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In Serein Book 2The CageTable Of ContentsPart 1 - Grasslands1/1 - A Day Too Late1/2 - A New Way To Play1/3 - A Day Too Late (Reprise)Part 2 - Not quite home or even dry ….2/1 - Different Forms Of Torture2/2 - The Measure Of The Man2/3 - Kings, Lovers & Revenge2/4 - Of Challenges And Pledges2/5 - The DuelPart 3 - The Darkness3/1 - Encircled3/2 - Conna3/3 - The Cage3/4 - Strange LandsPart 4 - Pertineri4/1 - Missing Sequences4/2 - Lucian's Rejection4/3 - Mirrors4/4 - The Coffin & The Knight4/5 - Only A Woman4/6 - Angel ChildPart 5 - Of Trials & Retributions5/1 - Lord Tremain Can Raise The Dead5/2 - A Courtesan's Dress5/3 - Trant's Judgement5/4 - I Might Call You ConnaPart 6 - Order Out Of Chaos6/1 - Dungeon Visits6/2 - The Rapists6/3 - Still Inside6/4 - Asked & Answered
 
6/5 - Trial By Combat Part 7 - Pertineri Afternoons7/1 - Ablutions7/2 - Anything In The Hard7/3 - Pertineri Market7/4 - Crazy About YouPart 8 - Tomorrow, Manoranta8/1 - The Night8/2 - Bring Me Another 8/3 - Capitulation8/4 - A Strange ThingPart 1 – Grasslands1/1 - A Day Too LateWe walked, climbed and slithered under the blue, blue sky, with the sun hot from aboveand the snow and ice cold from below.Lucian led the way in the direction where the roadway must have been, yet we could notfind it nor see it, and eventually it became clear that the upheavals on the mountainsidemust have erased a great deal more of the landscape than we first suspected.After an hour or so I sat down and refused to go any further.“There must be an easier way to do this. And, I am hungry and thirsty. Can’t we call for some food first?” I asked of him who was bursting with bright energy and really enjoyedclambering across the fields of rock and ice, repeatedly opening up great distances between us and then waiting with supressed impatience for me to catch up.He agreed but when he opened the connection, there was a deathly silence on the other side.The old man did not respond, and no-one else had taken his place.Something most unusual had happened since the horse people had called on our help,only a day ago? Just one day ago – it seemed like lifetimes had passed since we lay in thegrey marble room I had made for him, and which was now entirely gone, blastedfragments scattered across the ridges and the valleys of the North Mountains.I caught a flash from Lucian that he was sorry that the Tadara had vanished with thetower and then a small amusement.We really did not need swords to fight with anymore.So, he opened the doorway and, noting my hesitation, took my hand and more or less pulled me straight into the opening.There was a horrendous sensation of falling, spinning out of control and a definite rush of  bitter cold, but it lasted only for a heartbeat and we stepped out of the white and into anonslaught of difference on every conceivable level; so much so that I nearly fell if ithadn’t been for Lucian steadying me with his hand and with his mind.
 
The air was thick, dry; it was much warmer here and after the bright freshness of themountain range, the dense, dry heat fell upon me from all sides like a predator. The lightturned the strangest hue of orangey-yellow; my body felt heavier as though weights were pressing on my head and shoulders and before me, there stretched a horizon so vast andwide it made my knees go weak. There was a steady push of deep wind blowing acrossmy face without let up or pause that caused a pressure in my ears and against my eyes.Lucian transferred my hand into his other hand and wrapped an arm around my waist,holding me closely.I was grateful and leaned into his familiarity of presence and texture as I centred enoughto look around me.We stood in a round space, defined by an absence of grass, on what appeared to be somekind of sand or ground stone, covering thinly a base of rock beneath us. The space itself was not much bigger than a small cottage, and beyond it, there was the grass Iremembered from Lucian’s memories, stretching out in all directions as far as the eyecould see.To the right of me and just outside the circle, lay a largish pile of smoldering black;overlaid, I remembered that this is where the keeper’s home would have been, that it had been a round shaped hut made from grass and mud, decorated with earth colours andweaves carved into the surface.As my eyes tracked on and past the keeper’s house, following a straight trail that led to anassembly of caved in and broken structures, I became aware of the outlines of a number of motionless human shapes, on the trail and halfway in the grass that was trampled flat by the side of the trail.It was very obvious that we had come a day too late.Lucian stood straight by my side, holding me, tracking across the land, scanning for lifesigns and for the enemy. As far as he knew, there were no enemies to the horse peopleand I began to feel very uncomfortable, standing in this circle so exposed. I linked tighter with him and helped to scan, widening out onto the Serein levels and what I knew of theold magic ones, half to be of use and half to give me something to do beyond becomingmore and more disconcerted and afraid with every heartbeat that passed.This place was enormous, vast, and full of a whispering silence. There were just thetiniest of minds amongst the grasses, and the grasses itself had such an enormity of  presence here that they represented a dense, slow consciousness of their very own.There was no discernable life anywhere and through the link, I felt Lucian becominguncomfortable now. Where were the horses? These plains had been filled with them onour/his last visit. Where were the horse people? Where were their enemies?All was whispering, rushing silence.I strained and stretched out to fill in the levels he could not yet cover and finally, I perceived a highly unusual echo amongst the noise of the grasses, unusual because it pulsed slowly and repeated itself with intervals large enough to make it difficult to detectas a pattern if you were not extremely acute and careful.I alerted Lucian to this pattern and we tuned into it together, filtering out the distractionsof silence until the pulse was clearly perceived, the resonance of a giant beating heart.We sat in the pattern world, waiting for it to come again, to ascertain more of its nature,and when it did, I realised that it was a kind of revolving doorway that would open just
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