“The prince is coming here,” said the traveling merchant. “How do you know this?” asked someone from the crowd. “I saw him in a town far to the south, and members of his entourage told me he was heading this way. He plans to come all the way to the coast, and that will surely…
It all started with the resolution passed by the town council. No, perhaps not. That might be giving it too much weight. It really started when Tomas got stinking drunk that evening. But since the council resolution comes into it, we’ll just have to start there. It was passed unanimously, and was short and to…
Iluan-ga had not felt such excitement for a very long time. She was 81 years old, and a member of a well-disciplined order whose members maintained physical and mental health, and reasonable emotional control. She paused in her study of the ancient manuscript. PÂ-EKLI-TÎ-ÂN she read. “The saying of the master.” Not PÂ-EKLI-ÂN “a saying…
“And then I let go when I’m at the farthest point out, drop into the river and swim to the far shore. The current will be helping me.” “And if you can’t make it?” “I’ll come up against that rock.” “What rock? I can barely see anything.” “There’s a rock in the water just where…
Everybody knew that in a small village in the mountains there lived a very rich man. Just why he chose to live in a small village in the mountains nobody knew. Precisely which village was his home, nobody knew either. They just knew that somewhere in those mountains there lived a very rich man. Years…
*It was nearly a week after her first lesson with the sword, and if Tlisli had only had a mirror, she would hardly have recognized herself. Many days of travel with Azzesh had already strengthened her body, not to mention toughening her mind. She didn’t even notice things that would have had her crying only…
Tlisli* jumped up from lunch and reached for her backpack. Azzesh had again provided an excellent meal, cooked quickly and yet tasty and well seasoned. There was more meat than Tlisli would have preferred, but she would never think of mentioning that to Azzesh. The reason she had jumped up and reached for her backpack…
The first time that Yagac approached the shrine he was carrying a stick he had cut from a tree and sharpened. “What do you bring for the god?” said the aged priest. Villagers said he had been at the shrine more than a hundred years. He looked it. “I bring this spear,” said Yagac, his…
Tlisli* struggled to wake up. It felt a little like when she had been a small child and had almost drowned in the river. She had wanted to breathe, but couldn’t. She had struggled toward the surface, but it never seemed be there. As she struggled, images passed through her mind. She was struggling through…
[This is a work of fiction, as should be obvious throughout. Nothing in it resembles anything else enough to be mistaken for reality, but just in case someone disagrees, if you think it represents something in real life, it doesn’t. This is the second installment in the Tlisli Series, and is continued from Tlisli’s Escape.]…
