"Yes." She had learned that earlier in the summer.

"Once we're at the chain - it's two chains, actually - our boat will take us along it link by link, from the Tombstone to the Harbourmaster's tower," Frostpine went on. "If you find a weak spot, tell me - even if it seems unimportant. I'll strengthen it as I strengthen the spells on the chain." Reaching back, he patted her knee. "I wish I didn't have to do this with you, but -"

"I'm the only other one with smith-magic at Winding Circle." She took her face out of his clothes so he could hear her soft voice. "I'm the only one who can feel things like you do."

"If things go wrong, I may need to draw on your power," he added. "It may take both of us to finish the job."

"Serious magic," breathed Daja.

"As serious as anything you or I have ever done."

When they turned off the road to Summersea, to follow a steep downhill track to the harbour, Daja hid her face again. Finally they stopped; she could hear the welcome sound of waves slapping rock. She opened her eyes when Frostpine dismounted, to see they were on the southeast side of Bit Island, inside the harbour wall. Torches had been planted in the sand to cast light on a waiting longboat, crewed by men and women in the dun jerkins and breeches of the Ducal Navy. Daja slid off the horse and ran for the boat, blushing crimson at the soldiers' laughs. Once aboard, she planted herself quite solidly on the middle bench.

"We need to work on your riding," Frostpine remarked as he pulled the hard cloth bundle off his horse.

"We need to do no such thing," she muttered in Tradertalk. "I'll just walk."

"Walking carries no freight, and a freightless Trader is a poor one," he replied in the same language, opening the cloth. From it he drew a long, limp roll of silvery mesh. Its mirrors and wire glinted in the torchlight.

Carefully the Guards climbed into the longboat. Five had brought long spears. They seated themselves among the sailors, and braced their weapons between their knees and feet. Once they were settled, Frostpine passed the metal net aboard the boat. The sailors opened it to its full length and width, then fastened it overhead, using the spears to hold it like a canopy. Once it was secure, other Guards took crossbows and quivers from their saddles and boarded, leaving one of their number to look after their mounts.

Daja was shifted to the port rail, one bench away from the prow. Frostpine was on the same side, two benches behind her, the pack that a Guard had carried for him between his knees. When everyone was in place, the Guards with spears angled them outward, stretching the metal net canopy until it covered the boat.

"I won't activate the spell until we're at the chain," Frostpine told everyone. "But keep this in mind: once I have, don't look overhead. It would prove very unsettling, take my word for it."

Daja nodded hard; she could vouch for how unsettling the spell-net could be!

"Once we're in sight of the chain, no talking except in whispers," ordered the sergeant, placing her crossbow on her lap. "And be miserly with those!" Everyone nodded. Living near the sea all their lives, they knew how sound carried over open water.

The coxswain nodded to the pair of sailors who stood outside the boat, ankle-deep in the gentle harbour surf. Grunting, they pushed the boat into deeper water and hopped in. The coxswain whistled softly, and the oars went up; a second whistle, and they bit into the water.

Daja felt better already.

Bit and Crescent Islands passed on the left like shadows. Seeing trees on the islands, Daja realized that it was almost fully light. She huddled down, feeling uncomfortably visible, even with the bulk of the island and the thick harbour wall between them and the menace at sea. There were no glimpses of it to be had; the wall kept it from view.

When they hit larger waves off Maja Island, a strained voice said, "How much longer?"

It was Frostpine. A sailor hooked a hand through the belt on his habit, allowing the dedicate to lean over the side. Taking deep breaths, Frostpine locked one hand on the bench, the other on the rail, gripping them so hard that his knuckles turned white.

Daja hid a smile under her hand. "I'd've thought you sailed better," she whispered.

"I don't. I need faults, to accent my excellence - otherwise ..." He gulped. "I would be too wonderful to live with."

He gasped, and made a dreadful noise deep in his throat.

"Lucky girl, to have so modest a teacher," joked a Guard softly.

"He thinks it's bad now," the sergeant whispered, grinning, "he ought to be outside the harbour. That's where the real sea beats. This here is like boating in my washtub."

They came out of Maja Island's lee. Ahead in the grey morning light was the harbour's mouth, an opening fifteen hundred yards wide. On the west it was guarded by the rising bulk of the Harbourmaster's Tower, on the east by the granite lump and smaller tower of the Tombstone. Beyond them, lightning flickered against a mass of black clouds.

Daja gasped.

"It's a fake," the coxswain told her, clipped voice mild. "Mage-work."

Daja tried to relax. If it was a fake, it was a convincing fake of a shipkiller storm.

Something at the foot of the Harbourmaster's Tower flickered in the corner of her eye. She frowned, and made herself look dead ahead. There, in her side vision, a galley-shaped billow of silvery fire rocked in the lee of the huge tower, inside the wall. Another such shape - a galley spelled to invisibility - lay off the Tombstone. These had to be the Duke's ships, Daja realized, shielded by magic, and serving as an extra, secret guard at the harbour mouth. It wasn't just the enemy outside who believed in hiding in plain sight.