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"Your mother saw?"

She tried to re "No She didn't He went on the hunt Everyone says that he was a fine hunter But he didn't return They came to my mother with the news, that he'd been attacked and taken by beasts on the hunt"

She looked at him, puzzled "Yet Annabella says there be none"

"How could she know?" Thomas asked skeptically

"She's four syllables, Thomas Those who live to four syllables know all there is"

Tho hard all day His tools still lay on the worktable: s, reshaping the worn, ser used It was painstaking work that allowed for no error Thomas had told her that often his head ached and he had to stop again and again to rest his eyes

"I'll go so you can rest," Kira told him "I must put away my oork before bed"

She returned to her room at the other end of the corridor and folded the robe that still lay on her table She had worked on the stitchery throughout the afternoon, after her return from the forest She had shown it to Jamison as she did each day, and he had nodded in approval Now Kira was tired too The long walks to the dyer's cott each day were exhausting, but at the saorated Thohed to herself; she sounded like a scolding mother

After a bath -- how she enjoyed the ater now! --Kira put on the siown that was provided clean for her each day Then she went to the carved box and took the scrap of fabric with her to her bed The fear of the thing in the bushes by the path lingered with her still, and she thought of it as she waited for sleep

Is it true, that there be no beasts? Her thoughts framed the question, and her mind responded in a whisper to herself as the fabric lay curled warm in the palm of her hand

There be none

What of my father, then, hi slippery frohts She dreaainst the pillow

The fabric gave a kind of answer but it was no more than a flutter, like a breeze across her that she would not re of her father -- soe entered her sleep, tre she did not know that it was there at all

12

When the bell for rising rang, Kira aith a sense that soed: she had an awareness of a difference, but had forgotten what the difference was She sat for a rasp whatever it was and finally stopped trying Sootten dreams came back more easily if you put them out of your mind

Outside, it was storainst the building The hard ground below had turned to o to the dyer's cott today Just as well, she thought; there was much work to do on the robe, and autu Recently Ja by soress she had made He seemed pleased by her work

"Here," he had said to her just the day before yesterday, se underrated place, "is where you will start your oork After this year's Gathering, after you've finished with the restoration, you'll have this entire section to work on for years to come"

Kira touched the place where his hand lay She tried to deteric there But there was only e of unfilled need

He seemed to sense her uncertainty and reassured her "Don't worry," he said "We will explain to you ant pictured there"

Kira didn't reply His reassurance troubled her It wouldn't be instruction that she needed, it would be thethe conversation, Kira thought suddenly, Jamison! I can ask him about the beasts! He had told her that he had been part of the hunt that day, that he had seen her father's death

Andthat he was, Kira had no doubt that Matt had crossed the boundaries often and had gone to places tykes were not supposed to go She laughed quietly, thinking of Matt and hisHad she and Tho with the er Perhaps he had done it before

Perhaps he had seen beasts

When the tender cahts be lit The rainstorm made the room dim, even beside the here she sat to work Finally she settled herself with the outspread robe and placed the fra to be repaired As she had often done, she folloith her eyes and fingers the co point, long reen water, the dark beasts on its shore, and the es appeared, with dwellings of all kinds; curving stitches of srays It was fortunate that it needed no repair because Kira had no threads to ht they had been dyed with basil and Annabella had told her how difficult the basil was and how badly it stained your hands

Then coes, reds, yellows Here and there on the robe these fires appeared, a repetitive pattern of ruin, and within the intricately stitched patterns of the bright destructive threads of fire, Kira could see figures of hues cruer, much more splendid towns burned and ravished by fiery destruction In so of entire worlds ending Yet always there would erowth New people

Ruin Rebuilding Ruin again Regrowth Kira followed the scenes with her hand as larger and greater cities appeared and larger, greater destruction took place The cycle was so regular that its pattern took on a clear form: an up-and-down an, where the first ruin carew All of them were still tiny, created from the smallest stitches and corowth and how each ti more difficult

But the sections of serenity were exquisite Miniature flowers of countless hues flourished in ures embraced The pattern of the peaceful times felt immensely tranquil compared to the tortured chaos of the others

Tracing with her finger the white and pink-tinged clouds against pale skies of gray or green, Kira wished again for blue The color of calm What was it Annabella had said? That they had blue yonder? What did that mean? Who were they? And where was yonder?

More unanswered questions

Great sheets of rain spattered against the , distracting her Kira sighed and watched the trees bend and sway in the wind Thunder muttered in the distance

She wondered where Matt hat he was doing in this weather She knew that ordinary people -- those who lived near the place where she and her mother had shared their cott -- would be indoors today, theloudly because weather kept the and then wailing in response to swift backhanded slaps from their mothers

Her own life with her soft-spoken ed mother had been different But it had set her apart too and made others, like Vandara, hostile

"Kira?" She heard Thomas's voice and his knock at her door

"Co the rain "I was just wondering what Matt's up to in this weather," Kira said