The forest filled it, wall to wall, and the shadows of the clouds shivered on the treetops as the wind moved through the boughs. Down the center like a crooked bolt ran the river Vultsniada, white and racing, and along its banks crowded mills and villages and—to the north, on the lowest steps of the mountain—a limestone keep which bridged the torrent and admitted, through open sluice gates, a great waterfall. But for all the beauty of it, Baru’s eyes went to the crows and hawks and harriers soaring on the thermals, high above meadows and clearings of stone, the birds gathered in towering
...more
