by Jane Routley
“They were not supposed to,” he said. “We have rules about these things, too.”
I stopped and looked at him. “I don’t really know anything about you, do I?”
His mouth was tense. “I am not trying to deceive you. It has just been… We have been busy.”
“Yes, I know that… Can you at least teach me your language?”
He laughed. His laughter sounded relieved to me. “Sure, if you are brave enough to try.”
“I already know one word. Bullet.”
He pulled a face.
“Oh, and another. ‘Wilk.’”
He laughed. “That’s a swear word. Do you want to start with some swear words?”
“Definitely. Always useful. And yours sound really vicious.”
He pronounced a couple: they were about shitting and turds, like our swear words. I did my best to pronounce them as he did. This was not going to be easy. I would have to start writing them down and practising them. But it could be worth it.
“Do you think, if I can learn your language, I can come to your country one day? Maybe I could find out for myself what happened to my mother.”
He tensed up again. “I’m not sure,” he said. “I do not really have the authority for that.”
“Authority?” I asked.
“The way our government works is very complicated. Best to wait and see.”
He doesn’t want to take you, said Katti. She pressed her head into my hand. Maybe it’s dangerous.
I watched the ghost’s strange straw-coloured hair bobbing away down the path ahead of me.
I couldn’t see how he could stop me if I really wanted to go. All governments have loopholes. But maybe it was too dangerous. After all, it had killed my mother. Still, wouldn’t it be amazing to go somewhere no one else had gone?
“I could became an expert on all things ghost,” I said to Katti. “Consulted by the government and everyone else important. Now that would be good. We could wind up eating the finest salmon, you and I.”
I might never have to talk about mangle-wurzels again.
The End
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I’d like to thank my agent John Jarrold, my editor Kate Coe, and all the other great people at Rebellion Publishing who made this book possible.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JANE ROUTLEY has had a variety of careers, including fruit picker and occult librarian, and once lived in Germany and Denmark for a decade. Now she works at a railway station and is a keen climate activist. Jane has published six books and won two Aurealis awards for Best Australian Fantasy Novel. Her short stories have been widely anthologized and read on the ABC. Her current ambition is to visit an active volcano.
Empire. Revolution. Magic.
Gerrit is the son of Bourshkanya’s Supreme-General. Despite his powerful storm-affinity and the State’s best training, he can’t control his magic. To escape the brutal consequences, he flees.
Celka is a travelling circus performer, hiding both her link to the underground and her storm-affinity from the prying eyes of the secret police. But Gerrit’s arrival threatens to expose everything: her magic, her family, and the people they protect.
The storms have returned, and everything will change.
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Paris was supposed to save Hallie. Now… well, let’s just say Paris has other ideas.
There’s a strange woman called The Chronometrist who will not leave her alone. Garbled warnings from bizarre creatures keep her up at night. And there’s a time portal in the keg room of the bar where she works.
Soon, Hallie is tumbling through the turbulent past and future Paris, making friends, changing the world—and falling in love.
But with every trip, Hallie loses a little of herself, and every infinitesimal change she makes ripples through time, until the future she’s trying to save suddenly looks nothing like what she hoped for…
“A high-flying novel of love and peril—sheer page-turning entertainment that hooked me with its wit from the first sentence.”
Helen Marshall, World Fantasy Award-winning author of Gifts for the One Who Comes After
“A glittering novel of time travel that you’ll want to devour like a mille-feuille in one single bite. I loved it.”
Lavie Tidhar, World Fantasy Award-winning author of A Man Lies Dreaming and Central Station
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A heroine who really gets up close and personal!
Babylon Steel, ex-sword-for-hire, ex... other things, runs The Red Lantern, the best brothel in the city. She’s got elves using sex magic upstairs, S&M in the basement and a large green troll cooking breakfast in the kitchen, and she’d love you to visit, except...
She’s not having a good week. The Vessels of Purity are protesting against brothels, girls are disappearing, and if she can’t pay her taxes, Babylon’s going to lose the Lantern. She’d given up the mercenary life, but when the mysterious Darask Fain pays her to fi nd a missing heiress, she has to take the job. And then her past starts to catch up with her in other, more dangerous ways.
Witty and fresh, Sebold delivers the most exciting fantasy debut in years.
‘Ingenious, gripping, and full of pleasures on every level. Exceptional.’
— Mike Carey, New York Times Bestselling author of The Unwritten
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