“You want to be getting your plants in,” Halice observed. For all her years with a sword at her side, she’d grown up a smallholder’s daughter in that border district where the hilly land’s too poor for Lescar, Caladhria or Dalasor to be bothered who claims it.

“Getting dirt under my fingernails?” I scoffed. “I’ll see who’s willing to wager some sweat. A day digging my vegetable patch should make a decent stake for someone.” Someone who’d want coin to spend when the first ships arrived.

Goats were tethered on the common grazing cut by tracks already taking on the breadth and permanence of roads. We passed a lad struggling to get a peg in the ground while his beast prodded him with malevolent horns. “Peyt’s less use than that billy,” I observed, “and he smells worse. Can’t you just ship him back to Tormalin?”

Halice laughed. “Peyt could have his uses. Getting between me and some Ice Islander for one.”

The chill that made me shiver had nothing to do with the fluffy white clouds fleeting across the sun. “We’ve none too many decent fighters left, not since Arest took his troop to Lescar.” I wondered which of the continuously warring dukes had the gold and good fortune to secure his services.

“We’ll see familiar faces back before the sailing season’s half done.” Halice was unconcerned. “Allin tells me there’s been camp fever all over Lescar through the latter half of winter.”

“Lessay should be smart enough to get clear of that.” But Arest’s lieutenant had still opted to leave last summer. Land may be valuable, he’d said over a farewell flagon, and granted, it can’t be stolen or tarnished, but it’s cursed difficult to spend a field on drink or a willing whore. I couldn’t argue with that.

Genial, Halice swapped pleasantries with toiling colonists busy in burgeoning gardens and met sundry acquaintances bustling about their errands. Village life was what she’d grown up with, everyone living in each other’s pockets. I picked pockets when pressed into a tight corner and moved on swiftly. I’d been raised as a Vanam servant’s daughter in the midst of that busiest of cities where my mother kept herself to herself and not just to avoid the pitying glances of those inclined to patronise an unwed woman with a minstrel’s by-blow at her skirts.

I smiled and chatted but still found it unsettling to be so readily recognised by folk I barely considered neighbours. After half a lifetime making sure I went unremarked, I found this an unwelcome consequence of living with Ryshad. He’d helped half these people with something to do with their building and had dealings with the rest in his unofficial capacity as Temar D’Alsennin’s second in command. I’d yet to find a subtle way of letting these people know that gave them no claim on me.

Eventually we reached the wide river curling through the broad fertile plain between the hills and the sea. Indistinct in the mouth of the spreading estuary, I saw the solid bulk of the Eryngo, Kellarin’s biggest ship, riding secure at anchor as the crew made ready for their first ocean voyage, just as soon as the holds were full with goods to raise Kellarin’s credit back home. Closer to, the bare ribs of half-built ships poked above tidal docks hacked out of the mud the year before.

Halice’s gaze followed mine. “Our own caravels should be exploring the coasts before the last half of summer.”

“Do you think the Elietimm will try their luck this year?” I didn’t mind letting her hear my apprehension. “They’re not dogs, to take a lesson from the whipping we gave them.”

“We’ll be a match for anyone looking for trouble.” Halice sounded equal to the prospect. “Peyt and his mob will step up smart enough if it’s a choice between fighting back or having your skull split and I’ve told D’Alsennin I’ll be drilling any colony lads bright enough to swing a sword without braining themselves.”

I knew for a fact Ryshad wasn’t keen on that idea, concerned that the lads would find their loyalties split between D’Alsennin and the mercenary life. Well, that wasn’t my problem, and anyway, I had more serious concerns. “What about Elietimm magic? Swords don’t do so well against that.”

“Arrows and crossbow bolts kill an enchanter just as dead as anyone else.” Halice looked out towards the distant ocean. “I can’t see Guinalle and young Allin letting their black ships sneak up unnoticed. Let’s hope for the best while we plan for the worst. With Saedrin’s grace, all those ships will have to do is surveying.”

Halice turned to follow the track leading upstream towards Temar’s newly finished residence. A woman passed us, full skirts sweeping the grass, decorous kerchief around her head.

I looked after her. “That’s Catrice’s mother.” The woman hailed one of the boats busy about the placid waters of the river.

“Off to see Guinalle, I’d say. Let’s see what the demoiselle reckons to all this before we corner D’Alsennin.” Halice used her fingers to blow a piercing whistle and a mercenary called Larn promptly turned his boat towards us. A native of Ensaimin’s lakeland, he was currently earning his bread ferrying up and down the river.

“Want me to wait?” He showed Halice the deference of all sensible mercenaries.

She shook her head. “We’ll see ourselves back.”

I got carefully into the boat, bigger than the cockleshell skittering across the estuary with Catrice’s mother but still none too secure to my mind.

“You really should learn to swim,” commented Halice.

I stuck my tongue out at her. “It’s hardly a necessary skill for a travelling gambler.” Vanam is as far away from any ocean as it’s possible to get in the erstwhile provinces of the Tormalin Empire.

Sitting, I took an unobtrusive grip on the thwart. As Larn leaned into his oars I studied the far bank of the river. The all-entangling vegetation had died back from the stone ruins over the winter and had yet to reclaim them. That laid all the more starkly bare the decay of Kellarin’s first colony, founded generations before Vithrancel was even thought of.

More than attitudes and priorities separated the colonists and the mercenaries. Temar D’Alsennin and his hopeful followers had crossed the ocean an astonishing thirty generations ago, turning their backs on the dying days of Tormalin’s Old Empire. From their wistful recollections, all had seemed paradise for the first couple of years but then they’d suffered the first fatal onslaught of the Elietimm, ancestors of those same Ice Islanders who’d plagued both sides of the ocean for the past few years. Those early settlers who hadn’t been slaughtered fled upriver, hiding themselves in caves discovered while prospecting for metals. Ancient magic had hidden them all in a deathless sleep until the curiosity and connivance of the Archmage had unearthed the incredible truth, lost for so many years thanks to the Chaos that followed the death of Nemith the Last.

I’d enjoyed witnessing the discomfiture of Hadrumal’s conceited wizards when the ancient magic of Tormalin had proved to be nothing to do with their own mastery of air, earth, fire and water. I’d been intrigued to discover the same aetheric enchantments could be worked through those ancient songs of the Forest Folk, whose blood ran in my veins thanks to my wandering father’s fancy alighting on my maidservant mother. On the other side of the coin, that Artifice had been able to lock those colonists helpless and deathless in the shades between this world and the next still gave me the shudders and then there was Ryshad’s distrust of Artifice. I wasn’t so interested in it to risk losing him. I realised I was absently twisting the ring he had given me round and round on my finger.

As always Halice’s thoughts were more immediately practical. “Why’s Ryshad so set on making bricks? Isn’t there enough stone here to keep him happy?” She nodded at bright scars marking the age-stained grey masonry. Beyond using the place as a quarry, most colonists had no use for these uncomfortable reminders of years lost while they lay insensible under enchantment.