But I have said enough, and
indeed it is foolish to waste breath in such talk, since Fate will have
its way with both of you, and the end of the game in which we play is
already written in Pachacamac's book for every one of us. Did not Rimac
speak of it the other night? So play on, play on, and let Destiny fulfil
itself. If I dared to give counsel it was only because he who watches
the battle with a general's eye sees more of it than he who fights."
Then he bowed in his stately fashion and left me, and it was long ere he
spoke to me again of this matter of Quilla and our love for one another.
When he was gone my anger against him passed, since I saw that he was
warning me of more than he dared to say, not for himself, but because
he loved me. Moreover, I was afraid, for I felt that I was moving in the
web of a great plot that I did not understand, of which Quilla and those
cold-eyed lordlings of her company and the chief whose guest I had
been, and Kari himself, and many others as yet unknown to me, spun the
invisible threads. One day these might choke me.
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