Kay, Guy Gavriel – Sarantine Mosaic 01 – Sailing to Sarantium

SAILING TO SARANTIUM

Valerius the Trakesian has great ambition. Rumored to be responsible for the ascension of the previous Emperor, his uncle, amid fire and blood, Valerius himself has now risen to the Golden Throne of the vast empire ruled by the fabled city, Sarantium.

Valerius has a vision to match his ambition: a glittering dome that will proclaim his magnificence down through the ages. And so, in a ruined western city on the far distant edge of civilization, a not-so-humble artisan receives a call that will change his life forever.

Crispin is a mosaicist, a layer of bright tiles. Still grieving for the family he lost to the plague, he lives only for his arcane craft, and cares little for ambition, less for money, and for intrigue not at all. But an imperial summons to the most magnificent city in the world is a difficult call to resist.

In this world still half-wild and tangled with magic, no journey is simple; and a journey to Sarantium means a walk destiny. Bearing with him a and a Queen’s seductive promise, Crispin sets out for the fabled city from which none return unaltered, guarded only by his own wits and a bird soul talisman from an alchemist’s treasury.

(continued from front flap)

In the Aldwood he encounters a great beast from the mythic past, and in robbing the zubir of its prize he wins a woman’s devotion and a man’s loyalty-and loses a gift he didn’t know he had until it was gone.

In Sarantium itself, where rival Factions vie in the streets and palaces and chariot racing is as sacred as prayer, Crispin will begin his life anew. In an empire ruled by intrigue and violence, he must find his own source of power. And he does: high on the scaffolding of the greatest art work ever imagined, while struggling to deal with the dangers-and the seductive lures-of the men and women around him.

Guy Gavriel Kay’s magnificent historical fantasies draw from the twin springs of history and legend to create seamless worlds as vibrant as any in literature. Sailing to Sarantium begins THE SARANTINE MOSAIC, a new and signal triumph by today’s most esteemed master of high fantasy.

GUY GAVRIEL KAY’S distinguished literary career began when he helped compile Tolkien’s posthumous masterpiece, The Silmarillion. Kay’s own epic trilogy THE FIONAVAR TAPESTRY appears on “The Internet Top 100 SF/Fantasy List.” Subsequently the author of Tigana, A Song for Arbonne, and The Lions of Al-Rassan, he has been both a winner of the Prix Aurora Award and a World Fantasy Award nominee. His works have been translated into fourteen languages. He lives in Toronto.

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SAILING TO

SARANTIUM

SAILING TO SARANTIUM

GUY GAVRIEL KAY

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SAILING TO SARANTIUM. Copyright © 1998 by Guy Gavriel Kay. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address HarperCollins Publishers Inc., 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY 10022.

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A hardcover edition of this book was published in Canada in 1998 by Viking.

FIRST U.S. EDITION

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kay, Guy Gavriel.

Sailing to Sarantium / Guy Gavriel Kay.

p. cm.

ISBN 0-06-105117-9 I. Tide

PR9199.3.K39S25 1999 813′.54-dc21 98-47254

99 00 01 02 */RRD 10987654321

For my sons,

Samuel Alexander and Matthew Tyler, with love, as I watch them

‘…fashion everything

From nothing every day, and teach

The morning stars to sing.’

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I imagine it is obvious from the tide of this work, but I owe a debt of inspiration to William Butler Yeats, whose meditations in poetry and prose on the mysteries of Byzantium led me there and gave me a number of underlying motifs along with a sense that imagination and history would be at home together in this milieu.