The Power and the Poison

Starry-eyed twelve-year old Larissa Basmajinik vows to marry only for love.

Though excited at being an attendant at her oldest sister's wedding, Larissa knows it is a marriage arranged for political purposes, as are most marriages among young members of the nobility in the 1700s in the eastern European nation of Varonobsk. In the journal she has just begun to keep, she records her secret thoughts, including this foolish vow of a child who overestimates her power to control her destiny

When at the wedding feast she hears in her mind a thought that seems to come from one of the many servers and attendants, she dismisses it despite its ominous nature. She regards the gift of hearing thoughts a curse that she dares not reveal lest she be accused of witchcraft. As years pass, on several occasions this thought hearing occurs, always bringing a warning of possible danger-to her? To someone she loves? Faithfully, she records the messages in her journal but tells no one of them. It is not a phenomenon she understands or can control, and only rarely can she guess whose thought she's heard, so she tends to ignore them.

Will she learn to heed these warnings in time to avert the disaster they portend? Or will she understand their meaning too late? Read Larissa's private record of her journey from child to young adult to wife to mother, a journey fraught with danger, heartbreak, and the stubborn persistence that carries her through many trials. Will she ultimately succeed in controlling her fate? Or will her tale reveal the folly of hubris?