This was before the end:
Word that the aging Emperor 'Kazeth had fallen into a coma from which he was not expected to wake reached the University of Melcena by special courier, just past midnight. The courier's message threw the Imperial Guard into chaos at once. Of course the Crown Prince had to return to the capital immediately, and so there were supplies to gather and horses to saddle and passage by ship to arrange.
No one expected the Crown Prince to do any of the work. It wasn't hard for him to find a time when everyone was looking a different way, and creep very quietly out of the Imperial Residence.
The cool night air brushed gently by Zakath's face, and if he blinked at it more than usual there was no one to notice. The grounds were brightly moon-lit and quiet, with only a few drunken male voices attempting a song to which they apparently knew neither the words nor the tune. Zakath steered well clear of the larger residence halls, taking a shortcut by the College of Economics building to the three-story complex where the female students lived.
He would miss the classes, as dull as most of them were when not even the teachers dared to voice an opinion in his presence. He would miss the raucous students who rarely attended classes, a few of whom actually did seem to like him--or else just thought it would be a lot of fun to see a prince get drunk, in which case they were out of luck. The freshly caught seafood with clearly visible tentacles had been an acceptable challenge, but Zakath couldn't risk alcohol lowering his defenses too far in the company of his guards or his future administrators.
Most of all, Zakath was going to miss the study sessions and long arguments with Miria, the only person at the University who didn't seem to care who he was when she thought he was dead wrong.
Almost a quarter of the University's students were women. The majority of them were enrolled in the College of Economics, because their fathers thought it would improve their chances of finding a good marriage--which worked more often than not. Melcene businessmen were keenly aware of the advantages of having a wife who could keep accounts accurately and drive good bargains.
Most of the girls on campus therefore spent their time working, one way and another, to catch a husband. They were only a little better than the women at court, in Zakath's opinion.
Miria took her own classes cheerfully enough, but her real passion was the history of Mallorea, military and political. She had managed to get a seat in several of the lectures Zakath was also required to attend, and after about two weeks of noncommittal professors and silent students and a constant pressure for the Prince to share his opinion, she'd finally snapped and given a five-minute critique of Emperor Korzeth's judicial system. Sheer exasperation, she'd admitted to him later, with a blush. Zakath was grateful for it.
He couldn't imagine losing Miria. The rest he had always known he would have to give up.
Miria's window was on the ground floor, fortunately. If he'd had to throw rocks whenever he wanted a chat, he'd probably have broken every window within ten yards by now--his aim was the despair of his arms-master. Zakath rapped sharply on the glass.
A young woman whose golden-brown hair framed her classically beautiful face in rather tortured curls unlocked the window and leaned out, her low-cut nightgown showing her to advantage. "Why, hello, your Highness," she purred.
Zakath cleared his throat. "Hello, Penna. I'd like to talk to Miria, please."
"I can't see why," Penna complained, rolling her eyes, but turned away to prod her roommate into wakefulness.
Miria wore loose trousers and an old tunic to sleep, and came to the window without hesitation, rubbing a hand over her eyes. Her dark hair stood up in strange places, and she only half managed to hide a yawn. By court standards she was very plain, with lips more expressive than beautiful and thick eyebrows that grew unshaped. Zakath's heart caught in his mouth at the sight of her.
Concern creased Miria's forehead as she looked at him, but she didn't ask why he'd come without warning in the middle of the night. "It'll just be a minute while I find boots," she said.
Zakath nodded, and tried to get his thoughts clear while Miria poked through the room's clutter in the dim light. There wasn't much time. His guards would be on high alert the moment they realized he had slipped away. He really didn't want to be the object of a full door-to-door search, so it had probably been stupid of him to go at all, but he needed this one moment free from watchful eyes.
Boots located and fastened, Miria climbed nimbly out the window, landing in the smooth gravel with a crunch. Penna called softly, "If you're not back in an hour, I'm going to sleep."
"She'll be back by then," Zakath said. Miria had never actually had any trouble with the door-wardens, who had been pleased, on the whole, to find that the Prince of Mallorea caused so little fuss. It was still easier to avoid the whole issue.
There was a small hedged garden at the back of the building. As they walked toward it, Miria moved into the crook of his arm, wrapping hers around his waist. "What's wrong, Zak?" she murmured.
He gritted his teeth, the words not wanting to line up in any sensible fashion. "My father is dying."
Miria was silent a long moment, though she tightened her arm in a gentle hug. "If they sent for you, they must be sure."
"He would have died three years back if not for that Dalasian healer," Zakath said. "She says there's nothing more to be done."
His father's death was hardly a surprise. Like many Emperors of Mallorea after the chaos of Kal Torak's brief time in power nearly five hundred years ago, 'Kazeth had waited nearly past middle age to marry and produce an heir. Ambitious princes were potentially dangerous to a healthy ruler. It left the Imperial bloodline dangerously thin, to Zakath's mind; his closest relatives were third and fourth cousins at several removes, and one badly timed accident could collapse the Empire entirely. He certainly wasn't going to follow that tradition.
"I've got to go right away," he sighed. "The moment people at court find out how ill he is, everyone will be claiming he supported their private cause." Vultures, all of them, he'd always thought so--and likely to be his constant company for the rest of his life. "I've got to remind them there's still going to be an Emperor."
A night bird sang, low and mournful, from the eaves. Miria's boot scuffed the ground as they walked, and she leaned her head lightly against his shoulder. "I wish we had more time," she said at last, "but you'll be a good Emperor, Zak, I know you will."
He shook his head. "I'm not ready for it, not yet. You've read all the same books I have, you know the kind of things I'll have to do--I don't think I can. And the thing is, being Emperor, I don't think it's possible to make small mistakes."
The garden included a stone bench, and Miria drew him toward it, letting go of him to sit down. The night felt suddenly much colder. "You'll do whatever you have to do for the sake of your people," she said. "You probably won't enjoy any of it, but you will do a good job, and I hope you find some benefits in the end."
Benefits. There had better be at least one. "I'll send for you as soon as I can, Miria," he promised, and hastened to add, "you and your family." She was not much closer to her father than he was to his, her exasperated but dutiful affection an interesting counterpoint to the respectful fear that had always characterized fatherhood to Zakath. Still, it wouldn't be appropriate for her to travel alone.
She blinked up at him, her puzzled face pale in the moonlight. "Send for me?"
His heart sank. "You will come to Mal Zeth, won't you?" He tried to imagine holding the Empire together without Miria there to make him laugh, argue with him, and generally keep him human, and the bleak picture made him shiver.
"Zak, I'm hardly halfway done with my degree," Miria protested. "I can't just leave."
"You never wanted a degree in economics anyway," he countered, as persuasively as he knew how, "and you can study Imperial history just as well in Mal Zeth, I can get all the books you want. You'd be bored here without me to argue with."
Miria laughed reluctantly. "I will be, you're right about that. But, Zak--"
"Please, Miria," he entreated, half-kneeling to take her hand in his. "I'm going to need an Empress, and you're the only one I want."
Her eyes went wide. "What, me?" she gasped. "They'd never let you!"
"Either I'm Emperor or I'm not," Zakath said, "and if they want me they're going to have to accept you." There would certainly be a lot of commotion over it, all in the painfully polite style of the court, where yes, of course frequently meant if it can just be delayed long enough you'll see you're being an idiot. He set his jaw at the thought. If he couldn't force this through, he'd never be able to carry the Empire at all.
Miria leaned forward to cup the back of his neck with a warm, delicate hand. "That is possibly the most awkward proposal of marriage I've ever heard of," she said, "certainly worse than Penna's last two young men. I ought to tell you no and make you try again, just so you won't take me for granted."
"But you won't?" he pressed hopefully. It hadn't sounded like a refusal.
"But I won't," Miria agreed, and kissed him, soft and lingering. She drew back and squeezed his hand. "Listen, Zak--whatever happens, whatever you have to do as Emperor, I know you'll do it for the right reasons. I trust you. And I will always, always love you--nothing can change that."
Something twinged in his gut, trained in paranoia by his father's lectures and a hundred tiny betrayals over his childhood years. Miria meant it, of course, but it was so exactly the kind of thing that people would say to manipulate him. Promising love, promising affection.
He shoved the fear down, and kissed her again.
After a while, they walked mostly in silence back to Miria's window, and he boosted her inside. Everything had already been said; besides, Penna was an inveterate gossip, and didn't need any more fascinating news tonight.
Out of view of the window, Zakath curled one hand in a small but imperious signal, and the soldier who had been shadowing them since they left the garden faded into clear view and saluted in response, one fist over his heart.
"Lieutenant Atesca," Zakath greeted the Melcene recruit. "You found me very quickly. My thanks for your patience."
The soldier bowed stiffly. "I hope your Highness will return to the Guard now," he said. "People do panic when their primary responsibility goes missing."
For all that Atesca was as blandly humorless on the surface as any of the Angarak soldiers, Zakath liked him rather better; in addition to being very competent, the Melcene didn't seem to take himself quite so seriously. "Don't worry," he said, "I won't vanish again." He would shortly be Emperor, and what little privacy he'd been able to snatch before was gone forever.
The lieutenant hesitated, then added, in a softer tone, "Permit me to say, your Highness, that I wish you and your lady every happiness."
Zakath smiled, too wide and honest an expression--it really gave too much away, he'd have to work on that. "Thank you, Atesca," he said. "I hope for that as well."
This was the end, and the beginning:
Packing, traveling, facing the unfamiliar challenges of the imperial court, Miria had often worried that her agreement to come to Mal Zeth would end badly for everyone. She could never have predicted this.
Her throat was raw, and the stone was cold and rough against her shoulder and cheek, painfully hard underneath her. The edge of the heavy metal cuff bit her wrist and the chain dragged it down, but she had fought it and pounded the wall with both fists until her hands bled, screaming until the last hint of reflected sunlight was gone from the corridor. Then she had kept on doing it until her body rebelled. She could smell the drying puddle of bile, which had wholly missed the tiny wooden bucket.
No one was coming, and no one would come; she'd known that all along. The soldiers had put her in a cell without windows, and walked away. Miria was accused of high treason, and the taint could spread too easily for anyone to risk. The next footsteps she was likely to hear were those of her death approaching.
Miria rubbed her hands on her dress, which was silk and the only thing in the cell that had any capacity to soothe. Dried blood was beginning to stiffen the fabric under her fingers, blood and tears, but that hardly mattered now. The maids would never scold her over these stains, and the dress would never find its way back to her closet. It only had to last her until the morning.
"Please," she tried once more, hopelessly. Her voice was as rough as the walls and barely made it to a whisper. "He's got to know I would never hurt him. Please..."
No one could hear her. The stone walls were too thick, the doors too solid, and there was no one who cared to listen. In the silence, Miria's heartbeat throbbed in her aching wrists and behind her eyes, a frantic flutter as though her heart sought to pack all the years that might have been into these last few hours.
Not even her father and uncle, somewhere in the same prison, were close enough for speech--and Miria didn't think she could bear to speak to them anyway, her fury burning too hot and bright. Treason against His Imperial Majesty, the officer had said, and they had frozen. She recognized guilt when she saw it in her father's eyes. Miria bent her head into the cool touch of her palms, tasting bile sour on her tongue. How could her own family have betrayed her like this?
Her father had taken a bribe from enemies of the Empire and claimed Miria would murder the Emperor on their wedding night. He'd accepted Murgo money, and sold away her honor and her happiness. Miria had known there were debts, because there were always debts, between her uncle's ambitions and her father's poor business sense; she should have questioned it when her uncle began to buy her silk and real jewels, but she'd thought it was in hope of imperial patronage.
Treason was an unpardonable crime, and whole families had regularly gone to the block by way of example throughout the history of Mallorea, even if not every individual had been involved. Miria had argued that it was unjust, in that first class with Zak at the University of Melcena. The Crown Prince had said it was necessary. Nobody but Miria had quite dared to contradict him, since the grim-faced soldiers standing to attention in the back of the class made an eloquent kind of statement on their own.
Did Zak think she had been planning to kill him even then, plotting to catch his attention?
He was trying so hard to prove himself the kind of Emperor who could hold Boundless Mallorea together. If he thought she had to die for the sake of his empire, there was no one who would argue him out of it now.
Zak, she thought desperately, as though thinking it hard enough could somehow convey her words to the emperor's ears. Zak, please, don't...don't remember me as a traitor, I can't bear it. I wouldn't have done it, I didn't know.
I did love you...I do...please, someone, anyone, hear me...
A peculiar hum shivered somewhere deeper than her ears, a hushed murmur like the sea that grated oddly in her back teeth. It was the only distraction there had been for hours, so Miria could hardly help focusing on it.
Who calls? The woman's voice was gentle and puzzled, distantly familiar, and sounded close enough to touch; behind and around it, the whispering continued. But there was no one in the hall, no sound of footsteps.
"Please help me," Miria begged, unashamed of the tears that spilled over again, wondering if this had any connection to reality or if hallucination had set in. "Can you hear me? Where are you?"
Child of my people, calm thyself, the voice soothed. I know thee not, but I will do what I can to aid thee. Where art thou, and what is thy name?
Miria caught her breath. She knew what this was now, the distant memory of a story her mother used to tell her. No privacy with the Dals, her mother had said, all your cousins wanting to read your thoughts; Melcena, the enormous bustling center of commerce, was quieter. Her mother had died more than ten years ago, and Miria had dismissed the story as metaphor.
Tonight, she'd had privacy enough to sicken her, and any alternative was a rescue past all hope.
The terror and desperate need poured out of her in a flood, nearly drowning out the distant whispers. Compassion washed back in response, and Miria knew without asking that the other mind belonged to Andel, a dedicated healer who had served in the palace five of her thirty years. Who was so close to Zak that Miria's heart leapt for the impossible chance.
The Emperor is enraged, Andel warned her. I do not think he will hear me. But I will try. She hesitated, then offered, See with me, if thou wilt.
Between staring at stone walls in the dark, and one last chance to see Zak, there really wasn't any question--even like this, even when he was probably about to have her killed. Gratefully, she allowed Andel to draw her closer. Between one blink and the next, the darkness had bloomed into a torchlit palace corridor, but there was no pain, no sense of adjustment to the sudden light.
It was some small comfort that Andel had believed her instantly and without question. The echoes that passed between them told Miria that no one could get away with a lie in connection like this. There would be no such advantage with 'Zakath.
The image bobbed forward a bit unevenly as Andel walked. On a normal evening, Zak's night shift of bodyguards would have been outside the imperial suite, protecting their emperor's scant hours of rest as diligently as his life. Tonight the heavy doors hung open, as though the last few people through couldn't be bothered to close them, and the three soldiers on shift had apparently followed their commanding officer into the lavish receiving room.
Andel knew all the men, some better than Miria did herself, and no one offered the healer any challenge as she entered. They were too busy watching the argument.
Although Andel's gaze took in the whole room with careful observation, Miria could only see 'Zakath, standing rigidly straight with a grim-set expression and fists so tightly clenched that they trembled. He was still in his velvet robes from the day's audiences, now crumpled and hanging crookedly, and the dark red color deepened the shadow under his eyes, highlighting his pale and bloodless face. Miria's heart ached for him.
Facing him were General Ranisk of the palace guard, his own uniform showing the day's use, and the Chief of the Bureau of Internal Affairs, Tallor, whose expression was faintly, unforgivably smug. Tallor had never liked Miria or the notion of the Emperor marrying a poor Melcene girl from no notable bloodline, and might therefore be the only person actually pleased by any part of the whole horrible situation. From the day Zak first introduced her at the palace, the bureau chief had looked at her with the same air of polite disgust her uncle had given the stray kitten Miria had adopted on the way to Mal Zeth.
"Surely your Majesty can see the need," Tallor was pushing, in his usual obsequious way. "If this terrible plot has gone any further--"
"No," 'Zakath snapped. It was close to the flat voice that signaled danger, but there was a fraction of a crack in it.
Enough weakness, apparently, for Tallor not to take the hint. "Thus far my men cannot track down the Murgo agents, and any information is vital, your Majesty. I am only trying to be certain this will not happen again."
The general remarked, "Traditional procedure does include--"
'Zakath slashed a furious hand down, cutting off both men. "If either of you say another word about putting Miria to the question, I will have you crucified," he hissed, deadly earnest.
Miria recoiled violently, and her head thumped against the stone wall. Of course they'd want to make sure they knew everything she knew, and the possibility of torture hadn't even occurred to her.
"Then the execution will be carried out at dawn, as usual?" General Ranisk inquired.
'Zakath turned his head toward the public execution grounds, and flinched, a tiny twitch that spoke like a scream to Miria. "In private," he contradicted. "Tonight."
Zak had defended her this far against the people he relied upon the most, his father's closest advisers, even believing she'd betrayed him; at least she had this much of his heart. The terrible mercy crushed the breath from her for a long, painful moment.
"Your Majesty," Andel chose her moment to interject, bowing her head in polite submission, "your pardon, but I see no reason to act in such haste. With the Murgo conspirators as yet uncaptured, the investigation cannot be complete."
Tallor offered her a condescending smile. "I assure you, Healer Andel, the evidence we have is quite conclusive. Your compassion does you credit in your own work, but this is a political matter."
Andel ignored the bureau chief. "Emperor 'Zakath?" she prompted gently.
Please, Zak...please... Miria bit her lip, twisting her hands together.
The young Emperor met Andel's gaze for a split second, then broke away, the cracks in his hard-fought armor too visible. Pain, and grief. "I can't spare her, Andel," he said quietly. "Even if she wasn't...entirely complicit, even if she didn't intend to follow through, her family conspired to kill me. I can't save Miria. Don't speak of it again." The accompanying threat was unvoiced this time, but remained clear.
Miria tasted blood in her mouth, drew a long, careful breath, as though the air might shatter her. How many breaths left to her now?
I am sorry, Andel murmured. Miria didn't dare risk her control in a verbal reply; if it slipped, she would scream and never stop; still, she tried to send her gratitude for Andel's effort.
"But I will not have her execution made into a public spectacle," 'Zakath went on, firmly, and looked at his personal guards.
"If your Majesty permits," Andel interrupted again, "I have herbs that can send the girl to sleep before your soldiers carry out their duty. She need feel no pain." This much at least I may do for thee, she added, and Miria could feel the bitter taste of her failure in the words.
Zak half-turned, gave Andel a slow nod. "Accompany them to the prison, then, if you are willing."
Miria clung to Andel's sight for one last moment, and traced the sharp lines of Zak's face for a short eternity. Then Andel had to turn away, and Miria pulled back, opened her eyes to the darkness of her cell and found her face wet with tears. "Oh, Zak," she whispered.
The worst part of it was, he was right. Nothing could move the world enough to allow them happiness now, not with the cloud of treason hanging over her family. Even if she'd been found innocent by some miracle, he couldn't marry her after this, and he certainly couldn't afford to spare her life because he loved her. Too many people would believe their young Emperor was weak, too many people would take advantage, and the empire would tear itself apart, as Angarak society always did at the first sign of weakness. Miria had made excellent marks in her history classes.
Waiting at the back of her mind, Andel pushed very gently for attention. I value thy memories as my own, she said, and thou hast not given them to our people. Thou art very young, and it has been too short a time to ask this of thee, but we have no more. Wilt thou share thyself with us, past and future?
Miria couldn't claim to understand the question completely, but she could feel Andel's deep fear that Miria might be lost forever, as no Dal ought ever to be lost: not just dead but forgotten. There was very little that Miria cared to keep secret, but strangers had already tried once to use her as a weapon against 'Zakath. Swear my memories will never be used to hurt Zak, she demanded.
Thine own feelings shall defend thy beloved, Andel assured her. None who remember thee will ever seek to harm him.
That didn't sound like such a poor legacy to leave behind. And if Andel's people remembered her, maybe someday Zak would know she'd never betrayed him. All right, Miria agreed, hesitant. What do I do?
The world opens up behind her eyes, all at once. The Dals have been watching, caught up in Andel's urgency; Miria hadn't even noticed the background whispers fading to an attentive hush.
There is too much to take in, too much to grasp, but Miria is suddenly part of an enormous family--from Kell to Dal Perivor to the Isle of Verkat, the people she'd never acknowledged as kin welcome her into their minds, compassion echoing and re-echoing. There is so little time, they say. Forgive our haste, child.
If there were time, she would share with one at a time, form friendships and exchange memory and grow gradually deeper in the pool of memory that ties her people together, as all of them echo to her--but there is no time, and if her memories are to be saved at all it will be like this, scattered all at once to the corners of the earth.
There are no words, there is no time for words, but her people sing approval in a vast chorus, and Miria smiles for the first time since the soldiers came.
And then something entirely different unfolds behind her eyes, and Miria is elsewhere--
The darkness surrounds her, velvety black, but the glory before her drowns it out, a ball of fire greater than the sun. She gasps, but there is no sound.
"The conditions are met," a voice says in her ear, dry and emotionless. "Hail, Miria, child of Melcena, child of Kell."
"The conditions are met," a second voice echoes in agreement, though how she knows that when they sound so identical she isn't sure. "Hail, Miria, beloved and twice betrayed."
She can't see anything but the great lights and the darkness. "What conditions?" she asks, but her own voice is missing.
One of them, possibly the second one again, says, "Conditions necessary to your task."
"Will you accept the task?" The first voice. There is a difference between them, but she cannot tell what it is.
Miria has no idea what task they mean, but as she is just about to be executed, if they want her help it had better not take long.
"It will take you longer than you have yet lived," the second one says.
Something is wrong. Something moves where it should not, and the glorious lights tremble and flame and go out, and she can see a crack in the darkness, twisted and foreign--
"The universe is divided against itself," the first voice tells her. "You must make the Choice, lest all be destroyed. Choose one of us and thereby choose the future."
"Will you accept your task?"
There ought to be someone else, someone more suited, more important, but she feels the attention of the universe like a weight on her shoulders, and apparently there is only her. "I accept the task," she says, and the words ring through the stars like a bell.
And then she sees--
a mirror that reflects a young woman, with Zak's eyes and an open Dalasian face. Tiny, lopsided flowers weave through her dark hair, and her smile is quiet and joyful. "Well met, Mother," she greets, and the touch of her mind is clouded by distance and something more, but her love is very clear. "I am Anthia, thy firstborn and Emperor Zakath's, if thy Choice lead to me, and here thy beloved is well and happy with thee."
Yes, Miria cries soundlessly, I choose this! Tell me how to reach you!
"All may be well," Anthia assures her, "but the instant of the Choice is not now."
The image of her daughter fades suddenly, like a dream, and then harsh daylight floods an empty palace corridor, smashed open to the sky by some tremendous force. Smoke and distant screams drift in the wind, and something that feels terribly wrong stalks through Mal Zeth.
A fragment of the mirror, shattered across the floor, catches a reflection, and she knows the mind for Andel but the face is lined and bloodstained. "Thou must not let this happen," Andel whispers, and her eyes drift closed--
Andel! What do I choose to stop this? she asks in desperation.
"The instant of the choice is not now," the second voice tells her.
But how can I know what choice to make? Miria demands.
Both voices say, very dryly indeed, "You can't."
Miria opens her eyes to her cell and the first faint glimmers of torchlight, gasping for breath with the intensity of the vision. In the back of her mind, the whole of the Dalasian people breathe with her, shock and joy and dismay all intermingled.
Holy Seeress! they cry, acknowledgment and recognition--and fear. Losing a new-found child is a tragedy, but losing a Seeress with the touch of vision still upon her is unthinkable, and losing her--the Prophecies have marked Miria as the one Seer the Dals have awaited for long ages, and if she dies now who will Choose? And the torchlight is growing stronger.
"She will be the focus of all your people, and the instrument of the Choice. Do you accept her?" a dry voice demands, and Miria can't hear the difference at all anymore. But the knowledge is there, suddenly, shared between the Dals as Miria's memories are shared. She must begin as an infant, and she must allow the focus, as no infant could properly choose to do. This is Necessity.
And all the Dals know her now. We accept, the choral answer comes swiftly. Well met, our Cyradis, Thou Who Must Make the Choice.
A distant Seeress touches Miria more directly and whispers, Well met, foster-daughter. Long have I expected thee.
In Mal Zeth, a young woman accepts her fate with a peculiar calmness that the guards take for shock, and her last audible words are to the Dalasian healer: "Tell Zak I have always and will always love him...tell him to look after my cat." Before the dark sleep takes her, she catches Andel's mind again and pleads, Keep him safe, for my sake. And the healer pledges faithfully.
In Kell, the Prophecy moves, and what was one is now two; a Seeress and her husband begin to count the months before the birth of their infant girl, and the foster-child who shares the womb.
She knows nothing, and she remembers everything. The song of her people carries her, holds her up, floats her gently through the pain. She is no one, and she is everyone, and she is--herself.
We name thee Cyradis, for thou art the One Who Chooses, they tell her, in choral affirmation. Daughter, sister, mother, choose well.
Notes:
This is Part One of two. The second half is complete and will be posted inside of a week, promise. The complete story was posted anonymously as a Yuletide gift for Elektra3. Please review!