She sat up in bed: Nia and Jory, halfway across her floor, jumped back a step. They were dressed to go outdoors. “What do you think you’re doing?” Daja asked in her most forbidding tone. “You’re only supposed to come in when I’m here.” She always put work materials away after an early mishap in which the youngest Bancanor, inspecting her things, had turned his hand bright yellow, but there was always a chance the children could find trouble with items she couldn’t put away. “But you are here,” Nia replied. “I was asleep. That’s not here, here.” Even to a tired Daja that didn’t sound rational. “What do you want?” “There’s the teacher thing today, yes?” asked Jory reasonably. “And meditation after you get back, even if it’s still light. You’ll never learn how to skate this way.” Daja looked at them with horror. “Skate? Now? Before breakfast?” “It’s a good time,” Nia assured her. “We’ll have the basin to ourselves. And you have to practice till you’re used to it.”
