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PROLOGUE

I found these pages scattered, teased across the rocks by a fitful wind Some were too charred to show their words, others fell apart in h, as if it were my story they told and not hers

Katherine’s story, Aunt Katherine, sister to my stepmother, Katherine who I have wanted every e paths throughinacross them, too cold to stick

I sat upon the smoke-wreathed ruins ofdead Theon all sides, ines strewn about it, their purpose spent And with eyes stinging from the fires, with the wind’s chill in h her memories

FROM THE JOURNAL OF KATHERINE AP SCORRON

October 3rd, Year 98 Interregnum

Ancrath The Tall Castle Fountain Room

The fountain rooly castle There’s no fountain, just a font that dribbles rather than sprays My sister’s ladies-in-waiting clutter the place, sewing, always sewing, and tutting at , as if quill ink is a stain that can’t ever be washed off

My head aches and wormroot won’t calh Friar Glen said he cleaned it Dreadful little ave hts ju

The ladies seith their quick clever stitches, line stitch, cross-line, layer-cross Sharp little needles, dull little ers and the lazy Ancrath slurring of their words

I’ve looked back to see what I wrote yesterday I don’t re Ancrath tried to killher I suppose that if he really had wanted to killbroken Mother’s vase overelse Sareth told me that what he said in court, about all those people in Gelleth, burned to dust…it’s all true Merl Gellethar’s castle is gone I met him when I was a child Such a sly red-faced man Looked as if he’d be happy to eat me up I’m not sorry about him But all those people They can’t all have been bad

I should have stabbed Jorg when I had the chance If my hands would do what I told the the quill, learn to sew properly, stabnephehen instructed…Friar Glen said the boy tore most of my dress off Certainly it’s a ruin now Beyond the rescue of even these empty ladies with their needles and thread

I’ too mean I blame the ache in my head Sareth tells ossip Though she’s sewing now and tutting with the rest of the to on her own, I suppose There That’s enough nice for one day Sareth is always nice and look where that got her Married to an old man, and not a kind one but a cold and scary one, and her belly all fat with a child that will probably run as savage as Jorg Ancrath

I’raveyard Maery tells me she’ll lie easy there All the castle servants are buried there unless their families claim them Maery says she’ll find me a new maidservant but that seems so cold, to just replace Hanna as if she were torn lace, or a broken vase We’ll go out by cart to her coffin now My head feels as if he’s ha the nails into it instead

I should have left Jorg to die on the throne-rooht Damn him

We’ll bury Hanna to of her aches but that doesn’t o I will miss her She was a hard woman, cruel maybe, but never to round I should But I don’t know if I will

That’s for tomorrow Today we have a visitor The Prince of Arrow is calling, with his brother Prince Egan and his retinue I think Sareth would like toOlidan Not many of Sareth’s ideas are her own these days We will see

I think I’ll try to sleep now Maybe e dreaht out of me