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I shrugged I was not very concerned I walked into the dark with a straight back The mud arm on my feet, and as I descended the air becaher, until I kneas nowhere near the opera house any longer, and even if I putaboveand thick

At last, the mud slackened, and a real path hardened beneath me, lit by a sudden bank of torches which burned low and sullen on the walls Wider and wider the path grew, until it opened into a vast vault, whose stone walls vanished into bronze doled with painted dolphins with intricate eyes and faded white stars near the peaks of the many do the walls like the rings of a tree

At my feet was a e at all, really, for you could jump over any of the walls as easy as you please The tallest one came up to my waist They were made of rock and bone, the little walls, Ajanabh’s faull bones pressed into the sharp corners It angled off into the distance, over the entire floor of the vault, polished bones glinting in the firelight

“These used to be cisterns,” ca in a s as sieges There was once enough water here to keep the city drinking tea well into any war, slurping at their scarlet cups while the army outside ate itself into defeat You used to be able to put your ear to the street and hear the gentle sloshing of the dark water—it was a co sound, for so many people Now it is ees anymore”

I looked but could see no one I began to step over the first wall of the maze—and almost stepped on them

At the entrance to the maze was a pair of shoes They were twisted out of the roots of cassia trees, curling wildly at the toe and the heel, the red roots snarling and looping like an embroidered hem The scent of the in a cup of black tea

“Don’t be afraid,” ca—no one will punish you”

I raised my foot to slip it inside, and stopped “I airls are meant to do, the way a spider is meant to weave”

“Ah, but not all spiders weave, so your question is a bit foolish on the face of it, don’t you think?”

I blushed “Sleeve wanted to know It doesn’t make any difference to me,” I mumbled

“As for dancing, there is nothing easier Put your feet in ”

“You are the Dancing-Master?”

“Of course What else could teach so well as I? But I do not teach alone: This h the correct path, by its end you will have learned the most extraordinary dance, such that any coronation would be proud to see at the height of its feast, such that any holy dervish would weep and call you his devotion”

“I think this is very strange—”

“All things are strange which are worth knowing Come, I have asked a third time Step into me and while you walk the maze I shall tell you how a pair of empty shoes came to be at the bottom of a cistern”