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Part Two – PELDANE

CHAPTER NINE

There was aalone with Silk in the second floor sitting rooarath, and Beldin returned The man was stocky He had silver-shot hair and beard and he wore a large gold earring in his left ear"Ah, there you are," Silk said, looking up as the three theed clothes and noore plain doublet and hose of a nondescrip brown "This is Captain Kadian He's the one who took our friends to the mainland"

He looked back at the boatested

"If you want reed He had that rusty sort of voice seafaringdrink, Garion surmised

He took a s froan, "it was three days ago when it happened I'd just come up froan" He made a face "It's an unhealthy sort of a place--all swao of ivory up here for the Consortiu around for a cargo A ship doesn't make any money for her ohen she's tied up to a wharf, y'knoent to a certain tavern I know of The tavern keeper's an old friend of er--and he sort of keeps his ear to the ground for ot there and set myself dohen my friend, he comes over to e at a good price I says to him that I'm always interested in that kind of proposition, but that I'd want to knohat kind of cargo was involved before I s I don't like to carry--cattle, for instance They can dirty up the hold of a ship to the point where it takes weeks to get it clean again Well, o involved at all It was just soe to the mainland I says that it wouldn't hurt none to talk with them, and so he takes me into this roo at a table--two men, a woman, and a little boy One of the men was dressed in expensive clothes--a nobleman of some kind, I think--but it was the other one as did all the talking"

"Was there anything unusual about that one?" Silk pro ordinary clothes, but that wasn't what caught ht he was blind--because of his eyes, you understand--but it seeh his eyes don't have no color at all I had a ship's cook one time, and one of his eyes was the same way

Foul-tempered sort he was, and a real poor excuse for a cook Well sir, this man with the funny eyes, he says that he and his friends had to get to Peldane in a hurry, but that they sort of wanted it kept quiet that they was going there Then he asks me if I knows of a place outside of die town of Selda where I could put them on the beach with no one the wiser, and I says that I did" He pulled his nose slyly "Just about any man as owns a ship knows of a few places like that-custo what they are an' all I sort of had e on a lonely beach soure that what a etsh ondrink from his tankard and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand "Like I say, I had mysuspicions about these people by now and I was just about to tell them that I wasn't really interested in the proposition, but then the wo the talking She earing a kind of long cloak or robe of some kind made out of black satin She kept the hood of it up the whole tiht grip on the little boy

Anyhow, the one with the white eyes, he pulls out a purse and spills it out on the table, and that purse was full of gold,these coasts That put a whole new light on the situation, let ain right then and there, and I asks the the talking, he says they'd coht off that my suspicions wasn't too far off the mark You don't find very many as is honest ant to sail out of a harbor in the dark of night, but we'd already struck our bargain, and I had his purse tucked under my belt, so it was too late to back out We sailed that very night and got to the coast of Peldane on the next afternoon"

"Tell the," Silk said intently

"I was just about to, your Highness," Kadian said "That coast down there is sunk in fog alot there wasn't no exception It was thicker than a wool cloak, but the people in Selda, they're used to it, so they always lights beacons on the city walls to guide ships into their harbor on foggy days I took s on those beacons and I didn't have no trouble finding the beach I wanted We hove to a few hundred yards offshore, and I sent ers toward the beach in a s a lantern fro, and I put so on pots and pans to help him find the way Anyhow, after some time passed, we could hear the sound of the oarlocks out there in the fog near the beach, and we knowed the bo'sun's coht of a fire co all sort of ot quiet We waited for a bit, but the bo'sun, he never cas, so I ordered the anchor up, and we sort of eased on back out to sea I don't knohat happened and I wasn't going to stay around to find out There was things going on that made me real nervous"

"Oh," Beldin said, "such as what?"

"Well sir, one time in the main cabin, this woman as the white-eyed man and the aristocrat had with the kind of restless and all, and I seen her hand Now, it ht in the cabin or some such--I don't spend all that much on la--it seemed to me that there was sparkles under the skin of her hand"