Despite the fact that she had not drunk very much or gone to bed very late, Wirrin pretended to be hung over so that she could ride in one of the goods carts. As much as she liked Dartol, she didn’t want to deal with his shouting after having eleven emotional people to deal with most of the previous day.

She did end up napping, among the barrels of produce, for most of the morning. Then she walked right at the back of the caravan for the rest of the day’s travel.

Unfortunately, since Dartol had stocked up on stone, ore, and salt in Telenva, Ketla and the mage were now riding in the rear-most cart. And, for some unknowable reason, Ketla seemed to want to chat.

The reason became fairly knowable, fairly quickly.

‘Drank a bit too much, did we?’ Ketla asked from where she was jostling in the back of the cart. Her book was open on her lap. It was the Church’s holy book, which Wirrin couldn’t help feeling that Ketla should have read already.

Wirrin shrugged. ‘Must have.’ She regretted actually replying, since Ketla was a polite sort and would have left her alone if she didn’t say anything.

‘Catching up with old friends, was it?’ Ketla asked.

Wirrin supposed that that made sense. ‘Old acquaintances, more like,’ she said. ‘Friendly acquaintances.’

Ketla nodded along, her eyes gleaming like she was about to get one over on Wirrin. ‘Interesting that you’re friendly with so many ex-inmates in Telenva.’

‘Interesting, is it?’ Wirrin asked, bothering to look up at Ketla.

‘Interesting,’ Ketla repeated, her eyes widening just a little as if she’d just had a realisation.

‘Do you think your cousin Kesak would be in prison if your family wasn’t so rich, Ketla?’ Wirrin asked.

The mage looked up from his book.

Ketla scowled before she could stop herself. She gave the mage the side-eye before she said anything. ‘Everyone deserves a second chance,’ she said.

‘Do they?’ Wirrin asked, looking at the mage. ‘Did I mention that I’m from Ettovica?’

Ketla opened her mouth like she was about to say something. Then closed it again and turned away and picked up her book. She went ‘hmph’ and angrily pretended to read.

The mage looked at Wirrin, face almost completely obscured in shadow. They were headed east toward Esbolva now, so the afternoon sun just barely illuminated the end of the mage’s nose and chin, and reflected off his eyes.

Then the mage, too, went back to his book.

Wirrin drifted back from the caravan a bit, to avoid Ketla trying to talk to her again. And passed the rest of the day in peace.

Wirrin woke in the middle of the night. She wasn’t sure why she’d woken until, a moment later, the ground moved again. Wirrin was laying just off the road with the rest of the caravan. It was cold and hard. But she wasn’t hearing footsteps. She was feeling them.

Wirrin sat up and looked at the mage, standing just to her left.

For several seconds the two of them simply stared at each other.

‘Oh,’ muttered Wirrin. ‘You want to read that note, don’t you? That Ensal gave me in Tegaya.’

The mage stared for several more seconds, then nodded.

Wirrin sighed and rolled over to reach for her pack. ‘I don’t know how many times I need to mention that I’m from Ettovica before you get it through your thick skulls,’ Wirrin complained as she fished in her pack for the vellum note.

The mage just stared.

Wirrin pulled out the note and offered it to him. ‘If you talk to Ketla, mention that I’m thirty-five and I lived right near the Church as a kid. See if she works it out then.’

The mage pinched the note between two fingers and the two of them held it for a moment. Then he shrugged, took the note, and walked off. Wirrin didn’t see that the note would interest anyone who wasn’t from Ettovica, anyway.

Mkaer’s voice rumbled into Wirrin’s head. ‘That man concerns me.’

‘He should do,’ Wirrin thought back. ‘He’s a mage.’

There was rumbling quiet for a moment. ‘And yet you antagonise him?’

‘Just because he could kill me doesn’t mean I should be polite,’ Wirrin thought. ‘If anything, it means I should be less polite. It’s his problem if he has no restraint.’

The rumbling faded as a memory drifted through Wirrin’s mind. A woman in thick grey robes, wearing a golden sun, hood flung back, face twisted by anger and scars as she burned the eyes out of a young man still desperately trying to sing the dirge.

‘Besides,’ Wirrin thought at Mkaer. ‘I mostly antagonise Ketla, not him.’

There was only a faint rumbling by way of response.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

It was only a couple of minutes before the mage returned, handed Wirrin the note, and left again. She shoved it back into her pack. Then she unstrapped a few things from the outside of the pack and held it in her arms as she fell asleep again.

Despite the interruption, Wirrin was feeling much better in the morning and went back to sitting with Dartol. As he had on the way to Telenva, Dartol regaled Wirrin with stories from his forty-odd years of being a caravaneer. Not only things that had happened to him, but things that had happened to people he’d met.

Many of the stories were a little disjointed, having happened decades ago, or to someone else. But it was a pleasant enough way to spend the day. Every so often Dartol would think to ask Wirrin if she had any stories and she would share something short, and he would get back to talking about his own life.

Despite the increased load, it was much quicker going from Telenva to Esbolva. The road was flatter and the road packers had clearly been through ahead of them. Real night was just falling on the fifth day out of Telenva when they arrived at the western caravanserai.

Esbolva was an unimpressive place as you approached from the west, and even more so if you approached at night. It was barely more than a weak line of wavering lamps. But there was something warm on the horizon.

Wirrin hugged Dartol by way of goodbye. ‘I’ll come to Epatlok with you if you’re still here when I leave, alright?’ she said.

Dartol gave her back a couple of good thumps and grinned. ‘I won’t wait for you. Until I inevitably stumble into you again in a couple of years.’

Wirrin gave him a couple of good thumps in return. ‘Until we bump into each other again.’

Despite the darkness of the Esbolva docks, Wirrin headed for the actual city.

There were more lamps beside the river to guide boats that might come in at night. And the bridge over the river was well lit. But that warm light on the horizon was getting closer.

From the peak of the bridge over the Estelen River, you could finally see the whole city of Esbolva, warm and bright and sprawled across the marsh formed where the Esbolva river diverged into the Estelen and the Boclas. It was like a bowl of lights.

Esbolva was warm like no other place in Nesalan. The steady light of the oil lamps glowed like weak sunlight on the yellowed concrete and stucco of the streets and foundations of the city. Even the pale, pine wood of the buildings seemed to glow.

The streets were wider than most southern cities to allow carts and horses to pass anywhere they pleased. The buildings were rarely over two stories, and the whole city had a concave sort of shape that illuminated the horizons around it with a warm glow like gentle dawn.

Partly because of the bright, diffusing lights of the city’s lamps, it was much busier at night than most towns Wirrin had been to. The whole place felt like a caravanserai in the evening almost all the time.

Wirrin nodded vaguely to the people she passed, who nodded back, as she made her way east across the city. Aside from previous visits to the libraries, she generally avoided the centre of town, where the older, bigger, heavier buildings were.

She supposed she would be headed back to the libraries soon, to see if she could find anything about Naertral. Though she felt she had a pretty good lead already.

For tonight, though, she headed for Outolt, the inn she tended to stay at while she was in Esbolva. It was a wide, pine building with a stuccoed concrete foundation like every building in Esbolva, with a first floor about half the size of the ground floor.

Despite there being no one sat outside, the outside tables were still out. Worn, dark, resin-stained pine. They would be used very little for winter, Wirrin knew, but it was part of the image, so they were left in place.

The taproom was almost empty, as expected for it being past midnight. Both fireplaces were lit, though the fires weren’t banked high. The furniture inside was much like the furniture outside, though a bit less worn and with the addition of a few padded couches.

A young man was leaning on the bar, chatting to an older man sitting across from him. Five other people were scattered around the room, two pairs and one older woman sitting by herself.

‘A good night?’ The young man leaning on the bar stood to wave at Wirrin.

‘Good enough,’ Wirrin said. ‘I’m after some leftovers and a single room.’

The young man smiled. ‘Certainly. Have you already eaten?’

Wirrin nodded. Dartol had stopped the caravan for dinner, but had decided to push on and reach Esbolva rather than stop and arrive early in the morning.

‘A few hours of travel ago,’ Wirrin said.

‘I won’t be a moment.’ He let himself out through a door behind the bar.

The older man sitting at the bar smiled at Wirrin, pulling at smile lines and crows’ feet. ‘You look like a traveller, you know?’ he said.

‘I’ve been told that,’ Wirrin said, sitting down with an empty seat between herself and the man.

He was probably in his early fifties, tan, and a bit skinnier than a southerner, with black hair, and the shoulders and rugged complexion of a barger. He gave another friendly smile and returned to his drink.

The bartender was back shortly with a small plate of cold meat, bread, and roasted potatoes. ‘I’ve got a cup of soup heating for you in the kitchen,’ he said, as he put the plate in front of Wirrin.

‘Soup does sound good.’

‘Oh, it is,’ the bartender said. ‘Do you want a drink? Maybe some tea? It’s pretty cold outside.’

Wirrin glanced down at her lap and her thinner, autumn leathers. ‘It’s not that cold,’ she smiled. ‘I would still like some tea, mind.’

‘Maybe you don’t think it’s that cold,’ the bartender smiled, smooth-faced. He had the lighter skin of an urbanite, and the same black hair and middling build common to the east and northern-centre of Nesalan.

The meat was cold and greasy with congealed fat, the bread was crusty and a bit stale, the potatoes were soft and gummy. It was all very tasty. The tea was actual tea with honey and ginger, and the soup was corn and potato. It was certainly good enough for a late-night snack.

Wirrin gave the bartender a white-gold coin stamped with a crossed sword and hammer and meandered upstairs to find herself a room. The inn was filling up for the winter, but Wirrin’s favourite room in the back corner was still free.

In the morning, the taproom looked more like Wirrin was used to. It wasn’t quite full, but it was bustling with all sorts of people. She vaguely recognised some of them by face, but no one paid her much mind.

Gava was behind the bar with two young women. She smiled when Wirrin approached the bar. ‘I’m sure I’ve seen you before,’ Gava said.

‘Oh, I’ve been here a few times over the years,’ Wirrin said.

Gava tapped her nose. ‘I thought so. We’ve got berry porridge and honey toast for breakfast. What do you fancy?’

‘A bit of both, and some ginger tea,’ Wirrin said.

Gava looked at one of the young women, who nodded and passed through the door into the kitchen. Gava raised on her toes to look over Wirrin’s shoulder. ‘There’s a couple of tables left,’ she said. ‘Or you can sit at the bar.’

Wirrin nodded.

The young woman came back after only a few moments with a bowl that had a plate balanced on it like a lid, and a heavy, slightly chipped mug. Wirrin took her breakfast to a two-seater table near the door.

The stale bread from last night was much improved by toasting and honey. The tea was fresh and nicely spicy. The porridge was thick and sweet and tart with berries. It was probably the best food Wirrin had had since she left Tellan.

Once she was done, Wirrin gave Gava another sword. ‘I’m not sure how long I’ll be staying,’ she said. ‘Back corner upstairs.’

Gava nodded and scanned an open log-book. ‘I imagine you’d be the southern traveller from last night,’ she said, smiling. ‘Looks like you’re paid up for two weeks.’

Wirrin nodded.