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paper
they’re written on…”
    “… frigging idiots… don’t leave shit
hanging out the tailgate…”
    Rahl stayed on the eastern sidewalk and
kept moving. At the foot of the pier was a pair of Council Guards from the keep
assigned to port duty. He scanned the faces quickly, but neither was a familiar
face from the handful of Council Guards he’d met through Kacet before his
brother had been transferred to the keep at Reflin.
    Just beyond the guards was the
black-stone building that held the portmaster and the customs collectors. Rahl
slipped through the port-master’s door, then stopped short of the guard
stationed inside. The guard took in the truncheon at Rahl’s belt and dismissed
it.
    That irritated Rahl, but he merely
straightened, and announced firmly, “A letter for dispatch.”
    Portmaster Hyelsen sat on a high-backed
stool. The window to the right of where he sat allowed him to look down the
main black-stone pier. Three vessels were tied up there. One was a
“three-masted square rigger, and one was a brig. The other was a smaller
schooner. Before Rahl could determine more, the portmaster turned. His eyes
fixed on the scrivener.
    “Young Rahl… I expect that will be the
letter the weaver paid to have dispatched to Valmurl.”
    “Yes, ser.” Rahl stepped up past the
guard and extended the letter.
    “Just in time. The Suthyan trader—the
square rigger— she’ll be leaving late this afternoon, on the evening winds, for
Brysta. Valmurl after that.” Hyelsen produced a pen from somewhere and wrote a
few words on a small square of paper, then handed it to Rahl. “Here’s the receipt
for you.”
    “Thank you, ser.” Rahl slipped the square
into his belt wallet, inclined his head, then turned and hurried out. Something
about the portmaster troubled him, but, he couldn’t have said what, not
exactly, except that when Hyelsen looked at Rahl, he seemed to be sensing more
than Rahl’s words or appearance.
    As he cleared the pier, Rahl took a deep
breath. He was still careful to watch for wagons and carts, and for what the
horses might have dropped on the pavement.
    Across the paved serviceway that fronted
the main pier and the two flanking it and back, past the memorial park to the
east, Rahl caught sight of the time-faded black stones of the Founders’ Inn.
    Had Creslin really so enchanted all the
Westwind Guards and the Montgren troopers with his songs that they worked
together from that moment on? Rahl snorted. There had to be a limit to what
song—even something like ordersong—could do.
    He looked farther south and up the wide
stone road that ran through the center of Land’s End to where it climbed the
rise south of the town to the Black Holding, where the Council still met. Rahl
shook his head. No matter what the magisters said and Tales of the Founders
recounted, Creslin and Megaera couldn’t have been that great. No one could have
been. He crossed the avenue, dashing behind an empty wagon I until he was on
the sidewalk on the west side. Ahead he noticed fresh boards across the front
of a shop. He didn’t remember what it had been, but he could make out some of
the painted lettering on the sign set into the bricks and partly covered by one
of the boards. “Fine tailoring,” he murmured. That could have been why he
hadn’t recalled it. He kept walking, past the coppersmith’s and then the
cooperage.
    Rahl smiled as he saw the chandlery ahead
on his right.
    He stepped up onto the narrow porch and
smoothed his hair and tunic. He tried to ease through the chandlery door
quietly because he sensed someone was already inside talking to Fahla. It
didn’t do any good. A bell attached to the door rang. Still, he moved to one
side, where he looked at the leather goods—a pack with wide straps, clearly
used, and an old bridle, and a wide belt with loops—almost an armsman’s or a
guard’s belt.
    Next to the pack was a small book, one
without a title on the spine. He opened it and looked at