The Thousand Flower Throne loomed on the dais. The throne, though rendered in gold and fine enamels by masters of a bygone age, was not as striking as the dainty figure propped upon it. Sitting in her own personal storm cloud of black silk was an austere-looking, scrub-rose-faced woman. A scrub rose that had earned its place in this garden not by the merit of its particular splendor but on the cunning of its thorns. This rose queen with her tenacious tendrils and piecing gaze cast her eyes down from her high garden perch to me.
“Well, captain?” Her voice was like pruning shears. Precise and ruthless. “What have you learned of our visitor?”
Strange musings from a distant shore.
