“Stored. Carefully stored. Now we all remember what armaments lead to. As the Gardener said, beginning a war is easy. Any fool could do it and frequently did, but all of us now remember the kind of messes that came after. Instead of going to war, everyone is waiting to see what the vile races will do. Mr. Weathereye says it’s possible they’ll just dwindle away.”
The queen turned to catch a glimpse of herself in the tall, gold-framed mirrors that lined the wall. Light splintered in the jewels of her diadem, swept in glowing rays across her silken robes, became trapped in the incredible cape crafted from cloth of diamond, Sophia’s gift from the cellars of Lorn. She was Queen of the Ghoss. “Will we rule perfectly, Joziré? Will our people work together in perfection and joy?”
“Madam,” he said, taking my face between his hands, “we will do our damnedest!”
He started the kiss, but I refused to let it end. Holding Joziré wiped out all recollection of old regrets, pains, and sorrows. I could not be grateful enough for several lives’ worth of experience cased in one body still capable of this particular delight…And even these to be joined at the end, as the Keeper had told me.
The trumpets sounded again. We two stepped away from one another, faces flushed, fingers clinging, as ponderously, ceremoniously, the doors swung open. In the vaulted room beyond were the Gibbekot, the Gentherans, the Ghoss. Near the dais sat Falija, together with the Crown Prince and Crown Princess, Bamber Joy and Gloriana, who looked both determined and slightly embarrassed in their diadems and court dress. In the front row, by special invitation, were Maybelle, Jimmy Joe, Jeff, Ella May, and Sophia, with the young man she had decided to marry. Among the onlookers was a Trajian juggler with his wife; upon the rafters a flutter of chitterlain; in a corner, beside Howkel and his family, a scuttle of gammerfree. Peering through the wide-flung doors of the terrace, ranks of umoxen stood shoulder to shoulder, while upon the dais stood the Gardener, Mr. Weathereye, and Lady Badness.
Everyone present was there for the same reason. We were a cluster of organisms, experimentally working together to bring joy to Fajnard, hoping such joy could be become contagious and infect others beyond Fajnard, and perhaps, someday, spread to the middle of things and the edges of things. If not in this great experiment, then perhaps in the next one, or in the one after that…
The wide aisle to the dais was laid in soft, scarlet carpet. Upon the dais were two tall thrones. Smiling at one another and all those assembled, we rested our hand upon the hand of our love, and stepped forward into our lives.
About the Author
SHERI S. TEPPER is the author of several resoundingly acclaimed novels, including The Companions, The Visitor, The Fresco, Singer from the Sea, Six Moon Dance, The Family Tree, Gibbon’s Decline and Fall, A Plague of Angels, Sideshow, and Beauty, which was voted Best Fantasy Novel of the Year by the readers of Locus magazine. Tepper lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
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ALSO BY SHERI S. TEPPER
The Awakeners
After Long Silence
The Gate to Women’s Country Beauty
Grass
Raising the Stones
Sideshow
A Plague of Angels
Shadow’s End
Gibbon’s Decline and Fall
The Family Tree
Six Moon Dance
Singer from the Sea
The Fresco
The Visitor
The Companions
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
THE MARGARETS. Copyright © 2007 by Sheri S. Tepper. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © APRIL 2007 ISBN: 9780061842146
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