun, what did you have to trade for that information?"

Grimacing, Petri took a deep breath. "The Arcanum who trained me went through my mind before I learned how to keep it out. It couldn't see everything, which is why it agreed to bargain with me, but it saw some of what happened on Upworld."

"Well, that's not so bad," said Chessie, slowly, a look of confusion on her face. "Unless…"

Hm... Unless what, I wonder? I guess you'll all have to read the book to find out. ;-)  Yeah, I know, I'm horrible. But I'm really hoping to be able to release it in the next couple of months, so it won't be too much of a wait. :-)  Thanks for stopping by, everyone, and don't forget to check back tomorrow for another edition of Mistral Dawn's Musings! :-)