"There was one thing, though," said Peddo, staring with sudden interest into his empty cup. "I spotted areas that were trampled, as though a company had camped there. But cursed if I ever saw any such groups roaming. Jabi would see things off in the distance, beyond my sight, but by the time we got there-and he's fast, you know how fast he is-there'd be nothing to see. But cover to be had, if you take my meaning. Once I surprised four lads, who were hiding from me in the scrub. Jabi flushed them out, could see them moving, and they got nervous and tried to bolt. But they were only laborers, out looking for work. It puzzled me. I felt there was always something going on just out of my range of vision."
"Me, too. I felt the same thing. So did Scar. He was restless, stooping as at prey and then giving up on it. I go over and over those days in my mind. I just sense I overlooked something, that I missed the sign spread in my path, but I don't know what it is." He'd been missing too much. The commander was right: He'd been drowning himself in cordial, rather than doing his duty. He'd lost his edge. He wasn't keen set. But he couldn't say that out loud.
"You know what the tale says," added Peddo." 'Forest and cavern and mountain and lake and ravine and every village, too, all these hide crime from the reeve.' Nothing to be done about it. We find what we can. We do what we can."
"That's not good enough. The Guardians are dead. We're the guardians now. Who else is there?"
Peddo scratched his head. "Well. Any person who seeks to do what is right. Neh?"
Joss watched the lass flirting with the firefighters, who were boisterous, vibrant, and so very young, full of wholesome energy, the gift of the gods. They walked about their patrol every day, and when they saw smoke or flames, they ran to meet their trouble. "I met a southern merchant. You didn't run across him, did you? He called himself Feden." Wetting a finger, he drew the man's clan mark onto the table-top.
Peddo burped, considered, shook his head. "No."
The heat from the candle dried up the mark. Outside, it began to rain.
"He was from Olossi. He said he sent his factors, and later a slave factor, down into the empire to trade. It just got me thinking. There must be women in the south, just like there's women in the Hundred."
"Did it hurt that much when the lass called you 'Uncle'? That you think you have to go looking for women outside the Hundred? Don't mind her, Joss. She's not that much of an armful. Shame about the other lass, though. She did like you."
Joss shrugged. "It's not the worst day of my life. I'll miss Mada, though I'm happy for her good fortune. No, it's just, after a while, you do wonder, don't you?"
Peddo was eyeing one of the firefighters, the one who seemed just ever so slightly to be eyeing Peddo back. "I always do wonder, but I rarely find out."
"That's not what I meant! I wonder… what it's like. I wish I could go south."
"South? To Olossi? Why can't you? I mean, with the Commander's permission, of course. You'd have to have some patrol in mind, some mission. A message to carry to Argent Hall or-"
"No. I mean south, over the Kandaran Pass or across the Turian Sea."
"Out of the Hundred? You're crazy, my friend. You can't leave the Hundred. No reeve can. Break those boundaries, and you will be dead."
"I'm half dead anyway."
"Aui! Stop being maudlin. What do you know about the south anyway?"
"Nothing more than what the merchants tell me, and they're all liars."
"So they are."
"The fields are always green, the fruit is always ripe, the lands are always at peace, and the women are the most beautiful in all creation."
"You have had too much to drink," said Peddo. He emptied Joss's half-full cup into his own empty one.
"You've downed twice as much as I have. Anyway, I'm sure of it." Abruptly, taken aback by how badly he wanted it to be true, Joss leaned forward and fixed Peddo with a glare. "There must be a place where the shadows haven't fallen. Somewhere folk go about their lives in a measure of peace, like they used to here. Don't you think so?"
Peddo sighed. He bent closer, and pinned Joss's wrist to the table with the pressure of his hand. "You know what it says in the Tale of the Guardians.'Corruption and virtue wax and wane within the heart. Yet it is the dutiful strength and steady hand of those who live and die while about the ordinary tasks of the world that create most of that which we call good and harmonious.' If you give up hope, if you give up trying, you'll never find peace. No one will."
He sat back, released Joss's wrist, and drained his cup. Glancing toward the table by the door, he suddenly sat up straighter. "Whoop. He's coming this way."
"You're blushing," said Joss, unaccountably cheered by the sight, as if Peddo's blush of itself could banish shadows. "Do you want me to get out of your way?"
"Yes, but stick around long enough to open up the conversation and make me look clever and funny."
"That won't be easy!"
"Maybe not, but it can't be any harder than tracking down the most beautiful woman in all creation. If such a thing even exists, which I doubt."
"Best get my practice in, then." As the young firefighter paused beside their table and offered them a sweet, if tentative, smile, Joss lifted a hand to indicate the bench beside Peddo. "Greetings of the day to you, ver. Can we buy you a drink?"
PART THREE: GHOSTS
In the South: Kartu Town, on the Golden Road
6
IT BEGAN WITH such a small thing. Who could have known?
"I'm thirsty, Mai! My throat is dry dry dry!"
Mai loved her half sister and cousin Ti; she really did. But despite being the same age as Mai, Ti could not sit still for more than five breaths at a time. On the days when Ti came with her to sell produce at the marketplace, it wasn't very restful.
"Go and get a bowl of kama juice, then. We'll share it. Here." She unhooked the wooden measuring bowl from the handle of the cart. "But hurry. I can't sell almonds without the bowl."
Ti grabbed the bowl out of her hand and bounced off into the swirl of the marketplace, all bright awnings, swarming buyers, and gesticulating sellers. Kartu Town's main marketplace was actually one long street that emptied into the main square. Folk brought their carts and set up their stalls on either side of the street most days, raising awnings or parasols depending on the season and time of day to ward off the sun's glare. The marketplace used to be in the square itself, but not anymore, of course. That had all ended twelve years ago.
Kartu's residents had adapted. As Grandmother said, Kartu Town thrived because the townsfolk were reeds, able to bend when the wind blew.
"Ah, Mai'ili, such a fine day!" Mistress Zaldra swept up to Mai's cart with her youngest child in tow and a slave boy carrying her purchases.
"A fine day, indeed, Mistress Zaldra. I hope you are well."
"I'm not well!"
"I'm sorry to hear it. What troubles you today, Mistress?"
Her catalogue of troubles was lengthy and detailed, but Mai asked her questions each time she paused for breath and it was the widow herself who finally brought her complaints to a close. "Enough! I have need of peaches, dear."
"The market rate is one zastra a peach today. That's what everyone is charging."