Clariel: The Lost Abhorsen (The Abhorsen Trilogy Book 4) Read Online Free Page A

it was short, reaching only to mid-thigh, and did not meet his knee-high leather boots. A sword hung in its drab scabbard on the left side of his broad belt, and thrust through the belt on the right side was a narrow club of some dark, heavy wood.
    He turned as Clariel approached, bowed his head and snapped to attention.
    “Good morning, milady,” he said, without a flicker of emotion in his eyes or face. “My name is Roban. I have been assigned by the Guild to guard you when you go about the city.”
    “Thank you,” said Clariel. “Um, why do I need to be guarded? We got here without any guards.”
    “Actually, we were with you from several leagues outside the High Gate, milady,” replied Roban. “Incognito, being as the Lady Jaciel wasn’t yet admitted to the guild.”
    He didn’t look at Clariel, but at a point somewhere above her right shoulder. It almost felt like he wasn’t talking to her, but reporting to some invisible officer who was hovering above her head.
    “Did you really follow us in?” asked Clariel. “Why?”
    “Orders, milady,” replied Roban, not actually answering the question.
    Before Clariel could continue, she was interrupted by the bustling arrival of Valannie, who was always bustling, constantly on the move, busy doing something or organizing other people to do things. She was probably only ten years older than Clariel, and certainly did not look prematurely aged, but there was something about her which made her seem much older than anyone else around. She reminded Clariel of her grandmother, her father’s mother, who had been just such a managing person.
    “Lady Clariel, I am so sorry to keep you waiting,” she declared, pausing only to insert her arm through the crook of Clariel’s elbow. “Everything is arranged. We will go to Parillin’s first, for cloth, then to Mistress Emenor, she has by far the best dress-cutters. Then Master Blydnen for shoes, or perhaps Kailin’s, and I think Ilvercote for some scarves and suchlike. Oh, that reminds me. Take this for the time being. Don’t worry, you’ll soon have something more fetching.”
    She held out a blue shawl of some shimmering cloth. Clariel looked at it, but didn’t take it.
    “What’s this?”
    “A silk scarf, milady!” exclaimed Valannie. “To cover your head.”
    “I have hair for that,” replied Clariel. “And a perfectly good hat inside I can get if you think it’s going to rain. It doesn’t look like it to me.”
    “No, no, no! Hats are for ordinary folk! You must wear a scarf, Lady Clariel!”
    Clariel opened her mouth to say something about no one wearing scarfs on their heads in Estwael, but stopped as she saw her mother come out of the workshop door, trailed as always by apprentices and forge hands. She was not wearing her simple linen working clothes and leather apron, with its pockets full of files, hammers, pincers, rules and the like, but a kind of layered robe of blue and pale gold silks. She also wore a blue headscarf, though Jaciel’s was embroidered with small golden coins that caught the sunshine and flashed it back, proof of real gold.
    The lack of an apron was a bad sign, thought Clariel, because if Jaciel was not working, then she might take an interest in her daughter.
    This proved to be the case. Jaciel stopped in mid-progress toward the men who were unloading the charcoal and changed direction, coming straight at Clariel. As she approached, Roban stood even more stiffly at attention, and Valannie quickly put the scarf over Clariel’s hair, pulled it down to cover the Charter mark on her forehead, and knotted the ends under her chin.
    “Clariel. You have come down.”
    “Yes, Mother.”
    “No more tantrums then?”
    “I wasn’t having—” Clariel started hotly, before biting her lip. She never could seem to have a normal conversation with her mother. “That is, I am quite reconciled to my fate, thank you.”
    “Your fate?” asked Jaciel. “Rather portentous, don’t you