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Title: Youngling
A Terran Empire story

Author: Ann Wilson

Release Date: June 9, 2008 [EBook #25747]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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YOUNGLING

A Terran Empire Story

by Ann Wilson

Copyright (C) 1992 by Ann Wilson

Unnamed world, 2559 CE

Joste was waiting in front of his desk when two guards brought the
just-captured human into his office. He found it hard to look at the
man without becoming physically ill, and wondered briefly how the
guards could tolerate touching him. Well, that was their job; his was
to question the man, and he found himself hoping the foul thing would
resist, give him an excuse to use force.

It wasn't because the other was human, or because he was an enemy--Joste
had questioned prisoners before without having had the slightest desire
to use physical persuasion--and the man looked no more repulsive than
any other human. Granted, he was dirty and his battledress was torn,
but that was to be expected from someone who had been in combat. And,
though he was bound, the man held himself proudly.

No, the revulsion wasn't caused by anything so straightforward. It was
what the man had done-- Joste's thoughts shied away from consideration
of such obscenity, and he had to force them back. Simply endangering
females without dire need was enough to earn a dishonorable death; they
were so terribly few, less than a fourth of the Traiti race, cherished
for themselves and honored for the young onl