CHAPTER 5THE SMILE OF THE BEAST
The famous Archives were a block of tile-roofed buildings set amidst flowering gardens. Cool arcades of columns marched in a row, casting shade wherein lazed scholars and students from Gorovod and Skhvar, Arungol and Kavlad, Ordovoy and even Grand Khev itself, as well as from easterling Aijan and the trade-cities of the Hundred Isles, and some were even come hither from the Gold City, so far to the jungled south as to be deemed nigh fabulous.
This was only fitting, as within these tall buildings of white marble reposed the greatest collection of books and scrolls and incised tablets ever amassed in the history of man. It was Prince Udrun of the Borgovoy Dynasty had begun the mighty collection, added to by each successive Prince of Novodny after his time. I
