Free Natural Ordermage by L. E. Modesitt Page A

feelings weighed on him more. She’d arrived cheerful, then almost run out the door. How could trading with Jeranyi upset her that much? Or were she and her family involved in more than that?
    It was probably stupid—and possibly dangerous—but he decided to walk down to the chandlery. After all, it wasn’t that late.
    He walked confidently through the darkness, knowing that he could find his way better than most people because he had a clear feeling for where things were.
    Even before he reached the chandlery, he could sense people around it, but the shutters were closed, and no lamps showed. Rahl had the feeling that whatever was happening was at the loading docks hi back. He retraced his steps to the narrow alleyway beside the alchemist’s and eased his way into the deeper gloom near the wall. His left hand rested on the butt of the truncheon for a moment before he grasped it and slipped it out of the leather loops. Why was he doing this?
    He had no idea, except that he was worried about Fahla. She’d acted like she was in trouble, and she never had done that before.
    Ahead of him he could sense two wagons backed up to the chandlery’s loading dock. He slowed and hugged the stone wall as he moved silently toward the wagons.
    He tried to hear the whispers.
    “… sure about this…”
    “… copied the notice… quoted it word for word…” That was Fahla.
    “… be here in the morning…”
    “… can get to the east cove and wait.
    Rahl smelled vinegar. At least, he thought it was vinegar, or maybe pickles.
    “… sure that’s wetted down good. Wouldn’t want an explosion now…”
    “… vinegar and water… done solid…”
    Although Rahl was trying to catch the words, his darkness senses registered someone moving toward him from out of the shadows on the south side of the loading dock.
    The man felt as though he carried a red-tinged shadow as he moved toward Rahl, except it wasn’t a shadow exactly. Rahl lifted the truncheon.
    The man said nothing, but lunged and thrust at Rahl with a long blade.
    Rahl near-instinctively slid/parried the thrust, then stepped inside the blade and kneed the man in the groin while slamming the truncheon across his temple.
    Rahl swallowed hard, because a sense of redness—and death—washed over him, even before the man toppled onto the dusty stones. How could one blow from a truncheon have killed a man?
    “You hear something? Where’s Hondahl?”
    Rahl backed away from the dead man and slipped back down the alleyway as quickly and quietly as he could. He couldn’t believe that the man was dead, and he still worried about Fahla, but he was much more concerned about his own safety.
    He stayed close to the wall and kept moving, as well as trying to check to see if any other guards might be nearby, but he didn’t hear, see, or sense any.
    Only after he was well away from the chandlery and headed back home did he consider the implications of what he had seen and heard—and done. Somehow, Fahla and her family were tied up with the Jeranyi traders and possibly the pirates. That was probably how they kept their prices low. They also feared more than losing goods if they were loading wagons in the darkness, without a single lamp lit, and had guards ready to kill people.
    He was still holding the truncheon in his left hand when he reached his dwelling, and he’d been looking over his shoulder the entire way back.
    “Rahl?” called Khorlya a moment after he closed the door.
    “Yes. I’m back.” . . “Good. Sleep well.”
    Sleep well? After everything that had happened?
    “Good night,” he finally said as he moved through the darkness to his own small chamber and narrow bed. He closed the door, close as it made the room feel.
    After undressing, he lay on his pallet, looking up into the darkness and thinking. Should he have gone to the magisters? But how could he after having killed a man? He knew that was cause for exile, jf not worse, even if he had been attacked. But