The brush/tunk of the drum lay down in the ground and beat in the blood, while the notes of the harp were as lush, as brilliant as the patches of crimson and sapphire, emerald and amber the lamps’ light picked out from the paintings, the deep green-blue glows in Rose’s tunic, the warm cream of Miralys’ robe, the brittle white that Rohant wore.
Shadow crooned wordless sounds, her voice rich and flowing. Cool. Caressing. Magical. Like spring rain falling from clouds so high the drops seemed to come from the sun. She had doubted herself. She doubted no more.
They came from the shadows, slender and angular, black and silver similitudes of Naya, Zayalla, Annethi, Itsays, Tallitt and Sullan, spinning threads from themselves in a weave more complex than any she’d tried before, spinning dreams for Autumn Rose, for Miralys and Rohant, even for Digby, dreams she didn’t know, couldn’t know, didn’t want to know. What she wanted was her own dream. What she got was that AND Kikun’s dream blended:
Her sisters danced with pattering feet and busy hands-a strange dance, a dance she didn’t know. And Gaagi Raven came and danced among them, black scales glittering, black wings sweeping among them, closing about each one in an oddly protecting embrace (if it could be called an embrace when neither touched the other), wings closing and spreading, closing about Naya, then Zayalla, then Annethi, then Itsays, then Tallitt, and finally Sullan.
The Joy came then, the Purpose. She sang laughter as she saw Itsays wink at her, saw Naya smile and clap her slender hands, saw Zayalla shake her snaky hips, Annethi dance with Sullan around and around Kikun, and touch his shoulders and bend to touch his hands and dance away in joy, dance in circles about Spash’ats and Jadii Gevas, Xumady and Mask while the Lael-Lenox the Grandmother Ghost pranced in a tight little circle of her own…