ey are known as the Eternal

ng never comes.

Y E’S Daughters includes:

history of their cousins in Bryn Bresail: th

available nnly to the Daughters of Sophia, and rules for making magic

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J

Y9 “The female of the species is deadlier than the male ... - Valentina Villanova

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Dedication For my mother. Sample

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In traduction: 3hree K c e s of ‘Eate ............ Chapter O n e : B i r t h ........... Public Veils .................... Private Lies .................... The Daughters ................. Organization .................. Methods ..................... The Sidhe .................... The White Plague ............... National Organization ........... Relations With Other Societies ..... Chapter 3 i o : Blood .......... Handmaidens ................. Daughters of Sophia ............

Chapter 3hree: Barrier ........

Map: Gateways to Bryn Bre Men ....................... Sam

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ara Arciniega’s hidden ”

narrowed. This was no time for

He looks ... dangerous.”

m beneath the bench, he removed its ut heavy telescope - and replaced it

“Make sure this arrives safely in Aldana, and take Stefan with you. He knows his way around a sword.”

Gruenhild had worked for Arciniega long enough to recognize the urgency in his voice. Without responding, she ducked back into the dark rear corner of the room and vanished. The only sound of her escape was a brief gust of air followed by the click as the secret door locked behind her. The stairwell beyond was all but sound-proofed.

As the door slid shut, Arciniega’s groundskeeper smiled. Stefan had already left for Aldana ... but he wouldn‘t make it. The boy had seen too much, and might begin to put two and two together. Awaste, really ... but this mission was three hundred years in the making, and could not be risked for a seventeen-year-old fool.

Gruenhild ran a hand through her short dark hair, her fingers lingering on the scar beside her temple. It had been there for nearly four hundred years. A reminder of her mort ality... even as her life stretched on endlessly. I am not eternal, Gruenhild thought to herself. All worlds mast end. .. She walked down the hidden staircase, shouldering the leather case that held Arciniega’s Blood Science research materials. At the bottom of the staircase, she peered through a peephole into the manor’s small kitchen. Empty. Gruenhild stepped out stealthily, and reached for a small rack of herbs that rested in an unnoticed corner. Uncorking a small glass bottle that read ”Chicken oil,” Gruenhild glanced out the kitchen’s window and saw a courtyard filled with horses and Inquisition soldiers. Arciniega’s light spectrum had certainly earned some unwanted attention. Bright torches burned in their hands. They were eager to begin the “purification” of the house.

uBastards,” she whispered. “You haven’t caught me yet.” Upending the bottle’s contents into her mouth, Gruenhild grimaced. The elixir was bitter, foul, but effective. It was always a bit eerie to watch its effects, and she stared at her hands in fascination as they slowly faded from view. Within a few seconds, Gruenhild and her possessions vanished within a shroud of invisibility. Sample

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With a whispered pray The groundskeeper smiled, placing the rest of the now- invisible bottles in her unseen beltpurse. Opening the door casually, she stepped out into the courtyard. Arciniega would have killed the first wave of attackers by now, and soon he would escape the house as well. She had no fear of that. He was a crafty devil, and dangerous as well.

Ignoring the screams of Arciniega’s staff, she crossed the courtyard and headed away from the flames licking the foundation of the ancient estate. Arciniega would assume that his humble groundskeeper had smuggled his equipment out at great risk, and would likely become even more trusting. Soon, she would be as irreplaceable as the scientists in his laboratories - the men that she watched, day and night, subtly guiding their experiments. Without his knowledge, she controlled the information he obtained, preventing him from reaching certain conclusions that were too dangerous to be left in his hands.

Gruenhild smiled grimly. Men like Arciniega were uncommon, even after four hundred years. She welcomed the challenge he represented. Soon enough, she would have to return to the guise of his gentle, loyal servant, laughing at his jokes and pretending not to understand the scientific conversations that floated through the house with every breeze. But for now, her eyes shone with intellect, and her carefully guarded facade fell, as invisible as her body as she waked stealthily through the trees.

Deep in the forests around the manor stood a small hut - the groundskeeper’s house. Inside the hut was a simple cot, a small armoire for clothing and utensils, and a cooking fireplace. Gruenhild slid her hand beneath the cot, opening a small chute in the floor. Two hundred years ago, this hut had been part of a lumber mill.

Gripping a knapsack of clothing and her knives, she slid into the chute, feeling herself accelerate rapidly before bursting out over the underground river. She fell into the rippling waves, feeling their chill bite into her skin in the blackness of the small cave. Anyone else would have drowned in the black river. Anyone, that is, except a child of the Lake.

Bryn Bresail awaited.

You consider us to be

Pavtlow, Ussura - 16 “Idon’t care what yo snarled, leaning 1

the Montaigne. Look what your own provinces and mine!

“Matus Ma...” a pressing matters on he

are not children, wai tears. You have gifts, s

men as we can m come farther north them. Matushka is

a thimble,” Aleksi glowered, his dying because of Montegue’

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