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“The resulting garment was black, of course. But it was like no fabric I'd ever seen before, liquid and faintly glimmering. He had ordered each of his guardians to donate several of their feathers, and these he had woven into the material. They were not visible exactly, except as a suggestion of wings when the cloak caught the wind. It was a garment that needed no adornment, for it was like something snipped out of a dream, and he gave it none, apart from the row of buttons. I would have expected him to pick the finest of those I had gathered, but instead he chose a selection that would represent all the regions of his realm: silver from the Weeping Mines and the lower tributary of the Tromlu River; carved oak from the antlers of one of the hag-headed deer; colored marble from the Blue Hooks. The effect was more impressive than if he had adorned himself in jewels, for together the buttons possessed an enchantment that made strange images flit through my mind when I looked upon them, memories of places I'd never seen. A shadowy grove around a narrow standing stone; a flash of mist-shrouded water tumbling down a sheer cliff.” — Heather Fawcett