Jalia At Bay (Book 4) (25 page)

“Can I help you?” he asked politely.

“We want to buy three, no five passages to Slarn on the Steam Dragon,” Jalia asserted. She added Cara and Don to her list to give herself more bargaining power. “We have five horses and three donkeys to transport as well,” she added as an afterthought.

Toren wondered if he should tell Jalia that his ship was full. Then it occurred to him that if this woman found out he was lying, he might well regret it. He sighed before he spoke.

“It will be one gold piece for each of you and a half for each horse. Donkeys come in at a quarter each so that will be eight and a quarter in gold please. The Steam Dragon leaves at first light tomorrow, but anybody traveling with us must be on the ship before midnight.”

Jalia’s mouth dropped open in astonishment. He was asking for a staggering amount of money. A donkey was typically valued at a quarter piece of gold in Jalon, so transporting one at that price was equivalent to buying it again.

“I will offer you two pieces of gold for all,” Jalia responded as her market trader skills went into action.

“There will be no bartering,” Toren said firmly. “That is the price and you are very welcome not to travel with us, if you do not wish to pay it.” He dropped his eyes back to the ledger he was working on and ignored her.

“The price was only a quarter of that, less than a year ago,” Cara protested. She could barely afford her own passage at that price, let alone that of Don.

Toren looked up at Cara. His eyes narrowed as he recognized her and her brother. The Marin family all favored their mother and she was a woman that no man who did business with her would ever forgot.

“Marin’s aren’t you?” he asked and Cara nodded in reply. “We do good business with Brila Marin and transport prices for goods haven’t gone up for existing customers. So you can transport the horses and donkeys for a half gold piece in total. But there is a war going on in Slarn and transporting people costs a gold piece each. Take it or leave it.”

Daniel hushed an angry Jalia to silence as he asked the question that had been bothering him ever since Hadon Mallow first mentioned it.

“Wars are things of myth and legend. Who are the people of Slarn fighting?”

Toren looked up and laughed.

“What do you know of Slarn?”

“Nothing, except that it is where the river Jalon splits in two.”

There was a slate notice board behind Toren. He picked up a piece of chalk and drew a large circle on it.

“That represents the city walls of Slarn. They are a perfect circle and unassailable.”

Jalia snorted with contempt at the idea of such a wall. That was what they said about the wall around the Alchemists Guild, and she had climbed those on a daily basis to visit Marco.

“Wait until you see them, Lady, before you jump to judgment.”

“The walls are six miles from one side to the other,” Toren continued. He drew a line coming in from the north east to the center of his circle and then drew two lines going out. The lines cut the circle into three equal pieces.

“These lines represent the river Jalon coming into the city and the two rivers, Jalon and Slarn going out. We will come up the Jalon from the west.”

Daniel thought it highly unlikely that a river would split so perfectly in two, but he held his peace and let Toren continue with his explanation.

“Each trium of the city has its own royal family named after the trium they rule, the Dalk’s, Jenver’s and Tallis’. I was born in Tallis. It has been tradition since the fall of the Magician Kings that the King of Slarn comes from the royal families in turn. Once raised to King of Slarn he rules until he dies. The king died three years ago and now there is a war between the royal families as to who should become the next king.”

“I thought you said it went in sequence?” Jalia asked.

“The rule of law is that the new king must be between forty and fifty years old and be of royal blood,” Toren agreed.

“So what went wrong?” Daniel queried.

“It was the Jenver’s turn. The only candidate they offered up was Kalenda Jenver.” Toren stopped as though that explained everything.

“What..?” Jalia started to ask.

“Kalenda is a woman. Women are not allowed to become kings.”

“Pay the man, Jalia,” Daniel said and Jalia reluctantly counted out five and a half gold pieces from a bulging purse on her belt.

Cara leant forward and whispered to Jalia, “I can’t afford to pay you back.”

“You saved us more than your travel costs. I think it balances out,” Jalia whispered back.

“You are probably only charging so much because you can’t transport Hadon’s swords,” Jalia said as she put the money down on the desk.

“How do you know of that?” Toren asked sharply. “Hadon Mallow keeps his own council.”

“We traveled to Boathaven with Hadon,” Daniel explained. “He wanted to use my donkeys and I insisted on knowing what they were carrying. He told me that the Swallow had brought the bulk of his cargo from Telmar.”

Toren relaxed, “Haddon Mallow is here?”

“Down by the dock gates. The guards have confiscated the remainder of his swords.”

“I must go and see him,” Toren said, standing up. “You are wrong in your supposition, young lady. All the swords from the Swallow were loaded on the Steam Dragon when we docked. That loading was supervised by the Lady Sorn herself. I suspect it was her mentioning that fact to the Lord Protector that resulted in the ban.”

Daniel caught Toren by the arm as he hurried past.

“Why would the Lady Sorn tell the Lord Protector anything of her business?”

“She is his niece. She is staying with him at the palace. The Lord Protector’s given name is Gal Sorn. She was named after him by her father. Do you know of her?”

“We have some business to transact; that is all. Is she to travel with us on the Steam Dragon?”

“Leave her swords to my tender care?” Toren asked and laughed at the thought. “It is like she is wedded to them. She insisted I show her the hold they were going in before we loaded them. She didn’t want to risk them getting rusty because it might be damp.”

“Yes, she will be coming with us, in the State Cabins at the top of the ship. She has been traveling between Telmar and Boathaven all her life. I first gave her passage when she was a toddler, traveling with her father and mother.”

Toren shook Daniel’s hand off and walked out of the building at speed, anxious to talk to Hadon Mallow to receive the final payment for the swords.

“You paid up remarkably quietly,” Daniel mentioned. It wasn’t like Jalia to part with so much money so easily.

“It was less than a third of what I won last night.” Jalia turned to Cara who stood behind her.

“Since I paid for you and your brother’s passage to Slarn, perhaps you would look after Hala while we go and see Gally Sorn?”

“Of course,” Cara agreed. She had come to like Hala and it wasn’t asking much. “Do you want us to take the horses and Daniel’s donkeys onboard too?”

“Jalia, give me a gold coin,” Daniel asked. Jalia looked puzzled, but threw one at him, which he caught deftly. Daniel tossed the coin to Cara who looked even more puzzled than Jalia.

“Make sure all of the horses and donkeys are well fed and watered. From what I have seen of the Steam Dragon’s prices, it might cost you that much to do it.”

Cara grinned with delight. She had been brought up on a farm where the rule was that you made sure your animals were looked after before you sat down to eat. She understood Daniel perfectly. Cara thought that it was a massive shame that Daniel was bound so tightly to Jalia. She wanted to take him to her bed every time they got within a few feet of each other. It was making her feel tense.

“We are leaving our horses?” Jalia asked as they left the booking hall and came out into the red evening sunlight. It was a beautiful evening and the sky was bright red in the west.

“I could do with a long walk. My legs have become bowed.”

Jalia put her arm in his and leaned on him as they walked across the dock towards the gates.

“Don’t you think it strange that Lady Sorn’s uncle has blocked passage of the very swords she wants so much?” Jalia asked.

“I have a good idea why.”

“Are you going to tell me?” Jalia asked when it was clear that was all he was planning to say.

“No, you can work it out for… ooof!” Daniel doubled over from a friendly punch in the stomach.

“Come on lazy. I have to say goodbye to Grilt and Tel. It looks as though they are about to leave.”

Jalia ran towards Lock-up Four where the argument between Hadon and Captain Waters was still going strong. Captain Toren had joined in and if it hadn’t been for the fifty guards protecting Captain Waters it would certainly have come to blows.

Daniel rubbed his aching stomach and limped after Jalia. ‘
It was worth it’
, he thought. He hadn’t managed to truly annoy her in days.

The Lord Protector was a distinguished, muscular man in his fifties with eyes that were almost black, some said they matched his heart, but all agreed that they matched his soul. He was handsome in that way the exercise of power affects some men. The Lord Protector had been exercising power of one form or another most of his life.

He strode through the palace corridors as if in a great hurry, though in fact the message he carried was not particularly urgent. However, the desire to spend some more time in the company of his favorite niece spurred him on.

He slid the elegantly carved doors to the State Room open, ignoring for the ten thousandth time the masterpiece of art the carving was. The Lord Protector had little time for works of art that did not breathe and were not warm to the touch.

The State Room had been built when Boathaven had been at its political zenith. It had been the town where the Magician Kings from Slarn and Telmar met to discuss the future of Jalon, dance into the early hours of the morning, and gossip about who was having an affair with whom.

No expense had been spared on the palace’s construction as it had been paid for by the wealthiest families of both cities. The finished product put many of the buildings in their cities to shame.

The State Room was no exception having been designed by master craftsmen. The far wall of the room was a panoramic window that looked out towards the River Jalon. The window was filled with a single pane of glass from the city of Ranwin. Despite the millennia it had stood there, it remained clearer than the finest crystal. The uninitiated would take fright on seeing it, believing the wall was missing and that they might fall through it to the ground.

On the left wall, adjacent to the panoramic window, stood a massive stone fireplace. Far bigger than the room needed for anything as mundane as warmth, it was an artistic statement in its own right. Made from black stone with flecks of silver running through it, it dominated the room. It had been polished so perfectly that it shone.

Three crystal and silver chandeliers hung from the ceiling, each capable of holding fifty candles and capable of directing their light downwards through cleverly constructed mirrors. The other walls of the room were hung with exquisite tapestries showing hunting scenes, though the images had faded with age.

All this wonder around him was ignored by the Lord Protector, who only had eyes for the raven haired beauty who stood admiring the view. She had a glass of wine in her hand and held herself with such poise that the Lord Protector had to suppress a desire to throw her to the floor and ravish her that very instant.

Gally Sorn turned at the sound of the sliding of the doors and saw her uncle had entered the room. She smiled with genuine pleasure.

“I thought you would want to know,” her uncle said in a cultured voice. “That the trap you set has been sprung and Hadon Mallow’s remaining swords are in the possession of my guards.”

The smile slipped on Gally’s face and she cursed most foully. The glass she was held shook in her hand and some of the blood red wine in it spilled onto her snow white dress.

Gally cursed again and put the glass on a side table to wipe off the wine before it ruined the silk. The Lord Protector was confused by her reaction.

“I thought you would be happy. All has worked exactly as you planned, has it not?”