The Tales of the Wanderer Volume One: A Book of Underrealm (The Underrealm Volumes 4) Garrett Robinson (poetry books to read TXT) 📖

time to time—though there is nothing very lovely about bathing, truth be told. But in any case, I got a better look at Mag than most. I will not dwell overmuch on the details. Suffice it to say that she had a fine body. Exquisitely muscled and strong and … well, she was worth glancing at, let us say.”

Sun’s blush deepened, and Albern gave her another smile. “Are you sure you do not want me to stop? I had nearly forgotten about the proclivities of noble children.”

“Oh, please,” said Sun. “I am not some trembling son of Selvan. I am fine.”

“Well, then. It was quite some time before I noticed the oddest thing of all about Mag. She had no scars. None at all. Not on her body, her arms or legs. Not even her hands.”

“That makes sense, considering how well she could fight,” said Sun.

Albern frowned. “It does not make sense. No matter how skilled a fighter may be when they learn warcraft, they still have to learn it. And everyone, when they are learning to fight, gets injured. Training accidents are common. Your opponent is trying to strike you with a blade. No matter how blunted it is, no matter how padded your training armor, at some point, everyone spills a little blood. You yourself have scars on your hands that do not look like they came from a cooking accident.”

Sun frowned and looked down at a few tiny ridges on her knuckles. “That? That was no injury, only a blister from the back of my shield.”

“I knew that before I mentioned it,” said Albern. “Yet what I am trying to tell you is that Mag did not have even that much of a mark upon her. Her skin was perfect. Flawless.”

He paused, looking at Sun, who suddenly realized her eyes were wide and her mouth was hanging open slightly. Albern nodded.

“Yes. Do you understand now? Can you begin to glimpse Mag’s prowess? How skilled do you have to be—how naturally talented, I mean—to avoid any wound at all, even early in life? Even when you are first training to use a blade, or fight with soldiers by your side? And as time went on, we got to see Mag train—if you could call it training. Privately, I thought it was more of a demonstration that she was the best among us, and we were unworthy to march beside her. Not that she ever lorded it over us. But no one could touch her, no matter how many opponents they put against her in the practice ring.

“That was the beginning of her legend—right there, in the Upangan Blades. How could she be real? Think beyond her skill with a blade. How could she have avoided any cuts her whole life, even on her hands and knees as a child, running amid mud and rocks and scaling to the tops of trees?”

“It … it does not seem possible,” breathed Sun.

Albern slapped his hand lightly on the table. “And yet, there it was,” he said. “The evidence of it was plain—it lay right before our eyes. The Uncut Lady. I came up with that name myself, by the way.”

Sun felt herself entirely caught up in the wonder of it. But then the tavern’s door opened, and there came the sound of new voices. Sun glanced behind her—and felt her blood freeze.

There in the doorway stood the two guards from earlier, the ones from her family. They looked about the place, and for a frightful moment Sun thought they were still searching for her. But they stood relaxed and lazy, and when they saw an empty table on the other side of the room, they moved towards it.

They were not here for Sun, but only to get a drink. Although her pulse seemed to resume after a long moment of holding its breath, Sun still felt herself far too exposed. She glanced back at Albern, whose eyes had widened slightly.

“I take it you do not want those women to see you,” he said. “As with the constable.”

“You are correct.”

“Then ignore them, and talk with me as if we have been conversing all night.”

“If you will promise to keep an eye on them for me.”

“Of course.”

Sun sighed. “Very well. Tell me what happened in Northwood.”

A shadow passed over Albern’s face. “Many things, and nearly all of them dark. But it did not start out that way.”

When we arrived to her inn, I asked Mag to let me pay for the food and lodging of my friends. She understood at once. I had never done so before, and she could see the pain in my eyes when I asked it of her. By those signs, Mag knew we had come to her on an evil road. She never troubled Loren or her friends to pay for their lodgings, and when, in the end, I tried to pay her, she refused me, too.

Loren met an old friend in Mag’s common room—a boy named Chet. They went off on their own, and the rest of us ate and talked and simply rested after a journey that had gone on far too long. Shortly after the sun set, I encouraged the party to ready for bed.

I myself did not go to sleep right away, but stayed up to speak with Mag and Sten. It had been years, after all, and I was eager to hear how they had been getting on. Mag and I could never have been lovers, but she and Sten could never have been anything else. You could see it in the way they looked at each other, the little touches on the arm or shoulder when they would speak. They would share smiles that turned into private moments between the two of them, and never mind the fact that I was sitting right there.

First I told them all that had happened to our party in the Greatrocks—of how we had ridden north