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"I can’t like any garden without stones," Evvythe differences between sandstone here and sandstone in Gyongxe "It would be like taking someone’s ribs out"

"What can you do with stones, if I e the course of a stone hurled by a catapult?"

Evvy made a face Some of the people who had hosted them on their journey west had asked such questions Oddly, she didn’tat the sky andI can only help the faster Look I can do this" She reached into the sandstone under her hands and sank light into the thousands of grains of quartz, apatite, and garnet that were part of it When she heard Parahan inhale, she realized that she had closed her eyes She had not needed the The guards were babbling in the language of the i therinned at Parahan "I can do it with heat, but heat won’t stay long in sandstone or liht or heat for very long I’ because we didn’t have to buy torches or la his chains out of the way, crawled over until he could hold a hand over a glowing stone "Will it burn?"

"Oh, no," Evvy told him "Rosethorn threatened to send ht and hot heat every tirinned as he touched the stones "No heat at all She only threatened you?"

"I missed too many meals before she and Briar tookfood fro of food …" Parahan raised his beak of a nose to sniff the air "I s stones "We can’t take these The gardeners will get in trouble if anything is "

Evvy frowned "Stones in a wood should be free to go where they want if they let go of their soil Not that I’d pry these fine fellows loose They’re happy with their tree"

"Stones in a wood that does not belong to the eave Evvy a hand up as the light from the stones faded "Let’s see e can steal frouards stood, too "You can’t steal the euard in tiyon

"We won’t steal," Evvy told thees Froive people who aren’t imperial"

Parahan hooked arms with Evvy and they marched up the path

Rosethorn had to wonder if she was ods to spend her entire visit to the Winter Palace in a towering state of vexation For one thing, when the eardens, he le of ardeners dealt with the plants If she even touched one, the gardeners hovered as if they feared she , she and Briar had been forced to wear silk again today, because they were in the imperial presence She should have known they would not be allowed to get dirty when the

Third, she was deeply unhappy with the ed their tracks They drowned the voices of the wind in the leaves and flowers of the garden with the constant click of their strings of beads She had heard that eastern ether to be worn on neck and wrist She had seen localtheir journey down froes wore ropes of thearden were considered far erous than Rosethorn and Briar in a throne room

As if we couldn’t have turned those potted plants into weapons, Rosethorn thought as the breeze carried another burst of hollow clicks to her ears She rounded on thethese plants say with that unending noise," she inforht at great expense from far Sharen and raised more carefully than most children, trembled and reached for her across the stone borders of the path The courtiers shrank closer together, terrified of touching those priceless blossoms Weishu looked on, his face emotionless

Briar raised his hands to both sides of the path The roses halted their

Rosethorn had not taken her eyes off the s?" she deic If I were, you couldn’t distract me with noiseest of theic is inscribed in the e, the more inscriptions -- the more spells -- on a bead And the h the woers The small bone-white beads that s, as well as those of her fellow raphs In between those beads were others, soyi characters, soures, so on the surface