Unguilded by Jane Glatt Page A

they know my child will be powerful.”
    “Our child,” Valerio said.
    “Our child,” Arabella agreed.
    “Come, the Servers will take care of our bags and mounts. We have magic to do.”
    “Yes,” Arabella. She let her hand rest for a moment on her flat stomach before following Valerio Valendi towards the ferry dock. They had magic to do—a spell to ensure that her child was born without a living sibling.
     
    KARA PURSED HER lips and lifted the compress off her finger. The wound was still a little swollen, but she thought most of the infection had been drawn off. She prodded it with a clean finger and flexed her right hand. She felt only a twinge of pain.
    She was lucky, thanks to Mika. She was still wary of him, but she thought he was telling the truth—he was willing to risk much to learn how to read and write. Without his help she could have lost her finger—or even her life—and as long as she had something he wanted, she thought she could trust him to help her.
    She wondered if she could get more from Mika than safe passage to Rillidi Port. He was part of a world she’d never even heard of, a world where people weren’t owned by their guild, weren’t at the mercy of the guild’s wishes and desires. If she could become part of that world, she could choose the type of life she wanted. She might even be able to stay in Tregella.
    Her problem, Arabella Fonti had called her just before she’d told her to run away. Now Kara wondered if she’d hoped the daughter she’d never wanted wouldn’t survive the trek to Rillidi.
    Thoughtful, she stared into the fire. What problem was solved by Kara running away? Not Papa. Her mother had said she was going to divorce Papa. Arabella didn’t care about the daughter she’d born, so she likely cared even less about the man who’d fathered that child.
    Was she somehow a threat to Arabella’s position within Mage Guild? She would expect her mother’s reputation to diminish with her daughter’s escape, but maybe having a daughter without magic was worse. Kara running away didn’t change that, but it did mean she wouldn’t be around as a reminder.
    The guild wanted more Mages—it was a Guildsman’s duty to have children, talented children. But in all her years in Rillidi, her mother had not born another child. Did a Mage without talented offspring lose status? Would Arabella Fonti need to bear another child since her only child had no magic?
    Even if she did, that didn’t explain how her own disappearance benefitted her mother. Perhaps she really did want the best for her? Kara shook her head. That’s what she wanted to believe, not what she could believe.
    “Here,” Mika tossed a blanket to the ground beside her. “It’ll get colder once the sun goes down.”
    “Thank you,” Kara said. She was grateful to have more than her tattered shawl. She knew too well how cold it could get at night.
    “And I brought some books.” Mika held out a battered volume. A second one was tucked under his arm. Kara took the book from him and set it down in front of her.
    “ Navigation: Charting a Course Using the Sun and Stars ,” she read. She opened it to the first page. “It shows how to determine where you are based on the sky. I’ve heard of this, but it’s not something I’ve been taught. It’s a Guider Guild skill.”
    “That would be useful to a traveler like me,” Mika said. “The man I got it from said it was the story of Gyda—how she came from the heavens to show the First Guildsman the Way. There are pictures of the heavens, and Gyda’s star.”
    Kara flipped through the book until she found a series of drawings of the night sky. Sure enough, Gyda’s star was identified.
    “Yes, but the pictures show the sky as you’d see it in different seasons.” She turned the page. “See,” she put the book flat on the ground, and Mika leaned over her shoulder to look. “This is the sky in early summer, like now.” She flipped to the next page. “And here