Eric Flint’s place on the web

TIME SPIKE – snippet 37:

            Elaine Brown walked away as soon as Kathleen and the nurses were out the door. Neither Casey Fisher nor Marie Keehn looked in her direction. Barbara Ray’s comment about not knowing where the C.O. hid had struck a nerve, and neither of them wanted to be able to even guess where she would be holed up.

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            Instead, Marie and Casey watched the women work their way across the open ground. When they disappeared behind the trees and foliage, Marie whispered, “I really don’t like sending them off like that, with nothing to defend themselves with except one shotgun and three shells. They could run into some animal and…”

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BY SCHISM RENT ASUNDER – snippet 85:

.VII.

The Temple,

City of Zion,

The Temple Lands

            "Very well, Allayn," Zahmsyn Trynair's voice showed rather more irritation than he normally permitted it to as Rhobair Duchairn seated himself at the council table, "we're all here now. Now can you tell us what this is all about?"

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 BY SCHISM RENT ASUNDER — snippet 84:

        "I rather thought he might be." Cayleb leaned back, crossing his legs, and cocked his head as he contemplated Pine Hollow.

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TIME SPIKE – snippet 36:

            She keyed her way into the infirmary, hesitated, then left the door unlocked. If one of the prisoners decided to join Collins, she had just let him in. And that could be bad. But she might need a quick way out, and an unlocked door could be the difference between instant death and a chance at escape.

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BY SCHISM RENT ASUNDER – snippet 83:

            King Cayleb II sat on his throne as his "guest" was escorted into the throne room by a pair of extraordinarily alert royal guardsmen. The guardsmen's bootheels sounded loudly, firmly on the blue-swirled, lapis-like Charisian marble of the vast room's polished floor, but the Earl of Pine Hollow's lighter court shoes made almost no sound at all.

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TIME SPIKE – snippet 35:

Chapter 25

            Joe woke to the sound of a little shriek and a prisoner standing over the next bed.

            “If I were you, I’d lay still.”

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BY SCHISM RENT ASUNDER – snippet 82:

.VI.

Tellesberg Harbor,

and Tellesberg Palace,

City of Tellesberg,

Kingdom of Charis

            No guns boomed in salute as the small, unarmed galleon made its way through the opening in the Tellesberg breakwater . . . but at least none of the batteries opened fire on it, either.

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TIME SPIKE – snippet 34:

            James Cook reached up for the six-inch metal bar from the small opening the health examiner required for ventilation in the cell house, that had come loose during the Quiver. He’d taken it down from time to time and had patiently filed the end to a reasonably sharp point, and then placed it back. He just wanted to make sure the sharpened bar was still loose and would come easily into his hand if he needed it. Which he figured he would, with a prisoner uprising underway led by Adrian Luff.

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BY SCHISM RENT ASUNDER – snippet 81:

            At least Samyl Cahkrayn, the Duke of Fern and the first councilor of Dohlar, seemed to understand that Thirsk and the handful of other surviving (and disgraced) senior officers of Duke Malikai's shattered fleet were a valuable resource. He appeared to be trying to protect them, at any rate. And without a protector that highly placed, Thirsk probably would have already suffered the full consequences of the king's "extreme displeasure." Of course, it was always possible the real reason Fern was preserving Thirsk was as a potential sacrifice against a greater need. If the Group of Four ended up claiming a sacrificial victim for the failure of Vicar Allayn's oh-so-brilliant naval campaign plan, it would be hard to come up with a better one than the senior surviving admiral from the resultant fiasco.

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TIME SPIKE – snippet 33:

            Adrian Luff turned the key, heard the click and gave a little sigh of relief. He hadn’t dared try it any earlier. Getting too anxious had caused more than one solid plan to disintegrate. Using his mirror he checked the hall to be sure the guard was nowhere to be seen.

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