Page 272 of Salt Between the Wolves

Ships arrived and departed with the tide, merchants argued over prices, and fishermen repaired nets along the harbor walls while gulls screamed overhead as if the world contained nothing more important than wind and food.

Eira sat in one of the upper rooms overlooking the bay, surrounded by maps she had promised herself she would finish reviewing before evening, though the promise was not going well.

She had spent the last hour reading the same paragraph three times, tracing a line of trade routes that crossed the western coast, a line she knew and understood, yet every few minutes she found herself staring through the window instead at the gray, cold, restless sea.

A knock sounded at the door, and before she could answer, Leander stepped inside with several folded papers beneath one arm.

"You've been looking at that map for an impressive amount of time."

Eira lowered her gaze. "I am studying it."

"You've been studying the same corner for nearly half an hour."

She ignored that.

Leander considered her for a moment. "Have you slept?"

"Enough."

"That wasn't a number."

"It rarely is."

A faint smile touched his mouth before he crossed the room and set the papers on the table.

"Then perhaps you'll be pleased to know I have found a problem interesting enough to distract you."

"I doubt that."

"So do I."

That earned the smallest hint of amusement, and for a while they worked in relative silence as Leander reviewed shipping reports and Eira sorted correspondence, while outside the harbor continued its endless, normal, predictable, and seemingly safe movement.

The sound of hurried footsteps in the corridor broke the illusion, and Leander looked up just before the door opened without ceremony.

One of the household guards entered and stopped just inside the room, his expression immediately erasing whatever reply Eira had been about to make and making it clear that something had happened.

"Lord Leander."

The guard glanced toward Eira and then back again. "There are riders from the north."

Silence settled over the room as Leander straightened.

"From where?"

"They claim to have crossed through the mountain roads three days ago."

That alone was unusual, since travelers rarely pushed that route this late in the season unless they had little choice.

Leander's expression sharpened. "And?"

The guard hesitated. "One of them says Frostvein banners have been seen south of the northern territories."

Eira went completely still, not visibly and not enough for anyone else to notice, but still enough that Leander noticed anyway, as he always did.

"How reliable?"

"The rider swears he saw them himself."