He dreamed that he heard her voice, that, as he lay dreaming, she sat down beside the bed and combed his hair with a silver comb, pulling at the tangles, complaining humorously that even after so many centuries, he had never learned to keep himself neat.
He dreamed that she sat beside him in the shadows and sang a most ancient and mysterious song predating all human languages, a song which can call back the setting sun and bid it rise again; and he dreamed that the sun rose in the west, out of the blackness of Tashe, illuminating also Leshe, and then he truly awoke, in that room, in broad daylight, the blue sky of Earth itself visible through the window.
TasheLesheawokeAnd the silver comb was on the nightstand beside the toy heron.
And she was with him in the room.
sheHe got up. She st
