Snippet #1076088

Kit listened intently as Amunet told her story, and felt a pang when the young woman mentioned something about losing people she loved to the disease as her thoughts were involuntarily directed towards her own family. She forgot all that as the tale continued, however, and focused with rapt attention on not only what her newfound friend was saying, but also on what she was not. As she spoke of her twin, Amunet's heartbeat increased, and Kit could nearly hear the blood rushing through her system and the sound of her throat constricting. She swore she could feel the other girl's pain, and her chest tightened reactively.

Then something changed. Amunet's voice grew stronger as she talked about her resolution to make herself stronger, to find the people who had loosed this awful disease upon the world at large. The heat of anger that she was emitting was a little shocking to her tablemate, who had never seen her mad at anything. So complete was her conviction, so strong the inflection behind it, that Kit was truly moved. Here was someone who had taken the worst of situations and decided to really make something of it. Not just to keep on living, but to truly be alive and proactive.

"Let me help you," she said softly at the conclusion of Amunet's speech. "I am not strong, but I know that I can be of some assistance. I lost my sister, too, and both of my parents. Until now, I never thought I'd be able to do anything about it, but... maybe I can, even if it's just a little."

Norman chose that moment to enter with three steaming bowls of stew, and Kit did not have to wonder long how much of the conversation he might have heard. "As to that," the old butler said with more authority in his tone than Kit was accustomed to, "I might be of some use. I was not always a manservant, and my previous profession may provide some assistance as well, should you wish it."

Katherine was startled. There was a hardness to Norman's tone that she had never before heard, and the sudden change confused her. For a moment, she wondered if the man speaking was even Norman at all. Her dismay must have been evident on her face, because he continued in a softer manner. "In addition to being employed as Master Wilson's butler, I was also his bodyguard, and I was in British law enforcement before that. Should you need help training yourself, I would be happy to give it." Kit sensed tightly-suppressed rage, and guessed that Norman was probably just as angry as either of the girls at what had been wrought.

She gestured for him to sit and take his meal with them, which once would have been extremely odd. Now, though, it seemed like so many of the boundaries of Kit's old life had ceased to exist, and this was one that she had disliked in the first place. It took him a minute, but eventually Norman sat, and he and his employer sipped at their stew, deciding to wait for Amunet to make her decision, something that by unspoken agreement neither of them would push. In truth, she was still a bit taken aback by Norman's confession, but she'd always known he was a little different from a typical manservant, and when the entire world was chaos, what was one more unexpected revelation?