Back In Gray

The People Of The Wind, XVIII.

When Tabitha visits Philippe in the hospital, we know that the window is:

"...open to the blue and blossoms of springtime." (p. 644)

- so we have got away from the winter that we saw in Gray and on St. Li but where are we now? He sees from her complexion that she has not been in Gray so is that where they are? Yes. When she leaves the building, we learn that it has:

"...been hastily erected on the outskirts of Gray." (p. 646)

- and then we read our last description of the city:

"Where she stood, a hillside sloped downward, decked with smaragdine susin, starred with chasuble bush and Buddha's cup, to the strewn and begardened city, the large curve of uprising shoreline, the glitter on Falkayn Bay. Small cottony clouds sauntered before the wind, which murmured and smelled of livewell.

"She inhaled that coolness. After Equatoria, it was intoxicating. Or it ought to be. She felt curiously empty." (p. 647)

We have seen Scorpeluna in Equatoria. Gray should certainly be refreshing after that. Gray, seen by Arinnian in flight, at least twice through Daniel Holm's office window and now by Tabitha, has been described often enough to generate a real sense of place.