Brigan spun around to face the man, swearing with as much as exasperation and fury as Fire had ever heard anyone swear. The man scuttled away in alarm.

Your eyes are beautiful," he said, and she felt warm suddenly, warm in the sun that dappled through the treetops and rested on them in patches.

I don't understand your book. Isn't every book a book of words?

What she really loved was to hang over the edge and watch the bow of the ship slice through the waves. She loved it especially when the waves were high and the ship rose and fell, or when it was snowing and the flakes stung her face.

I think.' she said, 'that sometimes we don't feel the things that we are. But others can feel them.

It seems better to me for a child to have these skills and never use them, than not have them and one day need them," she said.

She wanted to cause him pain for taking a place in her heart she wouldn't have given him if she'd known the truth.