#i will learn how to draw my husband until Moss is free then I will commission moss out the ass instead

[truekingpumpkin]

Posts are gonna be on bluesky before tumblr as a heads up

[loquaciousquark]

30th Wintermarch. Sunlight peeked through the cloud cover for almost a full two minutes this afternoon and I nearly took flight from joy

I’ve been reading Art and Shame: Forbidden Wonders of Faith by Foisine De Petitforet, and aside from the forbidden wonder of Foisine’s name, I am vastly intrigued by the asides she keeps adding in the margins of the more controversial pieces. One of them talks about how she believes the absence of clear power always leads to the worst person possible seizing it, and I couldn’t help but think about Kirkwall.

The viscount’s seat has been empty almost three years now. There are more templars than city guard in the streets these days, and Aveline says Meredith’s officers keep coming to her demanding she account for herself whenever she makes a decision that doesn’t involve them. She’s refused them so far--she says she won’t ever turn over the city’s authority to what ought to be a Gallows-restricted arm of the Chantry, no matter how much they press, but Donnic looks uneasy when she says so.

Well, it’s not

Hm. I was going to say it’s not any of my business, but somehow it feels like everyone will be caught up in it whether they like it or not. (Elthina would prefer not, according to Sebastian, but I think she thinks Meredith and Orsino are more reasonable than history has shown me.)

Well! I shall remain optimistic. Until the city starts coming down around us, anyway, and then I shall take my dog and my favorite blanket and flee into the hinterlands to live as a hermit for the rest of my days, eating rabbits and the moss that grows on trees and shaking my staff at passersby.

13th Guardian. Shocking cold front came through last night--all the world’s icy glass. Very pretty and violently annoying, especially when one’s great hall holds heat as well as a linen dropcloth

Was at Elegant’s today for tea, and Tomwise came! It was the first time she and he and Worthy and I had all been in the same place since before I moved to Hightown. Had a marvelous time reminiscing about simpler (poorer) years, and then Elegant’s husband came in to say hello and we all went prim as roses. He knows, I think, but he’s awfully dour about questionable legality, so she’s asked us to avoid the more overtly murderous stories when he’s around.

Reminds me of Stinton, to be quite honest, with the difference that Elegant seems to genuinely like her husband. Curious!

Tomwise did say business has been worryingly good lately. He said the Coterie’s been ordering poisons in bulk, that everyone seems to be feeling the tension lately. Not much any of us can do for it from Elegant’s tea-room.

Oh! And Elegant told me Aveline’s not the only one with Chantry bells ringing--Jule and Pelarie are getting married in the summer! I’m to be invited over Lady Ashbridge’s objections as I’m the one who introduced them. I’m so glad for them--and if nothing else, they’ll be able to get away from their mothers now. Oh, good for them both. Maker keep them in health and happiness, at least until they’ve managed their own place.

19th Guardian. Not quite as cold, but "brisk” is the most generous of interpretations

Rarely does a trip to the market leave me quite so wrung. Then again, rarely do I eavesdrop quite as blatantly as I did (I’m normally much more surreptitious), so perhaps it’s what I deserved.

I just wanted some sweets. There’s a chocolatier beside Jean-Luc’s who makes the most amazing honeyed almonds and nut brittle, and I thought it might be a nice surprise tomorrow at cards. Merrill’s been bringing this sweet dessert-y liqueur along lately, and it seemed like it would match well. (I also managed to find the owner of that little carved figurine with “Bright Heart” engraved on the bottom--turns out it belongs to a little girl who lives just down the road from Jean-Luc, a gift from her father for her seventh birthday. It had fallen out of her bag and he’d taken her all over the city without luck. Glad I could find that one’s home again.)

Anyway, after I finished off the first little bag of almonds myself and had to go back for a second to actually bring to WG, I was walking back through the Hightown Market and happened to glimpse Orana standing at a stall I didn’t recognize, one of the new ones that came in with that Orlesian caravan last month. It was covered in fancy silks and the trader wore a silk half-mask lined in jewels. (I wish I were joking. And considering I strongly doubt an Orlesian would be caught dead in paste rubies, that mask was almost certainly worth more than my entire wardrobe.)

She was asking about a pipe. I knew why the moment I saw it--it’s perfect for Bodahn--he’s been looking for something like it for years, as long as I’ve known him. It was made of meerschaum and had a lovely intricate geometric pattern carved into it. Very beautiful and very dwarvish. And very expensive, which is why the merchant wore a sneer so enormous it knocked his mask askew.

I tell you, journal, I was ready to storm him like the Black City. I was halfway across the square when I saw Orana draw herself up in that way that usually means I’m about to be crushed like a beetle, so I--well, I stopped, and ducked in the most awkward fashion behind Hubert’s stand so she wouldn’t notice.

Orana’s trade is very good. I forget how good, sometimes, aside from the occasional odd sentence structure, because she has hardly any accent. That changed for this merchant. She went full Tevinter on him--cold as ice, her accent thickening with all those heavy vowels that could make anyone sound noble, even a slight elf of barely twenty, and even though she didn’t raise her voice in the slightest she made it perfectly clear that her patronage was an honor to him instead of the other way around, that everyone in this city knew who she was and in whose household she served, and that if he didn’t improve his demeanor immediately he would find his tariffs of import abruptly so high he’d have to forgo the feed for his mule and pull his silken cart himself.

Flames, but he went white. Gave her a mighty discount, too, and flinched when she scattered the coins on his stand instead of handing them to him directly, as if she couldn’t bear to touch him. I didn’t even know her face was capable of haughty. Haught?

I didn’t know what to make of it. I’d half a mind to go after her and make sure she was all right, if nothing else, but then who should come around the corner but Fenris, and when Orana saw him she went straight up and said something in Tevene I couldn’t follow. He looked concerned, but not unduly so, and said something back in the same language, and then he turned and went with her back up the stairs towards the Amell estate and out of sight.

I’ve been thinking about it all day.

Did she learn that behavior from Hadriana? She must have--I can’t imagine someone as gentle as she says her father was teaching her such things. It was certainly effective in putting that snide little man in his place, but...surely it must rankle to have to pull on lessons learned during slavery when you thought you were free, learned from someone infinitely cruel, who taught only by example on you and on the ones you loved.

Or is it worth it? If the payoff is forcing someone to respect you at last, when no one ever has before. When no one ever thought they should.

I wondered if Danarius

I think Merrill would say everyone ought to respect everyone else just because they’re people. I wish someone had taught the Orlesian merchant that lesson.

I asked Varric to help temporarily misplace some of his paperwork on the way out, though, just out of spite.

25th Guardian. Drizzly, chilly

Fenris said Orana was a little shaken but otherwise all right. She hadn’t meant to make a scene but his mask had reminded her of a man who used to attend Hadriana’s parties who made the slaves’ lives miserable, and she grew so angry she had to stand up for herself, and by proxy for them. She hadn’t thought it would work quite so well and was a little afraid he’d come after her, which is why she’d asked Fenris to help her get home.

He didn’t elaborate further, and I didn’t ask. Even I can tell when there are parts of a story I’m not meant to hear.

I will say Bodahn adores the pipe, and Orana looked so proud as she gave it to him that it all seemed worth it. Though I suppose that’s for her to decide, not me.

(I’d still very much like to give that fellow a knock right over the Hightown wall. Hmph.)

9th Drakonis. I hate Drakonis. What a miserable month

Letter from Carver today I’ll tuck in for safekeeping later. He reminded me of how he and Bethany used to talk in their own language and make me so angry at being left out. For whatever reason they’d slowly stopped using it as they grew up, and I’d forgotten all about it... Apparently there’s a set of twin sisters in one of the Warden units and they can read each other so well they don’t even have to speak.

I wonder if they have a sister at home waiting for their letters too. I’m wondering all sorts of things these days, it seems.

14th Drakonis. Toby took two steps out the back door this morning and immediately came back in soaking wet and exceedingly indignant

Spent most of the morning’s trip out to the Coast wondering why Fenris’s scarf looked so familiar. I’d forgotten it’s the one I’d given him two Satinalias ago, oops. At least it looks very warm.

Came home in time to hear Orana reading off a shopping list to Bodahn, and had the realization three damned years late that for all the time I spent teaching Fenris to read, it never one flaming time occurred to me to ask if Orana could.

Bodahn said her father had taught her a handful of letters in secret, and Bodahn himself had taught her the rest, a few months after she’d arrived. He didn’t mention it because it was right after Mother had died and he’d thought I’d had enough on my plate.

Not too much for that, though. I wish he’d told me. I wish it had occurred to me any moment before today.

He said she had been a very quick study but hadn’t wanted me to know, in case I’d been angry she’d learned. Then she’d grown to understand us all better, but by that time it hardly seemed worth bringing up because everyone around her was reading, anyway.

Damn.

Damn!

25th Drakonis. Almost comfortable outside, which is saying a great deal

Got Orana a little journal. I haven’t the faintest idea if she’ll use it, but burn me at the pyre if she doesn’t at least have the chance. 

Had such vivid dreams of Fenris last night I was quietly panicking about desire demons all morning, but Merrill says she’s not noticed anything lately. (That could be because she’s been so deep in the mirror issue she hasn’t seen daylight in weeks, but who am I to break mirrors, no matter how much I might wish to?)

In other news, Aveline marries in just under six weeks! Had Sebastian and me over yesterday to help her with a few details, since Sebastian has an in with the Chantry and I have exquisitely fine taste. And the willingness to carry things from room to room, which I suspect is more the purpose Aveline wished. She said Donnic intends to ask Fenris to stand up with him and she wanted to be sure I was all right, since I’m standing up with Aveline. Of course, said I, almost entirely meaning it, but it was at least enough to convince her to drop the subject.

I made her show me her gown at the end. White and gold, and Merrill’s going to make her a crown of marigolds for her hair.  She will be beautiful. Is, too, but when they open those doors Donnic will see the light of the Maker coming to meet him.

Aveline told me (very gruffly) that she’d sent an invitation to Isabela’s last known location, but hadn’t heard anything in return. She knows as well as I do not to expect anything from that quarter. If three years without my scintillating company hasn’t brought the pirate wench home again, Aveline’s wedding hardly will either.

Ugh.

I know very well that the only reason I’m so bitter is that I miss her dreadfully. How tedious, to be so aware of one’s faults and too stubborn to do a single thing to rectify them.

19th Cloudreach. The sun shone today so brightly the sea nearly looked warm

Drowning in wedding preparations. Should I ever marry, I will stand before a Chantry mother with no one else present and not an ounce of cake. I’m not even sure I’ll allow my spouse-to-be to attend.

25th Cloudreach. Went out without coat or scarf today and skipped across Hightown at how light it felt

Anders has been rather withdrawn lately, so I went to Darktown this morning to help him out at the clinic. I’d made up some potions and poultices from the cache of elfroot we found rooting out those slavers last month, and I thought that’d be enough to please him. Instead he looked hollow-eyed and thin as paper, and barely said “thank you” before asking me to help him dig through sewer waste. 

He looked as bitter as he did during that whole mess with Alrik a few years ago, down in the tunnels beneath the city. There weren’t even any innocent girls to nearly kill this time, so I haven’t any idea why he’s so faint.

He did say there had been unfortunate circumstances regarding certain underground factions. He wouldn’t tell me anything else.

That man used to trust me, once.

30th Cloudreach. Promise of clear warmth on the horizon--it better follow through, too, or I’m taking it straight to Andraste

Night before Summerday, and the night before Aveline’s wedding! She’s staying here at the estate tonight so we can all help her get ready tomorrow. It’d have been a shorter walk to the Chantry from the barracks, but she’d have also had to walk through the barracks in her wedding dress, and even now I think there are some things she’d like to keep private. Even if she does look splendid in this gown.

We hosted a small dinner for her and Donnic tonight--the big wedding feast will be tomorrow, but this was just for us and two of Donnic’s brothers. Anders came--I doubted, but he did--and Merrill, and Sebastian and Fenris and Varric, and everyone was so civil to each other I nearly fainted from shock.

One of Donnic’s brothers also asked to take me to dinner some time, which was very funny. Not at the time--I know my eyes flickered a bit helplessly between all involved and utterly oblivious parties scattered across the room--and then I shrugged and said I was complicatedly in love with someone who either complicatedly returned the sentiment or just deeply enjoyed stringing me along, but I’d look him up should it ever fall through. He laughed and thanked me for my honesty, and brought me another glass of wine to drown my sorrows.

I asked Aveline, later, how she was feeling. Bittersweet, she said... she had been thinking of Wesley a great deal, and wondering about Donnic’s parents, and daydreaming about how their lives might change over the next few years. She said she’d worried about falling in love again, once upon a time, until my mother had sat her down and talked the sense right into her again. She’d told her hearts always found a little room to grow, no matter the scars, and that happiness could sometimes be all the sweeter for the grief that came before.

I will say only it had better not show the slightest peep of a cloud tomorrow. After everything else, she deserves to have decent weather on her wedding day.

1st Bloomingtide, Summerday, clear as a glass and warm and beautiful in every way, thank you Andraste for your kindness, I’m blowing you dozens of kisses

They are married. Beautiful weather, and a beautiful ceremony--as I’d thought, Donnic nearly toppled over as he and Aveline came out the doors towards each other and he tripped twice walking her down the aisle to the Chantry mother. Merrill’s marigolds shone in the sun like little suns of their own. She’d done a circlet of sorts that trailed down in the back and wove through Aveline’s hair, which was loose for the first time in my memory and softened her so much I should hardly have recognized her if I hadn’t been the one helping her do it.

Donnic looked marvelous, too. He wore a simple brown suit and a white vest with just a trim of gold around the buttons--a sound decision, given he’s so steadfast and calm, and leagues better than the flashy embroidered nonsense all over the last society wedding I attended with Mother. Not that I think he could see a thing aside from Aveline’s face the whole hour the mother spoke, anyway.

Fenris and I were right behind them, and I’m delighted to report, journal, that I was so preoccupied with my overweening gladness for Aveline that I handled myself with more aplomb than I’ve ever managed in my life. He wore the same coat he did the night he came to the Champion’s ball for me, and I must say it looked sharp as a knife next to my own dark yellow gown (less fine than Aveline’s, naturally, but it was kinder to me than some shades she nearly chose).

I will also say I was very, very pleased at the attendance. More of the guard came than I expected, and all our friends, of course, and Donnic’s enormous family, but so too came quite a few friends of both Aveline and Donnic I hardly knew aside from the faces. We didn’t quite fill the Chantry, but it was awfully close, and anyway they all looked glad enough for the two of them I was satisfied.

The feast after was enormous and had excellent wine. Varric found some artisan pâtissier straight from the Winter Palace who is the direct cause of my pants not fitting tonight, and between the glorious Fereldan-style flat cake and the three-tiered champagne glass tower, it’s a wonder anyone will be able to roll out of bed tomorrow.

Aveline and Donnic are away tomorrow morning for a honeymoon in Orlais. No one will say precisely where, though I’m certain Varric knows, and for once I’m glad she’ll be away so long. We’ve all promised to keep an eye on the guard in her absence, just in case the templars begin edging somewhere they shouldn’t. (Not, in retrospect, that I’ll likely be able to do much, but a promise is a promise.)

They played Fereldan fiddle songs once everyone was deep enough in their cups to dance without worrying about what their neighbors might thing. I haven’t danced the River Dane’s Line since Lothering, though more people knew it than I’d thought, and then they played Those Sweet Brown Eyes, Oh, and before I could help it I looked over and saw Fenris across the room looking back at me. It was the same tune we danced to a hundred years ago at the Hanged Man for Satinalia, when Mother was still alive and I was wondering if we’d ever be friends again.

He smiled when he saw me looking. Neither of us danced--the whole room was between us, and by the time I’d have reached him the squares would have been set, but I could see the memory was as plain for him as it was for me, and as pleasant.

He did come over after and compliment both my dress and the decorations (part of my wedding present). This time I had the presence of mind to admire his coat in candlelight, instead of the shadows behind shrubbery, and it looks as good on him as I’d thought. It has just the barest lining of gold thread at the sleeve cuffs and the trim of the wide belt, and he wears it so very well.

One final note, and then I must sleep: towards the end of our conversation, Donnic’s brother (the middle one, who asked me to dinner the other week) came up and joined us in the conversation. He said nothing overt and was as pleasant throughout as any family of Donnic’s ought to be, but at the end he bowed over my hand and told Fenris that should he ever cede the war, he’d be happy to take up the colors in his place. 

Fenris looked confused long enough for me to stumble over some nonsense explanation as Donnic’s brother left, but I’m certain he put it together soon enough. One day I should like to meet someone who declines to heckle me to my face.

It was a beautiful wedding, though.

[azvolrien]

The Lady of Kaltara - Chapter Four

In which we actually learn the title character’s name.

~~~

           For the second time in recent days, Fayn woke to unfamiliar surroundings. The memory of why returned all too quickly; immediately she shied away from it, unwilling to return to Cruon’s workshop with its needles and tubes and the chair with its straps, even just inside her head, and forced herself to concentrate on her surroundings instead.

           She had been untied, mostly; her wrists and ankles were free, but the collar remained locked around her throat and now sported a chain fixed to the back that rattled with every movement, the other end padlocked to the iron frame of the bed on which she had woken. The bed itself was unexpectedly comfortable, with a proper mattress covered with a clean linen sheet and a jaunty patchwork quilt, while the stone walls had been cleanly whitewashed, one of them decorated by a framed painting of a swan, and a woollen rug lay on the floor. There was even a proper toilet and basin in one corner, rather than just a bucket.

           It was, however, still a cell. The single small window was more than her height above the floor and blocked off with thick steel bars, and the door only locked from the outside. Light-headed and weak, Fayn hooked two fingers under her collar – someone had, at least, wrapped it in cloth to stop the metal chafing – and gave it a pull, but to no avail. She sighed and closed her eyes, only to open them again when a key turned in the lock and the Lady let herself into the cell.

           “Here.” She placed a steaming mug on the bedside table and sat down on the floor against the opposite wall. Fayn managed to sit up. “It’s just tea with honey. Drink.” Fayn just stared at it in suspicion. The Lady’s expression hardened. “Cruon took a lot of your blood – about as much as he could without you going into shock. You need fluids and you need sugar. Drink the damn tea or I’ll force it down your throat.”

           Fayn drank. It was surprisingly good.

           The Lady folded her arms. “You’re probably owed a few answers. Know who I am?”

           Fayn shook her head.

           “Is that right? That’s rare enough in these parts. Still, I did send Vil up to the mountains. Guess my fame doesn’t extend much outside the Basin. Name’s Mara Kovar, Lady of Kaltara. Not nobility in the classic Kiraani bloodline sense, but I keep things in order out here in the marshes and pay my taxes, so the Empire allows me my little affectations.”

           Fayn lifted one arm and, glaring, pointed at the bandage wrapped around her elbow.

           “Cruon, well… he’s a funny sort of mage,” said Kovar. “Works with blood – draws on the power tied up in it to do his experiments and make his potions. But some blood has more power in it than others, or is good for different ends. Humans are stronger than animals, and humans with magic are stronger than those without. The blood of the moontouched, now…” She sighed. “You know about Andari Sickness?”

           A hesitant nod.

           “Hardly anyone who saw the Andari Event lived to talk about it, but there are one or two accounts written down. They speak of a brilliant light and a searing heat, like the sun fallen to earth, before it faded away to leave the city in ruins and the land cursed. But stories change, they get exaggerated or twisted around, and soon nobody’s sure what really happened and what’s legend. So naturally when my idiot little brother hears rumours of fabulous treasures left behind in the ruins of Andari, he finds a way over the Wall and goes to see for himself. And he comes back bleeding from the mouth and carried on a stretcher, without any fabulous treasures to show for it.” Kovar bent over in her chair, rubbing her scalp with her fingertips. “As I said, he’s an idiot. But he’s family, and he’s running out of time and options. Cruon’s skills might be the last chance he gets, and how better to lift a curse from the sun than with a blessing from the moon?”

           Fayn, staring at her in a mix of reluctant pity and utter disbelief, opened her mouth to suggest taking him to a hospital, but no sound came out. Speechless both literally and figuratively, she touched the tips of her fingers to her throat.

           “I had an extra rune added to your collar while you were out cold,” said Kovar with no particular emotion. “You won’t be able to make a sound while you’re wearing it; you’ve clearly got a defiant streak, if Cruon wasn’t lying about how you kept trying to bite him, and I don’t want you yelling and disturbing my brother’s rest. He’s got the room above, you see.”

           Fayn bared her teeth.

           Kovar smiled sadly in reply. “Heh. Yeah, I think Cruon told the truth there.” She stood, leaning against the wall at her back, and held up the key on its ring. “I have the only key to this cell; nobody gets in here without my permission. I’ll have some food brought down in a while.” She glanced around the cell and added, “I’ll bring a few books for you to read as well. Get some rest in the meantime.”

           Fayn curled up in the corner of the bed, resting her chin on her knees, and continued to glare.

           “You have a very unsettling stare for someone whose eyes don’t work properly,” commented Kovar. “I’ll leave you in peace.”

           The cell door swung closed behind her with a certain finality, and the lock clanked shut. Fayn was left alone once more. She uncurled from her furious ball and lurched dizzily to her feet, then leant against the wall until her head stopped spinning. Breathing heavily, she set about exploring the room. There wasn’t much to see. The bedside table was fixed in place, its single thick leg inserted into a slot in the floor and secured there with lead; no chance of picking it up for use as a weapon, though if she balanced on top of it and leant precariously out to the side, she could just see out of the window. No escape route there, either – even if the bars and the glass were somehow dealt with, it was too narrow for her shoulders, as was the toilet plumbing. The chain on her collar was a fairly generous length; she could reach each corner of the room in turn without pulling it uncomfortably taut, though it would not have allowed her more than a couple of steps into the corridor outside and its weight was an encumbrance all by itself. Perhaps it could be used as a weapon, if necessary.

           Fayn sat back down on the bed, rubbing her temples. Looking for possible weapons was all well and good, but no weapon she could find would be of any help if she lacked the strength to wield it. She needed time to recover from Cruon’s needles before any escape attempts would have the slightest chance of success, and she had no idea how much time she had. She was safe as long as Mara Kovar thought she was useful. Perhaps Cruon really could cure Andari Sickness with her blood, in which case she probably had until Kovar’s brother had recovered – or perhaps Cruon was an utter charlatan with no real healing abilities, in which case… Well. Who knew how that would go? Either way, it seemed doubtful she would be allowed to walk free to speak of what had happened. Kovar was clearly not totally without a conscience, or she would not have bothered to arrange reasonably safe and comfortable quarters for her captive, but someone ruthless enough to order the kidnap and bloodletting of an innocent stranger was unlikely to flinch away from having her quietly disposed of once she had ceased to be of use.

           She lay down on her back and closed her fingers around her wedding ring, still on its own slender chain around her neck. Kovar didn’t know she had reinforcements on the way. Wygar knew where she was. Wygar always, always knew where she was, whether he wanted to or not, and he would be coming after her. She tried to hold on to that idea, but the walls of the cell, the collar at her neck, and the memory of needles in her veins made it difficult to feel encouraged. Still holding the ring, she rolled onto her side to face the wall.

           Fayn wanted her family, so hard it made itself known as a physical ache in her chest. She wanted her husband and her daughter, but also, deep in her bones, her parents and siblings, both those she could barely remember and those she remembered as clearly as glass. Within the privacy of her cell, weak with blood loss and muffled by the collar’s magic, Fayn closed her eyes and cried until sleep claimed her. Despite her exhaustion, it was a long time in coming.

***

           Another day of Rathus’ long-legged gallop brought them to a low ridge at the edge of the Kaltara Basin. Ahead, the occasional dry hill or stand of trees rose from the marshlands, but otherwise there was nothing but mile upon mile of water and reeds.

           “You travelled in the Gorsfen on your journeying year, didn’t you?” asked Una after they broke camp the next morning, staring up at an impossibly-wide sky.

           “I did, sweetheart,” said Wygar. “Nearly drowned, fought an afanc, and lived in a crannog for a couple of weeks. But the Gorsfen is less than half the size of the Basin, and it’ll be much slower going from here.”

           “Are there afancs here?”

           Wygar grimaced and touched the old hooked claw tied on a cord around his neck. “I don’t think so, no. I certainly hope not. But who knows what else could be hiding in the water here?”

           “Crocodiles, maybe?”

           “Please don’t sound hopeful about that! No, we’re too far north for crocodiles. Right. Time to get our feet wet, then.”

           Rathus trotted down the slope and waded out into the marsh. At first, water only squashed between his toes, pressed from a sodden carpet of moss, but soon it was up to his knees and lapping at his belly as he pushed through dense reed beds and crossed carefully over deeper channels. Calburn’s words had proven true; Rathus was indeed a little more intelligent than before. Where previously he would have walked blindly ahead until directed otherwise by Wygar, now he paused to check his footing more carefully before committing his weight and detoured around the more impassable thickets they found. Occasionally, where the water was shallow and the ground firm enough, he managed a canter, but for the most part he could go no faster than a trot if even that much, and Wygar estimated they had travelled no more than thirty miles into the Basin by that sunset. They set up camp on one of the low islands within the marsh, overlooking a wider channel of water.

           “Is it a river or a pond?” wondered Una, crouching to splash her hands in the water. “I can’t see the ends of it, but it doesn’t have much of a flow to it.”

           “It – do you know, I’m not actually sure.” Wygar sat cross-legged next to her. “In some ways, the Kaltara Basin is more of… a much shallower bit of the Inland Sea. So I suppose that makes areas like this like sea lochs in miniature, or maybe some kind of natural canal.”

           “That makes sense.” Una dried her hands on her tunic and sat down. “What’s your elf-sense saying now?” she asked. “Are we closer?”

           “Oh, it goes without saying that we’re closer, sweetheart.” Wygar closed his eyes. “It’s a little clearer now,” he said without opening them. “Not enough to completely pinpoint her location – I can’t do that unless she’s within about half a mile – but… we’re closer, and we’re going the right way.”

           “Good.” Una picked up a small stone and flicked it into the water. “Do you ever find that a bit… creepy? How you can always find her?”

           “Mm, a little bit. It’s why I try to ignore it most of the time. It would go both ways if she were an elf as well…”

           “But she isn’t, so it doesn’t.”

           “Indeed. Still, it does come in useful in emergencies. Anyway, let’s raise the wards and get some sleep.”

           It wasn’t the sun or the dawn chorus that woke them the next morning, but the sound of voices drifting in the air. Wygar sat up within the wards and packed up his bedroll, trying to make out what was said, but they were still too distant and fell oddly flat through the fog coating the marshes. He could see the water around their hill, but not much further. Frowning, he shook Una awake from where she curled up under her blanket, her back to Rathus’s ribs.

           “Morning,” she yawned. “Is something happening?”

           “Not sure, sweetheart. Someone’s nearby, but I can’t tell who. Listen.”

           Una cocked her head. “They’re getting closer.”

           Soon they could make out the words, though what they meant was a mystery. Someone was spiritedly – if not very tunefully – singing to the marshes in a language Wygar did not even recognise, let alone understand, while a low murmur of other voices followed behind them. Soon, dark shapes emerged from the fog and revealed themselves as a little train of barges sailing along the channel. The foremost was hauled along by a seal-like construct, its tow-ropes leading down from the bow to the construct’s harness, while four more were towed behind in turn. The singer was the man at the helm of the tug, who controlled both the rudder and the construct with two different wheels.

           “Wait here a moment,” whispered Wygar, before he stepped out of the wards and walked down to the water’s edge just as the tug’s bow drew level with the island. “Heading east?” he called across the water.

           “Ayup,” said the pilot. “Bound for Vosta with all manner of cargo.”

           “Taking passengers?”

           “Sure, if you can get aboard before we’re past.”

           “Back in a moment.” Wygar hurried back up to the campsite, where Una had taken an apple from the bags to eat as she waited. “Get packed, sweetheart,” he said. “They’re going the right way, and we’ll move faster by boat.”

           Una nodded and stuffed her blanket into a bag while Wygar dismissed both the wards and Rathus. He tied the summoning stone back around his neck, slung the saddlebags around his shoulders and his staff through the loops, and lifted Una into his arms, then sprinted down the hill and leapt from the island into the last of the passing barges.

           “Made it?” called the pilot.

           “Made it,” Wygar shouted back.

           “That was quite a jump.”

           Wygar looked up. They weren’t alone on the barge: as well as a cargo of pelts, logs, barrels and what looked like a large cage mostly covered with a tarpaulin, they shared the space with half a dozen other rough-looking travellers, four men and two women. The speaker was one of the men, a skinny, pallid fellow with a long knife sheathed across his chest.

           “Thanks,” said Wygar, sitting down with his back to a bale of pelts and setting Una on the deck at his side. “Heading for Vosta?” Wherever that was.

           “Aye. Got things worth selling,” the man rapped the blade of his knife against the cage, to a growl from its inhabitant, “and if you can’t sell something in Vosta, well, you just can’t sell anything.” He looked them both up and down. “Got a name, wanderer?”

           “Yes.”

           “Gonna share it?”

           “Heh, been a while since anyone used it,” said Wygar to buy time to think. “Fox. Call me Fox.”

           “Fox, eh?” The man sheathed his knife again and stood up, crossing the barge for a closer look at the bedraggled pair. “Suppose that makes the little mutt there your cub, then?”

           Wygar placed an arm in front of Una and didn’t quite manage to make it look casual.

           The man rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You know, I expect she’d fetch a decent price to the right buyer. That nice red hair and gold eyes, and a half-breed for another touch of the exotic.” He genuinely didn’t seem to think this was something his audience might find offensive. His companions glanced at each other behind his back, one of the men clearly trying not to laugh. The two women held a quick, whispered conversation and sat back to see what would happen. “You’d get a better price in Vosta,” he went on, a predatory light coming into his eyes, “but if you need the cash now I could take her off your hands.”

           Nobody even saw Wygar stand up. The butt of his staff cracked into the base of the man’s throat, sending him toppling onto his backside as he clutched his neck. Wygar placed one foot on his chest and pushed him down onto his back. “I’ll make this easy to remember,” said Wygar, setting the staff tip against the man’s forehead. “Touch. Her. And. You’re. Dead. Understood?”

           Wheezing, the man approximated a nod. Wygar moved both his staff and his foot away and sat back down next to Una, holding his staff across his knees in both hands to disguise their trembling.

           The other five shared another look for a silent moment, then burst into laughter. One of the women passed a handful of coins to the other. “You’re an idiot and you completely deserved that,” said the man who had suppressed his laughter earlier.

           The other two men picked up a couple of logs from the stacks and built a miniature wall around Wygar’s corner of the barge. “We’ll leave you your territory, Fox,” said one of them, still half-laughing as the man with the knife retreated to the bows and hid amongst the barrels there. “He won’t bother you again now that you’ve shown him who’s boss.”

           Wygar just nodded, not trusting himself to speak steadily yet. “I’m sorry you had to see that, sweetheart,” he murmured to Una.

           “I’m not,” she muttered back. “He wanted to sell me! If you hadn’t hit him, I would’ve.”

           Wygar chuckled softly. “Yes, I thought you might. But you still have some training ahead of you before you can hit as hard as me.”

           “Where’s Vosta?”

           Wygar didn’t know, but the group across the barge were happy to explain.

           “It’s the capital of the Basin, more or less,” said one of the women. “The only proper town in the marshes, not counting the odd little village or shack, and the stronghold of Lady Kovar.”

           “Of more interest to us,” said one of the men, “it’s also the biggest and best trading port between the Empire and Huaxia across the Inland Sea – at least if you don’t want to deal with all the customs checks at the Huaxia Shield,” he added with a wink.

           “So you’re smugglers?” said Wygar.

           “Good sir, we are offended!” said another man with a mock gasp. “We just take our goods to Vosta. The smugglers take care of what happens after that.”

           “Your friend there,” said Wygar, nodding towards the bows. “You traffic slaves often?”

           “Nah, they’re too hard to transport for a small outfit like ours,” said the other woman. “You need to be dealing in bulk to make much of a profit at that out here.”

           “Though Lady Kovar does issue the odd request now and then,” said the first man. “A healer, a beast-blooded, a stonemage to fix up her fortress walls…”

           “Moontouched, a while back,” put in the second man.

           “Moontouched?” said Wygar.

           They explained. “Dunno why she needed one,” said the first woman with a shrug. “Maybe after a symbol of the moon’s favour. Something to do with the tides?”

           “Does the Inland Sea even have tides?” asked the other woman.

           They fell into a good-natured argument about it, leaving Wygar and Una to their thoughts. Una took Wygar’s hand. “What do you think?” she asked.

           “That I’ll need to have a chat with this Lady Kovar when we get to Vosta,” he growled.

           “Yep. That’s what I thought, too.”

           The little line of barges sailed on. Within the cage under the tarpaulin, a pair of gleaming golden eyes fixed on Wygar and Una, and narrowed in thought.

~~~

Little bit of trivia for you: ‘Kovar’ is a Czech name meaning ‘Smith’. So effectively Wygar and Mara have the same surname.

Una is actually mixed-race both by real-world and Stranatir standards; her parents are (approximate fantasy equivalents of) Northern European and South Asian. However, the in-universe racists don’t really care about that and are more concerned that her dad is an elf.