issue of his betrayal by rescuing us, and probably she found the whole matter very puzzling and significant.
It had occupied my own thoughts for all of about two minutes. It was clear that he'd waited near Casto Canto, assuming we'd be too lost and disorganised to deviate from the plan. It was equally obvious that his motive for such a preposterous and melodramatic deed was his obsession with Estrada. The only question in my mind was whether he'd try to follow us further. If he did, he'd have little luck now that the width of the Casto Mara was between us.
With that cleared up, I'd decided I still couldn't give a donkey's arse about the fat old crook. It wasn't me or Saltlick he'd saved. He probably wouldn't piss on me if I was on fire and he had a bladder infection. We would likely have escaped anyway, and without so much carnage or needless spectacle. All told, it was easy for me to put aside the whole shameful incident.
At first, I'd experimented with trying to get comfortable, but I was too cramped to make any headway. Even stretching a foot or twitching a hand sent the boat into dangerous convulsions. I settled for watching the clouds scud by overhead. After a while, I drifted off, half awake. I'd start occasionally, struggle to remember where I was, and look around in alarm at the liquid expanse around me. The sun was lower in the sky each time, there was a little more chill in the air, and Saltlick and Estrada were still gazing at nothing. On the fourth such occasion, I found the sky streaked with melting bands of purple, and the nip in the breeze a distinct coldness. Little else had changed, within or without the boat. Estrada had her eyes closed, Saltlick was still rowing steadfastly, and ducks and moorhens were still bustling about. The river's flow had picked up, however, since my last inspection. The ripples were white-flecked once again, and deep enough that in the failing light the muddy current resembled a furrowed field convulsing under small tremors. We must have travelled quite a distance into Paen Acha. The forest would continue more or less unbroken on the east bank until the tail of the valley choked it off. To the west, it was only a wide stripe across the land, which soon would give way to…
'Saltlick,' I cried, failing to keep the alarm out of my voice, 'we should stop now.'
Estrada's eyes flicked open. 'We've an hour's light left,' she said, sounding slightly groggy.
'That's nothing to do with it. Saltlick, pull in to the bank.'
Estrada, wide-awake now, told him, 'Keep going. Leave him alone, Damasco.'
'We're getting close to Altapasaeda.'
'So?'
'So, there may not be many places where I'm welcome in the Castoval, but there's only one where they'll chop my head off before they even bother to arrest me. The farther I stay from Altapasaeda and their crazy ideas about law enforcement, the less likely they are to find an opportunity.'
Estrada looked at me with puzzlement. Then, as though talking to an addled child, she said, 'Damasco, where did you think we'd been going to all this time?'
In retrospect, standing up in the boat wasn't the best idea I'd ever had. Alarm at Estrada's revelation seemed like less and less of a good excuse as the night wore on. While it had achieved what I'd wanted, that hadn't proved to be much comfort — not as I tumbled into the river, not while I flailed to keep my head above the surface, not even as I floundered to the bank and lay choking greenish water into the mud.
Nor had it carried much weight with Estrada and Saltlick. Estrada proved a strong swimmer after her initial panic, and Saltlick was able to gain a footing on the riverbed; the sight of his upturned face bobbing shoreward would have been humorous under better circumstances. He'd even managed to salvage our boat, dragging it behind him with one hand.
Once they'd landed, it had provided them a seat from which to ignore me.
Since no real harm had been done, such vindictiveness struck me as uncalled-for. Estrada only broke the wall of silence when — sick of shivering on a fallen tree trunk in my sodden cloak — I decided to build a fire.
'Are you insane?'
I glared at her. 'What was that? I couldn't hear for the sound of my teeth chattering. If it was 'Are you cold, drenched and pissed off?' then the answer is yes.'
'You know we can't light a fire.'
'I know that the troops at Casta Canto were a scout party, and we must be far ahead of them by now. I know we've likely gained the same lead on all of Moaradrid's forces. So I suggest that, when the alternative is freezing to death, we should make the most of it.'
'You talk as though none of this is your fault.'
'And you talk as if this didn't happen because you've been leading me into the hands of people who want to kill me.'
Estrada sighed, ran a hand through mud-clotted hair. 'Fine, do what you like. It was stupid of me to think you'd listen to anyone but yourself.'
'Whenever I do,' I called at her retreating back, 'it seems to end badly.'
I turned irritably back to my would-be fire. It had been hard to find dry wood, or indeed dry anything, and it was a long time before my carefully constructed heap of grass and sticks produced much besides smoke. I nearly whooped with joy when the first amber tongue licked out from a fissure between two twigs. Conscious of Estrada's eyes on me, I tried to pretend it was exactly what I'd been expecting. After that, it was easy work to pile logs and branches onto the hungry blaze, until it danced waist-high in the twilight.
I'd been wondering if Estrada's stubbornness would win out over her misery. I was pleased when she and Saltlick came to join me, Saltlick still hauling the upturned boat behind him, trailing its broken mast like a tail.
'Are you sure you want to sit here?' I asked, chewing a piece of soggy bread I'd discovered in one of my pockets. 'I'm expecting Moaradrid's entire army to arrive at any minute.'
'Yes, Damasco. I'd like to share your fire, if that's all right.'
'Of course it is, Mayor Estrada.'
'And perhaps,' Estrada added, with a glance towards Saltlick, 'we can save any other matters for a later date.'
What she meant was, ' Let's not argue in front of the giant.'
Her tone conjured a memory, of my father speaking to my mother when she returned from one of her nights of drunken frivolity. A little, timid man, he would listen to her rant about some inconsequential thing, and then say softly, 'Perhaps we can discuss this later, my darling?'
Close on its heels came another vision: Estrada and myself, wearing the joyous expression of proud parents, stood over a gigantic crib in which sat a dribbling, hiccupping Saltlick.
I shuddered.
Still, I'd no desire for any more forced reconciliations; my throat was still smarting from the last one. I managed a smile, and said, 'Of course.'
Anyway, I had more immediate concerns. The wet bread had only enraged my appetite, and all the rest of my edible supplies had ended up in the river. It didn't make me feel any better to watch Saltlick contentedly tucking into bunches of leaves he'd stripped from a nearby bush.
'Do you have anything we can eat?' I asked Estrada.
'I left my rucksack on the harbour in Casta Canto,' she replied, a little guiltily.
'Then I'm going to see what I can find.'
Two miserable hours had passed before I returned. The fruit of my labours was a handful of gnarled apples and a rabbit so ancient it would probably have expired that night even if I hadn't clubbed it over the head with a rock. My fire had tormented me all the while as a glimmer of beckoning orange through the trees, and I was depressed to find that Estrada had let it burn down to a heap of flickering embers. I added branches to the neglected blaze, then sat down next to her and set about gutting the geriatric rabbit. Estrada eyed the work with distaste, but said nothing.
I was drooling with hunger by the time I'd rigged a makeshift spit and begun to roast my prize. Yet once it was done and the meat divided, our portions were so meagre that you'd have thought I'd cooked a shrew. With vigorous chewing, it was edible at least, and followed by the apples it dealt with the worst of my stomach cramps. Since Saltlick lay beside the boat heaving out loud snores, I decided the time was right to tell Estrada what I thought of her plot to get me executed.
Perhaps she caught the glint in my eye. 'I know what you think about going to Altapasaeda. You made that
