Барб Хенди - A Wind in the Night

Wayfarer was there and hurried over to take Magiere’s cloak. Brot’an, possibly checking to see if she had been followed, stood peering between the closed curtains and out the window.

“Well?” Leesil asked too loudly.

Much as Magiere knew he hated sea travel, it was obvious he was starting to hate the four walls around them even more. It was a nice enough room, large and airy with two double beds. Brot’an always slept on the floor, which left the second bed to Chap and Wayfarer. All in all, the situation could have been worse.

But for as long as Magiere remained silent, though Leesil was desperate to press on, the answer to his question was obvious.

He flopped backward on the bed beside Chap and, with a groan, ran his fingers through his long, unbound hair. Chap dropped his head on his paws with a threatening rumble as a stream of memory-words rose in Magiere’s mind.

—This isn’t working— ... —We need ... to walk the piers ... and ... talk to captains ... directly—

Magiere winced. “Don’t growl at me! I’m no happier about this than any of you.”

Leesil lifted his head and looked first at the dog and then at her. “What did he say?”

“He wants to start talking to ship captains.”

“Then I should do so,” Brot’an put in, still peeking out the window.

Magiere clenched her jaw. “You’d be spotted quicker than anyone. We’ve all tried disguises, and I’m sure they’ve learned to look closer at anything suspicious. You’re a head and a half taller than any of the natives ... even taller than most travelers and sailors in the port.”

Glowering in all directions, Leesil sat up slowly on the bed’s edge and began tying the old green head scarf over his bright, white-blond hair. Wayfarer glanced at Chap, but she didn’t speak and remained standing, clutching Magiere’s cloak in both hands.

“They’ve got to be spread thin by now,” Leesil muttered, looking to Brot’an, though normally he didn’t speak to the shadow-gripper unless he had to. “Can you guess how many are left?”

“I know exactly how many,” Brot’an answered, “and exactly who they are. Three women and one man, and one of the women is crippled.” He finally turned to look only at Magiere. “Fréthfâre is with them, for Dänvârfij would not have made some of their rasher choices.”

Chap snarled as his head snapped up, and Leesil’s mouth fell open for an instant. Even Magiere felt anger rising and had to push it down before she could speak. She had run Fréthfâre through with her own falchion, though that vicious advisor to Most Aged Father, leader of the Anmaglâhk, had survived. Magiere didn’t mind Brot’an’s guarded secrets, but only so long as he remained useful.

“You’ve known this since Drist?” she asked him. “Didn’t you think that was something you should’ve shared?”

Brot’an raised his right eyebrow, which made the scars skipping around it spread. “You never asked,” he replied passively.

Again not trusting herself to speak, Magiere closed her eyes. They should have attempted this conversation before, but both Leesil and Chap were dead set against sharing anything with Brot’an unless necessary. And the old assassin had a habit of only trading information.

“Én’nish is one of the women,” Leesil put in. “I caught her across the stomach with a blade in Drist. She couldn’t be fully healed yet.”

Brot’an nodded once.

Magiere’s anger began to fade. “That leaves two in good health, and two can’t cover the entire port.”

“The two are highly skilled,” Brot’an countered. “They can cover more area than you realize. You are correct that they might spot me, or even Léshil in disguise, more easily among the local inhabitants. You two are also taller than the people here.”

“Then what are we supposed to do?” Leesil asked in frustration.

“I could go,” Wayfarer said quietly.

To make it all worse, Magiere had already seen Brot’an look the girl’s way.

“With Chap,” Wayfarer added. “I speak enough Numanese, and I saw other dogs on piers with the people here.”

“No!” Magiere snapped.

“I saw a number of black dogs down there,” Wayfarer continued without flinching, and her beautiful green eyes were so calm that she almost didn’t seem herself. “It seems a common color in this place. We could try the trick Leesil used before.”

At that, Chap growled.

Wayfarer actually frowned at the dog, something no one would have expected for how much she, like her people, revered the majay-hì.

“At least the people of Calm Seatt thought you only a wolf,” she said to him, “instead of ... what you are.”

Chap silently watched the girl, and one of his ears twitched as he looked over at Leesil.

Leesil stiffened upright to his feet and whirled on the dog. “No, it isn’t a good idea!”

Magiere could guess what Chap had said.

“I am smaller than any of you,” Wayfarer went on. “Covered in a plain brown cloak and leading a black dog, no one would notice me.”

Magiere wasn’t about to let the girl fall into the hands of the anmaglâhk, and grasped Wayfarer by the shoulders. “You can’t walk around the port, not even with Chap. What if you were spotted? Have you thought of that?”

—I can protect her—

Magiere ignored Chap, but Wayfarer frowned as she looked to Brot’an. “Greimasg’äh?”

Brot’an had grown too quiet, and that worried Magiere when he looked at her.

“The girl and the majay-hì need only look for the larger ships,” he said. “Find one with a captain willing to take passengers, and then arrange for payment.”

“No!” Leesil insisted.

“I agree, they cannot go alone,” Brot’an added. “I agree that I cannot be seen walking openly around on the docks ... and neither can you. Wayfarer may be the only one who can blend well enough. I will trail her and Chap to the port but hide off the open waterfront, exposing my presence only should a threat occur.” He looked to Magiere. “If you had a better option than what you have already tried, you would have said so. We must find passage and leave this port.”

Magiere’s thoughts were blank; she didn’t have a better option.

Brot’an turned to Wayfarer. “I will teach you how to walk in a way that will support a guise.”

Magiere took a step back in defeat and then studied Chap. “We’ll need a bucket of coal.”

Leesil didn’t look fully convinced, either, but he didn’t argue. “We’ll have to do something with his ears, too.”

Chap hopped off the bed.

—No one ... is touching ... my ears—

Magiere crossed her arms. “You think not?”

Midmorning of the same day, Dänvârfij—Fated Music—stood at the prow of a small Numan trading vessel called the Falcon as it maneuvered into dock at Soráno. Leaning on the rail, she looked out across the port and strained for a glimpse of a large cargo ship bearing the name Cloud Queen .

No such ship or any of its size was in sight.

A few of the sailors glanced her way, as she and her small team had remained below deck for most of the short voyage. As she did now, she had often worn a cloak with its hood pulled over her head when she left her cabin, so some of the men still tried for a curious glimpse.

To them she would appear overly tall and slender, with strands of long white-blond hair escaping the hood if the wind was too strong. She pushed such back inside her hood, exposing one pointed ear for an instant.

Any human aboard would have paused at the sight of her slanted, oversized eyes with large amber irises in a darkly tanned face too narrow to be human. And from that they would think her one of the Lhoin’na, the elves she had heard about of this continent. But her homeland was half a world away in a place that humans near there called the Elven Territories.