Chapter 8

“Miss Leena,” Varsin Senshall said, ushering her into his office, “I wasn’t expecting you so soon after your last visit. Has Lady Ellerie already figured out when you’ll need the first load of coal transported? I’ve been thinking Matagor may be the best option for regular deliveries. It won’t sell for as much there as it would in Tyrsall, but the distance is shorter. It should more than make up for the difference.”

“The mines aren’t operating yet,” Leena said. “We’re still looking for someone to handle that. I came here with a deal of my own. Her Imperial Majesty has allowed me to offer my services to the Senshall Trading Company—for a brief trial, and under strict conditions.”

Varsin’s eyes widened. “Ahh, I see. Please, take a seat.” He sat down across from her. “What would these conditions be, exactly?”

“I’ll come to Tyrsall once per week—to your home, not here—and I’ll pick up outgoing messages. They have to fit in a small shoulder satchel and be intended for Sanvara City, Four Roads, or our keep in the free lands. Then, during that week, I’ll visit each of those locations and deliver the messages, and pick up any that are being sent back here or to the other destinations. I hope to add Aencyr in Bancyra as well, but I’m not certain yet.”

Varsin looked thoughtful. “You’d go to our operations in Sanvara City and Aencyr?”

“No. I’ll go to the Sanvara City Travelers’ Post, which will send a courier to deliver the messages to your office in the city for no additional cost. If the messages need to go elsewhere, that’ll be up to your people down there. I don’t know yet what the situation will be in Aencyr, but I expect it to be similar.”

“It would certainly be helpful if we could correspond with Sanvar so quickly, but why those destinations only?”

“It’s all I have time for,” Leena said. That wasn’t entirely true, but if she was going to build up a larger network, she didn’t want to be dependent on a single trading house. She hadn’t worked out a solution yet, but she could partner with Senshall as an experiment while she looked for other options in Circle Bay, Matagor, and elsewhere around the north.

“You should really be talking to my father. He’s in charge of our operations in southern Aravor, including Sanvar.”

Leena didn’t know anything about the elder Senshall other than a few hints Varsin had let slip.

“I’m only supposed to deal with people I already know,” she said. “You can tell your father about it if you want, and let him take part, but I won’t be meeting with him.”

Varsin hid a small smile. “As you wish.” Then his look turned thoughtful. “We’ll rarely have a full satchel of messages for just those three destinations. Can I sell the extra space?”

“No, the offer is for the Senshall Trading Company alone, but you can include small packages if you have room for them.”

“You mean like trade goods? Or coin?”

“Whatever you want, as long as it fits in the satchel and is light enough for me to carry.”

“Well, that could make things ... interesting. I’ll have to think about what that might mean, maybe talk to some people.”

“Please don’t tell anyone outside your family—or Marco, since he already knows about me. I’m only allowed to do this if you can guarantee my safety.” She passed him a copper piece. “This will help with that. Show me the room you’d like to use, and then if you and the coin are both in that room at the day and time we agree on, I’ll come. If there’s any sort of problem, just make sure that either you or the coin aren’t in the room at that time.”

There was one more layer of security Varsin didn’t need to know about. Chaaya had memorized the coin’s signature, and before Leena Traveled to Tyrsall, Chaaya would do a Seeing on the room, and then the rest of the house, to make sure the family wasn’t being coerced into letting Leena believe it was safe to arrive.

Varsin examined the copper piece as if wondering how it worked, but he didn’t ask.

Instead, he said, “We haven’t discussed the price yet. Just how much is this going to cost me?”

Leena gave him a smile of her own.

“It’s not going to hold, Miss,” Fenton said. He was in charge of the carpenters and builders who’d made the journey to the keep. “It’s too heavy.”

“It only needs to last a few more minutes,” Ellerie said. “Help me with the sand and the lime now, while your men are finishing up.” The other builders were hauling the last of the heavy blocks up the side of the ravine. It had taken two days to dig all the fallen stone out of the riverbed and carry the smaller pieces up by hand. For the larger pieces, they’d cut two makeshift stairways into the steep bank and smoothed out the slope between them. Then they’d placed the stone blocks, one at a time, on a length of burlap which they bundled up and tied at the top with lengths of rope. With two men on each set of stairs, they’d dragged the heavy block between them up the bank of the ravine.

Ellerie grabbed the bucket of quicklime, pointing Fenton to the matching bucket of sand.

“I don’t understand what this is supposed to do,” he said, hefting it. “It won’t make enough mortar to hold everything together.”

“We’re not making mortar,” she told him. “This is just part of the spell.” The amounts were small enough to be almost symbolic rather than serving any actual purpose, but they had to do something or they wouldn’t be necessary. Luckily, sand and lime were much cheaper than the components used in the metal-shaping spells.

She carefully made her way out onto the broken section of the bridge, which was now spanned by a wooden frame the carpenters had constructed in roughly the same shape as the underside of the missing arch. The builders had piled the fallen stone onto the frame, but even after bracing the whole thing with heavy logs to keep it stable, the structure creaked alarmingly from the weight it was supporting.

Ellerie poured the quicklime powder into a crevice between several stone blocks to ensure it wouldn’t blow away in the wind, then handed her empty bucket to Fenton, who’d remained on the bridge rather than adding his weight to the shaky platform. She took his bucket in exchange and added the sand on top of the lime.

Returning to the intact part of the bridge, she set the bucket out of the way. “I’m ready.”

Fenton nodded and turned to his crew, who’d reached the top of the ravine. “Hurry it up there, boys!” he shouted.

If that caused them to move any faster, Ellerie couldn’t see it, but it didn’t take them long them to reach the bridge. As they drew even with her near the broken edge, they braced their feet and then pulled the ropes toward them, hand over hand, shortening the distance between themselves and the stone block. Fenton helped them untie the knots and uncover it.

“Is this close enough?” he asked. “I’m not sure the frame will take it if we pile it on with the rest.”

“It’s got to be touching before I start the spell,” Ellerie said.

He frowned but nodded. “Slide it over, lads.”

There was only enough room for three of his men to help push, and they had to get down on their knees to get a good grip, but slowly, the heavy block slid up to and over the broken edge of the bridge, slamming down onto the pile of loose stone. A splintering sound came from the wooden frame below and the whole structure dropped two inches before holding steady. The builders made startled exclamations and quickly backed away. Ellerie took their place, kneeling down so she could reach the pile. She began murmuring the words to the mixing spell.

As she spoke, the stone gradually turned into a thick sludge, as if it had melted without any heat. Then the sand and lime swirled into the mixture, causing the sludge to dissolve further. The final result was more fluid, though still grainy. The frame wasn’t solid enough to keep the liquid from flowing out through the cracks and gaps, but Ellerie could force it to stay in place.

The tricky part happened as she moved from one spell to the next. With the completion of the mixing spell, her control over the mixture would gradually fade and wouldn’t be renewed until she was partway through the shaping spell. Without a more solid mould to hold everything in place, she couldn’t take a break between spells.

She began the shaping spell immediately, picturing in her mind how she wanted the final structure to appear. Since the frame supported most of the weight and provided the approximate shape she would need, she focused her attention on the finer details, ensuring the stone was distributed smoothly and evenly, that it matched the dimensions of the other arches, and that the upper surface of the new section would be at the same height as the original stonework it abutted. The workers murmured in amazement as it took form, even though they’d known, in general terms, what she was attempting.

Ellerie had tested the stone-shaping spells with Hildra enough to make sure they worked, and she’d made a few small statuettes over the past weeks for practice, but this was the first time she’d tried stone-shaping for real. It was both easier and harder than metal-shaping. She was able to manipulate larger amounts of material with ease, but stone didn’t lend itself to the fine-grained control she could manage with metal.

As she neared the end of the spell, she forced the material into the final form she wanted, then held it there as it hardened in place. The bridge was now complete, spanning the entire river, though the shaped stone didn’t quite match the rest of it. Instead of blocks held together with mortar and careful engineering, the shaped section was one solid piece.

According to the shaping book, the new section would be at least as strong as the rest of the bridge, but there was no way to know for sure until they tried it. To improve the chances, Ellerie prepared a warding spell she’d gotten from Hildra, one designed to strengthen stonework. As she began casting, she decided to include the entire bridge, not just the rebuilt section. If one part had collapsed, the rest could as well, and there was no sense in tempting fate. The warding spell didn’t take as long to cast as the other two, but when it was over, she had to close her eyes and take deep breaths. The three spells together had required more power than she’d ever used before.

“Miss?” Fenton asked. “Are you all right?”

She opened her eyes and pushed herself to her feet. “Just tired, Mr. Fenton. Thank you.”

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” he said, staring at what she’d done. “It would have taken a crew of stonemasons an entire week to do that.”

“Let’s hope it worked,” she said. “I’ll need to borrow two of your men to help load wagons so we can try it out. The others can get started building the crane. We’ll need it soon. If the bridge holds, we’ll be working on the fortress wall next.”

Nedley stumbled as he appeared in the wheelwright’s shop in Four Roads. His guts heaved and the room seemed to be spinning. He had to drop to his knees to keep from falling over.

“Nedley, are you all right?” Leena’s voice came from somewhere above him.

He screwed his eyes tightly shut and waited as his stomach calmed. Finally, he felt it was safe to stand up.

“I think so,” he said. “I just got dizzy. Did that happen to anyone else?”

“Just Ditte, and only a little bit. She said it felt funny, and then she spun in circles a few times to keep it going. No one else has mentioned anything unusual.”

“Oh,” he said, flushing. Why did he have to be the only one to get sick from Traveling? Was this how Corec had felt on the ship?

“Do you need anything before I go?” Leena asked.

Nedley dropped his travel pack on a table and searched through it to make sure he’d brought the letter. “No, I have everything.”

“Then I’ll drop by in two days to see how things are going,” Leena said, then disappeared.

Nedley looked around the empty shop. They’d taken the last of their things along with the supply caravan, so only bits of scrap were left over. It felt odd to be there alone. It felt odd to be anywhere alone. He couldn’t remember the last time that had happened.

But he had a job to do. First up was a visit to the Three Orders chapter house.

His armor—which he’d worn for the trip rather than carrying—wouldn’t be appropriate, so he stripped it off, then took a moment to stretch. The plate armor was getting tight around his shoulders and would soon start leaving a gap at his waist if he got any taller, but he hadn’t told anyone yet. Corec only had silversteel plate in small and very large sizes, with nothing in between. There was no way Nedley would be able to fit into one of the larger suits, and he didn’t want to give up what he had.

After working out the kinks in his back, he put on the shopkeeper’s suit and long coat he’d bought the last time he’d been in town. It was all the tailor had been able to manage on short notice, but that was probably for the best. Anything fancier and he’d have been putting on airs. He strapped his sword belt on, grabbed the letter from his pack, and left the shop, resetting Ellerie’s mage lock on the door. He didn’t want anyone stealing his armor while he was away.