Second Kiss

by Robert Priest

  Pathar: city at the heart of the Pathan Empire located deep underearth, beneath the ocean.

  Phaer Isle: the mountainous, mid-ocean island, once the home of the Elphaereans and later home to the Phaer people. Lately conquered by the Pathan Empire.

  Phaer people: any non-Pathan residents of the Phaer Isle; also known as Phaerlanders.

  Shissillil: a former suburb of the city of Ulde. Due to the earliest known case of spell-crossing a place reputed to be without friction.

  Spell fire: refers to the fire that occurred in the Great Kone when it stopped turning during the Battle of Phaer Bay.

  Spellbinders: Phaerlanders, usually children, with the innate vocal quality necessary to become a mage.

  Spell kone: a crank-driven cone upon which a spell is written in one long spiral from the rim to the point. Turning the crank causes the cone to revolve while the eye or “witness stone” descends — thus “reading” and invoking the text of the spell.

  Thralls: beings who escaped their enslavement to the blood magic of the Necromancer of Arthenow and migrated to the Phaer Isle five hundred years before the events of this tale.

  Ulde: the capital city of the Phaer Isle. The ancient village was formed around the Great Kone.

  Copyright © Robert Priest, 2015

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.

  All characters in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Editor: Allison Hirst

  Interior and cover design: Courtney Horner

  Map by Sherwin Tija

  Cover images: bottle © img85h/shutterstock; vines © Deviney/Dreamstime

  Epub Design: Carmen Giraudy

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Priest, Robert, 1951-, author

  Second kiss / Robert Priest.

  (Spell crossed ; book 2)

  Issued in print and electronic format.

  ISBN 978-1-4597-3020-5 (pbk.).--ISBN 978-1-4597-3021-2 (pdf).--

  ISBN 978-1-4597-3022-9 (epub)

  I. Title. II. Series: Priest, Robert, 1951- Spell crossed ; book 2

  PS8581.R47S39 2015 jC813’.54 C2014-905052-6 C2014-905053-4

  We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund and Livres Canada Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishing Tax Credit and the Ontario Media Development Corporation.

  Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.

  J. Kirk Howard, President

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