“Parth, will you wait for me one year?” “No.” “Only a year—” “A year and a day, and you’ll return riding a silver steed to carry me to your kingdom and make me its queen. No, I won’t wait for you, Falk. Why must I wait for a man who will be lying dead in the forest, or shot by Wanderers out on the prairie, or brainless in the City of the Shing, or gone off a hundred years to another star? What should I wait for? You needn’t think I’ll take another man. I won’t. I’ll stay here in my father’s house. I’ll dye black thread and weave black cloth to wear, black to wear and black to die in. But I
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