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But the people on the streets didn’t look like they felt fortunate They looked like dread hexes had been painted on every wall As she passed beneath three- and four-story-tall palaces, Liv spiedout toward the sea The sound of cannons was barely audible down in the h

They passed unmolested all the way to the temple district The Great Pyramid of Ru suddenly towered above them Liv instantly saw both its kinship and its rivalry with the ziggurats of Idoss The Idossians had gone for height, and their great ziggurat was taller and steeper than the Great Pyrarandeur, it couldn’t compare to this: ashed limestone laid out precisely on the cardinal points of a coht up each corner, the great steps up the east face sheathed in burnished copper, shining like red gold in the sun, the pinnacle itself sheathed in electruh Every season, the facings of all four sides were changed--though this year, with the are to the autuarden, a veritable iven over to a new director every year, with a noble fa the costs

This late in the year, the flowers should have been withered and dying, the full splendor long passed Instead, every plant was still in blooreen bane, the Color Prince had said This year, the gardens had been designed to evoke a sun resting on the pinnacle of the Great Pyraardenias and white irises and white hydrangeas yielded to daisies and buttercups and e roses and lilies and tulips represented the rays of the sun, stabbing through a sky of hyacinth and bluebells A forest of vibrant greens took up the middle, and the base was a maze of rhododendrons, camellias, and roses of every color Streareat steps in whihts to land in pools a dozen paces below And all of this was te equally lavish The noble families did this to compete with each other

The sheer scale of the wealth necessary for such a display simultaneously enthralled and sickened Liv This city ealthy, but they’d passed their share of beggars and slatterns and cripples and orphans, even in half an hour

"Staring," Phips Navid said gently

Liv pulled her eyes away No one see was a sure way to break their disguise

But everyone else see their heads down In another two reat steps One of the commanders of the Blue Bastards was there, a bent-nosed blue-eyed old goat with no front teeth na with one of the city captains as guarding the base of the pyraht see you Coed over with her men "Sir," she said, "I was headed over to check how e I want you to take up to Lord Aravind up top"

Gri dumb, Liv said, "Can I send one of my oing to keep that little ass of yours so tight if you don’t sweat a bit?"

The captain laughed with Paz, and Liv’sto suppress it

Liv looked at her otta go up, you’re cohed, but then looked uncomfortable "I’m afraid I can only let two of you up there We could take the e for you if you want, but I can’t let armed parties up the Great Pyraht?" Paz Cavair said

"I hate to be a stickler, but orders and all," the captain said He was a young man Dark-haired, beautiful blue eyes, beaded beard "You kno it is"

"I do," Paz Cavair said "Jump"

"Huh?" the captain asked