If I could sum it up in 50 words, I wouldn't have needed to write a whole novel about it.

I spoke it soft, but close enough to brush against her lips. I spoke it quiet, but near enough so that the sound of it went twining through her hair. I spoke it hard and firm and dark and sweet.

Are you hurt?" "Absolutely," I said. "Especially in my everywhere.

Over the last month I had pulled a woman from a blazing inferno. I had called fire and lighting down on assassins and escaped to safety. I had even killed something that could have been either a dragon or a demon, depending on your point of view. But there in that room was the first time I actually felt like any sort of hero. If you are looking for a reason for the man I would eventually become, if you are looking for a beginning, look there.

One of them had a large wooden sign nailed to its door proclaiming, NO SYMPATHY! I wondered what non-arcane visitors might think of the warning.

Then I felt something inside me break and music began to pour out into the quiet. My fingers danced; intricate and quick they spun something gossamer and tremulous into the circle of light our fire had made. The music moved like a spiderweb stirred by a gentle breath, it changed like a leaf twisting as it falls to the ground, and it felt like three years Waterside in Tarbean, with a hollowness inside you and hands that ached from the bitter cold.

For people who don't know, the fundraiser works like this: people donate to Worldbuilders and they're automatically entered to win geeky swag in the lottery. We're just starting week two and we're already giving away more than $40,000 of books and games.