Song of the Shiver Barrens
Page 50
I watch the child play in the sunlight, running under the apricot trees, squelching the fallen fruit with her bare feet, laughing at the soft sweetness of them beneath her toes. She has Temellin’s laugh and Samia’s freckles and Arrant’s bright courage. The cabochon my sword bestowed on her shines gold.
I have been an Exaltarch and ruled an empire. I have achieved the revenge I sought. My enemies have begged for mercy at my feet. I have ruled the nation of my birth, although they did not at first welcome me. I have loved and lost and grieved and thought I would never love or laugh again.
And then the child creeps into my arms, and love overwhelms me, laughter bubbles up when she chuckles. The mosaic of my past is fractured by a child’s laugh, melted by her smile, banished by her very existence. And I who have trodden its patterning find a peace I once thought I’d never know.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
No book arrives at its finished, published stage without the help of a great many people. There are editors, copyeditors, proofreaders, designers, marketing people and blurb writers, cover artists, beta readers and agents and mapmakers…and this book seemed to need more hard work than most.
So for all of you, a heartfelt thank you. I couldn’t have done it without you, and a very special thanks to Associate Publisher Stephanie Smith and all the team at HarperCollins Voyager; the cover artist Shane Parker; the mapmaker Perdy Phillips; my talented fellow Voyager authors who know how much I owe them—Karen Miller and Russell Kirkpatrick; other friends who risked being honest and gave of their time—Alena Sanusi, bookseller Mark Timmony, Donna Hanson, Sharyn Lilley, my sister Margaret Larke; and my agent Dorothy Lumley who put me brilliantly on the right track when I derailed.
And to you, my readers—I hope you have enjoyed the ride to get this far, the last page of the trilogy—and thank you all. Please feel free to email me or to visit my blog at www.glendalarke.blogspot.com
About The Author
Glenda is an Australian who now lives in Malaysia, where she works on the two great loves of her life: writing fantasy and the conservation of rainforest avifauna. She has also lived in Tunisia and Austria, and has at different times worked as a housemaid, library assistant, schoolteacher, university tutor, medical correspondence course editor, field ornithologist and designer of nature interpretive centres. Along the way she has taught English to students as diverse as Korean kindergarten kids and Japanese teenagers living in Malaysia, Viennese adults in Austria and engineering students in Tunis. If she has any spare time (which is not often), she goes birdwatching; if she has any spare cash (not nearly often enough), she visits her daughters in Los Angeles and Virginia and her family in Western Australia.
Visit Glenda Larke at:
www.glendalarke.blogspot.com
www.glendalarke.com
For information about Glenda Larke and her books, plus all the latest science fiction news, visit:
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www.voyageronline.com.au
the website for lovers of science fiction and fantasy.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.
Books by Glenda Larke
ISLES OF GLORY TRILOGY
The Aware (1)
Gilfeather (2)
The Tainted (3)
THE MIRAGE MAKERS
Heart of the Mirage (1)
The Shadow of Tyr (2)
Song of the Shiver Barrens (3)
Writing as Glenda Noramly
Havenstar
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Copyright
Voyager
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
First published in Australia in 2007
This edition published in 2010
by HarperCollinsPublishers Australia Pty Limited
ABN 36 009 913 517
www.harpercollins.com.au
Copyright © Glenda Larke 2007
The right of Glenda Larke to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her under the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000.
This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
HarperCollinsPublishers
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National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data:
Larke, Glenda.
Song of the shiver barrens.
ISBN 13: 978 0 7322 8200 4. (pbk.)
ISBN 10: 0 7322 8200 4. (pbk.)
ISBN 978 0 7304 4454 1 (epub)
I. Title. (Series : Larke, Glenda. Mirage Makers ; bk. 3).
A823.3
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