Stones Unbound (The Magestone Chronicles Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page B

was going, but she was smart enough to know she didn’t want to be
alone in Tala’ahar at night.  Even being with this thief was better than trying
to wind herself back to the embassy through the dark maze of city streets.  While
the main thoroughfares were lit with oil lamps, connecting the main squares of
the city they were not on a main avenue now.  It was behind them.  They were in
the dark heart of the trade district now, twisting and turning past closed shoppes
and tall warehouses lining the tight streets, dark alleys like gaping mouths
spread at uneven intervals between buildings.  Some buildings leaned on others,
like drunken friends.  Celia could hear movement down some of those alleys, and
every once in awhile could see dark shapes moving at the edge of the deep
shadows.  At those times, the man beside her would slide his rapier slightly
out of its scabbard with a slight hiss , and the figures would fade back
into the safety of the dark.
    After a time of walking, she grabbed his arm gently and
offered “Thank you.”  While walking through this rats nest, she had had enough time
to reflect on the possibilities of what could have happened to her.  She was
smarter than that, but she had still managed to make a mess of things. “Could
we stop for a short rest? It’s been a long day.”
    Without slowing, the man glanced at her again, “Not here.
Keep walking.”  He sounded annoyed.   One of the temple bell towers chimed the
hour, with others throughout the city joining in.  Eight bells.
    Celia did not talk again for a while.  “Why Keela?”
    “What?” the man responded absently, sounding confused.
    “Back in the square, you called me Keela,” she replied. 
“Why Keela?”
    “Oh.  I used to have a hound named Keela when I was a
child.  It seemed appropriate... at the time,” he now sounded amused.
    “A hound!?”  Celia fumed as they kept walking.  She had lost
track of where they were, except that the glowing lights of the Imperial Sky
Citadel hovering a hundred, or maybe fifty, spans above the city gave her a
small frame of reference.  That was the only landmark she could glimpse between
the buildings, and that still did not tell her exactly where they were.
    “Okay, what is your name then?” the man asked.
    “Celia,” she answered reluctantly.
    He laughed loudly, startling her, and several others, based
on the sounds she heard from nearby alleys; bottles clinking, one bottle
smashing amid curses.
    “What’s so funny?” Celia demanded.
    “Close enough.” The man stated as they finally rounded a
corner to a more brightly lit street.  Noises of music, singing and
conversation rose from several of the well-lit buildings along the street,
distracting Celia.  She counted two inns and several taverns along the street
before it turned a bend out of sight.  Other than the Imperial Way, and its
sister Trade Way, she was sure not one other street ran straight in the entire
city.
    ---o---
     
    Stepping into an inn with a sign painted with a red rooster
hanging out front, Celia was assaulted by heat, noise, and pipe smoke.  While
she welcomed the first, coming in from the freezing night air, the other two
overwhelmed her senses.  The man she was with paused, looking around the
crowded common room.  He saw someone he apparently knew, grabbed her by the arm
and threaded his way through the crowd, dragging her gently behind.  As they
wound their way towards the back of the room, she glanced around.   The inn had
a high ceiling in the common room, as they went she supposed, with sleeping
room doors overlooking through a balustrade on the walk above.  A hearth at each
end fed their warmth into the large room.  A long bar up the center of the room
served drinks on three sides, the fourth opening to what Celia could only
assume was the kitchen at the back, based on the smells and noises she could
sense from that direction.  A small stage sat in the far corner where three
musicians