"How do you know that?" she demanded.

"The Goddess told me a story of the great past," he replied. "She told me that the ancestor race split into two groups, and that one destroyed the other. Then that race, called the Urzani, conquered the humans. That was like two or three thousand years before the Blood War. If this is the first example of human writing, then we're not even to that part yet."

"Urzani. I have heard that term," Dolanna said absently, tapping her cheek.

"I'll tell you the story the Goddess told me some time," he told them. "I'm sure you two would find it very interesting," he noted, looking at Allia and Keritanima.

"And why is that?" Keritanima asked.

"Because your people and the Selani are descended from the Urzani," he announced flatly. "The Wikuni and the Selani descended from the Sha'Kar, who are descendents of the Urzani. You and Allia are cousins as much as sisters."

"Truly?" Allia asked suddenly.

"That's impossible!" Keritanima flared. "I mean, look at us! How could we be related to the Selani? We're absolutely nothing alike!"

"Not now, but a long time ago, the Wikuni looked like the Sha'Kar, because they were the Sha'Kar. I'll tell you about that later, sister. Right now, we have another job that's just a little bit more important."

"Oh, fine, go and drop a cannonball like that on my lap and expect me to just forget about it," Keritanima growled at him as she grabbed a good half-span of book and turned it, so hard that it made an audible thud when the pages turned. The page to which she turned was still written in Sha'Kar. "Alright then," she growled, starting to turn pages again.

After about two more hours, they found what they were looking for. "Stop!" Miranda said excitedly as Keritanima turned a page. The fox Wikuni turned back a page as Miranda almost snatched the book out of her hands, pointing to a line. "Am I tired and thirsty, or is that High Wikuni?" she said excitedly.

Keritanima feverishly looked over the page, and Tarrin saw her eyes widen. "Alright, we're in business!" Keritanima announced. "Everyone here thank my father, who's rotting in an insane asylum, for making them teach me High Wikuni," she said in a grand voice. "I can read this!"

"You hope you can read that," Dar corrected.

"Oh, no, Dar, I can read it," she challenged, putting a finger on the slightly angular scrawl. "'Herein lies the third generation of the script of the Shorian dialect of Low Sha'Kar," she read from the book. "A simplified system of writing adopted by the Sha'Kar for communicating with other races after encountering great difficulty teaching their writing system to the other races. Created by Shoria Do'Ara, High Scholar and thirty-fifth Keeper of the Tower of Sharadar." Keritanima gave out a squeal of delight. "Contained on the pages hereafter is the cross-indexed dictionary of translating Sha'Kar into Shorian Script!" she said with a laugh. "I guess this does mean that our ancestors with the Sha'Kar," she said with a look at the book. "If the root written language of my people was invented by a Sha'Kar, then it's only logical that my ancestors were also Sha'Kar." She looked at Allia. "I guess we are cousins, sister."

"We can discuss that a bit later, sister," Allia told her, a bit impatiently.

"But you're the only one who can read it," Tarrin objected. He knew the real answer to that, but he was too interested in getting started than he was in getting bogged down in a history lesson. They'd learn about that soon enough, if they read through the book. "If we keep looking, we may find where they have Sulasian."

"Which would you rather do, Tarrin? Use up another six or seven hours looking for it, or start right here and now?"

Given the choices in that context, Tarrin realized it wasn't much of a choice. "Well, alright then," he agreed.

"Miranda, break out the books," Keritanima said. "Everyone take a seat. We're all going to have a little study session."

"What are you talking about, sister?" Allia asked.

"I'm going to tell you a word in Sha'Kar and point to its corresponding symbol. Then you're going to copy that symbol down in your own books and write the Sha'Kar word using a phoneticized comparison to whatever language you're most comfortable with beside it. That way you have to write it down, and it's always easier to remember things when you have to write them down. Trust me, I know. I speak from experience."

"This is going to take months," Dar groaned.

"About that," Keritanima agreed. "Sha'Kar is an unbelievably complicated language, with a vocabulary that has as many words as two other languages put together. Given that it looks like there are two systems of written language, it's going to make it that much harder."

" Two forms?" Tarrin asked in dismay.

Keritanima nodded, her eyes poring over the book. "Some of these symbols repeat. From what I see here, it's because those repeating symbols don't represent a word, they represent a phonetic syllable. Like a symbol that represents a block of letters instead of a single one. I guess they ran out of ideas for new glyphs, and adopted a syllabic format for all the words they invented afterwards." She grunted. "High Wikuni is also a syllabic writing style, using fifty-two symbols to represent phonetic sounds. But it looks here like there are quite a few more syllabic symbols than fifty-two."

"Ugh," Miranda grunted. "This is sounding more and more difficult by the moment."

"The syllabic format will actually be the easier one to learn, because repetition breeds familiarity," Keritanima said professionally. "It's the glyphic format that's going to be a royal pain to learn. From what I see here already, the words represented by glyphs are not translated into the syllabic form. We'll have to learn every glyph and its corresponding word, one by one."

"It's going to take months," Dar groaned again.

"Clear your calendar, boys and girls," Keritanima said grimly. "We're going to be very busy for a while."

Months. In this strange altered time, that would be more like rides, but the sheer size of the task before them was intimidating. Mother, is there anything you can do to help? he asked pleadingly.

You have but to ask, kitten, she replied lightly. I seem to recall that Dolanna learned Sha'Kar in a matter of rides. Maybe you should ask her how she did it.

I know how she did it. She said she used a priest spell-can you do that for me? he asked immediately.

You have but to ask, my kitten, she said in a teasing voice. And before you ask, yes, I can grant priest spells in that altered reality. Have Dolanna teach you the spell. In fact, have her teach it to all of you. Well, except Miranda, of course. She'll have to negotiate with Kikalli over this.

"It will not take as long as you think, Keritanima," Dolanna told her patiently. "I once used minor priest magic to learn Sha'Kar. We can do so with this. It is a simple spell."

Dolanna must have read his mind. "Dolanna, I was thinking the exact same thing," Tarrin told her gratefully. "Can you teach us the spell?"

"It is a simple matter, dear one. Priest spells are prayers for a specific thing, using ritual words. I can teach you the prayer of aiding memory in moments, but be warned that it is not an absolute. The spell only aids memory. It does not cause you to automatically remember perfectly anything you see or hear. But it will cut down the time it will take to learn by a drastic amount."

"I'm feeling left out," Miranda sighed morosely.

"I can use Sorcery to keep you up, Miranda," Keritanima assured her. "Mind weaves can pass information from one mind to another. Since we're the same race, they'll work for us."

"Oh. That's fine then," she said brightly.

"Well then, Dolanna, I'm feeling particularly pious at the moment, and find I have an overpowering desire to pray," Keritanima said with a light smile. "Teach us the words, and we'll get this ball rolling."