The Glass Mountains Read Online Free

meat-seasoner belonged to a distinguished clan, and he and my father were good friends. My parents had made arrangements for me to mate with Sennim, the meat-seasoner’s handsome son, shortly after I came of age. Maruk, too, was already betrothed, to a girl in another village. Maruk and Sennim were good friends, but despite our future together, I didn’t know him very well. We might have been friends had our parents not decided to mate us. As it was he made me more curious than all the other boys put together, but I didn’t know whether that was because I knew we would mate or because I liked him particularly.  
    There was less meat to be had than usual, and the seasoner said that since his supplier was late we should be judicious about how much we ate. There was nothing unusual about that—often there was a shortage of game. We ate mostly roots, anyway. But because of the fears about Forma, the shortage left me worried. We walked out with our meat into the sunny evening. Sennim had sat down casually in front of the house, as he often did, as if he just happened to be there while I happened to be leaving.  
    Maruk sat next to him, and I found a place on the ground a few measures away.  
    “There wasn’t much meat today,” I said. Sennim squirmed, as he always did when I was around.  
    “I can get you extra,” he said shyly.  
    “Really!” I said.  
    “She doesn’t need extra meat if others must go short,” said Maruk sternly.  
    Sennim caught my eye, to tell me that if I still wanted, he would get me meat. But now I felt annoyed with him, as if Maruk’s rebuke were his fault.  
    “Look!” said Maruk to me. “Another stranger.”  
    This time it was a man. Usually years went by between each sighting of a stranger. This one had dressed himself in the garb of Bakshami. He found it difficult to walk in the sand, moving clumsily, without even a vestige of grace.  
    He approached and eyed us critically—he seemed to think we were game to evaluate and capture. Instead of greeting this stranger effusively, as tradition dictated, I was surprised at how by tacit agreement we continued to sit nonchalantly. Later, we all agreed we’d disliked him immediately. He had a long face like the man the sand swallowed, and his mouth turned cruelly. At his side hung something hard and shiny that I instinctively knew to be a weapon.  
    Sennim yawned. “Can I help you?”  
    I scooted closer to the man, but Maruk pushed me back protectively. The man ignored us at first, pacing back and forth, falling and slipping and shielding his eyes. Finally he deigned to speak with us. “I’m a busy man,” he said.  
    None of us knew what to say to that. The man, while handsome, seemed tremendously vulgar, and the fleas seemed to like him quite well. Bug bites covered his face. But we felt such curiosity about him that we waited eagerly for his next words.  
    Maruk, of course, would take over talking with him. I looked at Maruk in admiration. I was the most mischievous in our family, Katinka the loveliest, Jobei the most generous, and Leisha the funniest. But Maruk was the most dauntless, and the most admired.  
    The man studied Maruk, then settled his eyes on me. “Perhaps the girl would like some dried fruit?”  
    Maruk scowled at me, so I reluctantly said, “I don’t like fruit.”  
    “It’s the best fruit from Artroro.”  
    My heart beat faster, and I knew it was instinctively copying the beating of Maruk’s excited heart as he heard the word Artroro. “Have you visited Artroro?” I asked. I didn’t believe a flea-bitten man such as he could be native Artroran.  
    “Young lady, I’m wanted in Artroro and every sector on the planet, except Pussan, where everyone is an outlaw, and Bakshami, where no one is.” He bent to pet Artie, but my dog bared his fangs.  
    The stranger eyed us with a sort of bored hopefulness. “I understand some of the elders have fortunes stashed away. A fortune isn’t much use