Visions
The Shepherd Book II
A Novel by Jeffrey B. Linn
All rights reserved

Chapter XI

Abruptly my vision washed away in a wall of whiteness. A cubbyhole of my mind recognized the marble of a familiar citadel, and the scent of tarragon, which meant that I was on the edge of the yard adjacent to the spice gardens. Still I leapt into the air again and again. I noticed the well with it's blue-tiled roof, and a woman in a citrine tinted gown approaching. She paused and parted her tawny locks, regarding me with intensity. It was Cassia. All this I perceived only remotely; my thoughts otherwise engaged.

"I have heard," she began, "that you are wont to pass the evening on the lawn." In the background beside a trellis of vines a figure trembled in spasms of poorly concealed mirth: Nebiah. Then she froze and stared in my direction as if at a squall gathering. She shot across the grass. Cassia's lips were forming a word when Nebiah's brown arms locked around her waist.

"Silence!" she hissed. "He has had a vision."

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