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Panting a little, Feather Cloak steadied herself and surveyed the council Standing, she looked even e that it seereed "Yet there reer to us We will coic to weave a second spell like the first Then they could fling us back into the aether, and ould surely all perish, together with our land"

Pain cut into Liath’s belly She tucked, bending slightly, reflexively, but the pain vanished as swiftly as it had come--it was only the memory of her labor pains the day her , and the threat of the Aoi return

"The only one who can stop the? Was this the fate he had tried to hide her froain, but this ti the truth fronorance hadn’t spared her, it had only ic in such a way see her words, aware of the anger burning in the pit of her stomach "But I have heard of a story told by , when the Aoi--"

"Call us not by that name!" cried Cat Mask "If you co us?"

"I do not intend to insult you!" she retorted, stung "That is the name my people call you"

"Don’t you knohat it means?" asked Green Skirt

"No"

Cat Mask spat the words "‘Cursed Ones’"

"What do you call yourselves, then?"

They all broke out talking at once

Feather Cloak lifted a hand for silence "In our most ancient ho After our ancestors left that place and came over the sea, we called ourselves The Ones-Who-Have-Made-A-New-Home Noe call ourselves The-Ones-In-Exile, Ashioi, which also means, The-Ones-Who-Have-Been-Cursed"

"Ashioi,"the word she knew--"Aoi" --ee survived, only in fragia Da had compiled over the years? Surely Da had understood the true purpose of the Seven Sleepers What had he been looking for in these notes and scraps of e? Had he wondered how a spell as powerful as the Great Sundering could coh in order to understand the whole "Wouldn’t it also be true that if such a huge region of land fell to Earth again, it would make a terrible cataclysm?"

"Maybe so," said Eldest Uncle, "yet if this land approaches close by Earth and is flung away again by a spell woven by human sorcerers, that act, too, will cause manifold destruction The tides of the universe spare no object, for even when bodies do not touch, they influence each other If you are trained in the craft of the stars, then you understand this principle No part of the shore is safe froh tide, or an ebb tide Either way, Earth will suffer"

Twilight ca darkened so quickly that spinning dust ht simply vanished as shadow spread For a le Seat and the Jaguar Seat began to glow, illuures who stood on their backs: Feather Cloak and Eldest Uncle In that glea their cloaks and arm sheaths took on new colors, roots of scarlet and viridian that shuddered deep within

His final words, like an arroere aimed at her heart "The only choice is whether iven a chance to live"

In her mind’s eye she saw the ruined city that ended at a shoreline so sharp and straight that a knife ht have shorn it off A knife--or a vast spell whose power beggared the iht have sheared off the land so, cutting it cleanly as one slices away a piece of meat from the haunch

To conte, left her sick to her stomach and profoundly dizzy She went hot all over Her blood pounded in her limbs, and the hot taste of fire burned on her lips as a wind roared in her ears

Who would perish, and ould live? Who had earned the right to make that choice?

The room blazed with heat The council le Seat, engulfing Feather Cloak entirely Liath staggered at its brilliance, yet within the archway of leaping flames shadorithed