10
Sabíana stood in her city and wept.
She didn’t even bother to stop herself. This was not her city anymore.
Passing through the Harbinger’s portal was strange, like awakening from a dream that seems more vivid than the waking world. Her disorientation wasn’t helped by the sight before her.
It was all wrong. The seven towers that used to sparkle like different-toned gems every morning had been torn down. Instead of them, seven identically spaced protuberances that looked like chimneys leered over a blackened roof. The veined marble and malachite of the walls had been covered by some sort of off-white spackle that was cracking in some places and painted over in others. From a distance, as it was meant to be viewed, the former palace of the Dars of Vasyllia now looked like a squat, util
