Bates had operated with his usual efficiency. The smaller family carriage with his mother’s favorite team of white horses was at the front door. Hest handed her up into the upholstered interior and then followed her in. They did not have far to go, and the weather was not so terrible, but his mother enjoyed being seen descending from her carriage into the busy market. The coachman would wait for them, letting all know that Trader Finbok’s wife was at the market.

As soon as the carriage was in motion, Hest cleared his throat. “Father suggested that we first book my passage to the Rain Wilds, before we do anything else.”

She frowned. He had known that such a stop would not please her. It would take them down to the ships docks, and she would have a long boring wait as he exchanged pleasantries, found out which liveships were going up the Rain Wild River, and when, and then decided which to take passage on. Not all carried passengers. Most of their valuable cargo space was devoted to the goods they carried. Upriver went all the necessities of life that the Rain Wilders could not create or harvest for themselves. And that was almost everything. Downriver came the rare and the unusual, the magical artifacts of the ancient Elderling cities that the Rain Wild Traders had been plundering for generations. The long-buried cities were difficult to mine, and dangerous, but the value of the goods that came out of them was what had created Bingtown’s reputation as a town where “if a man could imagine it, he could buy it in Bingtown.” Was Trehaug almost mined out? There had been rumors that the supply of wonders would soon come to an end. The discovery of more buried ruins at Cassarick had been heralded as a renewal of the fountain of Elderling goods, but Hest knew what few cared to talk about: Cassarick had been a much smaller city and did not seem to have withstood the ravages of time and damp as Trehaug had. Which made the theoretical discovery of Kelsingra all the more tempting.

“No. That’s foolish.”

He had almost forgotten what had begun the conversation in his wandering thoughts. “Foolish?” he asked.

“How can you book passage when you don’t know when your new wardrobe will be ready? Or when you will find the perfect gifts to turn her silly head back to you? No, Hest, we will visit the Great Market first and lay all the groundwork for your renewed courtship. Later, when we know when the tailors will be finished, then you can go on your own to book your passage. That is a much more practical plan.”

“As you wish, Mother. I only hope Father agrees with you.” He sounded appropriately dubious about crossing his father.