“Sit down.” I offered her my stool and the watery wine. I liked Allin and her ready habit of sharing any skill, magical or practical, had won her many friends in Kellarin. Not that she realised this. The last child of a long family, her humility bordered on the ridiculous and Temar wasn’t the only one determined this mage-girl learn to value herself as highly as other people did.

“How can I help?” Her hectic colour faded as she drank the wine.

“Could you please bespeak Casuel?” Temar asked politely. “See if he knows when we might expect the first ships?”

Allin turned to the expectant Jemet. “A candle, if you please, and a mirror.”

The lad scurried to fetch the paraphernalia for Allin’s spell and then stood at Temar’s shoulder, blue eyes avid.

Allin snapped her fingers at the candle to kindle enchanted flame and carefully captured the unnaturally ruddy light in the mirror. She went about her wizardry with far less ceremony than most of the mages I’d had the dubious fortune to encounter but even this understated display had Jemet in silent thrall, Bridele sneaking a look from the kitchen door. The lately come craftsmen still retreated awkwardly when magic was worked but the original colonists had lived in an age when Artifice was a readily acknowledged skill. They made no distinction between Guinalle’s aetheric enchantments worked for their benefit and the different abilities of the mageborn. As far as they were concerned, magic of any stripe meant Kellarin would never again suffer Elietimm attack undefended and unable to call for aid.

The reddish glow on the metal shrank to an eye-watering pinpoint of brightness and then spread once more in sweeps across the mirror like wine in a jolted glass catching the light. Concentration lent dignity to Allin’s plump face as the radiance faded to a burning circle around the rim and the mirror reflected a miniature scene. We saw an elegantly appointed bedchamber where a familiar figure was stepping hastily into his breeches.

“Casuel, good morning,” Allin said politely.

“What’s so urgent it couldn’t wait until after breakfast?” Casuel fumbled with his buttons before running a hand over tousled brown hair, not yet pomaded into fashionable waves.

“Esquire D’Evoir.” Temar came to stand beside Allin and inclined his head in a well-bred bow. “I beg your pardon. It’s rather later in our day.” He spoke with the aristocratic precision that Casuel always took as due respect but I generally felt it was D’Alsennin’s way of hiding his irritation with the wizard’s pretensions.

“Sieur D’Alsennin.” Casuel’s tone turned abruptly from brusque to ingratiating. Temar’s House might have vanished in the Chaos but if the Emperor decreed it be raised again, that was good enough to win a grovel from Cas.

“Everyone else in Toremal will have eaten their breakfast long since by now.” Ryshad’s murmur was for my ear alone as he moved behind me, folding strong arms around me.

I craned my head back to whisper. “Since when’s our Cas been Esquire D’Evoir?” In those same ballads where Allin’s appearance would have been as appealing as her personality, Casuel’s all-encompassing knowledge of the fragmentary history of the Old Empire would have been arcane learning essential for saving a princess or restoring a king to his throne. As it was, his self-serving scholarship had been entirely focused on proving his merchant family’s claim to ancient rank. Then Planir had seconded his scholarship for his own mysterious purposes and Cas had inadvertently helped save Kellarin’s people.

“Temar helped fill in the missing twigs on his family tree.” Ryshad nodded at the distant image. “Imperial grant of insignia at Solstice, he’s now Planir’s liaison with Tadriol and official conduit for any prince wishing to communicate with Kellarin.”

So Cas had been rewarded with all the access to the great and the good of Toremal that his snobbish heart could wish for.

“We need to know when we might expect the first ships from Bremilayne or Zyoutessela,” Temar was explaining as Allin somehow brought Casuel’s face closer to the mirror.

“But the first one will have arrived by now.” Casuel fiddled with a tasteless gilt fish brooch pinning the frilled collar of his silk shirt.

“I would hardly be asking if it had,” Temar said with more courtesy than I’d have managed.

“It set sail on the twelfth of For-Spring,” insisted Casuel.

There was a pause as we all mentally tallied up the days and the phases of the greater and lesser moons.

“That’s very early to be setting out.” Ryshad knotted doubtful brows. Raised in the southern port of Zyoutessela, he knew more about the seasons’ vagaries than the rest of us.

“Especially when you have neither mage nor aetheric adept aboard to cope with ocean winds and currents.” Unpleasant satisfaction turned Casuel’s well-made face ugly.

“I don’t understand,” Temar said sharply.

“The ship was backed by Den Harkeil gold,” began Casuel pedantically.

“Avila told me that was arranged,” Temar interrupted.

“The Sieur Den Harkeil has set his clerks loose in every archive he can secure access to.” Casuel looked momentarily envious. “They’ve dug up every scrap of parchment detailing Den Fellaemion’s voyages and the Sieur’s convinced it should be possible to cross the ocean without magical aid. There’s no mention of it in any of the tales of Nemith the Sea-farer.”

“Because no one with a grain of sense would think of venturing into the open ocean without an adept aboard in those days,” said Temar tightly.

“Why does Messire Den Harkeil feel entitled to ignore both Planir and the Demoiselle Tor Priminale saying a ship needs a mage or an adept or ideally both?” Halice was scornful.

“He believes the islands in the mid-ocean are the hidden secret that enabled Den Fellaemion to reach Kellarin,” Casuel said reluctantly.

Temar bit his lip. “Suthyfer?” It was a measure of his concern that he used the mercenaries’ everyday name for the islands, not the fanciful Garascisel he’d decreed.

“Is that possible?” Ryshad looked from Temar to Allin who was looking distressed.

“Has the vessel come to grief?”

“I don’t know.” Temar chewed a thoughtful knuckle.

“Just because something hasn’t been done, doesn’t mean it can’t be.” Halice had other concerns.

“Ships nowadays are sturdier than the ones Den Fellaemion used.” Ryshad looked apprehensive. “Mariners are more used to sailing the ocean, with the growth of trade up to Inglis.”

“Half the noble Houses in Tormalin want a taste of the Kellarin trade,” I pointed out. “They’ll be sticking down their own colonists without so much as kissing your hand if they can get away with it.”

Allin shook her head emphatically. “Cloud Master Otrick himself always said it would be impossible to cross the ocean unaided.”

“Did he say the same after he learned about Suthyfer?”

Halice studied a map. “If a ship could reach the islands, take on fresh water, take bearings on the right stars and check the sun from solid land, that would set them fair for the second leg of the journey.” She looked at Allin. “Did Otrick factor that into his calculations?”

“I don’t know.” Allin faltered with sudden self-doubt. “The Emperor has decreed that any land grant must have my seal,” Temar insisted but he looked worried.

“We’re going to throw people back into the sea, when their prince has sent them here on the promise of a new life?” Ryshad said dourly.

“Tadriol’s going to sail up and down the coast to enforce his writ in person, is he?” I chipped in.

Halice jabbed an emphatic finger at Temar. “What about people who don’t recognise Tormalin writ? Land hunger’s been a goad in the Lescari wars for I don’t know how long.”

“Let’s not go begging for trouble.” Temar was scowling. “If the ship is lost—”

“—we’d best look for wreckage or survivors.” Ryshad completed the thought.