The possibility excited her. If it were possible for her to learn this quickly, it would be more of a challenge. That was exactly what she wanted—enough of a challenge for her to need to focus on the game, for her not to be able to simply see through it.
Carth let the game play out naturally, and Marna made a few skilled moves, clearly anticipating the way Carth would play. Carth allowed her to pin her in the corner of the board before she began playing with more intensity. There was a certain thrill in nearly allowing herself to get beaten.
Finally, Carth needed to end the game, if only so they could begin again. As she began making her move, Marna surprised her, countering. Carth had to stretch herself farther than she’d expected to defeat her, but in the end, the stone moved to the Marna’s side of the board, ending the game.
Marna sat with her hands in her lap, a disgusted look on her face. “I thought I was going to beat you.”
“Perhaps in time. I’m happy to continue playing with you.”
Marna nodded. “I would like that.” She stared at the board for a little longer before shaking her head. “You surprise me, Carth. I wasn’t expecting to actually enjoy myself on this journey.”
Carth smiled. “Me neither.”
22
The Goth Spald cut the waves with power. It was part of the reason Guya had prized his ship so highly. It was a powerful ship, one that was sleek and quick. It made a perfect smuggling vessel.
Carth didn’t use it that way—it was a means of transportation for her—but she valued it for many of the same reasons Guya had. Traveling across the sea could be monotonous, and now that she was determined to set up a network, she needed speed, which required the right kind of ship.
Marna remained belowdeck, finally sleeping. Carth intended to let her rest.
In the distance, the island of Neeland loomed. From the maps, Carth knew it was the massive island, one that spread for miles. The capital city of Avuan would be along the coast. Timothy had told her some of what came from Neeland, giving her an idea of what to expect, but she hadn’t known much more than that. She would find mercenaries, sellswords that she could hire to help her, and hopefully men who would explain the assassin sent after her.
The wind whipped the sails, bringing them closer and closer to shore. A sliver of the moon shone overhead in the dark night, and stars twinkled. Without the stars, and without the moon, Carth wouldn’t have been able to steer herself quite as easily. With them, she was able to guide the ship where it needed to go, knowing the pattern of the stars and the direction that would take her.
She eased the ship into shore, going along the side of the dock. She was pleased that Avuan had a deepwater port, preferring to pull into these docks rather than anchoring and rowing into shore.
Marna joined her on the deck as she began tying up and eyed the city with curiosity.
“You don’t have to go into the city. I’m looking for who hired them.”
“Just you?”
“Watch the ship. If I’m right about these men, we might need to depart quickly.”
“Or they might try to steal it, you mean.”
Carth shrugged.
When they were fully tied up, Carth slung a rope ladder over the railing and climbed down. It was better to do it that way rather than drawing attention to herself. As much as she could simply pull upon the shadows, she didn’t want to announce herself—or her abilities—by doing so. Instead, she preferred to make her way down the same way others would have.
Once on the city street, Carth paused. The buildings were all of gray stone, the kind of stone likely pulled from the sea, and the same sort of stone that built up the seawall near where she had docked the Goth Spald.
A muddy dirt path led along the street front. Unlike many other places where the road was cobbled, this was nothing more than hard-packed earth turned to mud from the recent rain. Carth wished she had different boots, hating that those she wore would be damaged by the mud.
She debated where to go, thinking about how best to find the sellswords, knowing only what Timothy had shared before. He had claimed that she would be able to reach him were she to have the need, that she could come to Avuan, and that she would be able to find him, but she would need a particular token that he had given her.
Carth reached into her pocket and pulled out the strangely shaped coin. She remembered well the conversation they’d had when he had given her the coin. She had asked if she needed to find him in a tavern, thinking that was the most likely place she would’ve found someone like him in Nyaesh or even Asador. Timothy had smiled and shaken his head.
“Neeland has a different approach to one of my skill. You need to take this to a building with a sign that matches it. Once there, you will find someone who can help you.”
“Only one that matches this?”
He had nodded. “You will find other, similar shapes. They will represent differing groups of men for hire. Some will be more or less receptive to what you have to sell. I would caution you to be careful in approaching some of these others. All are well trained. But not all will show the same consideration that I have shown.”
Carth remembered smiling then. When she had first met Timothy, she hadn’t thought he had much consideration for her. All he had wanted was to infiltrate the slavers, searching for information on how to find Guya and his family. She hadn’t known it at the time, but he had provided invaluable help.
And now she had to find him again. She wasn’t certain that she would be able to, even with his coin. Traveling in the dark and unusual city, she worried that she might be forced to use her abilities, which would expose her to other mercenaries.
Carth scanned the signs on doors as she made her way along the street. She wasn’t exactly sure where Timothy would be found, knowing only that she had the coin he’d given her. With that, he claimed she’d be able to find him, or at least someone who could lead her to him.
As she made her way along the street, she noted that there weren’t the usual storefronts that she was accustomed to seeing in other cities. Instead, each building had a symbol much like the one on her coin.
Carth paused, looking at one of the symbols. They were intricate, made of patterns that she suspected had meaning to the people of Neeland. She held her coin up, comparing it to the door she stopped in front of. On the coin, there were three triangles, each offset. A small circle was situated within each triangle and a single dot at the middle of each circle. The triangles were placed within a rectangular shape, one with hazy edges. She suspected that was important, though didn’t know why.
Her gaze went to the door. On it, she saw a pattern with similar triangles, but no circles on the inside and no dots. There was a rectangular shape around triangles.
How was she going to find Timothy this way?
If each of the shapes were so similar, Carth imagined she would have a difficult time determining a difference. It wasn’t the same as seeing images or letters… though, she realized, that might be exactly what they were. This could be simply Neeland’s formal writing.
In the darkness, it was difficult to make out the shapes. Now that she saw how difficult this would be, she realized she probably should come back in the daylight. Yet, at night, she enjoyed the fact that the streets were empty, and that she didn’t have to fight through crowds. She didn’t know how populated Neeland would be, or how dangerous it might be in the daylight, but at nighttime, with just her in the shadows, she didn’t feel nearly as uncomfortable as she might during the daytime.
Carth sank into the shadows, drawing them around her, and made her way along the street. She scanned the doors as she went, keeping the image of the pattern found on the coin burned in her mind. She found many different shapes. Some were quite different, making it easy to exclude them; others were much less obvious, at least to her. There were many similarities, sometimes so many that it was hard for her to distinguish them with any real certainty.
She paused, looking along the street
before turning, making her way away from the docks. She didn’t travel with any sort of goal in mind, other than simply scanning each doorway as she passed, looking for a match to the coin. As she wandered, she felt increasingly certain of the futility of trying to find Timothy this way.
What had he been thinking to believe that she could find him by simply matching her coin to his doorway?
She let out a frustrated breath, resigned to return to the ship and search during the daylight. Marna could help then. The ship would be safe in the harbor at day, wouldn’t it?
As she neared the main street, she saw movement. She hesitated, sinking into the shadows, but realized that the men were coming directly towards her. As they did, she noted a dull glint of steel.
With sudden certainty, she realized that not only could they see through the shadows, they were coming for her.
23
Carth prepared for a fight. She hadn’t wanted to fight, but these men approached with determination. She counted three—enough that a fight would be difficult, especially knowing the skill Timothy had possessed with the sword. The fact that these men were out at night made her suspect they would be as skilled as him. Men didn’t simply come out at night unless they were able to protect themselves.
She didn’t want to end in violence. She hadn’t come here to kill, she’d come to seek allies.
She thought about her options, but none were ideal. Still, it was better for her to run than to get into a battle she wasn’t prepared to participate in.
Carth sank more deeply into the shadows.
As she did, one of the men sprinted towards her. He moved faster than she would’ve expected, almost as if he were powered in the same ways she was. She had seen Timothy fighting, knew that he had significant skill with a sword, but she hadn’t thought him to be powered in any sort of way.
Did these men have abilities?
What had she come for? The answer was obvious. Understanding. The mercenaries. She needed to discover what had happened in Asador.
Though she might not have found Timothy, maybe she’d found others like him.
Her mind worked through the possibilities. She could run, lose track of them, possibly return to the ship, although there was a danger that they would find her there, or she could stay and see what they might know. That carried the most risk, especially if they attacked.
She didn’t know whether they had a way of deflecting her abilities, the same way that Hjan could deflect the A’ras magic, or the same way Ras had shown he was able to counter both shadows and the flame. Even Hoga had proven able to counter her ability, though hers was a more natural approach, one that came from knowledge of plants.
Carth released the shadows. She stood with her hands raised, and the nearest man racing towards her stopped suddenly.
She forced herself to keep aware of the sword. Her own sword was sheathed, and though she was skilled with it, she didn’t think she had the same level of skill as Timothy, so it was unlikely she had the skill of others like him. She was no mercenary.
“A Reshian,” the man said.
He had a hoarse voice, and through the darkness, she noted a hooked nose, a face scarred by pox. He had eyes that disappeared into the hollows of his cheeks, and short black hair. There was a confident laziness to his posture, and she had the sense that he was coiled, as if ready to strike were the need to arise. Carth didn’t want to give him any reason to do so.
“I’m not Reshian. I am descended from Ih-lash, and possess shadow skills, but I’m not Reshian.”
“If you have the shadow ability, you’re with the Reshian.”
Carth shook her head. As she did, the man pulled back his sword, preparing to attack.
With a surge of power, she sent the energy of the flame through the palm of her hand, pressing out and toward him.
He staggered back and held his sword up in a defensive pose. At least she knew the flames worked here.
“I am not with the Reshian.”
The other two Neelish men reached the other. He glanced at them and they shook their heads. The first man slammed his sword into his sheath.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
Carth considered showing them the coin. If she did, would she be brought to Timothy? His warning rang in her mind. He had cautioned her about the people in his homeland, warning her that there was danger here, and that if she were to find any others besides him, she might be subjected to that danger.
Carth palmed the coin, preferring not to show it just yet. “I’m in search of some men.”
One of the other men, a shorter one, with a more youthful face but the same hook to his nose as the lead man, started to snicker. The lead man shot him a hard look and he silenced.
“You think to hire someone?”
Carth glanced from his face to the others with him. She wasn’t certain she was reading this situation right. Something didn’t feel quite right for her.
“I need mercenaries. I hear they can be hired in Neeland.”
The lead man grinned. “Hired, yes. But the price is high. Are you prepared to pay?”
Carth reached for her pocket, and the lead man quickly unsheathed a short sword, moving faster than she could believe was possible. She would need to be careful with them. Possibly more careful than she had realized.
“If you’ll give me a chance, I will show you that I have the funds to pay for what services I need.”
The man nodded.
Carth continued reaching into her pocket, drawing out a coin purse. She had filled this one with fifty gold coins. Gold would be valuable regardless of where she’d acquired it, making the fact that it was Asador gold less of an issue. That she had Asador gold also provided her with another benefit as well. It would help prove to him that she wasn’t Reshian.
She opened the purse, showing a flash of gold, noting the hungry look to their eyes as she did.
Carth slipped the purse back into her pocket. “As I said, I’m looking to hire”—she shot a look to the younger man—“a few men. I have a task I need performed.”
“What sort of task?” the man asked.
Carth considered them for a moment. She made a play of taking her time, letting them think she needed that time in order to come to the decision. She already wasn’t certain she could trust them.
“The job would be mostly training.”
The man frowned at her. “Most don’t hire Neelish swords for training purposes.”
Carth shrugged slightly. It was the barest of movements of her shoulders, enough to draw attention to it, but trying to play at nonchalance. She wasn’t certain she succeeded. Perhaps not usually. But… “That’s the job. Do you have men for hire?”
The man’s gaze drifted to her pocket before returning to her face. When it did, he nodded once. “We have men for hire, though for what you’re requesting, I don’t know that you’ll need that many. That raises the price, you see.”
“Is that right? I would imagine you charged on a per-unit basis.”
Carth inwardly thanked Guya for all the times she’d worked with him, trading. Not only had she gained knowledge of sailing and the terminology of the sea, but she had gained an understanding of what was required for trading purposes. Guya had always been concerned about the unit price. He always claimed that was what was mattered. He might buy in bulk, but he sold in smaller quantities. That was where he made his money.
“You ask about the unit price of soldiers? These are men, not spools of thread or sacks of grain.”
Carth glanced at the three men. Instinct told her not to trust them, and she had learned over the years to trust that instinct. There was something that wasn’t quite right here, something she didn’t fully understand. She wished she had found Timothy’s mark, so that she could have found men like him.
And maybe that was the key. Maybe she needed to ask about their mark.
“Which house is yours?” she asked.
The men glanced at each other.
�
�House? What you mean by this?” the man asked.
Carth pointed to awards the nearest doorway. “The symbol. Which one do you affiliate with?”
The man shook his head. “The Neelish swords are all the same. What does it matter?”
Bells practically rang in her head. That ran counter to what Timothy had told her, and as a man who was a mercenary, and concerned about coin, she trusted that he had told her the truth. If it didn’t matter to them which one she went to and which one she hired, then he wouldn’t have made a point of telling her, and providing her with a coin to use.
“Your crest. Seems like everybody has their own crest. What does yours signify?”
The man stared at her, saying nothing for a long moment. Finally, he shook his head. “Do you want to hire our swords, or do you not?”
Carth studied them. The easy answer would be to say no. Timothy had been clear about the fact that there were differing factions of soldiers and Neeland, but maybe it was possible that those factions only existed citywide. Could it be that everyone within the city was a part of the same faction?
She had to admit that it could be.
“How about before we do the training, I give you a different job?” Now she would find out what she had come to learn.
“What kind of different job?”
Carth arched brow. “You are sellswords, aren’t you? What kind of job do you think I would offer a hired sword?”
The lead man stared at her. “What’s the job?” he repeated.
“I’ll need a dozen men. And preferably your most trustworthy ones.”
“You’re paying for them to be trustworthy.”
“Fine. That doesn’t change the fact that I need a dozen men. What’s the price on that?”
“Depends on what you need them for, and for how long.”
Shadow Found (The Shadow Accords Book 6) Page 14
