CYCLE C  |  Book 3 

Weaves of Sunlight

PREVIEW | Weaves of Sunlight

Two decades ago, when Valeriya Narskaya was she was still a teenager, she aspired to be not only a tennis star but a chess grandmistress too.  She regarded the second of these challenges as the easier of the two.  Only two skills, not a dozen or more, were required.  One was to survey the chessboard and identify the pieces that truly mattered.  The second was to look at the different ways those pieces might now move ahead.

Valeriya no longer played chess with a board and inanimate pieces.  What she did instead was look at living people. Right now, there were four such people: her onetime swain Malory, Zuni Kashani, Kari LaMarca, and Araceli Donovan.

Had Malory ever been her swain? Only in her dreams. He had nevertheless been gallant toward her, and he still featured in her dreams. These days he was on a quest Val was still trying to understand.  He was searching for valuable manuscripts, ones that he intended to house in the Vivarium digital library he was in the process of building.  Val sensed that he intended to use Vivarium to serve another purpose — one that was nefarious.

Zuni Kashani was a Muslim scholar who had once supervised Malory when he aspired to be a scholar himself.  She was now planning to leave Europe and settle in Kashmir. Malory was worried that if she did that, she'd get herself killed.  When he looks at Kashmir on a map, he sees a country that harbours extremists who loathe accomplished Muslim women. Malory was trying to persuade her to settle herself in a locale where she could pursue her scholarly interests in perfect safety.

Kari LaMarca was a young woman Val was determined to meet. Why?  Because she sensed that Malory was smitten with her.  Val was curious to know what her attraction was. 

Araceli Donovan was a Manila businesswoman who had established an office in Lucerna.  In addition to running her business, she was also engaged in a competition with Kari.  Both women were trying to learn the history of a treasure ship that sank four centuries ago.  The winner of their competition could receive a prize that, in Malory's estimation, would be worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Val was having trouble anticipating where these four pieces on her chessboard would move next.  A good reason for this was the fact that she was in a room so dark that the board was almost invisible to her.  She needed to open a blind, so that she could admit shafts of sunlight.