Page 71 of Into the West

Kordas colored a little. “Well, I hope I didn’t offend you—”

“Not in the least. So are you prepared for us to open our Gate to you in the morning?” Delia realized at that moment that Kordas had not yet said “yes” to this proposition.

And suddenly she felt so furious with him she wanted to box his ears. Kordas Valdemar, what is wrong with you? We’re heading into the dead of winter in boats, with ice threatening to stop us at any moment and the gods only know what other kinds of horrors there are out here and someone has offered us a sanctuary and now you—

“Word is spreading, Baron, that we have been offered sanctuary,” put in the Doll Rose in her calm voice. “I fear that if you do not accept it, you will not remain the leader for long.”

Kordas laughed, a little nervously. “Well . . . there is certainly that consideration.”

“I may kill you myself,” Isla said in her sweetest possible voice. “I don’t mind living in a boat, but there are limits, Kordas.”

Silvermoon laughed aloud at that. “Yes, you are like to be called Ter’i’le’e by my people, Baroness, for you hide peril under your tranquil surface.”

Kordas ducked his head. “I appear to have no choice,” he said, but in an amused tone. Or at least, it sounded amused to Delia. “Yes, and if this is even half as good a place as you have described, I don’t know that we will be able to repay you if our settlement lasts a thousand years.”

Silvermoon made a wave of his hand as if to dismiss the need for thanks. “You will repay us by being good stewards of what we leave with you.”

“Shall I tell the rest to spread the word to prepare for the journey in the morning?” Rose asked.

Kordas sighed. “Yes, please, Rose. I’d rather not turn my lovely wife into a murderer!”

Delia stayed up long past the point when she should have gone to bed—but so did Alberdina. Both of them were fascinated with what the Hawkbrothers had to say, and anxious about what Kordas would say in return. Briada had more sense than either of them, and went to bed earlier. “I’ll be just as amazed when I’m well rested, I’m sure,” she declared. “And I won’t fall over anything.” Alberdina eventually followed, but Delia stayed, and stayed some more, so when she finally stumbled to the barge through the excited crowds and into bed, she barely did more than take her boots off and wash down her face and hair with her prized fungal towel.

It was just as well that she hadn’t undressed, after all. After far too little sleep, she was vaguely aware of the barge moving, and a lot of bumping and sounds on the bank, but it wasn’t until she heard Briada shout from the front of the barge that she managed to drag herself out of a very confused slumber.

“Get up, ladies!” she heard Briada call through a muzzy sleep-fog. “We’re moving!”

Somehow that managed to penetrate the brain fog, and she would have rolled out of bed if she had not remembered she was in an upper bunk.

Alberdina groaned, but levered herself up and moved to one side of her bunk so Delia could scramble down. “It’s so dark,” Delia complained. She felt for the cap over the mage-light and slid it aside, wincing at the sudden flood of light.

“And now it’s too bright,” Alberdina mumbled, sounding cross. “I need my tea. I hope the water on the stove is warm.”

Delia squirmed around so she could cling to the edge of her bunk and feel for Alberdina’s bunk with her toes. When she was finally down, she got her towel and handed Alberdina hers. Like Delia, it appeared that Alberdina had not gotten out of her clothing before she went to bed.

They politely turned their backs on each other and Delia, at least, pulled her shirt up and her breeches down to give herself a good scrubbing, and felt a little more awake when she had done so. The day-old underthings would have to do.

By the time they clambered out of the barge, there was just a hint of light in the east. But they didn’t actually need that light, because within moments after they exited, that gigantic Gate sprang into being without any warning, and both the Gate itself and a ring around it added about the same light as a weak, overcast dawn to that of the hundreds of mage-lights overhead. Her eyes adjusted easily. There was good-natured shouting from ship to shore all down the line, horses and mules whinnying and snorting, even some laughter mixed with the noises of dogs running and barking.

They’d barely gotten their feet on land when one of the Dolls pulled up the mooring ropes from the land anchors and tossed them to another Doll who was standing on the stern of the scout barge that was usually second in the string. The Doll then loaded the land anchors into their midships cubby. The first and second barges, rather than being tied one after the other, were being rafted, bound up side by side. The Doll on the second barge hauled theirs along and looped it firmly to the prow and stern of the second, then jumped to their barge just as the first Doll pulled up the mooring line of the third, looped it thrice around the timberheads, and brought it to the Doll on the barges. Their efficiency astonished Delia; they worked so fast, and almost as one! Without a word—but with a friendly wave—the team of Dolls moved on to their next task.

In almost no time, all of their barges were tied together, and the first Doll brought Tight Squeeze, Buttercup, and Alberdina’s Dandylion and made them fast to the barges while Ivar took the lead rein. Then the Gate “bloomed” with a wash of silver light, and opened, and Ivar chirruped to them, tugging a little on Tight Squeeze’s lead rein.

Delia couldn’t help but notice that there was no thunderous boom associated with the Gate appearing this time. Evidently the Hawkbrothers had a strong sense of what Isla called “theatrics.” Not that we should complain. That was an incredible show. It felt like there were months of planning for it, but there can’t have been more than days at most. Unforgettable.

Since they were going with the current, it was no problem for the horses to get the barges underway, and on the other side of the Gate, Delia saw a number of people waiting for them on the light-flooded bank with personal mage-lights floating above their heads. Most were Hawkbrothers, but she spotted Jonaton, Sai, and Ceri among them, along with half a dozen Dolls and what appeared to be thickly bundled children that darted around.

Messengers, probably. I haven’t seen children in over a month, she realized. This place must be safe indeed for parents to let their kids run around like that! Energetic kids, too. They jump, run, and then vanish like they’re tireless.

And behind her, the Dolls were turning the next string into a raft, just as they had the scouting barges. Behind her she heard the sound of sheep approaching, baa-ing indignantly, and the yips of the dogs herding them toward the Gate. She could have stepped off the riverbank and into the brush to get out of the way, but instead, she trotted toward, and then through, the Gate.

There was the brief sensation of falling, then she found herself stumbling and caught by someone very short, who hadn’t been there a second ago. Tripping over my own feet! What a way to enter our new home!

The short person, who was so bundled up in furs they looked like a child’s toy, quickly guided her over to the side, and out of the way of the horses coming through the Gate with barge raft in tow.

The short person said something she didn’t understand, to which she replied, still a bit sleep-fuzzed, “I’m sorry, but—”

And then the person pulled their furred hood back and looked up. It wasn’t a human face that looked at her.