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"Did you ?" she demanded, unable not to want to knohat secrets the ancient text held

"What I read changedI have been, and how I ave depth to his expression, his handsome eyes, the curve of his an before that First of all it was the woman who took you away froe does not coh the colonnade archways, stirring the wisteria wound down and around the stone pillars A faint chi serenaded the from, everywhere and nowhere The two servants waited patiently a stone’s toss away, by the archway that led out toward the courtyard linking the two palaces, one secular and one religious, regnant and skopos

I knohere I am I am in Darre, the holy city, home of the Holy Mother who presided over the church

She could practically breathe in the ancient stones, the o and then collapsed into ruins, devastated by the raids of the Bwre allies and by its own internal corruption If she crossed under that archway, she could walk away into the city--except that she could not move

"Where is the book?" her voice asked

He glanced up, face lit by the sieway "I have my own suite of chambers in the skopos’ palace All of the presbyters do, of course, except those who travel as ambassadors" He did not stumble over his words He was far too well educated, too composed, too experienced in a courtier’s smooth affability "There’s also the library Ai, God, Liath! You can’t believe the library here! So much that one could never hope to learn it all! So the books, breathing in the weight of theainst my skin and let the voice of each writer otten hot suddenly? Fire burned in her cheeks

"Do you knohat I found there?" he asked, letting her precede hih to conceal oneself in But before she could ask and he answer, a presbyter hurried up, a lean ation froain You kno it is with these mercenaries that Ironhead has hired They will harass the townspeople, but with the Holy Mother so ill there’s no one to mediate between them Ironhead can’t be spoken to--"

"I’ll coh turned to Liath "One of my servants will show you to the library I’ll coain, he hesitated "But only if--well, I’ll say no more If it pleases you"

Her voice answered "I’ll wait for you there"

Soon enough she stood again at the catalog, running her fingers over the vellu the titles Commentary on the Dream of Cornelia by Eustacia Artemisia’s Dreams A copy of the Annals of Autun lay abandoned on the table next to her, a chronicle coer and bound together with a full account of the h the zodiac over a period of one hundred and sixty-eight years

Her hands turned the pages idly as her est daughter, Gundara,toward the doors, wondering if that h in whatever hall or official chaotiations as he was now conducting, an attedom where conflict would only lead to the death of innocents

Finally, she just gave in to that stifling grip that teased her h her body She sat on a bench and let the weight of sothem in Could all those words, written by so h the air and into her pores,one and always a part of her? It is always easier just to let go, to give in

She dozed

In her drea to find the path, but she is lost, forever lost, and she has to find the way upward but someone has hold of her, she is chained at the throat with a ribbon of silk that has slid down all the way through her entire body, and she can’t get away

"Liath"

She woke suddenly, heart ha away fro the ache in her back froe of the quiver had jath frootten dih carrying a laht his way