Daja's Book by Tamora Pierce Read Free Book Online

to Daja, fluffing up its chin-feathers.
    â€œI don’t know where Tris is,” Daja told the bird. “I think she was in the library all afternoon. Go catch bugs for supper, Shriek.”
    The bird named Shriek chirped harshly.
    â€œI can never tell if he knows what’s said to him,” Frostpine remarked.
    â€œThe problem is that he’s most interested in food, and he always wants that
now
.” Daja grubbed in a pocket and came up with some brown bread from lunch. Breaking it up into crumbs, she put them down for the starling. He ate briskly.
    â€œI’ve been thinking about the work you can do while we’re here,” said Frostpine, watching Shriek. “We don’t want you getting out of practice, and I’m afraid helping Kahlib with his extra work is out of the question for now. It seems the Trader caravan wants him to do some touch-ups here and there.”
    â€œAnd I can’t do any of their work ’cause I’m
trangshi
,” Daja said bitterly. “So what’s left?”
    â€œBoth Kahlib and the castle’s head carpenter are in need of more nails.”
    â€œFrostpine!” Daja protested.
    â€œI know, I know—but that’s the best I can manage. Besides, the discipline is good for you. Smithing of any kind, magical or not, is plain hard work.”
    The door opened to admit Briar and Tris. The moment he saw Tris, the starling began to shrill in the bone-rattling squall used by all fledglings of his breed. Flapping inside to perch on Tris’s shoulder, he pecked her ear.
    â€œShriek, stop! You’re a grown bird—act like it!” Flinching, she removed the lid of the small covered bowl that she carried. It was partly filled with tiny balls of raw meat and hard-boiled egg yolk. Bouncing to her wrist, the starling began to gulp them down.
    Frostpine got to his feet. “I’d best go put on a clean habit if we’re supping with Lady Inoulia,” he commented, stretching. “She looks like the kind of woman who cares if people come to the table in work clothes.” Passing Briar on his way inside, he tweaked the boy’s nose.
    Briar grinned, swatted the smith’s hand away, and walked onto the balcony, one hand in his pocket. “Want to see something dumb I did?” he asked Daja, producing a lump of dirty, irregular glass.
    Daja held it up to the last rays of the sun, inspecting it. Some of those black wisps looked like plant matter, dried grass or root. “Where’d you find this?” she asked.
    â€œI made it,” was Briar’s glum reply. He leaned against the door to the inside, running his fingersthrough his hair. “I fried about three silver astrels’ worth of dead saffron while I was at it.”
    Daja figured the amount: he’d
burned
enough saffron to buy a poor family’s meals for three months? “Why do a stupid thing like that?”
    Tris, joining them, asked, “Yes, why?”
    â€œI didn’t
do
it a-purpose,” he snapped. “I was
trying
to see if the bulbs were still alive, and—lightning jumped out of me.”
    Tris held out a hand. Daja passed the lump to her. “The soil in crocus beds is mostly sand,” Briar explained. “When I added lightning, I got glass.” As Tris examined the lump, her magic causing it to shimmer, Briar added, “If I have to cut
my
hair to stop lightning from growing in it like you did, I might as well shave myself as smooth as Frostpine is on top. It’s not like I have extra hair.”
    Tris’s frown twisted into a wry smile. Even with her own hair cropped, she had more of it than Briar.
    â€œ
Here
you all are.” Sandry came out onto the balcony, pulling three bobbins of undyed thread from her string workbag. “I need you each to take one of these and keep it on you for a day or so.”
    â€œWhy?” Briar wanted to know, when she offered one to him. “It’ll get