"We have reached the river people," Leanalham said. "Our journey will be easier."
"Why is that?" Wynn asked.
Leanalham smiled. "You will see. Sgaile will arrange passage down the Hajh."
"The… 'spine'?"
"Yes. The river passes by Crijheaiche, the settlement of the Anmaglahk, on its way to the northeast bay."
Wynn admitted that traveling by boat was more convenient, but it offered less of an opportunity to see this world up close. Still, she might get a thorough overview from the river's open way.
"Chap!" she called, scanning the trees. "Come back here, unless you wish to swim the rest of the way."
Sgaile turned his head with a warning frown, and Wynn fell quiet.
It was not hard to fathom his worry. Soon Sgaile would face another encounter with his people. Anmaglahk he might be, but his social skills were as stunted as Magiere's. Unlike Magiere, this shortcoming appeared to concern him.
"Gather," he called out in Elvish.
Osha and Urhkar took parallel positions at the procession's sides. As the aspen grove thinned, Wynn drew a long breath. Through the trees she saw three broad vessels slipping past upon the wideHajhRiver.
The barges looked like massive flat-bottomed canoes as opposed to their square and flat human counterparts. Laden with twine-bound bundles and smooth, slatless barrels, they rode lightly like leaves in a stream. Two headed downriver, while the other passed on its way up.
Each had a central mast of polished yellow wood. Their sails were furled, but the bound fabric was brilliant white in the bright sun.Where their raised sides turned inward at the pointed bow and stern, single tines sprouted to either side of their hulls like straight, bare branches on a tree's trunk. Wynn could not guess what these were for.
Elves front and rear in the barges held long poles but seldom dipped these. The downstream vessels moved on the current, and although the one headed upstream traveled as smoothly as the others, behind its stern, river water churned softly, like the slow thrashing of a giant fish just below the surface.
"Wynn! Get up here!"
Leesil's harsh shout broke Wynn's enchantment. She had unwittingly stopped while staring at the barges. Leanalham pulled on Wynn's sleeve, while everyone else stood waiting. Their entire procession had halted and not one of them looked pleased with Wynn.
She hurried to catch up as Leanalham outdistanced her. Magiere firmly pushed Wynn out ahead of herself, and Osha sighed some exclamation under his breath.
Chap charged through the aspens, the white female on his heels. Wynn saw no sign of the majay-hi pack, and Chap's companion stopped short, hanging back to shift uncertainly among the trees. Before Wynn tried coaxing her closer, Sgaile urged all of them onward. Just ahead lay a settlement more diverse than that of Sgaile's clan.
A few domiciles were made of stout aspens bent toward each other overhead, with vines of spadelike leaves woven into walls between them. In the upper branches of an elm, wood platforms supported partitions of anchored fabrics as well as shaped vines. One tall building was made of planked wood, grayed with age and weather. Thin smoke rose into the air from somewhere hidden at the settlement's far end.
The elves worked at varied tasks, mostly to do with goods near the docks. Their clothing had morehide and leather than the people of Sgaile's home wore. Many wore their hair cut midlength or even short to the scalp. Dock-workers picked among barrels and bundles, taking stock of goods arriving or awaiting departure.
Few noticed the newcomers at first, but by ones and twos they paused and called or gestured to companions. Wynn saw displeasure and even hatred, as in Sgaile's enclave, but none showed initial shock upon seeing humans. This made her more anxious.
"Is this a center of commerce?" Wynn asked.
"Commerce?" Leanalham said. "I do not understand this word."
"The way you purchase… acquire with money."
Leanalham blinked twice."Money?"
"The people trade," Osha explained in Elvish, "all knowing the value of a thing, by its make and the time and effort involved. We barter, but we do not have…" He stumbled and switched to Belaskian: "Money. And An-maglahkdo not trade."
"Why not the Anmaglahk?" Wynn asked, still baffled.
"Quiet," Sgaile said.
A darker-skinned elf in matching leather breeches and tunic-style shirt rose at the head of one dock from inspecting bales of cattail heads. He appeared neither hostile nor surprised, and Wynn suspected all here somehow knew they were coming.
Leesil and Magiere hung back as Sgaile approached, but Wynn crept a little closer to listen.
The leather-clad man scanned them all, with an especially close study of Leesil and then Magiere. His blond hair was cropped semishort and stuck out in bristles. Soft lines creased his brow as if he frowned too often, and his tan skin glistened with sweat.
"Sgailsheilleache," he said. "You are always welcome."
"My thanks, Ghuvesheane," Sgaile answered.
It took Wynn some thought to discern the man's name-Black Cockerel. It matched his demeanor if not his appearance.
"I need passage to Crijheaiche," Sgaile said, "for seven and one majay-hi."
Ghuvesheane shifted his weight to settle on the other foot. "I cannot ask this of any bargemaster. Not even for you."
Sgaile's expression hardened. "Has one of mycaste passed this way?"
Ghuvesheane nodded sharply. "Three days ago.A woman, traveling fast. She took passage on Hionnahk's barge, headed downriver."
"You must try for us," Sgaile insisted."By request of Most Aged Father."
Ghuvesheane's eyesnarrowed, and he closed them.
"Ask them," Sgaile said flatly. "Ask in the name of Most Aged Father. Who among you would refuse the Anmaglahk?"
"Assisting your caste is not at issue," Ghuvesheane returned, eyes still closed."As you well know."
Several elves down the docks stopped in their labors. Two came up behind Ghuvesheane, dressed akin to him. But they looked far more offended, as if Sgaile had asked something shameful-something he should not have asked at all.
"Is it not enough that you bring humans among us"-Ghuvesheane finally opened his eyes, his steady gaze shifting toward Leesil-"let alone a murderer and traitor?"
Wynn bit her lip against a blurted denial. Osha remained passive, but an echo of the dockworkers' embarrassment filled his expression.
Urhkar licked his lips as if they had gone dry. "That charge has not been validated."
Ghuvesheane remained unconvinced."Perhaps not, but you still ask too much, and my answer is the same."
Neither Leesil nor Magiere understood what was said, but Wynn wondered what would happen if Sgaile was unable to procure passage.
A young and thin-muscled elf came up the shoreline. "I will take you," he said, ignoring Ghuvesheane. "No one need ask me." He glanced at
Leanalham, as if he knew her. "We are still loading, but there is space near the front."
Dressed in leather breeches, he wore a goatskin vest with the leather side out and no shirt beneath it. He was barefoot and gestured to a small half-loaded barge down at the end of the next dock.
Ghuvesheane turned away with an exhale tainted with disdain.
Sgaile's jaw twitched as he nodded to the young bargemaster.
The exchange was peaceful enough, yet Wynn felt that it cost Sgaile more than all the rest of the journey combined. Much of their passage seemed to have taxed the Anmaglahks pride.