fast to the bollards at the wharf. Deck lanterns threw greasy orange streaks across waters pocked with light rain. At the taffrail of the nearest vessel, a woman crooned a melody, her knees tucked up under a fishing tarp as she peeled vegetables for her supper. Down the docks a bent grandfather trundled a wheelbarrow of cod toward the street, while a boy and his brother mended nets. The reek of fish offal and the squabble of the gulls that dipped and dived through dank pilings checked Elaira as if she had run against a wall.
She deliberated, aware that to go forward was to tread the safer path. What she wanted more was seclusion; and a salt pool left behind by the tide that she could use to attempt forbidden scrying.
She shivered under her damp cloak. The intention that lurked at the edge of her thoughts was dangerous; foolish. Still, she turned back toward the beach.
She found herself alone with temptation. The beggar had gone, the rocks where he had perched glistening with barnacles burnished by the torchlight off the street. The bayside surf was overlaid by deeper thunder, as two stout brewer’s boys rolled tuns from an ale dray parked outside a tavern. Sailors caroused in the side alley, laughing, while the shrieks of a bawdywoman taunted them to sport their prowess in her bed. The din of workaday humanity seemed remote and without overtones of comfort. Made aware that her months in the fenlands of Korias studying herb lore had retuned her nature to prefer silence, Elaira sighed. Change had overtaken her too fast since her unlucky foray to meet Asandir. She picked a spot where the breeze blew clean off the water and sat, her head propped in her hands. She watched the incoming surf, but tonight no iyats rode the waves to refuel their energies on the forces of winds and tides.
Night fell gloomy and damp. At her feet, ruffled over in pewter-edged ripples, lay the tidepool she longed for. Torn by indecision, she wondered which of her loyalties she should suffer for: the one, to Arithon, already breached; or the other, now cruelly strained, which tied her to Koriani service through sworn bond to a spell-crystal that Morriel would certainly use to break her.
Eyes closed, her hearing awash with the seethe of salt foam, Elaira reviewed the unalterable absolutes that imprisoned her in misery. Where once she could have lightened her mood with flippant behaviour and sarcasm, now the frustrated, circling grief of knowing a man with indelible intimacy ate at her, night and day. The surcease of physical release was denied her. That one act of spirited curiosity had caused her to be culled, and now used, as Morriel’s personal instrument to map Arithon’s motivations, could neither be escaped or avoided.
But interlinked with this were other trusts acquired in her visit to Enithen Tuer’s Erdane garret.
‘Girl, you’re shaking, and not at all from the cold,’ said a kindly voice from the shadows.
Elaira started, then exclaimed aloud as a hand lightly grasped her shoulder.
The beggar had not left her, but stood, guarded from prying eyes and wind by an overhang of sea-beaten rock. His earlier appearance had deceived. Clad all in black, he wore no ornament. None of his clothing lay in tatters. What had first been mistaken for a frayed headcloth was revealed now as a raven, hunched and damp on its master’s shoulder, regarding her with eyes too wise for a bird’s.
‘Who are you?’ Elaira blurted. But before he gave answer, she knew. His eyes upon her were too still and deep to encompass any less than the vision of a Fellowship sorcerer.
A wave that was larger than most hurled and broke against the shore. Fingers of foam clawed up the rocks, then splashed back in silver lace. His voice as he addressed her held the same ageless timbre as the sea. ‘I am Traithe, sent by Sethvir to give you a message from the Fellowship.’
As Elaira moved to speak, he restrained her. Though his step was careful and lame, his hands could grip hard enough to bruise. ‘No. Say nothing. You’re aware that the wrong words could set your vows to your order in jeopardy.’
She stilled, shocked by his bluntness.
Traithe said, ‘Understand, and clearly, that my purpose here is to shield you from any such breach in your loyalty.’
Stung still by guilt-ridden thoughts, Elaira’s sensibilities fled. She wrenched off Traithe’s hold and stepped back. ‘My Prime might command my obedience. She does not own me in spirit!’
‘Well spoken.’ Traithe sat, which irritated the raven to a testy flapping of wings. He raised a scarred knuckle to soothe its breast feathers, then peered slantwise at her, chagrined as a grandfather caught in a bout of boy’s mischief. ‘Hold on to that truth, brave lady.’
Yet his affirmation of natural order could not undo vows sealed to flesh through a Koriani focus-stone. A piece of herself that Elaira was powerless to call back had been given over into Morriel’s control. Her ambivalence toward the traps that Traithe most carefully never mentioned gave rise to an outraged admission. ‘Ath’s mercy, I was six years old when the Prime Circle swore me to service. They claim, always, that power must not be given without limits. But lately, I suspect my seniors prefer their trainees young, the better to keep their talent biddable.’
Traithe reached out and touched her, a bare brush of fingers against her hand. Yet warmth flowed from the contact, and a calmness that lent her surcease to think.
Unsure his kindness did not mask warning like a glove, Elaira chose a rock and sat also. ‘Courage saved nothing two days ago.’ She laced unsteady hands around her knees, self-conscious in the sorcerer’s frank regard.
‘If you speak of Arithon, he doesn’t need any man’s saving.’ Petulant and ready to roost, the raven sidled and clipped its master a peck on the ear. Traithe called it a rude word, which prompted Elaira to smile.
‘Better.’ The sorcerer had a crinkle to his eyes that bespoke a readiness to laugh. ‘The occasion wasn’t meant to be solemn.’ He pushed his bird from his shoulder, then watched with what seemed his whole attention as it croaked indignation, and finally settled in a nook and tucked its head under one wing. ‘Let me say what I was sent for, and see if your heart doesn’t lighten.’ As Asandir had done once before to ease her nerves, Traithe bent down and made a small fire. The kindling he used was a beggar’s gleaning of broken cork-floats and bits of jetsam. Flame caught with a hiss in the dampness, and shed fine-grained haloes in the drizzle.
Oddly content to be still, Elaira wondered whether some spellward of quietude had been set along with the flames.
Traithe answered as though she had spoken. ‘What peace you feel is your own, but it may perhaps be helped by the ward of concealment placed over this space between the rocks.’ He grinned in gleeful conspiracy. ‘To your sisterhood, this fire doesn’t exist.’
Elaira said, ‘Then you know about—’
He sealed her lips fast with a finger. ‘Let me say what we know. Otherwise,’ he stopped, let his hand fall.
