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The Veil of Years


LIFTING THE VEIL OF YESTERYEAR

      The young apprentice mage, Pierette, discovers that the pages in the history books are fading away. Like stars going behind a passing cloud, the events that define the sunny world she loves are winking out one by one, and the shadows of ancient headless Gauls—souls of the dead whose heads once adorned the pillars of the city of Provence—are seen by night . . .

     Is the Black Time coming, when evil will reign supreme? The answer lies in the long ago, when Provence was a Roman camp, and Pierette must brave the otherworld to journey there.

 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

L. Warren Douglas—anthropologist, naturalist, poet, and historian—puts it all together, melding myth, historic characters and events, ancient and future landscapes with a touch of fantasy. Douglas’s works are a treasure trove of ancient wisdom, lost legends, cutting-edge biotech, and unforgettable characters. From Sioux Falls to the South of France, Douglas has walked the streets and trails, smelled the flowers, named and savored the winds off mountain, sea, and plain—and his readers experience it.

Douglas’s mysteries are genuine, whether hidden in the myths of a thousand worlds, recorded by the world-spanning biocybes of Midicor IV, or obscured by the mists of the Celtic otherworld where dead gods speak, and ultimately it is the reader who must wander dusty trails, explore forbidding cityscapes, and discover answers as real as sweat, as poignant as lost love, buried deep in the forgotten past or hidden on a far, far world whose light will not impinge on us for a million years. For Douglas, to travel hopefully is indeed a better thing than to arrive, and his reader’s journeys are their own reward.

Illustration by Gary Ruddell
Cover design by Carol Russo


ORDER Hardcover

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

First printing, July 2001

Distributed by Simon & Schuster
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN: 0-671-31997-3

Copyright © 2001 by L. Warren Douglas

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

A Baen Books Original
Baen Publishing Enterprises
P.O. Box 1403
Riverdale, NY 10471
http://www.baen.com

Production by Windhaven Press
Auburn, NH

Electronic version by WebWrights
http://www.webwrights.com


Dedication

For Sue E. Folkringa, my wife, my friend and companion on all the trails and byways of Provence, and wherever else the endless quest may lead us.

Acknowledgments

Dave Feintuch and Leo Frankowski, for reading and criticizing the manuscript and making suggestions.

Alain et Nathalie, Hotel Cardinal, 24 Rue Cardinale, Aix-en-Provence, France, pour une chambre jolie et confortable, et un gai "bonjour" chaque matin.

The French people for the preservation of so many antiquities among which we may, on certain magical occasions, part the Veil of Years.

Sue, as always, for everything. Celeste Anne and Emma Sue, of course, just for being warm and furry.

Baen Books by L. Warren Douglas

Simply Human
The Sacred Pool
The Veil of Years
The Isle Beyond Time (upcoming)

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