Wayfarer (Wanderlust 2)

Chapter One

They had only ever seen the Port of Till from a distance. Up close, it was much larger and much busier than any port Soren had ever seen. West Draulin had a large port. Co had a large port. Till was different. Piers, docks, ships and boats spread far into the distance. It looked chaotic and orderly at the same time. It looked amazing.

Soren stood at the helm, guiding the Wanderlust along the coast. The Wanderlust was a big ship. In many places they had visited, they had been one of the biggest ships. That gave them some power, since smaller ships and little sail or rowboats had an easier time moving and could get out of their way. Till was no different. Little boats and ships sailed around them expertly, like flies buzzing around them. Farther down the coast, there were some large ships docked or anchored off shore.

Tanden either had an innate skill for knowing where the Wanderlust would be allowed to moor, or he simply paid enough to make the harbourmasters look the other way. Soren had never really known, but Tanden was doing it again, eyeing the port and calling out instructions to Soren and the men.

As he always managed to do, Tanden had noticed a large pier with space for the Wanderlust. They brought her in as gently as possible. Tanden continued to shout instructions while also working with the men to furl the sails and get the mooring lines ready. When they were close enough, a handful of men jumped onto the pier to tie off the ship.

Almost as soon as the ship was secure, Tanden hopped off of her to go find a harbourmaster and pay, leaving Soren to finish ensuring they were properly moored. Double-checking the men's work really was just a formality, Soren trusted everyone on the crew, especially with something as routine as mooring.

Tanden returned as they were placing the gangway, and hopped back onto the deck. "We're welcome here," he said, walking across the deck to join Soren. "We'll stay a few days, finalize our plans, and then, you and I are going inland."

"How?"

"That's something I need to look into," Tanden replied with a shrug. He had already moved on, and walked over to climb onto his usual spot along the bulwark. The crew knew what that meant, and gathered around.

"Gentlemen," Tanden looped an arm through the shrouds beside him. "Welcome to Till. Till is a lovely city that we don't know much about. Now, I always expect everyone to be on their best behaviour when you're on shore leave, so I shouldn't have to remind you. Teltish is apparently a common enough language here, so you should all be able to get by. We'll be mooring here for at least a week, but at some point Soren and I will be leaving you to head inland, and visit Sunland. The details of our excursion are as of yet unclear. For now, you'll all be enjoying our usual time off schedule, starting this evening. Until then we'll be dealing with cargo, and our Lady Wanderlust could use some proper love and affection. Don't you all agree?"

Then men agreed heartily, and went off in clumps to get to work as Tanden hopped off of the bulwark. "Soren, Ivern, with me."

A moment later, the three of them stood around Tanden's desk. Tanden flipped open two ledgers-the one where he kept track of cargo, and the one for crew's payments. "I need to head into the city and talk to some people," he said, as he leaned over the books. "We'll need to offload some cargo, you two can see to the specifics while I'm out. And find out what we need for the crew. I'll see who we can do some trading with. We'll pay the men as their shore leave starts."

Ivern nodded. "And your excursion? I know you don't have details, but you must have some plan."

"I want to go into Sunland," Tanden said. "Look-" he walked over to the wall, where a large map was hung, covered in pins. Till was a small country on the coast. To the East, there was Sunland. It was labelled, but it had no borders. It just disappeared off the edges of the map. "We don't know anything about Sunland," Tanden explained. "Do you even know why it's called that?"