Wren Journeymage Read Online Free PDF Page B

then said, “Takes a brigand to know one.”
    The girls and their brother had laughed as they set about making up their campsite on a hill, the rest of the caravan’s camps dotting the slope. “Brigand or no, this road has never been so safe as it is now,” the oldest girl had said.
    Safe is good, Wren thought as she rounded the last fold in the hills above the harbor and looked down at the roofs crowded together in a jigsaw crescent just below her. Beyond them the wide bay was forested with hundreds of masts, some with sails hanging slack, drying in the fresh breeze and sunlight.
    And beyond them, the sea! It stretched out to the edge of the world, gleaming and glittering, a deeper blue than the cloudless sky above.
    Aromas of fried cheese-breads and pepper-braised meat drifted on lazy breezes as Wren walked faster. The buildings were very unlike those in Meldrith, or even those in Siradayel or Allat Los, the other kingdoms she’d seen so far. Here they were built close together, with sturdy fronts facing the steady cold winds from the sea. Most were weather-worn, though the signs swinging from iron posts that arched over the narrow street were gaudy with colors and images.
    Brine and fish smells intensified as she followed a group of sailors down between taverns, from which came the sounds of brisk music and laughing voices.
    She slipped into a narrow alley between two low buildings, and suddenly there she was, standing on a low bluff overlooking one end of the harbor. Great ocean-going trade ships rolled gently next to piers, sails furled, busy people going up and down ramps that rose and fell with the moving waters.
    The many masts were clearer now—not just sticks but with caps and mastheads and rigging complicating them. Ships were anchored farther out in the waters; between them and the shore plied countless small boats, with oars rising and falling in practiced rhythm, a few with single triangular sails.
    Wren set down her knapsack on a tuft of grass and sat beside it. She’d promised to scry Tyron as soon as she reached the harbor, and this seemed the best time, when she was alone.
    So she dug out her scry stone, focused her inward eye, and—
    Tiny pinpoints of light coalesced into Tyron’s face.
    He grimaced. “The best scry stone in Cantirmoor and I still hate this,” he said. Wren knew he was talking out loud. He had a terrible time scrying, though he far surpassed her in most other forms of magic knowledge.
    “Well, I’m keeping my promise.” She spoke aloud, too, making it easier for him to ‘hear’ at his end. “Hroth Harbor lies just below me. Easy trip. Though how could you think Mistress Falin funny looking? Or were you just being polite about that—”
    Presence .
    Wren snapped her focus away. Then she shut her eyes and gripped the stone. She’d detected someone listening. She did not know if the listener was an idle scryer, or someone had put a tracer-ward on her stone.
    She pressed the stone against her leg, trying to recover that fleeting moment of awareness. A trace of intense focus, too quick to catch, but almost familiar—
    “Exciting, isn’t it?”
    Wren glanced up in surprise at an older woman who stood next to her, having come off the road just behind Wren. She spoke the language of Meldrith, but with an accent that Wren couldn’t place.
    “It’s my first sight of the sea,” Wren said, sliding her scrying stone into her knapsack and standing up.
    The woman smiled, her brown, weather-worn face seamed with laughter-lines. “Thinking of setting sail, or are you just here to see the sights?”
    “Both!” Wren said.
    The woman chuckled, a soft, pleasant sound. “Well, if you don’t have the money for a luxury berth, and I’m guessing you don’t—”
    “Good guess,” Wren said, grinning down at her dusty green tunic and dirt-caked mocs.
    “You’ll want to go to the Harbormaster and see who’s hiring extra hands.”
    “Harbormaster?” Wren repeated. “So you