The Second Generation

“Although I can guess,” he added, but it was in an undertone, spoken only to himself and not to his distraught friend. Turning away, he walked over to a cradle that had been hastily constructed out of a wood box. He whispered a word and lifted the enchantment from the baby, who drew a breath and began whimpering.

“The child?” the stranger said, starting up from the bed. “Is her baby all right? What the servant girl said ...” There was fear in his voice. “It isn’t, it isn’t dea—” He couldn’t go on.

“No,” said his friend in mystified tones. “It is not what you fear. The servant girl said she’d never seen anything 'like it.' But the baby seems fine—Ah!” The stranger gasped in awe. Holding the baby in his arms, he turned toward his friend. “Look, Keryl! Look at the child’s eyes!”

The young man bent over the crying baby, gently stroking the tiny cheek with his finger. The baby turned its head, opening its large eyes as it searched instinctively for nourishment, love, and warmth.

“The eyes are ... gold!” Keryl whispered. “Burning gold as the sun! Nothing like this has ever occurred in our people I wonder—”

“A gift from her human father, no doubt. Although I know of no humans with eyes like this. But that secret, too, Amberyl took with her.” He sighed, shaking his head. Then he looked back down at the whimpering baby. “Her daughter is as lovely as her mother,” the man said, wrapping the baby tightly in its blankets. “And now, my friend, we must go. We have been in this strange and terrible land long enough.”

“Yes,” Keryl said, but he made no move to leave. “What about Amberyl?” His gaze went back to the pale, unmoving figure upon the bed.

“We will leave her among those she chose to be with at the end,” his companion said gravely. “Perhaps one of the gods will accept her now and will guide her wandering spirit home.”

“Farewell, my sister,” Keryl murmured. Reaching down, he took the roses from the dead hands and, kissing them, put the flowers carefully in the pocket of his tunic. His companion spoke words in an ancient language, lifting the enchantment from the inn. Then the two strangers, holding the baby, vanished from the room like a shower of silver, sparkling rain.

And the baby was beautiful, as beautiful as her mother. For it is said that, in the ancient of days before they grew self—centered and seduced by evil, the most beautiful of all races ever created by the gods was the ogre....

Book 5: The Sacrifice

A child deeply wanted,
a son of the midlife,
the only daughter
with the father’s eyes,
for you, dear children,
we build these castles
that the walls may encircle
your borrowed lives.

Surrounded by stone,
by tower and crenel,
there is no courage
that is not stone,
and drawbridge and battlement,
merlon and parapet
assemble to keep you
redeemed and alone.

O child well-loved,
O son of the midlife,
who measured the tendon
in the span of your hand?
And glittering daughter,
image of memory,
is the heart of your blossoming
apportioned and planned?
Where is your country
and where are your people?
Where the unblessed
discontentment with walls?
Where is the siegecraft
of heart and autonomy,
encircling the castle
as the battlement falls?

Chapter One

The last ringing echoes of the chimes, hanging in the clock tower of the Temple of Paladine, were punctuated by the sounds of shutters closing, doors slamming shut, keys turning in locks, and the shrill protests of disappointed kender, who had been discovered poking about among the shelves and were now being tossed into the streets. Six strikes of the bell brought the day’s business to an end. Shopkeepers set about closing for the night; last minute buyers were eyed with impatience and hustled out of the stores as soon as their cash was in hand.

“Close up, Markus,” Jenna told her young assistant.

He promptly left his seat at the entrance and began to draw the heavy wooden shutters over the pane glass windows.