Author: admin

He’d drawn fresh charcoal around his eyes and secured his black hair with a strip of leather. His clothes were clean, and there was even a whit of warmth in his cheeks. Daylight, and an obvious bath, had made a new man of him. I had the rousing vision of crashing my hammer onto his…

There were six buildings besides the cathedral upon the tor. The largest was a two-level dormitory with attached stables that were often empty, but now smelled of manure from the knights’ horses. The second-largest building was an ivy-laden cottage where the abbess lived. Directly behind it was the dining commons, and then two more cottages….

I got to my feet and shuffled forward, hands out in front of me. For a time there was nothing, just blackness and the sound of my pulse in my ears. Then-silver light. High above, moonlight filtered in through narrow cracks, as if I were looking out at the night sky from within a huge,…

Aisling’s spring water. The shirtless knight glowered. “Diviner?” My stomach rolled. Bile I thought had all been spent on the cathedral floor returned, and before I could pay the knight’s impudence back with my own, I put a hand to my stomach. Heaved forward. And was sick on his boots. I ran. Maude, who was…

The corner of Rory’s mouth twitched. “Six.” His brows lifted. “Six.” Oh. A fuzzy feeling was settling into me. The nausea in my stomach had uncoiled. Another puff of the idleweed and it was gone. Another, and the hollowness in my limbs was replaced by a warm, blanketing haze- “That’s plenty.” Rory plucked the idleweed,…

“He’s only just been chosen by the knights. Surely the nobles in the hamlets will want to meet him.” Two’s back was straight, a pupil desperate to impress her tutor. “How can they respect a king whom the Omens frown upon?” The abbess came into the room. Chose my mattress over the others and sat…

The cathedral began to ripple. Light blurred away the details, pillars and windows and buttresses all caught in a strange, undulating glow. I walked through the pale nothingness, the world sluggish, but my heart upon a hummingbird beat. The cathedral rippled in earnest. Dark spots, like stains upon fabric, perforated the wide white space. “I’ve…

“I will.” “Very good.” He held out his claw-tipped hand. “Hurry.” He led me back through the gnarled apple orchard. We hastened through the courtyard, past the statues, returning, as if reeled back by a lure, to the cathedral. Day was succumbing to night when we reached the tall oaken doors. The abbess was there,…

Castor like yourself would not like to hear the story I tell before a Divination. Shall we simply proceed with the dream?” King Castor shuffled his feet. “I would like to do things the proper way. Please, go on.” The abbess touched my cheek, a familiar act of silent affection, then continued. “We know Traum…

SIX MAIDENS UPON A WALL The peculiar gargoyle, who spoke mostly in broken parables, shuffled to the dim corner of the ambulatory. There, strung between iron candlesticks, a spider’s web held a fly captive. “Incessant buzzing.” The gargoyle wagged a limestone finger at the fly, his craggy voice echoing through the cathedral. “Serves you right….