The only noise now was the rain, pattering softly with the magnificent indifference of nature for the tangled passions of humans.

A wager?" I repeated. "Yes," he said, and gave me a slow smile, bright with challenge. ... "Stake?" I asked cautiously. He was still smiling, an odd sort of smile, hard to define. "A kiss." My first reaction was outrage, but then I remembered that I was on my way to Court, and that had to be the kind of thing they did at Court. And if I win I don't have to collect. I hesitated only a moment longer, lured by the thought of open sky, and speed, and winning. "Done," I said.

The only noise now was the rain, pattering softly with the magnificent indifference of nature for the tangled passions of humans.

So let me end with the wish that you find the same kind of happyiness, and laughter, and love, that I have found, and that you have the wisdon to make them last.

If more people recognized the difference between friendship and mere attraction, or how love must partake of both to prosper, I expect there'd be more happy people." "And a lot fewer poems and plays," I said, laughing as I splashed about in the scented water.

One doesn't lose a self, like a pair of gloves or a pine. We learn and change, or we harden into stone.

They're safe,'' he said. "And you're not made of glass". He swept me up in his arms. I laughed. "And I'm not made of glass." He carried me into our room and kicked the door shut behind us.