The Assassins of Altis

Chapter Six

Alain waited for Mari to explain exactly what she was going to do, thinking as he waited that it had indeed been a mistake to try traveling on a Mechanic train again. Night had fallen completely, so that once they had left the lights at the Mechanic train station the inside of this coach had become as dark as the outside.

Mari leaned back and whispered in Alain’s ear. “Time to go.”

That was a bit worrisome, given the speed with which the land outside was rolling by.

Straightening herself up, Mari spoke in a tired but nonchalant voice just loud enough to carry a bit. “I think there are more seats in the next carriage, so we can lie down to sleep. Do you mind moving?”

Alain stood, pulling Mari’s pack down from the shelves that ran over their heads, then his own pack as well. “We can attempt it.”

She led the way out the rear door of their car and onto a small platform that led to the similar platform on the front of the next car on the train. Walking across the small gap between the platforms would bring them to a door leading into the front of the next car. Instead of proceeding to the door, though, Mari went to the railings on the side and looked out and over, squinting her eyes against the wind created by the motion of the train. Leaning back again, she made a helpless gesture. “I can’t see far enough ahead in the dark to spot any good places to land, and we don’t dare wait to jump anyway.”

“Jump? You said when we next jumped from a train it would be moving slowly and we would be able to see where we would land.”

“Yes,” Mari said. “That was the plan, but we had to change the plan. We’re going to jump now. Why did you think we came out here?”

“I was following you.”

“Well, follow me when I jump.” With a worried expression now, Mari hooked her leg over the railing, then brought the other leg across, holding on with both hands, her back to the railing and her feet on the narrow edge of the platform beyond the railing.

Since there wasn’t enough room on this platform for him to join her, Alain stepped across to the next car’s platform, then also stepped over the railing and hung on, balancing on the edge as the metal lines that Mari called rails rushed by below them and the wind buffeted them. Even over the rush of the wind he could hear the chugging roar of the Mechanic creature called a locomotive which pulled this train.

Alain stared down at the ground, which was moving past as fast as a horse could run. “Is this safe?”

“No!” Mari said. “Of course it’s not safe! But we don’t have any other choice! After you hit the ground, don’t get up for a little while. We want to make sure no one from the train sees us.”

“What if I cannot get up at all?” Alain asked.

“Try to fall softly!” Mari ordered. He was still staring at her, trying to figure out if she was really serious, when Mari reached out and latched onto Alain’s hand. “We’ll jump on the count of three! One… two… three!” She jumped, pulling Alain along.

He landed awkwardly, losing his grip on Mari, falling, sliding down a slight embankment and rolling over several times before eventually skidding to a halt. The last car of the Mechanic train rolled past as he lay there, the lights and noise of the entire train vanishing into the night. Dizzy and aching, Alain sat up and looked for Mari, wincing as new bruises announced their presence.

Mari lay a short distance away. He felt a moment of fear, then relief as she got her arms under her and tried to stand up, hopping slightly as her right leg seemed unwilling to bear her weight. “Ouch,” she announced.

Alain got to his feet and moved to help, flinching as his own foot protested. Just a sprain, he hoped, and not something broken. “Are you all right, Mari?”

She lowered her right leg gingerly, her face showing pain. “I think so. Walking isn’t going to be any fun for a while.” Mari gazed in the direction the train had gone. “If anyone had noticed us jumping, the train would have already braked and started back this way. Looks like we got away. Now we just have to find another way to get to Landfall.”

“Will we have to ride one of the trains again?” Alain hoped that he did not sound too aggrieved.

She looked at him, then started laughing. “You poor man. Have you ever asked yourself what you did to deserve getting stuck with me?”

“I simply consider myself to be very fortunate.”

Mari grinned, her teeth white against the darkness of the night. “Just keep telling yourself that, my love. No, I won’t make you ride a train again. At least, not anytime soon. They really are too dangerous now that we know the Imperials are checking them all for suspicious pairs of young men and women, and by the time we could try to board another one my Guild would have sent warnings out that I was traveling as a common.” Her smile faded. “Can you see anything around here?”

Alain peered around, searching the darkness and seeing nothing manmade in the night-shadowed landscape but for the metal lines the train rode on. “Nothing.”

“Then that means we start walking to Landfall. We’re most of the way there from Palandur.” Mari took a step and gritted her teeth. “That’s going to hurt for a while, but I can manage it. How about you?”

“About the same. Do we walk all the way?”

“I hope not.” Mari pointed in the direction they had been traveling. “Sooner or later we’ll have a chance to bum a ride on a wagon. Or maybe we’ll find a coach station and be able to ride at least part of the way. That reminds me.” Sitting down, she rummaged in her pack, finally surfacing with a small sheaf of papers. “Our new identities.”

Alain studied the papers. “You had two sets of false Imperial identification papers for us?”

Mari grinned. “I’m a Mechanic. I like to have spares handy in case I need them. And I have a nasty suspicion that the names on those other identity papers are now on the Imperial police’s arrest list.” She stood up again, adjusting her pack. “We’re a step-brother and -sister from Emdin now. Any ideas why we’re going to Landfall, if anyone asks?”

“Seafood?” Alain suggested.

“That sounds good to me. We’re off to see the big city, Landfall the Ancient, and enjoy the sea while the crowds are small at the tail end of winter and before we have to get the crops in when spring comes.” Mari gave him a questioning look. “That is when crops are planted, right?”

“As best I recall. It has been a long time since I was a boy on my family’s ranch”

“You need to tell me more about that while we walk, if you don’t mind. I’d like to know more about your childhood.” She tested her right leg. “That’s not as bad. Ready?”

“Will not the Imperials be looking for us here if they suspect we left the train?” Alain asked.

“Yeah. That’s why we’re going to walk way over to the left until we find a road going in the same direction.”

“Across the fields. In the dark.”

Mari gave him one of those narrow-eyed looks. “Do you have a better idea?”

“I was hoping you had a better one.”

“Nope. We’ve only got one choice.” She paused, thinking, as Alain waited. “There’s a common theme running through our lives these days, isn’t there?”

“I thought so.”

She shrugged, and again he could see the gleam of her smile in the night. “We can either let it terrify us or we can start seeing the humor in it, I guess.”

“At least there are no trolls tonight.”

“Exactly. Mage, it’s sometimes frightening just how much you and I are truly made for each other.” Smiling and limping, they started across the fields, searching for a road heading for Landfall.

The first night was in some ways the hardest, walking overland with minor injuries from their leap off of the Mechanic train. Alain was able to make the night pass a little faster by telling Mari some of the things he remembered from his parent’s ranch in the days before the Mages came to take him when Alain was five years old. Many of the memories he had suppressed while training to be a Mage. Now it was bittersweet to recall his parents, who had died while Alain was still a Mage acolyte. It made him feel better to share with Mari, though.

Alain tried to draw out Mari a little about her own girlhood in the city of Caer Lyn before being taken by the Mechanics, but once again Mari refused to talk about that, insisting that it was past and completely forgotten, almost yelling at Alain when he mentioned her mother. “I don’t care about her!” Mari said with a sad scowl that contradicted her words.

It was well past midnight before they literally stumbled onto a minor road going west. Already worn out from the events in Palandur the previous evening and day, Mari was almost asleep on her feet and Alain in not much better shape. They found a place just off the road where a few trees offered shelter and fell asleep in each other’s arms despite the cold.

The next morning, Mari stood looking around morosely. “I’ve been thinking. This isn’t like a little while back when we traveled south to Severun and then Marandur. Back then your Guild, my Guild and the Order were looking for us, but the Imperials weren’t. Now they are. I have a nasty feeling that any form of public transportation is going to be too risky to use.”

Alain, still seated, nodded and looked up at the sky. “We will have to pursue other methods, including avoiding the main road west.”

“Right. Do you know anything about sneaking through a countryside? I’m sort of making this up as I go along.”

“Yes, I do.” Alain forced himself to his feet, wincing as sore muscles protested. He took an odd pleasure in the look of surprise on Mari’s face. “Because I can cast fire, the Mage Guild intended that many of my contracts would be to common military forces. As a result, I received some training in military matters, including how scouts operate. I have also seen the use of scouts on a few occasions.”

“What do scouts do, exactly?” Mari asked.

“They seek to travel and see all about them without themselves being seen.”

“Ah.” Mari grinned. “That sounds like just what we need. What do we do first?”

Alain thought about it, making sure he remembered important details. “We are on a less-traveled road already. If the enemy—that is, the Imperial security forces—are actively searching for us, they will have checkpoints at intersections of roads.”

“Oh, sure.” Mari nodded, then couldn’t stop a yawn born of too little sleep. “Excuse me. That makes sense. They can’t cover everywhere, but occupying intersections offers the best chance of intercepting anyone using the roads. We just have to keep our eyes out for intersections and avoid them without being obvious about it.”

“It would be best to avoid roads altogether,” Alain cautioned, “but that would make our journey much harder, and since this land is divided into many farms we would have to deal with many fences and many landowners who would question our presence.”

“Much harder and a lot more time,” Mari agreed. “We’ll stay with minor roads, hitching or paying for rides when we can, and walking when we can’t.”

It took over a week of hiking and occasional rides in passing wagons. Every time they approached an intersection Mari discreetly pulled out her far-seer and scouted ahead, allowing them to spot Imperial checkpoints early enough to evade them without being seen themselves. Unfortunately, that usually meant avoiding riding on wagons, since dodging checkpoints would arouse the suspicion of drivers. By the time they sighted Landfall, Mari was wondering how much longer her boots would hold out.

Mari timed their arrival at the Imperial checkpoint outside the south gate to coincide with a rush of travelers. The officer they met eyed their new identification papers briefly, shoved them back at Mari and gestured to the next traveler.

Not far inside the city gate a small park beckoned, with few people in it at this time of the day. Mari sat down on a badly weathered stone bench under an ancient tree, pulling off her boots to rub her feet. “Ow, ow, ow. I am so tired of hiking.”

Alain sat down next to her, nodding wearily.

Mari leaned back, closing her eyes. “I suppose I should be grateful. All of this walking must be doing wonders for me. I’ll bet my legs must look great.” She glanced over at Alain and grinned. “Not to mention my rear end. Am I still distracting when you watch me walk from behind?”

“Very distracting,” Alain said. “I will be happy to evaluate your legs, if you wish.”

“I bet you would. You’ll see them someday, Mage, and a lot more besides.” Mari stretched, thinking happily of the upcoming sea voyage, on which any walking would be limited to going around the deck. “I’m probably looking forward to that day more than you are.”

“I doubt it.”

She laughed. “All right. We won’t have any trouble finding the waterfront. I vaguely remember it from a few years ago when I came here from… my first Guild Hall.”

“In Caer Lyn,” Alain said.

“Yes,” Mari replied, hoping the sudden frost in her tones got through to Alain. She stood up abruptly, her good mood vanished.. “We should go check the sailing schedules.”

Alain’s voice held a sigh of resignation. “All right.”

Her disposition lightened a bit on the way, partly because she felt guilty for snapping at Alain and partly because she was finally getting a chance to see a bit more of Landfall the Ancient, supposedly the oldest of cities. Many of the buildings showed ample signs of age in the weathering of their stone or in their old designs. Many of the trees were very old as well, with wide trunks, gnarled bark and expansive spreads of branches. The streets of Landfall were wide and straight, a perfect grid varying only occasionally to accommodate terrain or some special building.

Special buildings such as the Mechanics Guild Hall. Mari saw it in the distance, where the Guild Hall rose next to the same river that flowed downstream from Marandur and Palandur, and felt the same mix of yearning and anger at the thought of what she had lost and the lies she had been told.

Alain stayed silent the entire way. Though he never talked as much as Mari did, she had slowly learned to sense different qualities in his silence. Sometimes it was the quiet of someone lost in his own thoughts, an intriguing silence, and sometimes Alain would be wordlessly enjoying her presence, which was a nice silence. But this silence loomed like a fortress in which the gate had been sealed, as Alain drew into himself because he thought he had been wronged.

Upset as she had been, Mari had to admit that those times when he sealed the gate it was usually because she had given him good cause. Stubborn as she could be, Mari knew that she had been wrong to snap at him this time. “I’m sorry,” Mari finally muttered.

He nodded, but still said nothing.

“You know how I feel about that,” Mari continued. “You shouldn’t have brought it up.”

Alain looked over at her. “I said the name of a city.”

“Yes, but—” She glowered at the worn cobblestones beneath their feet. “I don’t think you can understand.”

“I understand that you avoid thinking about and confronting your past.”

“What makes you an expert at dealing with the past?” Mari whispered savagely.

“I have stood at the graves of my parents.”

It was odd how painfully such an impassive statement could lash at her. Mari grimaced. “All right. You have a point. I can only guess how hard that must have been for you. It’s different for me.”

“Would you feel better if your parents too were in their graves?”

That was as harsh a thing as Alain had ever said to her. Mari fought to control her anger. “No. I admitted that you have a point. Please drop it.”

“We always drop it, yet always it stays with us and between us.”

She stopped walking so abruptly that Alain took another step before he caught himself and came back. Mari stared at the ground, not really seeing the cobblestones now. “Maybe this was all a mistake. You and me.”

“Do you believe that?” he asked, and once again she could easily sense the emotion in his words.

Mari thought about possible responses, about more ways to hurt Alain, and then got a grip on herself. “No. Not really. I was trying to attack you so I could avoid facing things I don’t want to face. I can’t forget the past, Alain.”

“I would never ask you to do so. But will you let the past destroy the present?”

She exhaled slowly, dimly aware of annoyed pedestrians going around her and Alain where the two of them stood still on the sidewalk. An image of Marandur came to Mari, and it took her a moment to realize why. “Is that what I’m doing? Building a wall around the ruins of my childhood and maintaining those ruins as some kind of horrible monument to my suffering? Alain, please stick with me. I know something has to change. I don’t know how, yet. Please… don’t go.”

His voice finally relented. “I will never go.”

Mari took a deep breath, smiled at him, then took his hand as they started walking again. “I don’t deserve you.”

“If you did not deserve me,” Alain said, “then destiny would not have brought us together.”

“I’m sure. Maybe destiny wanted to punish you.” Feeling better, Mari spent the rest of the walk to the docks trying to relax.

Unfortunately, once they got there a series of talks with agents selling tickets on outbound ships kept producing the same result. “It will be three days before a ship leaves directly to Altis,” Mari said with disgust. “I do not want to spend three days here, worrying about various people who are looking for us.”

“One night in Palandur was almost too many,” Alain agreed.

Mari studied the boards where sailings and ships were posted, finally shaking her head. “There’s only one thing to do. Yes, again, we’ve only got one good choice. There’s a passenger ferry leaving about noon for Caer Lyn. From there we can surely get a ship heading straight for Altis without having to wait much, if at all.”

“You have not been back?”

“Not since I left the Guild Hall there.” But she knew what he was really asking. Had she ever gone home again. “No. Once I became a Mechanic, I guess my parents decided there was no place for me to go back to.” It came out not in anger, as she knew it usually did, but sadly.

He nodded, not pressing it this time.

“But getting on the ferry means getting past the Imperial customs checkpoints.” Mari looked around, an idea coming to her. “They’re looking for two people traveling together. If we buy two tickets for two separate compartments, and then go through customs separately and board separately, that might ensure that the Imperials don’t take any special notice of us. Once out of Landfall, we’ll be clear of the Imperials and not have to worry about them anymore.” She frowned as Alain shook his head. “What? The Sharr Isles are independent.”

“They are called independent,” Alain explained. “To a Mechanic such as you, the real status of the Sharr Isles would not matter, but the independence of the Sharr Isles is purely at the sufferance of the Empire and maintained by the Great Guilds. It serves the Empire’s interests to have so-called independent islands to funnel trade to and from the west. Even then, only the supremacy of the Great Guilds and their insistence that the Imperial borders expand no farther has kept the Empire from claiming the islands. The Sharr Isles take no step without Imperial approval, and do whatever the Empire commands. In exchange they gain the right to call themselves free and are defended by the Empire’s formidable military.”

“Great,” Mari groused. “So even in Caer Lyn we’ll have to worry about the long arm of the Empire. Well, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

“What bridge is that?”

One moment he was explaining geo-politics and history to her, and the next he was confused by something simple and everyday. Mari closed her eyes, took a deep breath, then looked at Alain. “That is a figure of speech. It means we will deal with that situation when we encounter that situation.”

He nodded back, his expression serious.

“The ferry is the Sun Runner,” Mari continued. “Let’s go get the tickets. I’ll go first, with you in line behind me, and you can just copy what you see me say and do. All right?”

The plan worked without any problem, though the length of the line to get past Imperial customs and border control worried Mari when she saw how close it was getting to the Sun Runner’s sailing time. The line moved slowly, everyone waiting with the stolid acceptance of official inconvenience that marked life in a state such as the Empire. When Mari finally reached an official, that woman eyed Mari’s papers with disinterest. “Traveling alone?”

“Yes.” An Imperial customs official just wasn’t as intimidating as a troll.

“Purpose of travel?”

“I spent a few years in Caer Lyn as a child.” Alain had taught her that lying by telling a misleading truth was far less likely to be apparent to any questioner than telling a complete fabrication.

“Emdin,” the officer commented. “You came straight from there?”

“Yes,” Mari replied. “Through Alfarin.”

“Have you been north or east of Alfarin?” the officer pressed.

That called for a flat-out lie. “No. I went from Emdin to Alfarin and then here.” Mari tried to look and sound like a rustic girl who didn’t have much experience in the wider world. “Should I have gone another way?”

“No,” the officer replied, sighing in the manner of someone tired of dealing with the public. “Did you see any unusual travelers? A pair of them, one an uncommonly attractive young woman with dark hair, the other a young man? They might have been claiming to be students at the university in Palandur.”

“I saw many other travelers, but none that seemed unusual,” Mari said, wondering again at why the Imperials seemed focused on an “uncommonly attractive” young woman. “I didn’t meet anyone who looked like that.”

The officer glanced at Mari’s pack. “Are you carrying any contraband?”

“No.” Not by Imperial definitions, anyway. It was the Mechanics Guild which had banned the ancient texts in Mari’s pack, manuscripts which the Imperials didn’t even know existed.

“Pass.” The official handed back Mari’s papers and gestured her onward.

Mari went up the gangway onto the Sun Runner and leaned on a rail, looking down at the pier where Alain was just reaching another Imperial official to be interviewed. She wasn’t too worried about how well Alain would handle that. The ability of Mages to lie without any sign of misgiving or deception was legendary.

Sure enough, after a very brief interview Alain was waved onward and came up the gangway. He glanced at Mari, then once aboard took a place at the rail nowhere near her but still within eyesight.

It wasn’t too much later that whistles sounded and sailors began taking in the gangway and the lines holding the Sun Runner to the shore. Commands were shouted from the high quarterdeck at the stern of the ferry where the ship’s wheel rested. More sailors ran up into the rigging and along the spars, and soon sails unfurled on the masts above the ship, shining white against the blue sky. Mari felt the ferry lurch beneath her as the sails caught the wind. The Sun Runner swung out away from the pier and into the harbor, then began gliding across the water toward the harbor entrance.

Mari watched the city of Landfall and the territory of the Empire slowly recede, thinking about when she had entered the Empire with Alain months ago and far to the north from the mountains of the Northern Ramparts. We made it. Through the heart of the Empire, through the forbidden city of Marandur itself, and out through the Empire’s oldest and largest port.

Maybe Alain and I can actually sleep in peace tonight, without keeping one eye open for danger. I’ve forgotten how that feels.

Several commons were talking in low voices nearby, just loudly enough for Mari to catch the conversation. She had been trying to ignore them, but then Mari heard something about Jules and listened closer.

“She was seen in the Northern Ramparts,” a woman insisted. “Just a few months ago. The daughter of Jules. Wearing a Mechanics jacket, she slew a dragon single-handed to save some commons, wouldn’t take any payment, and healed a dozen badly injured soldiers with the touch of her hand.”

“Nobody wearing a Mechanics jacket would care about commons,” a man grumbled.

“She did, but she didn’t act like a Mechanic except that she fixed all of their Mechanic weapons, too. And then,” the woman added, “a Mage showed up and swore allegiance to her and they went off together. People saw it. Some say she’s on her way to see the Emperor, to ask him to let her lead the legions against the Great Guilds.”

Mari pressed the palm of one hand against her forehead, closing her eyes to try to block out this latest development. Blasted soldiers. I save their lives and this is the thanks I get, them telling everybody who I am!

Stars above. I thought “who I am.” Not “who people think I am.” Am I starting to accept it? Am I starting to believe that I really am the daughter? I don’t want to be her. I don’t want that responsibility. But… she’s needed.

Caught in the internal discomfort of her thoughts, Mari barely noticed the second man shaking his head, but when he started speaking his words immediately caught her attention again.

“I don’t doubt she’s trying to get to the Emperor,” the man said in a low voice. “I’m sure she wants back in the palace again, after all these centuries.”

“What?” the woman asked in anxious tones. “What do you mean?”

“You’ve heard of Mara, haven’t you?” the second man whispered. “Consort to the first emperor, Maran himself? So incredibly beautiful, they say she bewitched Maran and almost ran the Empire for a time.”

The first man nodded. “I heard about that. She never wanted to get old, so she made a deal with the Mages to keep herself young forever. But it’s just a story, isn’t it?”

“Some say it is, some say it isn’t.”

“How could even the Mages keep someone young forever?” the woman asked.

“I don’t know,” the second man said. “It must be pretty hard, or pretty terrible, but she had the entire Imperial treasury to pay them off, and Maran’s hand backing her.” The man lowered his voice so much that Mari had to strain to hear it. Not that she wanted to hear it, but her curiosity was too strong by this point. “She doesn’t age, because she’s not really alive and not really dead. Mara drinks blood, they say, to keep herself looking young, the blood of young men. She has no trouble seducing them to their deaths because Mara is still as beautiful as she was when Maran reigned. And after all these centuries she knows more magic than any Mage. They say the Emperor Palan himself sealed her into a tomb in the old Imperial capital when the city was destroyed, but there are reliable stories that somebody or something came out of Marandur recently. You must have seen how the police have been extra vigilant lately, checking anyone traveling. Word is they’re looking for whoever left Marandur, where Mara has been imprisoned in her lair for more than a century. Someone woke her up. Someone freed her. She’s come out now. That’s what’s trying to get to the Emperor and back in the palace again. Mara the Undying.”

A hush fell over the three commons, while Mari stared at the waves, aghast.

“But,” the woman finally asked, “what if she really is the daughter of Jules and not Mara?”

“Believe what you like, but if I meet her I’m going to be looking to see if her teeth have sharp points,” the second man said.

“I’m not so young anymore,” the first man remarked, “so I guess she wouldn’t want my blood, and I’m not a citizen of the Empire, so it doesn’t matter to me whether she’s Mara or the daughter of Jules, as long as she does in the Great Guilds.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” the second man muttered.

The small group wandered off past Mari, who stayed leaning on the rail, hoping her expression didn’t show how appalled she was. I thought it was bad enough being the daughter of Jules. But that’s a lot better than having people think I’m an undead, vain, blood-drinking seducer of emperors and young men.

At least it explains why the Imperials keep asking about a very good-looking dark-haired young woman. They actually think Mara might have been the one who left Marandur? Granted, if any place would be a suitable lair for the undead it would be Marandur. I suppose the only good thing about that rumor is that no one is likely to recognize me from it. Incredibly beautiful? That’s about as true as the sharp teeth.

Though now she felt an irrational urge to find a mirror and check how her teeth looked.

Mara the Undying. Stars above. I’ll take being the daughter of Jules any day over that.

Alain blinked against the late afternoon sun as he looked forward along the deck, then aft. The Sun Runner was sailing slightly south of west to reach Caer Lyn, with an easy breeze filling her sails and a pleasant sea sending gentle swells to meet her. They had been at sea for a while now, the Imperial coast had long since vanished beneath the horizon, and even though he and Mari had been on the alert for anyone watching them, no one seemed to be paying them any particular attention.

But Mari had insisted on waiting to go to their cabins. “If anyone on the Sun Runner is pursuing us, I want to see them before they find out which cabin we’re staying in tonight. Who knows how many Imperial agents are aboard this ship. We can’t afford to be trapped in a room.”

He had recognized the wisdom of that, and so had waited while Mari joined him for periods and then left, to see if anyone followed her. After what had happened in Palandur, that sort of concern was only prudent. “There are no Mages aboard as far as I can tell,” he had told Mari, which was one thing to be glad of. But he was tired of hauling his pack around, tired of standing at the rail, and was looking forward to tonight, when he and Mari would be catching up on their sleep in an actual bed in one of their cabins.

That was all they would be doing in that bed, of course. Alain remembered Mari joking about how her legs looked, and tried to think about something else.

“Hey.” Mari came toward him after her last attempt to check for anyone following her, yawning again. “I can’t wait to find one of our cabins and take off this pack. I’m thinking if anyone aboard was after us, they would have betrayed themselves somehow by now. Still no foresight warning?”

“No, but you know that does not mean danger does not exist.”

“It’s something, though.” Mari yawned hugely this time. “Stars above, I’m tired. It’s been a long trip from you-know-where. We should turn in soon. Do you know some people always sleep at night and stay awake during the day? I think they’re called normal.”

“How boring,” Alain responded. “They probably also never get attacked by trolls or dragons.”

“I haven’t decided which I like least. Dragons are definitely faster, though. I prefer enemies I have a chance to run away from.” Mari leaned on the railing with her arm touching Alain’s, sighing happily. “Do you realize how long we spent inside the Empire? It’s great to at least feel free again. And aside from Asha, whom I’m doubtless transmitting to at this very moment, we shouldn’t have to worry about anyone from our Guilds locating us until we reach Caer Lyn.”

“Asha will not tell any elder where we are. She is in as much danger from the elders now as are we. But even if there are no agents on this ship, the Imperials in port will be checking people arriving at Caer Lyn,” Alain cautioned.

“We’ll just do the same thing we did when we got on the ship. Once we’re both off this ship, we’ll find a ship headed for Altis and get right on it. I don’t want to spend an instant longer in Caer Lyn than we have to. For safety.”

“For safety,” Alain repeated in a neutral voice. He knew she was not being honest with herself, and she knew she was not being honest with herself, but Alain thought that he had pushed her enough on that for now. He wondered if Mari would feel any differently when she actually saw once again the city she had once called home.

“You know,” Mari added thoughtfully, “we really need to plan things out more instead of just rushing into them. Develop a nice, detailed plan and then carry it out, just like we did when we got on this ship. We should try to do that every time from now on.”

Alain was about to reply when he heard whistles sounding and looked up. Sailors were rushing into the rigging again, and soon the motion of the Sun Runner altered, the gentle rolling turning into a slow wallow as the sails were furled overhead and the ship glided to a stop. Mari stared at Alain, then at the empty sea before them, then back at the deck house blocking their view of the other side of the ship. Together, they rushed to the nearest passage across the deck.

Alain caught up with Mari as she came to the rail on the other side of the ship. Mari did not say anything, just pointed, face rigid. Another ship had approached, a ship with only short, stubby masts and no sails visible. A stream of pale smoke rose from a huge tube rising out of the center of the strange ship, which was almost completely made of metal. On the front of the other ship, something which looked like a very large version of the Mechanic weapons Alain had seen was mounted on the deck and pointing at their own ship. A pair of large boats were already in the water, being rowed over toward the ship Alain and Mari were on, the dark jackets of the Mechanics crowding the boats easily visible.