When Aiglamene slapped her, it had none of the trembling affrontedness Crux might have slapped her with. She simply backhanded Gideon the way you might hit a barking animal. Gideon’s head was starry with pain. “You forget yourself, Gideon Nav,” her teacher said shortly. “You’re no slave, but you’ll serve the House of the Ninth until the day you die and then thereafter, and you’ll commit no sin of perfidy in my air. The bell was real. Will you come to muster of your own accord, or will you disgrace me?”
