Landfall (The Reach, Book 2) Read Online Free Page A

sleep.

    She didn’t know how long she’d been out, but when she was awoken by another of those teeth-rattling jolts, the Earth was far below.  As her eyelids drew apart , she started at the sight of it, the bright curve of the horizon far off in the distance, the shine of some far ocean in twilight, and below her the gloomy serenity of the land under the thrall of night.
    Her harness felt lighter now, as if it had been loosened while she slept.  She stirred, craning her neck to look upward through the bubble.
    Something was up there.  Something was approaching.
    Now the display terminal stuttered and came to life, and a face appeared.  It looked right at her and smiled.
     

 
    4
    Talia gathered her things and headed for the door.  She paused there, her fingers outstretched toward the handle as her mind raced with a thousand thoughts.
    Wait a minute.  Think.
    She was on edge.  Had been since she’d woken up early that morning, and she wasn’t thinking clearly.
    No.  I’ve been on edge since Knile walked back into my life two days ago.
    Talia wasn’t sure if she’d had a coherent moment since Knile had appeared out of thin air in her basement, materialising unannounced from the shadows as he always seemed to do.  He’d asked for her help getting into Grove, and she’d done as he asked, and then he’d continued on his way again.
    But he hadn’t left her thoughts yet.
    And now thoughts of Roman were floating around up there as well, banging around inside her already addled head and complicating things further.  Latent feelings of guilt had been aroused by meeting the boy again, emotions that she ’d thought she had caged in a deep dark place and secured with an iron padlock, but which had come bursting through her defences with dismaying effortlessness.
    And just when things couldn’t get any worse, Knile had called her back again yesterday afternoon to reveal that Roman was in danger, that the boy was about to walk into a trap, and that it was up to Talia to prevent it from happening.
    Typical, Knile.  Never around when I need you.
    But even as she thought that, she knew that she couldn’t brush the responsibility away quite so easily.  Talia was as much at fault for abandoning Roman as Knile was.  They had come to the decision together, telling themselves that it had been in the boy’s best interest to send him to Grove, that he would have a better life there.
    Whether it had been a decision based on altruism for the boy or just her own pure selfishness, she now couldn’t be sure.  She’d asked herself that very question a hundred times in the years since it had happened.
    In any case, she had to make things right.  Roman was in danger and it was up to her to save him, to warn him.  Knile was gone and he wasn’t coming back.  There was no one else to do the job.
    She pulled her hand back from the door and looked over her shoulder at her dismal little kitchen, her modest living room with its threadbare carpet.
    Not much of a place for Roman to live in, but we could manage.  Him and me, we could be happy here, if that’s what he wanted.  If he agreed to it.
    First things first.  Before anything else, she had to reach the boy and try to cut through his animosity toward her, make him listen.  She had to divert him from his course toward this Candidate program that Knile had spoken of, and maybe after that there would be time to discuss a reconciliation.
    So how do I get in contact with him?
    Yesterday afternoon, after the call from Knile, Talia had set out immediately toward Grove to see if she could gain entry in the hope of finding Roman inside.  That plan had not worked.  She had been turned away by the guards at the entrance, and this time there had been no old friends to show up and help her past them.  Discouraged, she had returned home, intent on rising early the next day to wait outside Grove yet again in the hope that Hildi or perhaps even Giroux himself might see her and usher