Lady of the Star Wind Read Online Free Page A

exit. Barent would make a valuable hostage, exactly what he needed to buy their way out of the dead-end trap the marketplace had become.
    “Leave and you can never return to this spot,” said their mysterious hostess. “This chance comes but once to a Traveler such as yourself.”
    Sandy tugged at his arm, drawing him a step or two farther into the tent and interfering with his aim at Barent. “I think we need to listen to her. Maybe she can help. She’s protecting us right now. That’s worth something.”
    Their unusual hostess laughed, and the sound trilled like birdsong, changing from second to second. “I’m Lajollae, Keeper of the Globes of Amarkana.”
    “Which doesn’t mean anything to me,” he said, holstering his blaster as Barent strode out of his line of sight, going deeper into the marketplace.  
    Lajollae extended her arms, hands cupped in front of her at waist height. She held an iridescent bubble about a foot in diameter, which had materialized in the blink of an eye. A second bubble fought to come into existence, pulling itself out of the first. Tiny flecks of gold floated in the second bubble.
    One golden mote separated from the rest and drifted through the skin of its own bubble and across empty space to sink inside the lower bubble. A moment later, another particle began the same journey.
    “We have until the top bubble empties into the lower,” Lajollae said. “Then I’ll be gone from this place and time, your opportunity gone with me.”
    “Opportunity?” Mark tried to focus on the vaguely sensible part of her declaration. “To do what exactly?”
    “To Travel—come.” She beckoned for them to follow her into the tent’s second chamber.
    Mark and Sandy exchanged another wary glance.  
    “What have we got to lose?” She bent to retrieve her bag.  
    “I’ve got it,” Mark told her, suiting action to the words. “All right, let’s go see what this Lajollae is peddling. Stay behind me.”
    The princess trailing him, Mark followed the strange being into her other room, giving the floating bubbles a wide berth. He attempted to calculate how many of the golden motes might have already descended, but focusing on the glittering shards was hard, making measurement impossible.
    Seeing the dimensions of the inner chamber, he was positive this tent couldn’t have been in the part of the market they’d been running through just moments ago.
    Lajollae was intent on him, her lavender face unnaturally long. Even the diamond-shaped pupils of her eyes were lavender. “I’m the servant of Ones who came before, setting me to follow my appointed rounds through their domain, to provide the amusement of Travel. My mistresses are gone eons ago, to an existence you could never fathom, young race that you are. But I was left carelessly discarded, with no choice but to keep to my route. You aren’t what the globes were created for, true.” She shook her head, as if recalling a great tragedy. “But if the Nelafinari bring you to me, then I can serve—you’re marked as ones who can choose.”
    “The-the Nelafinari? The little fellow who guided us here?” Sandy had apparently identified at least one tangible fact to anchor herself in all this unreal discussion.
    Lajollae pointed, and Mark swung around to find two of the small beings now kneeling at either side of the tent’s entrance. “They know my need, know I must send Travelers on their way. So the pack hunts.”
    Mark didn’t like the idea of being prey, but the Nelafinari had saved them from immediate capture and, no doubt, his painful and prolonged death at the hands of Barent Kliin.  
    “We waste time.” Lajollae sounded uneasy. “You must choose to Travel or to stay.”
    “You keep talking about traveling. How do you propose to help us get away from the men pursuing us? Do you have a groundcar or some kind of ship here?” Mark wondered if the tent included a third chamber, a garage maybe.
    One of the Nelafinari growled deep in