Crane Lifting Quotes

On motionless wing they emerge from the lifting mists, sweep a final arc of sky, and settle in clangorous descending spirals to their feeding grounds. A new day has begun on the crane marsh.

Shokaku is a crane of some kind.' 'For lifting things?' Will asked. 'For flying. A crane is a large bird,' she corrected him... 'Seems like a logical thing for a crane to do,' Halt mused. 'I suppose you wouldn't expect it to mean 'a hiking crane' or 'a waddling crane.

You can't possibly touch all the lives in this world. But if you can lift someone with your two hands, that is enough.

I wanted you, nameless Woman of the South, No wraith, but utterly—as still more alone The Southern Cross takes night And lifts her girdles from her, one by one— High, cool, wide from the slowly smoldering fire Of lower heavens,— vaporous scars! Eve! Magdalene! or Mary, you? Whatever call—falls vainly on the wave. O simian Venus, homeless Eve, Unwedded, stumbling gardenless to grieve Windswept guitars on lonely decks forever; Finally to answer all within one grave! And this long wake of phosphor, iridescent Furrow of all our travel—trailed derision! Eyes crumble at its kiss. Its long-drawn spell Incites a yell. Slid on that backward vision The mind is churned to spittle, whispering hell. I wanted you . . . The embers of the Cross Climbed by aslant and huddling aromatically. It is blood to remember; it is fire To stammer back . . . It is God—your namelessness. And the wash— All night the water combed you with black Insolence. You crept out simmering, accomplished. Water rattled that stinging coil, your Rehearsed hair—docile, alas, from many arms. Yes, Eve—wraith of my unloved seed! The Cross, a phantom, buckled—dropped below the dawn. Light drowned the lithic trillions of your spawn.

These hands," he squeezed them both on my face to make his point, "will never touch you without being gentle. Unless that's not what you want, of course." His eyebrow lifted waiting for me to balk, but I just waited. "These arms will never hold you back, but I'll hold you as tight as you'll let me. I can't wait for you to be all mine. You belong to me in every way, Maggie. Mine." I nodded in his hands. He leaned closer and whispered, "Say it." I didn't wait a beat. "I belong to you." And he belonged to me. He grinned. "You're daggum right you do.

But if it is true that human minds are themselves to a very great degree the creations of memes, then we cannot sustain the polarity of vision we considered earlier; it cannot be "memes versus us," because earlier infestations of memes have already played a major role in determining who or what we are. The "independent" mind struggling to protect itself from alien and dangerous memes is a myth. There is a persisting tension between the biological imperative of our genes on the one hand and the cultural imperatives of our memes on the other, but we would be foolish to "side with" our genes; that would be to commit the most egregious error of pop sociobiology. Besides, as we have already noted, what makes us special is that we, alone among species, can rise above the imperatives of our genes— thanks to the lifting cranes of our memes.

Right. Put Some coffee on while I think about this. I'm in dire need" Merrick gave him a look. "You can't work the stove, can you?" "I'm the eighth Earl Crane and the twelfth Viscount Fortunegate. I don't have to work the stove." "Two extra names and you can't lift your arms any more. Bloody lucky they didn't make you a duke too or you'd forget how to brush your own teeth.

Of course I am, Gran," I said quietly. I blew out a breath and leaned my elbows on my knees. "I will admit that the withdrawals suck, though." "That they do," she agreed and came to sit on the bed with me. "The sooner you get to her, the better you'll feel." "Yeah, but I don't want to scare her. If I run over there before a decent hour, she'll probably freak and kick me out." "I highly doubt that, boy." She lifted a piece of hair from next to my ear with her fingers. "Girls usually invite cute boys in, not throw them out.

A firefly landed on Honor’s sleeve and began walking up her shoulder, its tail still blinking. As she craned her neck to look down at it, Jack chuckled. “Don’t be scared. It’s just a lightning bug.” He placed his finger in its path. Honor tried not to think about the pressure of his touch. When the firefly crawled onto his finger, he lifted it up and let it fly off, signaling its escape route with sparks of light.

Harper lifted the book without looking at Flann. “Reading here.” Flannery craned her neck. “The Case of the Missing Girlfriend.

The matrix of the heart, lift down the eye That shrines the quiet lake and swells a tower… The commodious, tall decorum of that sky Unseals her earth, and lifts love in its shower.

I smiled sadly and whispered, "I would have taken a bullet for you, too, you know." "I know," he whispered gruffly and lifted my chin, "and that pisses me off and turns me on at the same time.

Wren, in her sleeping robe, standing close to a tall wolf demon, her head craned back to face him. The wolf: Moon caste, marbled ash-gray fur flowing silkily over angular features, a diamond-shaped patch of white on his long, muzzlelike jaw. He’s dressed in soldier’s clothes. One pawed hand is lifted to cup Wren’s face, like the beginning of a kiss.

One Disney “urban myth” is that in the event of a hurricane, the castle can be dismantled. That is untrue. The main building has an internal grid of steel framing, secured to a concrete foundation. The turrets and towers also have internal steel framing and were lifted by crane, then bolted permanently to the main structure.

You’d better marry her before she reaches eighteen and the spell wears off,” I said. “Spell?” “Yes. The one that’s hiding her fangs and pincers from plain sight.” “I don’t find them especially hidden,” he said mildly. “Then perhaps you’re a pair.” His brows lifted. “Now, that’s the cruelest thing you’ve said so far.” Mrs. Fredericks cleared off, and Chloe took her place before the piano. A beam of sunlight was just beginning its slide into the chamber, capturing her in light. She was a glowing girl with a glowing face, and Joplin at her fingertips. “Give me time,” I muttered, dropping my gaze to my plate. “I’ll come up with something worse.” “No doubt.” Armand pulled a flask from his jacket and shook it in front of my nose. “Whiskey. Conveniently the same color as tea. Are you game, waif?” I glanced around, but no one was looking. I lifted my cup, drained it to the dregs, and set it before him. He was right. It did look like tea. But it tasted like vile burning fire, all the way down my throat. “Sip it,” he hissed, as I began to cough. His voice lifted over my sputtering. “Dear me, Miss Jones, I do beg your pardon. The tea’s rather hot; I should have mentioned it.” “Quite all right,” I gasped, as the whiskey swirled an evil amber in my teacup. Chloe’s song grew bouncier, with lyrics about a girl with strawberries in a wagon. Several of the men had begun to cluster near, drawn to her soprano or perchance her bosom. Two were vying to turn the pages of her music. She had to crane her head to keep Armand in view. He sent her another smile from his chair, lifting his cup in salute. “I’m going to kiss you, Eleanore,” he said quietly, still looking at her. “Not now. Later.” His eyes cut back to mine. “I thought it fair to tell you first.” I stilled. “If you think you can do so without me biting your lip, feel free to try.” His gaze shone wicked blue. “I don’t mind if you bite.” “Biting your lip off, I should have said.” “Ah. Let’s see how it goes, shall we?

Each half of the arch is made from several sections. Enormous jacks, whose only prior job was raising the sunken Kursk submarine in 2001, were used to lift each stage higher and higher until it reached its full height of 110 meters. Inside are remotely-operated heavy-duty overhead cranes, to be used for moving people and equipment.

The embassy’s front door was of bulletproof steel lined with a veneer of English oak. You attained it by touching a button in a silent lift. The royal crest, in this air-conditioned stillness, suggested silicone and funeral parlours. The windows, like the doors, had been toughened to frustrate the Irish and tinted to frustrate the sun. Not a whisper of the real world penetrated. The silent traffic, cranes, shipping, old town and new town, the brigade of women in orange tunics gathering leaves along the central reservation of the Avenida Balboa, were mere specimens in Her Majesty’s inspection chamber. From the moment you set foot in British extraterritorial airspace, you were looking in, not out. —

At present there are only two land-based cranes in the world that could lift weights of this magnitude. At the very frontiers of construction technology, these are both vast, industrialized machines, with booms reaching more than 220 feet into the air, which require on-board counterweights of 160 tons to prevent them from tipping over. The preparation-time for a single lift is around six weeks and calls for the skills of specialized teams of up to 20 men.13 In other words, modern builders with all the advantages of high-tech engineering at their disposal, can barely hoist weights of 200 tons. Was it not, therefore, somewhat surprising that the builders at Giza had hoisted such weights on an almost routine basis?

Right. Put some coffee on while I think about this. I’m in dire need.” Merrick gave him a look. “You can’t work the stove, can you?” “I’m the eighth Earl Crane and the twelfth Viscount Fortunegate. I don’t have to work the stove.” “Two extra names and you can’t lift your arms any more. Bloody lucky they didn’t make you a duke too or you’d forget how to brush your own teeth.

I am Itzapoca. Long ago the Mayans worshiped me as a god. Today I am forgotten, a stone head half-buried in the jungle. Yet I have endured for ages, far longer than any puny modern structure built from steel and concrete. Long before the era of hydraulic cranes, my followers lifted me to the top of this lush green slope where I sit looking down on the shining blue waters of the bay.

Arin glanced up as she approached. One tree shadowed the knoll, a laran tree, leaves broad and glossy. Their shadows dappled Arin’s face, made it a patchwork of sun and dark. It was hard to read his expression. She noticed for the first time the way he kept the scarred side of his face out of her line of sight. Or rather, what she noticed for the first time was how common this habit was for him in her presence--and what that meant. She stepped deliberately around him and sat so that he had to face her fully or shift into an awkward, neck-craned position. He faced her. His brow lifted, not so much in amusement as in his awareness of being studied and translated. “Just a habit,” he said, knowing what she’d seen. “You have that habit only with me.” He didn’t deny it. “Your scar doesn’t matter to me, Arin.” His expression turned sardonic and interior, as if he were listening to an unheard voice. She groped for the right words, worried that she’d get this wrong. She remembered mocking him in the music room of the imperial palace (I wonder what you believe could compel me to go to such epic lengths for your sake. Is it your charm? Your breeding? Not your looks, surely.). “It matters because it hurts you,” she said. “It doesn’t change how I see you. You’re beautiful. You always have been to me.” Even when she hadn’t realized it, even in the market nearly a year ago. Then later, when she understood his beauty. Again, when she saw his face torn, stitched, fevered. On the tundra, when his beauty terrified her. Now. Now, too. Her throat closed. The line of his jaw hardened. He didn’t believe her. “Arin--” “I’m sorry for what happened in the village.” She dropped her hand to her lap. She hadn’t been conscious of lifting it.

Often beneath the wave, wide from this ledge The dice of drowned men’s bones he saw bequeath An embassy. Their numbers as he watched, Beat on the dusty shore and were obscured. And wrecks passed without sound of bells, The calyx of death’s bounty giving back A scattered chapter, livid hieroglyph, The portent wound in corridors of shells. Then in the circuit calm of one vast coil, Its lashings charmed and malice reconciled, Frosted eyes there were that lifted altars; And silent answers crept across the stars. Compass, quadrant and sextant contrive No farther tides ... High in the azure steeps Monody shall not wake the mariner. This fabulous shadow only the sea keeps.

Out of some far recess of the sky a tinkling of little bells falls soft upon the listening land. Then again silence. Now comes a baying of some sweet-throated hound, soon the clamor of a responding back. Then a far clear blast of hunting horns, out of the sky into the fog. High horns, low horns, silence, and finally a pandemonium of trumpets, rattles, croaks , and cries that almost shakes the bog with its nearness, but without yet disclosing whence it comes. At last a glint of sun reveals the approach of a great echelon of birds. On motionless wing they emerge from the lifting mists, sweep a final arc of sky, and settle in clangorous descending spirals to their feeding grounds. A new day has begun on the crane marsh.

Voyages III Infinite consanguinity it bears This tendered theme of you that light Retrieves from sea plains where the sky Resigns a breast that every wave enthrones; While ribboned water lanes I wind Are laved and scattered with no stroke Wide from your side, whereto this hour The sea lifts, also, reliquary hands. And so, admitted through black swollen gates That must arrest all distance otherwise, Past whirling pillars and lithe pediments, Light wrestling there incessantly with light, Star kissing star through wave on wave unto Your body rocking! and where death, if shed, Presumes no carnage, but this single change,- Upon the steep floor flung from dawn to dawn The silken skilled transmemberment of song; Permit me voyage, love, into your hands . .

I would like to forget the image of the ship’s crane at Southampton docks when it lifted into the sky the three wooden trunks which held all that my family owned. There is only one memory I want to preserve. It is Maria, who is also Zama, sipping condensed milk on the steps of the doep at night. The African nights were warm. The stars were bright. I loved Maria but I’m not sure she loved me back. Politics and poverty had separated her from her own children and she was exhausted by the white children in her care, by everyone and everything in her care. At the end of the day, away from the people who stole her life’s energy and made her tired, she had found a place to rest, momentarily, from myths about her character and her purpose in life." (from "Things I Don't Want to Know" by Deborah Levy)

We laughed and laughed and passed the bong around each other taking turns to burn our lungs. The room was smokier than ever before and it was late in the afternoon when I realised I was stuck. I was stuck to the sofa like glue. My whole body sank deeper and deeper into the material. My blood felt like liquid lead in my limbs as if lifting my arm could not be possible without a powerful crane. My mind drifted to the big cranes you see on building sites and I imagined it attempting to lift my arm as it buckled under the weight. I closed my eyes unable to hold my eyelids open anymore. My body sank even deeper as if the sofa was melting chocolate and my body heat was melting it beneath me. It began to feel like thick treacle beneath me as if it would stick to me making it harder for me to move or get up then I felt his hand again.

to move. More gunfire. Although his vision was dimmed, Alex saw two more grenades arc through the air. They landed next to one of the ships and exploded, a huge fireball of flame. Two of Sarov’s men were lifted into the air. At the same time, two or even three machine guns began to chatter simultaneously. There were screams. More flames. Conrad loomed over him. He seemed to have forgotten what was happening in the shipyard. Or perhaps he didn’t care. He tossed aside the metal rod, then slowly pulled up his sleeves. Finally he dropped down so that he was sitting on Alex’s chest, one knee on either side. His hands closed around Alex’s neck. Gently, enjoying what he was doing, he began to squeeze. Alex felt fingers as hard as iron clamp shut on his throat. He couldn’t breathe. There were already black spots in front of his eyes. Straining past Conrad, he saw something moving toward him. It was the magnetic disc. Conrad had left the controls on in the cabin in his haste to get over to Alex, and the arm of the crane was still swinging around. There was a sudden, loud clang. The

THE RETURN OF THE GODS Like a white bird upon the wind, the sail of the boat of Manannan mac Lir (Pronounced Mananarn mak Leer), the Son of the Sea, flew across the sparkling waves filled with the breeze that blew Westward to the Islands of the Blessed. The Sun Goddess above him smiled down with warmth upon her friend. The fish in the ocean danced for him beneath the turquoise water; the porpoises leapt above the waves to greet him. Upon the wind was a smell of sweetness, the smell of apple blossom in the Spring of the morning of the world. And in the prow of the boat sat Lugh (Pronounced Loo) the long-armed; strumming on his harp, he sang the Song of Creation. And as they drew closer to the green hills of Ireland, the holy land of Ireland, the Shee came out of their earth-barrow homes and danced for joy beneath the Sun. For hidden in a crane-skin sack at the bottom of the boat was the Holy Cup of Blessedness. Long had been her journeying through lands strange and far. And all who drank of that Cup, dreamed the dreams of holy truth, and drank of the Wine of everlasting life. And deep within the woods, in a green-clad clearing, where the purple anemone and the white campion bloomed, where primroses still lingered on the shadowed Northern side, a great stag lifted up his antlered head and sniffed the morning. His antlers seven-forked spoke of mighty battles fought and won, red was his coat, the colour of fire, and he trotted out of his greenwood home, hearing on the wind the song of Lugh. And in her deep barrow home, the green clad Goddess of Erin, remembered the tongue that she had forgotten. She remembered the secrets of the weaving of spells, She remembered the tides of woman and the ebb and flow of wave and Moon. She remembered the people who had turned to other Gods and coming out of her barrow of sleep, her sweet voice echoed the verses of Lugh and the chorus of Manannan. And the great stag of the morning came across the fields to her and where had stood the Goddess now stood a white hind. And the love of the God was returned by the Goddess and the larks of Anghus mac Og hovering above the field echoed with ecstasy the Song of Creation. And in the villages and towns the people came out of their houses, hearing the sweet singing and seeking its source. And children danced in the streets with delight. And they went down to the shore, the Eastern shore, where rises the Sun of the Morning, and awaited the coming of Manannan and Lugh, the mast of their boat shining gold in the Sun. The sea had spoken, the Eastern dawn had given up her secret, the Gods were returning, the Old Ones awakening, joy was returning unto the sleeping land.  

to look at Louisa, stroked her cheek, and was rewarded by a dazzling smile. She had been surprised by how light-skinned the child was. Her features were much more like Eva’s than Bill’s. A small turned-up nose, big hazel eyes, and long dark eyelashes. Her golden-brown hair protruded from under the deep peak of her bonnet in a cascade of ringlets. “Do you think she’d come to me?” Cathy asked. “You can try.” Eva handed her over. “She’s got so heavy, she’s making my arms ache!” She gave a nervous laugh as she took the parcel from Cathy and peered at the postmark. “What’s that, Mam?” David craned his neck and gave a short rasping cough. “Is it sweets?” “No, my love.” Eva and Cathy exchanged glances. “It’s just something Auntie Cathy’s brought from the old house. Are you going to show Mikey your flags?” The boy dug eagerly in his pocket, and before long he and Michael were walking ahead, deep in conversation about the paper flags Eva had bought for them to decorate sand castles. Louisa didn’t cry when Eva handed her over. She seemed fascinated by Cathy’s hair, and as they walked along, Cathy amused her by singing “Old MacDonald.” The beach was only a short walk from the station, and it wasn’t long before the boys were filling their buckets with sand. “I hardly dare open it,” Eva said, fingering the string on the parcel. “I know. I was desperate to open it myself.” Cathy looked at her. “I hope you haven’t built up your hopes, too much, Eva. I’m so worried it might be . . . you know.” Eva nodded quickly. “I thought of that too.” She untied the string, her fingers trembling. The paper fell away to reveal a box with the words “Benson’s Baby Wear” written across it in gold italic script. Eva lifted the lid. Inside was an exquisite pink lace dress with matching bootees and a hat. The label said, “Age 2–3 Years.” Beneath it was a handwritten note:   Dear Eva, This is a little something for our baby girl from her daddy. I don’t know the exact date of her birthday, but I wanted you to know that I haven’t forgotten. I hope things are going well for you and your husband. Please thank him from me for what he’s doing for our daughter: he’s a fine man and I don’t blame you for wanting to start over with him. I’m back in the army now, traveling around. I’m due to be posted overseas soon, but I don’t know where yet. I’ll write and let you know when I get my new address. It would be terrific if I could have a photograph of her in this little dress, if your husband doesn’t mind. Best wishes to you all, Bill   For several seconds they sat staring at the piece of paper. When Eva spoke, her voice was tight with emotion. “Cathy, he thinks I chose to stay with Eddie!” Cathy nodded, her mind reeling. “Eddie showed me the letter he sent. Bill wouldn’t have known you were in Wales, would he? He would have assumed you and Eddie had already been reunited—that he’d written with your consent on behalf of you both.” She was afraid to look at Eva. “What are you going to do?” Eva’s face had gone very pale. “I don’t know.” She glanced at David, who was jabbing a Welsh flag into a sand castle. “He said he was going to be posted overseas. Suppose they send him to Britain?” Cathy bit her lip. “It could be anywhere, couldn’t it? It could be the other side of the world.” She could see what was going through Eva’s mind. “You think if he came here, you and he could be together without . . .” Her eyes went to the boys. Eva gave a quick, almost imperceptible nod, as if she was afraid someone might see her. “What about Eddie?” “I don’t know!” The tone of her voice made David look up. She put on a smile, which disappeared the

There are other men who would be better suited to marrying Apicata. But I admire your gall. Give me one more reason why I should consider your petition, though it will likely not sway me." Casca paused, his eyes glancing somewhere in the vicinity of Apicius's knees. I thought he was going to falter but then he lifted his gaze, and when he spoke I knew that if Cupid was not with him, Venus certainly was. "Apicius, I should marry your daughter because we are meant to be. We are like rose wine and oysters, like truffles and pepper, like lentils and chestnuts or crane with turnip. We belong together like mullet and dill, milk and snails, suckling pig and silphium. You know the truth of their pairings and it is that truth I hold up to you now. Apicata and I are like spoon and plate. One is worth little without the other.

So,” he starts slowly, “if I am thinking that I want to kiss you, I should not say it out loud?” Oh, he’s completely messing with me now. Taunting me. I feel tears of shame and rejection rise to my eyes. “Please,” I manage to say in as withering a tone as I can manage, “I thought you were all about telling the truth. And now you’re nothing but a big liar.” His lashes lift as his eyes widen. His lips part and I watch, hypnotized now, as he says softly, so softly that I find myself tilting toward him to catch every word: “Violetta, cara mia, you are wrong. I am not a liar.” He doesn’t reach out to take hold of my shoulders, or take my hand to pull me in. He’s so sure of himself that he simply leans down, so close I can feel his breath scented with Prosecco warm on my face, for a split second, and then his lips meet mine. His confidence is breathtaking; when I’ve been kissed in the past, the boys always touch you just as they’re about to do it, make sure you’re willing, put an arm around you, hold your hand. It gives them a moment’s grace, a few seconds of self-protection, so if they’ve misjudged the situation--if you pull away--they won’t be left standing there looking like a fool, with their head craning toward you and their lips pursed like one of those baby dolls he mentioned that blows kisses when you pull the string in its back. Luca, however, doesn’t lay a finger on me. He simply kisses me. And not in a soft, tentative, exploratory way; his mouth is long and narrow, his lips hard and insistent. It’s not the kind of kiss I’m used to at all.

Then she turned and walked right to Jonathon. He smiled in surprise at her and swung his arm out for her to pass him in line for breakfast. I peeked at Bish, wondering if he saw. He did. Great. I swiftly bolted to him in as ladylike a way as I could and stopped him from pounding Jonathon into dust. "Bish," I said and put a hand on his chest to stop him. "Think about it. You're just overly upset because your body is mad that she's with him." "You're daggum right it is!" "It's just the imprint. It makes you feel over protective. Jen is just hurting and trying to figure it out. If you make a scene right now, you're going to be moving backward, not forward." He sighed in a grumble. "So I'm supposed to just sit around and watch her do things to piss me off on purpose and pretend it doesn't bother me?" "For now? Yes. Please. I will figure this out for you, but right now we have some seriously messed up stuff going down and that has to be dealt with first." He lifted his hands to the back of his head and closed his eyes. "Fine. I won't touch pretty boy." "Thank you." "I'm going to…uh…" His eyes fastened on Maria. He smiled. I looked over to see, too. Maria was throwing grapes into the air and catching them in her mouth. Then giggling to herself as no one else was at the table with her. Bish left without another word and walked right to her. I watched and could hear their conversation in their mind. "Hey, Maria. You're pretty good at that, kid," he said. "I know," she spouted. "This boy at school taught me. But then he pulled my ponytail on the playground the next day, so I'm not really friends with him anymore." "Why did he pull your ponytail?" "Momma says boys are mean when they like you," she whispered in a disgusted voice. "But I think Momma's been misinformed.

On the eighth day of Hunter’s absence, along toward dusk, Loretta heard a distant yodeling sound and glanced up from Maiden’s cooking fire to see men riding in. It wasn’t difficult to spot Hunter, several horse lengths ahead of the others, leading what looked like a mule carrying a priest. Loretta rose on her tiptoe, frowning. Surely she couldn’t be seeing what she thought she was seeing. What priest in his right mind would visit a Comanche village? Glancing around at Maiden’s neighbors, Loretta saw her bewilderment mirrored on every face. Then she looked at Warrior, who had been reclining nearby, guarding her. He had leaped to his feet upon hearing the men ride in. He slid a wary glance toward her and cocked an eyebrow. “My brother brings a Black Robe?” It was a priest. Loretta craned her neck to see. Hunter rode directly to the central fire, which had already been lit in preparation for nightfall, and dragged the priest off the mule. After barking a command at the poor man, he spun on his heel and came directly toward Maiden’s lodge, his stride purposeful, his jaw clenched in determination. Loretta drew a deep breath. Suddenly, incredulously, she knew why Hunter had brought a priest into the village. His footsteps slowed as he drew close, the muscles in his thighs bunching and drawing the leather of his pants taut. Loretta stiffened at the challenge his eyes issued. Lifting her chin, she waited for him to reach her, riveting her gaze on his broad shoulders, resisting the urge to run. Those long, powerful legs of his would easily outdistance her. “I have brought you a Black Robe,” he said tersely, and nodded toward the waiting priest. “He will pray your God words over us, yes?” With that, Hunter grasped her firmly by the arm and drew her toward the central fire, never breaking stride despite Loretta’s attempts to slow him down. “I won’t marry you!” she cried frantically. He threw her a look charged with martial arrogance. “You will be my wife, little one. My way or yours, in the end, it will be so.

Of course, Amsterdam’s flourishing mercantile classes did not invest only in art. Trade also financed the construction of the concentric canals encircling the city. Each of these was given a name indicative of the class of resident it hoped to attract: the Gentleman’s Canal (Herengracht), the Prince’s Canal (Prinsengracht), the Emperor’s Canal (Keizersgracht). A northern Venice was born, albeit with colder weather and worse food. Along the canals, handsome townhouses were built in classical or neo-Renaissance style, complete with ornamented façades, large windows and high-ceilinged rooms for entertaining guests. The houses were taxed according to their width at the front, so a unique shape of building evolved: narrow fronted but very tall and surprisingly deep, often with a sizable garden hidden Tardis-like at the back. Many included what the Dutch called doorzonwoningen, individual rooms running the whole length of the house, so that sunlight could shine all the way through from the windows at either end. Steep staircases saved valuable space inside, with elaborate systems of ropes and pulleys enabling front doors to be opened from upstairs by tugging on a loose end. Building smaller rooms on the upper floors than on the lower ones helped enhance the sense of perspective when one looked up from the street, exaggerating the height of the buildings. Gabled rooves were topped with flagpole holders pointing out like fingers, together with cranes and pulleys for lifting in furniture that would not fit through the narrow interior staircases.

Generally, men are superior in the areas of heavy lifting, where there's a past only by pachyderms and building cranes. Beyond that, I believe any right-thinking thinking will see that women have the indisputable advantage.

She had come to Berlin to write, an ambition as vague as it was hopeful, verified only by her saying so. There was no evidence of her writing, for she had not yet begun. Her torpor would eventually – necessarily – lift. But she was a kind of tourist, after all, and bent on swift amusements. The weather oppressed her. She sensed herself frozen inside. She was like one of the ubiquitous cranes located high on building sites in Mitte, a stiff shape merely, stuck mechanical in mid-air.

No one else is slow dancing, Ave,” he stated the obvious. I lifted my head. “We’re oil and water and we’re never going to mix with the rest of our kind. We may as well just accept that. They do a jig, oil and water slow dances.” He

I felt Seth pulling me to look at him instead of watching her go. That in itself made my pulse race. “That…” he sighed and licked his lip, “was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.” “You’re not upset with me?” The corner of his mouth lifted just a smidge before he leaned in ever so slowly and captured my lips, his warm palm finding my side inside my open sweater, tugging me to him with a jolt. I gasped against his lips. He enjoyed that immensely, smiling into our kiss.

It takes a remarkable human being to look into your future, see the hurt and devastation yet to come and instead of running, lifts you up and carries you into battle. That’s love.

Was there a magical love-of-the-dance moment, when the muse Terpsichore called to us and we lifted our arms and spun at one with the divine music of the Universe? I think not. Although pride and obsession can feel like love, I guess.

You listen to me, Soph,” I growled, but took a breath, taking it down a notch. I lifted her face with a crooked finger under her chin, wanting nothing more than to kiss her trembling mouth and make everything bad in her life go away for good. But life didn’t work that way, did it? You couldn’t think happy thoughts and fly away to Neverland. And you couldn’t kiss girls and have everything in their life that was wrong be right. If only. But I was apparently doing something right, because that lip…it wasn’t trembling quite as much anymore. And her eyes? They begged me to save her. “You were slashed when I found you, remember? And now, you have some scars.” Her face crumpled and she tried to move it away from my hand, but I brought it back to face me. I wrapped my free hand around her back, right against the part of her I was speaking of, and brought her against me. I put my mouth against her ear. “What is a life without scars? Scars come in all forms and we all have them. Some deeper than others, some more than others, some harsher than others. Your scars are yours, Soph, and you earned them,” I said harshly, my lips touching the rim of her ear. “It felt like sh—awful going through what you did, but the point is you did it. You. No one else. And no one else could have but you. And your scars are beautiful because of who you are and what you did to earn them. Don’t ever be ashamed of them. As for you being a plague? If that’s so, then please, infect me. Because I want everything you’ve got to give me.” I

I smiled as much as I could in my shocked and drunk-on-Sophelia state. This girl. This girl. She was going to be the proverbial death of me. Maybe the actual death of me. But what a way for a guy to die. “Are you okay now that you’ve got your gravity in you?” I joked softly. She lifted her head and said just as softly, shyly, like she was just realizing something herself and didn’t know what to make of it. “There is no gravity. The only thing holding me to this planet is you.” Ah, no. I was going to kiss her.

DRAGONFLY   As my feet take hold of the floor I cling to her lips with the kind of intensity that shakes her entire body with a paralyzing calm. She carefully pushes my shorts down around my thighs while holding on to these lips that have proved perfection to her love. Easing the edge of her skintight shirt up around her frail torso with a steady rise the lower portion of my body eases into hers, she struggling to get her arms around my neck and chest after lifting her shirt over.   Her leg rises up underneath my arm, holding her up as her other leg follows. Like a steady freight crane I carefully move her onto the bed as she holds on to me, falling into her with all of my love. Moving across the surface of her entire body in the way that a dragonfly wets its tail above still water I lie down beside her with one hand moving across her chest. Wishing only to free her I seize her lips with an upward nudge of passion that educes a sort of ethereal beauty as we lie within the soothe of each other’s company. Reaching again for her lips I lean in to kiss her with my pelvis and upper body against hers as our legs intertwine. Aroused beneath my waist comes the part of me that does protrude, causing an effluxion of vitality to commove down my entire vessel in a slow whisper that moves over my entire body towards my legs and toes.

Mea-dro, let’s go.” Loretta gave Tom’s neck a final hug and eased herself out of his embrace. She tried to smile at him but couldn’t. Hunter seized her by the arm and drew her toward Tom’s horse, which was now outfitted in Comanche riding gear. When he lifted her onto the mare’s back, she wondered if he would tie her on, as he had before, and received her answer when he mounted behind her, encircling her waist with one arm. Loretta craned her neck to keep Tom in sight as Hunter nudged the mare forward into a trot. A knot of tears swelled at the base of her throat. This was it, her last contact with home. “Do not look behind you, Blue Eyes,” Hunter murmured. “We go to a new place, eh? It will be good.” Loretta doubted that.

Big construction companies, making millions on underground developments such as this, had initially gone to the bother of bringing in cranes to lift mechanical diggers, once their work was done, out of their excavations. Then they’d realized that the cost-benefit analysis actually tipped in the direction of just finding somewhere to hide the digger and leaving it entombed in a wall, the company sometimes going just a little bit beyond the planning permission they’d been given for the few days it took to do so. Ballard had slipped someone at City Hall some cash to get a look at the plans and realized that, yes, the only place the digger could have been entombed was right up against the bank. Its

Sky Burial   Standing ‘mongst the dogs all squint of eye and crane of neck until I named the circling turkey buzzard speck of cumulus nimbus. Such scavengers bring me pause. Earth was lying easy on her back and breathing into blue, a thermal sigh, lifting bird and wonder to where this one might fly. The expanse so vast along the glaciered seam of plains and mountains, distance and the silence held still a dusky moment for the bird to preen in copper light on rocky moraine, preparing for its earnest work. In Tibet, whether monk or peasant, in breaching death, the empty vessel is washed in water, in prayer, carried by solemn procession into thinning air, laid prone, left alone, sacred fare, shared by vultures as spirit migrates to a new birth, born again somewhere. If we are attending to the way, we pass through many deaths. Birds can be a sign of such transitions. Yes, the buzzard had me thinking I was once a starling lost in false murmurations. Today, my name is lone hawk on bare limb.

Crazy, insane, gorgeous human. I can’t believe Melody is here. It’s like something out of a dream. She looks amazing, too. The last time I saw her, she was skin and bones, all ribs and bruises. Now she’s filled out and she looks healthy and lovely…all the more reason she doesn’t need to get tangled up with me. I’m not a good male. She deserves better. I stalk away from the edge of the platform, my thoughts whirling, all of them focused around curling hair and a cheery smile. The way she lifted my hand to her mouth and kissed my knuckles as if she were paying homage to me… “Hey, Brux!” Jonnas jogs up to my side as I storm back to the crane I was working on. “Go away.” “You know that female?” He lifts his chin at me, a smirk on his face. “You buy a couple nights with her in some cantina or something? You think she’s still taking clients⁠—” I turn on him so quickly that he stumbles backward. “You do not speak to her,” I snarl. “You do not make eye contact. You do not even look in her direction.” He puts his hands up. “Okay, so she’s yours. I got it.” She’s not mine. She deserves better. She deserves a life without someone like me bothering her, weighing her down… “But we all heard her ask you for dinner. Why’d you turn her down if she’s your female?” “Go back to work,” I tell him, voice flat. And I go back to work myself, trying to concentrate on the dock plans and knowing that I’m going to fail miserably at everything today. I’m going to think about Melody, and that night five years ago. I’m going to think about how sweet her mouth was against mine, and how good her body felt, how soft and fragile she was… And what a mistake it was for us to end up in bed together. So yeah, I turned her down today. Melody deserves better than an ugly alien with no good family name, no credits to speak of, and a criminal history. She deserves better than someone who’s an outcast amongst his own, whose blood isn’t pure mesakkah but might have a bit of moden in it. She deserves better than a broken-horned laborer.

On April 26, 1956, cranes at the port of Newark, New Jersey, lifted up fifty-eight truck bodies, minus their wheels and cabins, and put them on a surplus World War II tanker bound for Texas. “We are convinced that we have found a way to combine the economy of water transportation with the speed and flexibility of overland shipment,” McLean announced.

I kind of associate people with flavors. My grandpa? He's an acquired taste, but the closest I can get is crème brûlée. A caramelized shell on the outside. Burnt, bitter notes. But crack the surface, and you find nothing but sweet custard. And Granny? She's a lemon meringue pie. A classic. Pillowy, silken-sweet egg whites, tamed with a hint of sour lemon and a snap of rich, buttery crust." Squinting at him, she stopped rambling, feeling naked under his smoldering gray gaze. She lifted her heavy twists off the spot between her shoulder blades and fanned her neck. "Told you it was weird." "It's not. It's beautiful." He looked down at the water, then met her eyes. "Do you have one for me?" "I didn't. Before. I tried to figure you out, but nothing ever fit. I think maybe because my doubts got in the way. But now...?" "Now?" She traced her finger along the veins in his arms, watched his breath catch. "A ginger cookie. Not a gingersnap. Those are brittle and grate against your teeth. You're a chewy molasses cookie, the kind that gives when you bite into it, with exciting zings of crystallized ginger and pops of raw sugar." She dipped her chin, leaning on the railing again. He moved behind her and slipped his arms around her waist, melting her to the core. He placed his mouth right by her ear, his breath tickling her neck. "What I'm hearing is, you like things a little spicy." Laughing, she craned her neck around to catch the gleam in his eyes. "That's what you got out of that?" "I heard what I heard.

Teasdale doesn't have money for an attorney," he said. "Especially one from Boston. Who are you, really?" Sidney lifted her chin. "An attorney from Boston." "You don't sound like it." She lifted an eyebrow. "Like an attorney?" He scoffed. "No, you have that droning drivel down. You don't sound Boston." She shrugged. "I didn't start out there." "You sound like Sawyer," he said with a nod toward wherever Sawyer had headed. She refused to turn around to find out. "Well, I'm sure there are more than just two of us from---" "You know him," Crane said, narrowing his eyes. Sidney's tongue faltered, and she cleared her throat. "You're from the same place, aren't you?" he asked. "The same little hick town." "Because we both have an accent?" she asked, laughing, hoping it would cover up her lie. "Because of how I just saw him look at you," Crane said, studying Sidney with a grin. "Like a lovesick schoolboy. Holy shit, you're her>." Sidney's breath felt trapped in her chest, unable to move in or out, just held captive there. Sawyer had a her? And she was it? "I---I'm who?" "The girl he came to town all messed up over," Crane said, crossing his own arms. "A hundred years ago. Well, well, well." All messed up over. After punching out his own father. Defending her. Damn it if all her carefully constructed and ancient defenses weren't crumbling around her regarding him. The boy who shattered her already shaky confidence. The reason she bitterly swore off love and dove into work, into making herself a hard and formidable beast. A beast without people skills but still. And now... "We were friends in high school, yes," Sidney managed to push out, her voice sounding decidedly wobbly. "That has no bearing on Mr. Teasdale's case." "Which came to you how, again?" Crane asked. Sidney smiled. "I'll ask the questions." Crane winked, and she so much wanted to slug him. "Nice deflection. What firm are you with?" "Finley and Blossom." "Blossom?" he asked. And it wasn't about the name. It was recognition. Shit. "Yes, sir." "His damn niece," Crane said, slapping a big hand against the ladder. "I forgot she was a lawyer. Damn it. She sent you." Oh, seven kinds of hell, now this wall was disintegrating, too. She needed a suit of armor. "Everything okay?" said a voice from directly behind her. A voice that sent shock waves to all her nether regions, especially coupled with thee hand that rested on the back of her neck. Crap, she needed more than armor. Sidney needed a force field. "I work for her," Sidney said, ignoring Sawyer's question and fighting the urge to settle back against him. "And you need to bring back the win," Crane said, chuckling. God help her if she was ever up against this asshole in court.

He stepped a foot closer and leaned toward Dianna. He craned his head forward and whispered, “I heard he doesn’t care how he gets you back. Alive or dead, he has a price on your head. I heard he would drag you back in pieces if he had to.” Dianna did not move or say anything, but I felt the panic ripple through her. I looked at her and saw her struggling to maintain the cool demeanor she always projected. Before I realized what I was doing, I had stepped in front of her again. I grabbed the front of his dingy shirt, lifting him off his feet. “He will try,” I said, my voice a menacing growl even to my own ears.

THE WEBSITE FOR SSA Marine says, “Accelerating the Pace of Business.” Its terminal is now giving off a deafening whir: engine sounds, horns, beeps, and the echoes of workers shouting. The giant cranes lift containers off the ship, sliding them inward fast enough that they swing a little bit in midair. Currently, the bay is full of the haze-lightened silhouettes of container ships, players in that sprawling, fractal network whose workings have recently come to the fore in headlines about the supply chain. In the restored marsh along the park, clusters of migrating shorebirds are keeping their own schedule. It’s currently three hours from high tide, and on the shrinking islands, tiny sandpipers sit together so densely that they look like a tessellated pattern. Stalking around them are a variety of spidery birds, including long-billed curlews, which have surreal curved beaks more than half the length of their entire bodies. They are back for the time being, having traveled northeast to breed—possibly as far as Idaho—and in the meantime, they adjust their activities to the tides. On the one hand, it is true that you can see multiple forms of time here. The containers pile up; the shorebirds probe the mud; the phoebe chases its flies; a small, brown mushroom pushes up from the grass; and the tide continues to rise. Your stomach rumbles. But one of these clocks is not like the others. In order to maintain its equilibrium, it has to run ahead faster and faster.

Infinite consanguinity it bears - This tendered theme of you that light Retrieves from sea plains where the sky Resigns a breast that every wave enthrones; While ribboned water lanes I wind Are laved and scattered with no stroke Wide from your side, whereto this hour The sea lifts, also, reliquary hands. And so, admitted through black swollen gates That must arrest all distance otherwise, - Past whirling pillars and lithe pediments, Light wrestling there incessantly with light, Star kissing star through wave on wave unto Your body rocking! and where death, if shed, Presumes no carnage, but this single change, - Upon the steep floor flung from dawn to dawn The silken skilled transmemberment of song; Permit me voyage, love, into your hands ...

The sound stunned Evans. The ache, the longing, dying but sweetly pleading, like a happy memory drowning in truth. It was what he had been searching for, not just for Chinatown, his love story in need of love, but for those long Woodland nights he waited out alone in bed, flipping through old photograph albums, the pictures of Ali, whom he had let go, pictures of Ali and his son Josh, the family he had traded, one night at a time, for The Godfather. He knew he had fucked up. Goldsmith’s music was scant consolation, only magic, but where love and real life failed his foolish cravings, the music ennobled them in brass and piano and harp. Their glissandos were running water, growing in him the feeling, easy to forget, of why he was right, despite all the shit, to love Hollywood in the first place. The feeling was that word he lost so much trying to find and hold on to—now he had it—a word, in the time of Nixon, almost embarrassing to speak—“romance.” For Evans it was more than moonlight and ocean winds and Gatsby’s green flare across the bay; it was not fantasy but palpable evidence of a dream becoming true, the rare and shivery threshold of immeasurable pleasure, the promise imagination grants the mundane, and the mountain stream through which beauty and goodness, against all probability and reason, flow down into the world as art. It was, out of the darkness, a faith. Like Polanski’s crane, a lift, redemption, grace. True or false, it didn’t matter; as long as it was felt once, it could be felt again. Hearing that music for the first time, thinking of his father, he cried.

The thing that sticks out in my mind was the laughter. Some of the things we laughed at might be regarded as a bit macabre. ‘Old so-and-so ended up on his back and they had to get a crane to lift his aircraft to get him out.’ The fact that old so-and-so was in hospital was neither here nor there. It was still a hell of a laugh. We didn’t take ourselves too seriously. If anybody was heard waxing a bit heavy, and asking if any of us would survive another week, he’d be laughed out of the room. It was taboo to admit that you were in any sort of personal difficulties. We were kids, but at the same time at the top of our profession. We were demonstrating that we were better than the enemy and were saving our country.19 Professional pride and technical skill, about which Wellington’s officers cared little, were important, but if you tried to out-do your colleagues they would usually find a way of taking you down a peg or two.

Ticks Haulage is a family run business that has been established since 1988, based in Manningtree, Essex, specializing in road haulage services including self-loading vehicles with curtain-sider trailers with Moffett forklifts and a 32 ton Hiab Crane vehicle. Our drivers are able to provide a wealth of experience and expertise to handle all types of loads. All our lifting equipment is regularly tested and fully certificated.

European country. You heard it here first. Attribute to a “senior administration official” on deep background. Use previous suggestion of Berenger at DoJ to corroborate. Condition: make sure you tie this to Nealon heavily in your writing. Use phrases like “in cooperation with” or “cahoots” or something similar, but more sinister if you can. Furthermore, try and reflect nicely on the Gondry administration? Our man is doing all he can to deal with the situation, but this is obviously a heavy lift, what with Russia being involved and the general intransigence of the DoD. Dave translated DoD automatically—Department of Defense. Which he took to mean SecDef Passerini being a pain in the ass,

Ella woke again as they entered the picturesque village of Bibury. A stone bridge arched over the placid River Coln, and Ella craned her neck to watch a swan and its fuzzy, brown cygnets floating alongside beds of watercress and the boggy watermeadow called Rack Isle. Ella lifted her phone and snapped a picture. "It's like someone cued them." "I called ahead." They drove past a row of sandstone cottages with colorful gardens, and in the center of town, Heather pointed out the ancient Saxon church. "St. Mary's was on a Christmas stamp a few decades back." Ella rolled down her window to take another picture. "It's all so- so perfect.

Skunk? Was there skunk in Ireland? Taking out an evidence bag, she tried to pinpoint the area it seemed strongest, but it was impossible to tell. In any case, she swabbed a small area from the wall and then the ground, bagged them, and in addition picked up a sample of grit from the same area on the floor. The tower, with its two battered old wooden slat windows, was completely empty, save for some pigeon droppings. As birds didn’t urinate, Reilly already knew the foul smell definitely wasn’t coming from them. Moving tighter into the wall, she began stepping in concentric circles inwards, her gaze scanning the ground area. Then, her keen eye noticed some tiny bluish dots that were slightly incongruous amongst the grit and the droppings. She pulled out her tweezers and, bending low, carefully lifted one up for inspection. With some idea of what it was, she held it to her nose, sniffed, and removed all doubt. Rubber. Reilly’s mind raced, wondering if this was of any significance. Had the killer dropped it? Probably not. Whoever had hoisted that poor man up into the tree and slashed open his torso surely wouldn’t have then gone to the trouble of coming all the way up here to watch him die. Or would he? She craned her neck, looking upwards into the gloom, then made her way to the window. As she did, she let out a breath. There, framed perfectly in the opening as if it were a painting, was the hawthorn tree, the misfortunate victim dramatically hanging front and center. Leaving little doubt in Reilly’s mind that such positioning was completely intentional. It took a while, but eventually the local police managed to arrange for a mobile elevating platform to be sent to the site from the nearest town. The ME, having repositioned the man’s innards as best she could, wrapped the mutilated body in the tarpaulin and, with the platform operator’s assistance, accompanied it down to the ground, where she could examine it more closely. Reilly took a lint roller from her bag, took samples from the body and then concentrated her efforts around the perimeter of the tree, walking in concentric circles around the base amongst the humongous roots poking through the soil. Granted the victim was not a heavy man, but even so, it

She sighed and sniffed the air. The smell of dirty water hung thickly in it. They were supposed to be running a clean-up initiative. Whether they had and failed, or they’d succeeded and it had grown filthy again she wasn’t sure. Either way, she wasn’t fancying a swim.  ‘Johansson,’ Roper called from the tent, beckoning her over, the report from the uniformed officer already in his hand. ‘Come on.’ She approached and he held the edge of the door-flap open for her so she could pass inside. It was eight feet by eight feet, and the translucent material made everything bright with daylight.  The kid in front of them could have been no more than eighteen or nineteen. He was skinny and had thick curly brown hair. His skin was blued from the cold and had the distinctly greyish look of someone who did more drugs than ate food. He was lying on his back on the bank, eyes closed, hands bound together on his stomach. His clothes were enough to tell them that he was homeless. It was charity shop mix and match. A pair of jeans that were two sizes too big, tied tight around pronounced hip bones with a shoelace. He was wearing a t-shirt with the cookie monster on it that looked as old as he was. But that was it. He had no jacket despite the time of year and no socks or shoes.  Jamie crouched down, pulling a pair of latex gloves from her jacket pocket. She had a box of them in the car. ‘We got an ID?’ she asked, not looking up. She knew Roper wouldn’t get down next to her. He didn’t have the stamina for it for one, and with his hangover the smell would make him puke.  He’d leave the close inspection to her.  ‘Uh, yeah. He matches the description of a missing person’s — Oliver Hammond. Eighteen years old. No positive ID yet though. No picture on file.’ ‘Eighteen,’ Jamie mumbled, looking over him more closely. ‘Jesus.’ ‘Yup.’ Roper sighed. ‘Probably scored, got high, took a little stroll, fell in the river… And here we are.’ ‘Did he zip-tie his hands together before or after shooting up?’ She side-eyed him as he scrolled through something on his phone. She hoped it was the missing person’s report, but thought it was more likely to be one of the daily news items his phone prepared for him. ‘I’m just testing you,’ he said absently. ‘What else d’you see?’ Jamie pursed her lips. No one seemed to care when homeless people turned up dead. There’d been eight this month alone in the city — two of which had been floaters like this. She’d checked it out waiting at some traffic lights. There were more than a hundred and forty homeless missing persons reported in the last six months in London. Most cases were never closed. She grimaced at the thought and went back to her inspection. Oliver’s wrists were rubbed raw from the zip-tie, but that looked self-inflicted. She craned her neck to see his arms. His elbows were grazed and rubbed raw, and the insides were tracked out, like Roper had said. He wasn’t new to the needle. She didn’t need to check his ankles and toes to know that they’d be the same.  She lingered on his fingers, honing in on the ones with missing nails.  ‘Ripped out,’ Roper said, watching as she lifted and straightened his fingers, careful not to disturb anything before the SOCOs showed up to take their photographs. In a perfect world the body would have stayed in situ in the water, but these things couldn’t be helped.  She inspected the middle and the index fingers on the right hand — the nails were completely gone. ‘Torture,’ Roper added to the silence. ‘Probably over the heroin. You know, where’s my money?

Glass breaks. Silverware clatters. He lifts a chair and brings it down with a loud crack. Then he smashes another chair into the wall, destroying a pair of brightly painted plaster horse heads, and then he hurls it into the pagoda mirror. Shards explode out over the dining room, and still he doesn't stop. I have this impulse to do something, comfort him somehow, but when a person needs to break a lot of stuff, it's best to let them do it.

Councils" We must sit down and reason together. We must sit down. Men standing want to hold forth. They rain down upon faces lifted. We must sit down on the floor on the earth on stones and mats and blankets. There must be no front to the speaking no platform, no rostrum, no stage or table. We will not crane to see who is speaking. Perhaps we should sit in the dark. In the dark we could utter our feelings. In the dark we could propose and describe and suggest. In the dark we could not see who speaks and only the words would say what they say. Thus saying what we feel and what we want, what we fear for ourselves and each other into the dark, perhaps we could begin to begin to listen. Perhaps we should talk in groups small enough for everyone to speak. Perhaps we should start by speaking softly. The women must learn to dare to speak. The men must bother to listen. The women must learn to say, I think this is so. The men must learn to stop dancing solos on the ceiling. After each speaks, she or he will repeat a ritual phrase: It is not I who speaks but the wind. Wind blows through me. Long after me, is the wind.

It was almost possible to ignore that the church was also an active construction site. While tremendous progress had been made in recent years with the interior structures, still there was much to be done: scaffolding and interior lifts abounded, cordoned off with yellow tape. Their first destination was the apse and they wandered in that direction with necks craned and eyes open in awe.

She straightened her shoulders. "Sisy, are the ducks ready?" "All plucked and cleaned." Roxannah sautéed more onions and garlic with turmeric, adding roughly chopped walnuts to the sizzling butter before transferring them into a large mortar. Halpa gently removed the pestle from her hand. "I'll do this. You see to the duck." She cut the ducks into large pieces, trying to plan her next steps as she worked. The usual recipe required the duck to cook in water. Boiling made the meat tender. But it also meant that most of its flavor leached into the sauce, leaving the flesh of the fowl tasteless and stringy. She could roast the duck. But that would leave the sauce bland. Besides, roasted meat was never as fall-off-the-bone soft as boiled. It seemed stupid to try something new tonight of all nights. God, give me wisdom! Give me counsel so I know how to proceed. She waited for a moment, head bent low, trying to discern what to do. She felt a release, a sense of rightness about going forward with her risky plan. Nodding to herself, she added a dollop more butter to the same pan where she had fried the garlic and onions, which still held their lingering aroma. Sprinkling the duck with salt, she set it carefully into the sizzling pan. Halpa held the mortar under her nose. "Is this the consistency you want?" "Perfect." She fetched the jar of pomegranate molasses she had brought from home and added a heaping tablespoon to Halpa's paste, seasoning it with salt and a dash of turmeric, cinnamon, and cardamom. In the pan, she flipped the pieces of duck. Their skin had turned the color of bright copper, gleaming with melted butter. By now, the whole kitchen staff had gathered around to watch her. Even the Immortal craned his neck for a better view. She ignored them, keeping her attention on the duck. When both sides had fried evenly, she removed some of the excess fat, remembering Amestris's crack about the king's sleepless night. Pomegranate juice and a rich, gelatinous broth made from chicken bones would enrich the duck's flavor. She hoped the fried skin would seal in enough of the juices that simmering the fowl in liquid would not rob its flavor. Finally, she spooned in the paste from Halpa's mortar. Covering the pan, she lifted it over the fire to reduce the heat. It would simmer gently and, hopefully, be ready just in time for dinner.

She took another step into the wood, and then another, and as she moved in deeper, she was overwhelmed by the way the forest was attuned to her. Branches lowered themselves down, low enough for her to reach a hand up and stroke the bare bark, low enough for them to tickle the skin of her arms. Soon, her surprise turned into understanding. She knew what this feeling was now. She knew what was happening. It was the same elation she experienced when her garden's roses craned their necks out of concern for her. It was the same tingle that consumed her when the plum tree bent its branches to shade her on sunny days. Only now, in these dense woods, as far from her garden as she'd ever been, it was stronger than ever before. She became part of this forest as soon as she entered it, and it was a part of her. They could communicate. They could be as one, without a single word spoken. Filled with wonder, Harriet sat beneath the biggest tree in the wood. As she did, she heard a familiar rustling noise. Within seconds, curious tendrils of ivy appeared at her side, wrapped eagerly around her legs, and climbed over her hands. Harriet stayed very still. This ivy was different from the ivy in her garden--- it was more childlike in its embrace, more impatient. There was a kind of discovery in the way the tendrils wrapped around and beneath her that was new to them both. But soon, all foreignness was gone, for Harriet was lifted off the ground to lie on a silken pillow of ivy created just for her. Harriet let herself relax into it. We move because of you, the ivy whispered to her, and the trees hummed in agreement. You are exceptional, the wood told her. The words did not come as a person's voice. They came as the warm, whistling breeze, the rustle of branches, the titters of a bird. A sylvan lullaby.