The Spine of the World - By R. A. Salvatore Page 0,32

on the way to Meralda's meager house. She stepped from the door, and even from this great distance Jaka could see how beautiful she appeared, like some shining jewel that mocked the darkness of twilight.

His jewel. The just reward for the beauty that was within him, not a bought present for the spoiled lord of Auckney.

He pictured Lord Feringal holding his hand out of the coach, touching her and fondling her as she stepped inside to join him. The image made him want to scream out at the injustice of it all. The coach rolled back down the road toward the distant castle with Meralda inside, just as he had envisioned earlier. Jaka could not have felt more robbed if Lord Feringal had reached into his pockets and taken his last coin.

He sat wallowing on the peat-dusted hill for a long, long while, running his hands through his hair repeatedly and cursing the inequities of this miserable life. So self-involved was he that he was taken completely by surprise by the midden sound of a young girl's voice.

"I knew you'd be about."

Jaka opened his dreamy, moist eyes to see Tori Ganderlay staring at him.

"I knew it," the girl teased.

"What do you know?"

"You heard about my sister's dinner and had to see for yourself," Tori reasoned. "And you're still waiting and watching."

"Your sister?" Jaka repeated dumbly. "I come here every night," he explained.

Tori turned from him to gaze down at the houses, at her own house, the firelight shining bright through the window. "Hoping to see Meralda naked through the window?" she asked with a giggle.

"I come out alone in the dark to get away from the fires and the light," Jaka replied firmly. "To get away from pestering people who cannot understand."

"Understand what?"

"The truth," the young man answered cryptically, hoping he sounded profound.

"The truth of what?"

"The truth of life," Jaka replied.

Tori looked at him long and hard, her face twisting as she tried to decipher his words. She looked back to her house.

"Bah, I'm thinking you're just wanting to see Meralda naked," she said again, then skipped happily back down the path.

Wouldn't she have fun with Meralda at his expense, Jaka thought. He heaved another of his great sighs, then turned and walked away to the even darker fields higher up the mountainside.

"Fie this life!" he cried out, lifting his arms to the rising full moon. "Fie, fie, and fly from me now, trappings mortal! What cruel fate to live and to see the undeserving gather the spoils from me. When justice lies in spiked pit. When worth's measure is heredity. Oh, Lord Feringal feeds at Meralda's neck. Fie this life, and fly from me!"

He ended his impromptu verse by falling to his knees and clutching at his teary face, and there he wallowed for a long, long while.

Anger replaced self-pity, and Jaka came up with a new line to finish his verse. "When justice lies in spiked pit," he recited, his voice quivering with rage. "When worth's measure is heredity." Now a smile crept onto his undeniably handsome features. "Wretched Feringal feeds at Meralda's neck, but he'll not have her virginity!"

Jaka climbed unsteadily to his feet and looked up again at the full moon. "I swear to it," he said with a growl, then muttered dramatically, "Fie this life," one last time and started for home.

*****

Meralda took the evening in stoic stride, answering questions politely and taking care to avoid the direct gaze of an obviously unhappy Lady Priscilla Auck. She found that she liked Steward Temigast quite a bit, mostly because the old man kept the conversation moving by telling many entertaining stories of his past and of the previous lord of the castle, Feringal's father. Temigast even set up a signal system with Meralda to help her understand which piece of silverware she should use for the various courses of food.

Though she remained unimpressed with the young lord of Auckney, who sat directly opposite her and stared unceasingly, the young woman couldn't deny her wonder at the delicious feast the servants laid out before her. Did they eat like this every day in Castle Auck-squab and fish, potatoes and sea greens-delicacies Meralda had never tasted before?

At Lord Feringal's insistence, after dinner the group retired to the drawing room, a comfortable, windowless square chamber at the center of the castle's ground floor. Thick walls kept out the chill ocean wind, and a massive hearth, burning with a fire as large as a village bonfire added to the coziness