Paksworld

You folks are owed some snippets, and you have my apologies for falling short in the snippet department this year.    Those who haven’t read Oath of Fealty are welcome to peek past the “more” warning, but you will find spoilers.   (Those completely unfamiliar with the Paksworld universe will benefit from a quick side trip to the Paksworld website, which has maps and names and other useful stuff.)

Today’s snippet is from Kings of the North, partway through Chapter One.

Who: Kieri, the king

Where: the ossuary under the palace complex in Chaya

When: Midsummer Day.   The king visits the ossuary at both Winter and Summer solstices–alone–to report to the bones and listen to their wisdom (if any.)   In Summer by day, as long as the Suncandle burns,  and in Winter by night, in the dark.  Sometimes nothing happens.  Sometimes…

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As if physical hands touched his face, he felt something–a warmth on his right cheek, a coolness on his left.  Something of his father–the merest hint of a man’s firm, warm hand on his sword-side, the merest hint of a woman’s softer, cooler hand on his heart-side.  His heart stuttered a moment, then beat on.  He could not speak aloud; he asked the question in his mind.  Are you…father?  Sister?

Yes.

What…do you want? From his father’s hand–he could not think it otherwise–came a sense of love, support, peace.  He could almost smell that dim remembered smell, from times his father had picked him up and held him close.  From his sister’s hand, something different: affection, wistfulness, and–stronger as he listened–anger.  Then, sudden and strong: betrayal and warning.

Kieri scarcely breathed.  Betrayal?  Danger?  Who?

They lie.  She– But that was interrupted; his right cheek seemed to feel more pressure.

Not now.  No shadows this day.

The sensation faded, his father’s faster than his sister’s, leaving the certainty that he had more to learn from them.  The final word from his father felt like duty…from his sister, like judgment.

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