Samantha Noone

Erratum

Chapter Zero Annum 31,121. The room is dark. From the corner comes a piercing hole of light, a gust of wind and a rolling motion. XIIL is born this day, and the deeds fated that she should be born as a girl. She is hurried by the birth-helper onto her mother, who succumbs to her in relief. This day is passed, and she is much older now. She can see her mother, the creasing in the corner of her eyes, her warm hands embracing her. She is born amongst the wood, in a canopy built of bark, and she can smell the mahogany planks in her mind. When she sleeps, she comes back here and knows where she is from the smell... it guides her here in her dreams. She moved from the canopies and warm smells, into the swarm of the communes. Men and women grouped together like woodlice, they recoiled and uncoiled from waking and dreams. The central communes were known to be populated and suffered a range of problems. This is how the world worked for many millennia. There were civil wars and uprisings, and rebellions and usurpers, prostitutes and blacksmiths and highwaymen who were hung in the streets. Pigs and cows that came and birthed and fed a hundred people and their lives were gone in the blink of an eye. The streets bustled and people shoved and fights arose, territories were taken and overthrown, slaves flayed in the streets and slave masters bargaining their property to buyers.