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(This is not a digression.)
Palace floated above city, linked in spirit, both so unearthly in their beauty that I held my breath at the sight.
Seeds are rare, and for every one that grows into a perfect altarskirt, ten others become plants that must be destroyed for their hideousness.
I knelt before my grandfather with my head bowed, hearing titters of laughter. No, wait.
Only three, I mean. Now there are dozens, perhaps hundreds. They breed like rabbits.
I am sometimes mistaken for a boy.
powerful men are touchy over odd things.
There were lifetimes in those eyes, none of them happy.
guarded by beasts that do not exist.
Perhaps I should not call them gods, since no one worships them anymore.
Occasionally the population of an entire city will vanish overnight.
It is not safe to hate the Arameri. Instead we hate their weapons, because weapons do not care.
he was a halfbreed like me, part Amn and part Ken.
I was Yeine Arameri now, no longer Yeine Darr.
Unfortunately for him, my mother was just old enough to get with child.
SHOULD I PAUSE TO EXPLAIN? It is poor storytelling. But I must remember everything, remember and remember and remember, to keep a tight grip on
He can hunt you using only his senses.” (As opposed to what else? I wondered.)
It was not our sun, mind you.
I could get the gist of his features, but none of it stuck in my mind beyond an impression of astonishing beauty.
“I have waited so long for you,” the god breathed. Then he kissed me. Then he fell.
“There is no greater warrior than a mother protecting her child,” the woman said. “But Sieh is far less fragile than you, Lady Yeine.”
It occurred to me suddenly that my grandfather was very, very old.
But we can’t call them slaves, either. After all, we outlawed slavery centuries ago.”
“It means ‘we who remember Enefa,’ ” said Sieh. He had propped his chin on his fist. The items on Viraine’s workbench looked the same, but I was certain he had done something to them. “She was the one murdered by Itempas long ago. We went to war with Him to avenge her.”
For a moment I half-expected him to poke out his tongue, but the hatred in his eyes was too old for that.
That was how it happened, yes. The first time.
he could have done what he did to my mother. An assassin in the night, poison in my sleep.”
Zhakkarn, I know now, goddess of battle and bloodshed.
She is sternly beautiful: her hair is the color of bronze, and a pair of enormous wings feathered in gold, silver, and platinum are folded on her back. Kurue, called Wise.
It is a sphere of darkness so concentrated that it glows, so heavy with power that the earth groans and sags beneath it.
Dekarta already commanded the entire world. The Consortium existed only to do the ugly, messy work of world governance, with which the Arameri couldn’t be bothered.
Unthinkingly I straightened, so that she would think better of me. Such was her presence.
Never mind what Ras Onchi thought. I would never call myself Arameri, never.
A tongue whose meaning depended upon not only syntax and pronunciation and tone, but also one’s position in the universe at any given moment—how could they even have imagined mastering that?
It is blasphemy to separate oneself from the earth and look down on it like a god.
We can never be gods, after all—but we can become something less than human with frightening ease.
It is important to appreciate beauty, even w...
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walls that made my room bright as day. Sky embodied the Bright; the Arameri allowed no darkness here. But
Even if I leave, some part of me will remain. That cannot be helped.” Only later would his words disturb me.
The priests’ lesson: beware the Nightlord, for his pleasure is a mortal’s doom. My grandmother’s lesson: beware love, especially with the wrong man.
Later I would understand that I had already begun to love Sieh,
If he had not spoken those last words, I might have indeed considered him a friend.
In a child’s eyes, a mother is a goddess. She can be glorious or terrible, benevolent or filled with wrath, but she commands love either way. I am convinced that this is the greatest power in the universe.
Perhaps it was purely decorative.
Jealousy, even between father and son, is a fact of nature.
And I was not afraid. A bad sign.
The demons were as beautiful and perfect as our godborn children—but mortal. Put into our bodies, their blood taught our flesh how to die.
I saw myself caress his midnight hair, and look up to meet my own eyes, and smile in smug, possessive satisfaction.
