To Mark Park, Who knows the Little King From the heart out.

O Palicrovol, with death and vengeance in your eyes, I write to you because over the centuries there are tales you have forgotten, and tales you never knew. I will tell you all the tales, and because my tales are true, you will withhold your blade-filled hand, and no longer seek the death of the boy Orem, called Scanthips, called Banningside, called the Little King.

The Exiled Rebel and the Flower Princess

This is not the earliest of the tales, but it is the first that I must tell, because if you remember this, you will hear me to the end.

He came to her in the garden, where her women were draping her with flowers, which they must do every day of the spring. "What is the name of the girl?" he asked.

Her women looked to her for permission to answer. She nodded at sharp-tongued Cold-in-the-Western-Waters, who would know the proper words to say.

"Our lady will know the name of this man who walks boldly in the holy garden, and risks knowing all the secrets that only eunuchs know."

The man looked slightly surprised. "But I was told I might walk anywhere in the city."

Again the women looked to her, and this time she chose Bent-Back-from-Birth, whose voice was high and strange.

"You may walk where a man may walk, but you must pay what a man must pay." To her surprise, the man did not look afraid. By his fearlessness he was a fool. By his clumsy accent he was a foreigner. By his presence in the holy garden, he was new to Isle-Where-Winter-Is-But-One-Day-in-the-Mountains. But above all, by his face he was strong and beautiful and good, and so she nodded to Born-among-Falling-Lilac-Petals.

At once the stranger dropped to his knees and bowed his head, but he did not bend his back.