he knew which warehouses they had to go to. Before they had even left the street leading to the harbour, they could see from a distance a veritable forest of masts towering above everything. Once they had passed the last row of tenement houses, they were greeted by an open space – or at least a partially open one. From the residential buildings all the way to the quays stretched a wide, almost five-hundred-metre-long strip of cobblestones, onto which goods were being unloaded from the lazily rocking ships, mainly huge galleons. Impatient merchants were selling crates even before they had left the holds, which meant chaos reigned here. But there was a method to this madness, and everyone seemed to understand the laws governing it. Empty carts drove up to the appropriate spots and were loaded with precisely those goods that had already changed hands, and later, calmly and slowly, they drove off towards warehouses looming somewhere in the distance, or towards further ships to sail even further afield. Queues of carts stretched along the quay, just as James had said, heading for the cargo gates where one could pay customs duties on goods remaining on the island or being transported further by land.
‘We could have driven closer to the warehouses,’ James muttered from time to time.
‘We couldn't,’ replied Forth, who was keeping to the very front, constantly answering the elf. ‘Ever since the thefts have increased, you can only drive near the warehouses with a permit. Unfortunately, we don't have one.’
‘But it’s a carriage, not a covered wagon,’ grumbled the long-eared one.
Fortunately, Ari was walking right at the back and found it difficult to reply because of the crowd. Draco, accustomed to similar conditions on the Royal Tract and in the commercial districts of Dagos, moved without the slightest difficulty. Kei also seemed to have a very good sense of the crowd, as he didn’t stray even half a step from the dragon. James had the greatest trouble getting about; he kept bumping into people, so alongside his muttering came indistinct apologies thrown in the
