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Authors: Sharon Shinn
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before. Now the clientele was purposeful and sober, and no one lingered long at a table.
“That’s some powerful demon chasing at your heels,” Orson said at last. “Do you ever plan to come to rest?”
“I’d guess you knew a demon or two in your lifetime,” she replied.
He nodded and forked up a bite of sausage. “I chased most of them back,” he said.
“I’m working on it,” she said.
He chewed and swallowed. “Well, if you change your mind, there’ll always be work at the freighting office for anyone as good as you. I imagine I’ll be there awhile if you were ever looking for me.” He gave her a keen look. “That is, if you ever go looking for anybody.”
“Not lately,” she replied.
Stef, Jack, and Carp joined them then and began noisily eating breakfast. Wen excused herself from the table as if she was only going to be gone a moment, but, in fact, she stepped out of the tavern and continued on down the street, leaving Orson to make her good-byes. When she was sure they’d already left the city, she’d retrieve her gelding and ride out. She’d go straight south, following the coastline for a while. Or, if the mood took her, she might try a directly eastern route. It didn’t really matter. There was nowhere she particularly wanted to go.
Chapter 5
RATHER TO HER SURPRISE, WEN SPENT THE WHOLE DAY wandering Forten City. It wasn’t much to look at, particularly compared to Ghosenhall, but she liked its incessant energy and its continual surprises. One street would feature a collection of respectable shops, and the next one would be nothing but taverns, brothels, and gaming establishments. More than once, Wen saw a prostitute sashaying down one side of the road while a fashionable matron strolled along the other. The divisions were more distinct in Ghosenhall, where whole districts were wealthy and well-kept, and everybody knew how to avoid the unsavory streets where the dangerous elements of society gathered.
The streets where Justin had grown up.
More than once, Wen had found herself walking through those chancy neighborhoods in Ghosenhall, her hands resting on her weapons as she wondered what it would have been like to try to survive in such surroundings. Her own childhood had been so different, tumbling through a ramshackle farmhouse with six brothers and sisters, an assortment of cousins, dogs, kittens, and the occasional duck or lizard in the mix. She had been the middle child and easily overlooked because of her small size and her generally agreeable nature. Not until she was convinced that someone else’s privilege or her own unwarranted punishment was absolutely unfair would she pitch any kind of fit, but then her temper, at least among her siblings, was legendary. Three brothers had taught her early on that she’d better learn to fight if she wanted to hold on to what was hers; three sisters had convinced her that she didn’t want to expend the energy required to dress up in pretty outfits and flirt with scruffy boys. She certainly didn’t want to attempt to run a household the way her mother did, or worry over finances like her father.
But she loved the camaraderie of a houseful of siblings, the rough-and-tumble affection, the bickering, the solidarity. After a while it seemed inevitable that all the forces that had shaped her would turn her into a soldier, most at home in the company of other tough, casual, physical individuals who didn’t have much distinction between work and play.
And she had found her place in Ghosenhall.
And lost it.
And now she was wandering the crazy-quilt streets of Forten City and wondering what to do with herself next.
She didn’t once ask for directions; she didn’t even consciously begin hunting for it. But she was not surprised to find herself, early in the afternoon, staring at the compound holding the estate
“That’s some powerful demon chasing at your heels,” Orson said at last. “Do you ever plan to come to rest?”
“I’d guess you knew a demon or two in your lifetime,” she replied.
He nodded and forked up a bite of sausage. “I chased most of them back,” he said.
“I’m working on it,” she said.
He chewed and swallowed. “Well, if you change your mind, there’ll always be work at the freighting office for anyone as good as you. I imagine I’ll be there awhile if you were ever looking for me.” He gave her a keen look. “That is, if you ever go looking for anybody.”
“Not lately,” she replied.
Stef, Jack, and Carp joined them then and began noisily eating breakfast. Wen excused herself from the table as if she was only going to be gone a moment, but, in fact, she stepped out of the tavern and continued on down the street, leaving Orson to make her good-byes. When she was sure they’d already left the city, she’d retrieve her gelding and ride out. She’d go straight south, following the coastline for a while. Or, if the mood took her, she might try a directly eastern route. It didn’t really matter. There was nowhere she particularly wanted to go.
Chapter 5
RATHER TO HER SURPRISE, WEN SPENT THE WHOLE DAY wandering Forten City. It wasn’t much to look at, particularly compared to Ghosenhall, but she liked its incessant energy and its continual surprises. One street would feature a collection of respectable shops, and the next one would be nothing but taverns, brothels, and gaming establishments. More than once, Wen saw a prostitute sashaying down one side of the road while a fashionable matron strolled along the other. The divisions were more distinct in Ghosenhall, where whole districts were wealthy and well-kept, and everybody knew how to avoid the unsavory streets where the dangerous elements of society gathered.
The streets where Justin had grown up.
More than once, Wen had found herself walking through those chancy neighborhoods in Ghosenhall, her hands resting on her weapons as she wondered what it would have been like to try to survive in such surroundings. Her own childhood had been so different, tumbling through a ramshackle farmhouse with six brothers and sisters, an assortment of cousins, dogs, kittens, and the occasional duck or lizard in the mix. She had been the middle child and easily overlooked because of her small size and her generally agreeable nature. Not until she was convinced that someone else’s privilege or her own unwarranted punishment was absolutely unfair would she pitch any kind of fit, but then her temper, at least among her siblings, was legendary. Three brothers had taught her early on that she’d better learn to fight if she wanted to hold on to what was hers; three sisters had convinced her that she didn’t want to expend the energy required to dress up in pretty outfits and flirt with scruffy boys. She certainly didn’t want to attempt to run a household the way her mother did, or worry over finances like her father.
But she loved the camaraderie of a houseful of siblings, the rough-and-tumble affection, the bickering, the solidarity. After a while it seemed inevitable that all the forces that had shaped her would turn her into a soldier, most at home in the company of other tough, casual, physical individuals who didn’t have much distinction between work and play.
And she had found her place in Ghosenhall.
And lost it.
And now she was wandering the crazy-quilt streets of Forten City and wondering what to do with herself next.
She didn’t once ask for directions; she didn’t even consciously begin hunting for it. But she was not surprised to find herself, early in the afternoon, staring at the compound holding the estate
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