Eye of the Ocean Book 3 Ji'jin Station

Eye of the Ocean – Book 3: Ji’Jin Station
then sighed again. “All Priests do that, she was just worse than most. Ulanda, she
made the best of a bad deal. And it does work both ways, the human to the...
other.”
“In the story... the wind...” She was shivering again even though the room was
already warm. “Or am I just the snow wrapping around the stone?”
“Don't take it so frigg'in literally.”
“I think I almost ended up on Zimmer last night, at least the Overpriest
thought so. Is that literal enough? They say that the Lady created Zimmer on
Alisim out of the pattern of a Zimmer warding shield. What could I have done
with a Clan Zimmer prayer banner in the center of the world-altar? Why
Zimmer?”
“It's more the question of 'which' Zimmer. And it's just, well, it's like the snow.
It's just what's easy to see but the shape you get depends on the wind which you
can't see and what it's being blown against. Empire, or Empire Law actually, same
thing. The stone. And the white petal lost in the snow - it's the part of us, well,
like an image of the snow, that's the part of overpattern that we can comprehend.
Except it's twice removed from the real thing, the wind, but it's the most... If you
ended up on Zimmer after this was all over, you'd be able to see how the changes
went, the basic flow of things even though the details would be different for each
people and their worlds. It's likely that the Zimmer people were created
deliberately just for that.”
“How?”
“There's a book, get Rit to show you. Then you tell me. A better question
would be why they were created.”
“You just told me.”
“I told you diddly-squat.”
“You and Anga...”
“Shut. Up.” The two words exploded across the table. He gathered his
composure slowly in jerky tugs of his clothing. “Just don't,” he added hoarsely.
“And me?” she asked, the tone so even that the words had to have come from
the cold center of her. “Can I ask that?”
He turned his head a little as though he wanted to see her differently. His eyes
narrowed again and were lost in the folds of skin. “I watched you dance the
Opening. The wind was there, hell... too much there. Ulanda, take the other for
as long as you can. You're a hell of a lot more human than the Lady ever was.
The part that could care about people... she wasn't complete. You can't go
through what she did growing up and allow yourself to trust or to love. You're
more like Cassa. She fought to stay human.”
“Was she from Alisim?”
“No. Similar gene line though... things tend to get linked together, genes that
is, particularly these kind and the tag-a-longs give them some stability. Not in
Laurel Hickey www.2morrow.bc.ca