The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden: 1 by Catherynne Valente

Author:Catherynne Valente [Valente, Catherynne]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 0553903101
Publisher: Random House, Inc.
Published: 2006-10-30T16:00:00+00:00

I WAS SLEEPY THEN, RESTING MY HEAD ON THE rough-hewn table and letting Bartholomew’s voice roll over me like gentle water over stones. But Al-a-Nur had risen up in me in all its colors, and I could feel a yearning for it turning and warming itself in my belly. All my sib lings had gone, I was ready—why should I not leave this wretched hut, where my mother’s eyes scalded my back wherever I walked?

“Take me with you,” I whispered, sitting up, my eyes suddenly bright and calculating as a hungry little cat in the snow. “Take me to Al-a-Nur, to the Chrysanthemum Tower and the green pools under the willow. I will become wise there, just like you, you’ll see!” I clutched his hand tightly, but seeing his startled expression, let the callused fingers fall back to our table.

Bags—for so I already called him in my heart—peered closely at me, his eyes narrowing to tiny moon-slivers in the red bleed of his fur. He looked to Bartholomew and whispered, “And the wolf shall lead her astray…”

“What?” I asked, straining to hear their suddenly hushed voices. But Bartholomew grinned hugely, his ponderous tongue hanging out of his mouth in a most friendly fashion.

“Nothing, my dear,” interrupted Balthazar, shaking his ice-colored fur, “just a bit of Scripture. The Book of Carrion, chapter twenty-eight, verse ten. If you are to come with us you will learn that and much more. Certainly we will have you—we cannot turn a seeker away by the laws of our Tower. But perhaps it is not solely our decision…?”

My mother’s ponderous back was turned to us, and it shook slightly with tears—sorrow or relief I could not tell—smothered as quickly as snow sliding from a pine bough to the frozen earth. I went to her, and put my hands on her shoulders, leaning my head against her warm skin.

“Go,” she spat hoarsely. “Just go. If the Stars wish us to meet again, they will fashion the path before your feet.” She shrugged me off and disappeared from the great-room with her heavy, lumbering gait. I began to pack food for myself and my new brothers—we would need bread for the journey south.

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