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July 7 - July 12, 2021
“All the world is a cage in a young girl’s eyes.”
“Reading,” Ead said lightly. “A dangerous pastime.” Truyde looked up at her, sharp-eyed. “You mock me.” “By no means. There is great power in stories.” “All stories grow from a seed of truth,” Truyde said. “They are knowledge after figuration.” “Then I trust you will use your knowledge for good.”
How suddenly a life could crumble.
“What I know is less important than what the world sees,” Kit said. “Allow me to indulge in a little allegory. Art. Art is not one great act of creation, but many small ones.
“Wherever I am,” Tané said, “I am with you.” Susa had risked everything for a dream that was not hers. That sort of friendship was something not found more than once in a lifetime. Some might not find it at all.
Combe might speak the language of secrets, but he did not know hers.
“This protector, whoever it is, is a killer as well, and they must be unmasked.”
with flame came the subtlety of shadow.
Not only would Loth never be so reckless, but the Night Hawk would never allow such plans to be discovered. He had contrived this. “Something is not right,” Sabran finally said. “It is not like Loth to behave so rashly. And I find it exceedingly difficult to believe that none of you guessed his intentions. Are you not my councillors? Do you not have eyes in every corner of my court?”
I may be naïve, but rather than punishing them, surely we should pity those in ignorance and lead them to the light.” “Indeed,” Sabran said dryly. “The light of the pyre.”
“As one of your ladies, I give you my loyalty, Majesty. To give, one must be generous.”
there is something odd about the Berethnets. Each queen only having one child, always a daughter, and they all look so similar . . . I don’t know. Sounds like sorcery to—”
And yet Jannart had seen him. He had seen him, and he had not looked away.
“In Inys, this bird is called the lovejay,” she said. The bird on her wrist gave a merry chirp. “They take only one partner all their lives, and will know their song even after many years apart. That is why the lovejay was sacred to the Knight of Fellowship. These birds embody his desire for every soul to be joined in companionship.”
Eight years she had spent at the court of Sabran the Ninth. In all that time, she had never said anything to nettle her. Now she was like a viper, unable to keep her tongue in her mouth. Something made her want to rile the Queen of Inys.
“Are you one of Combe’s intelligencers, is that it? I hear he makes spies of the basest sorts.” “All you need know is that I make it my business to protect Her Majesty.”
That is the problem with stories, child. The truth in them cannot be weighed.
We may be small, and we may be young, but we will shake the world for our beliefs.”
The fool. The utter fool.
Even the most god-drunk fool could not believe Sir Galian Berethnet would extend a hand from the heavenly court and shield them from a bellyful of fire.
Sabran would keep goading Fýredel until he torched her. The blockhead must really think the wretched Saint would protect her.
The essence in her blood was spent. Her bones felt hollow, her skin as raw as if she had been flayed. She needed the tree, just a taste of its fruit. The orange tree would save her .
Tané had drawn her wooden sword with a shout. Even at eleven, she had known how to use it.
Sea sisters, Susa had called them once. Two pearls formed in the same oyster.
At some point, she had started to realize how fortunate she was to have the chance to be a dragonrider. That was when her heart had grown harder, like a ship collecting barnacles. And yet some part of her younger self remained. The part that had hidden the man from the beach.
And he might not be my patron, but I know the Knight of Fellowship tells us not to leave our friends alone.”
“You have not seen death, my lord. You have only seen the mask we put on it.”
“Our thanks to you, Mistress Melaugo. Your kindness will not be forgotten.” “Please forget it. I’ve a reputation to uphold.”
He would rise from the silk pillow of nobility and find the spy within.
The Queen of Inys stepped into the room.
“He threatened my people,” she murmured. “I had stepped out before I had considered what else might be done.”
“With youth comes folly.”
“I prefer the taste of mercy. It lets me sleep at night.”
After fourteen years of preparation, the water in me will not run true—and I am afraid,
We are judged for today, not for yesterday.
Ghosts were the voices the dead left behind. Echoes of a soul taken too soon.
She was most beautiful like this. The Inysh seemed to think her trappings were her beauty, but in truth, they concealed it.
“You do speak comely words,” she remarked. “I wonder if you mean them.” “Mine are honest words, madam. All courts will fall prey to affectation and deceit, often veiled as courtesy,” Ead said, “but I like to believe that I speak from the heart.”
The thousand years are almost done.
A vault of darkness that seafarers had always feared to cross.
“The woman is arrogant and overindulged—but,
In those days, Cárscaro had been famed for its masques, its music, and the red pear trees that grew along its streets. No longer. Since Yscalin had renounced its age-old devotion to the Saint and taken the Nameless One as its god, it had been doing all it could to undermine Virtudom.
As he worked, his mind lingered on Ead. He was sure Sabran was safe with her. From the moment he had first seen her in the Banqueting House—a woman with
acorn skin and watchful eyes, whose posture had been almost regal—he had sensed an inner warmth. Not the heat of wyrmfire, but something soft and golden, like the first light of a summer morning.
“Inspiration has yet to strike. Terror and creativity, in my experience, do not often walk hand in hand.”
when the heart grows too full, it overflows. And mine, inevitably, overflows on to a page.”
“Peace. I envy them too, sometimes. How easy they seem to find it. Onren, especially.” Tané hid her face behind her hair. “She excels,” she said, “with so little—” The words lodged in her throat. “With so little.”
When I was sixteen, I stopped everything but my studies. I stopped going to the city. I stopped painting. I stopped seeing Ishari. All I did was practice until I became principal apprentice. I forgot how to possess a skill. Instead, the skill possessed me. All of me.” Tané felt a chill. “But—” She hesitated. “You do not look the way I feel.” Dumusa blew out a mouthful of smoke. “I realized,” she said, “that if I am fortunate enough to become a rider, I will be expected to answer the moment Seiiki calls. I will not have days of practice beforehand. Remember, Tané, that a sword does not need to
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In the end, her confrontation with her rival was as quick and ruthless as having a tooth pulled.
He had fallen for the trick—a trick that should have fooled no one—because he had expected weakness.
