The Forgotten Sisters by Shannon Hale Read Free Book Online Page B

he makes himself,” he said. “Makes him pretty popular.”
    â€œNot with me. He’s bribing the traders to let him steal the mail and the girls’ allowance. I’m so livid I could eat a snake.”
    â€œYou should know something,” Fat Hofer said.
    Miri leaned forward, her breath held.
    â€œSnakes,” he said, “are delicious.”
    Miri scowled. “I have to go back to Asland and tell them what’s happening here.”
    â€œPlanning to walk to Greater Alva yourself? Bandits called those woods home not so long ago and perhaps still do. If you do get to the port, how will you pay passage to board a ship?”
    Miri stared at her bare feet, dried mud cracking off her toes. She felt as squashed as a toad in a wheel rut.
    â€œIf you find someone who will buy a silk dress, I’ll give you ten percent of what I make.”
    â€œThat’s thinking like a Lesser Alvan!” he said. “But alas, Lady Miri, no one in Lesser Alva cares about a silk dress. And unless you have solid coin, the traders arrange trades only through Jeffers. After your display, I’d guess Jeffers won’t be willing to do any business with you.”
    But she had to try. She was here to teach the girls, and she could not do that if they were busy as birds hunting for food every hour of the day. So Miri fetched one of Britta’s dresses and returned to Jeffers’s house.
    She clapped timidly and peered through the door curtain.
    More of the traders had joined the others in the house,sitting cross-legged on mats, eating flat bread, chatting in small groups.
    Jeffers leaned back in one of the wooden chairs, made cozy with frayed pillows. He smiled, but his eyes were unwelcoming.
    â€œYes?” he said.
    â€œI have a dress I’d like to sell,” she said quietly.
    Jeffers took a slow drink from a clay-fired mug. “It’s not proper for a lady to sell her own clothing off her back, now is it? Allow me to save your reputation by declining. But in good news, I found letters addressed to you!”
    He handed them to a young boy who brought them to the door.
    â€œApologies, the wax seals must have cracked on the journey,” Jeffers said with a shameless smile.
    She recognized the handwriting on the letters: one from Peder and one from Marda. She fingered the first letter’s broken wax and almost spoke an accusation when she noticed a blocky man with long hair and a bushy beard in the back of the house. A scar ran through one eye and split his cheek. Miri’s feet and hands felt icy cold.
    I know him. How do I know him?
    His meaty, scarred hand held onto the hilt of the curved dagger in his belt. He started to turn, as if he would look to see who Jeffers was talking to.
    Miri let the door close. She turned and ran from Jeffers’s house and off the island, her heartbeats keeping pace with her feet.
    Dogface
. That was what he was called. Two years ago she’d watched him and his fellow bandits depart Mount Eskel in a snowstorm. What would he do if he recognized the girl who spoiled their raid and led their chief over a cliff?
    Bandits have no honor. Bandits love only coin and death.
    Back at the house, Miri fetched ink, quill, and parchment from her bag and wrote a hasty letter to Britta, reporting what was happening with Jeffers and the allowance.
    When she returned to town the traders were gone. She kept running, her side aching, and caught them a few minutes into the woods.
    â€œHere!” she called. “Here’s a letter, if you please. For Princess Britta at the white stone palace. She’ll pay you for its delivery.”
    A young trader took it but looked at Gunnar with an eyebrow raised.
    â€œGive it here,” said Gunnar. “I’ll take care of it, my lady.”
    â€œUm, perhaps it would be best if I went with you and carried the letter myself,” she said.
    â€œYou could join us,” said Gunnar. “Unfortunately I