“A fresh chicken,” Stavia said with enthusiasm, spilling some well water for the Lady and dropping a coin for the poor into the box outside the Lady’s door, as she mumbled, “Food and shelter for those who have none, amen.” Then, “With dumplings. Could we?”
“There will be fresh chickens, yes,” Joshua mused. “We need to pick up our grain allotment, too. And there are fresh leaf vegetables at Cheviot’s stall. She has that protected area south of Rial’s Ridge. She’ll have lettuces two weeks earlier than anyone else will.”
Stavia did not ask him how he knew. Servitors, some of them, the good ones, simply knew things. They knew when visitors were coming before they arrived, knew when people were in trouble, knew when something bad was going to happen. This facility of certain servitors was never mentioned, however. Stavia had said something about it only once, and Morgot had shushed her in a way that let it be known the subject was taboo. The servitors certainly weren’t ostentatious about it. Some people, Myra for instance, never even noticed, but then Myra didn’t notice much outside of herself and Barten.
They wandered among the stalls and shops, stopping for the chicken at one, for the lettuces at another. The grain co-op was uncrowded, and they drew against their allotment in half the usual time. Joshua shook the sack, looking thoughtful.
“Not much there, is there?” The servitor who asked was a lean-bellied man with a thin, mobile mouth. “Not since they cut the allotment.”
“No, not much,” Joshua agreed.
“We hear the Council plans to cut it again this year. Not for the garrison, of course. Just for us. Would that be so, do you suppose?”
Joshua shrugged. Servingmen of Council members were often queried as to what was going on, but they, like family members, were encouraged to be closemouthed. “I couldn’t say.”
The lean man moved off, and Stavia whispered, “If they cut the grain allotment, people will go hungry this winter. We can’t live on dried fruit and fish and what vegetables we can put up, not unless the glass factory can make more jars.”
“So Morgot says,” Joshua agreed. “It’s the old question of power, Stavia. They could make more jars if they had more power. With only the one hydroelectric plant, it’s a question of priorities. Glass for windows or jars or lenses. Or drugs to heal people. Or steel for kitchen knives or a million other things. We’re doing everything with watermills that we can.”
“Maybe the grain harvest will be better this year.”
“That’s always possible.”
“Don’t we get more since Myra had the baby?”
Joshua shook his head. “No. Our allotment stays the same. Jerby went away and Myra got pregnant in the same year.”
It didn’t seem possible that over a year had passed since Jerby had gone to his warrior father. He had come home at midsummer, and Myra had gotten pregnant. Then at midwinter holiday, Jerby was home again. And so was Chernon, with his demand that she bring him another book because the books he had already had weren’t the right ones, and she must give him more because she had already given him so much. She couldn’t refuse him, but…. Stavia set that thought aside. And then baby Marcus was born, and it was almost time for midsummer carnival again.
“Myra won’t take part in carnival this time, will she?”
“What do you think?” he asked.
Stavia sighed. “She will if Barten wants her. She did last time, big as a melon. It really surprised me that he had the carnival with her. With her pregnant I thought he’d… well, you know.”
“You know why he did?”
She shook her head. “I don’t. Well, maybe. Maybe he was showing everybody that he could father offspring.”
“That may have been it,” Joshua replied, shaking his head doubtfully.
“Joshua, any male rabbit can make babies!”
“I know that and you know that, Stavvy, but Barten may be confused about it. He may think it proves something.”
“She will go to carnival with him if he’ll have her. Just to keep him from having carnival with someone else.”
“I think so, yes.”
“She shouldn’t get pregnant again so soon.”
“That’s probably right.” Joshua felt a winter-stored apple. “These would be good with the chicken—applesauce.”
“If we don’t have dumplings, I’d like mashed potatoes.”
“We’ve got potatoes left, but we’re short on flour.”
“Who’ll do the cooking while you and Morgot and I are gone?”
“Sylvia has invited Myra to stay with her family.”
“Poor Sylvia. Myra probably won’t be good company.”
“No. Not very.”
“Joshua. I know I’m not supposed to ask, but I really want to know. What was it like to come back?”
“It was probably the most difficult thing I’ve ever done,” he said. “Do you want to stop at the tea shop?”
“Could we? Do we have tea-shop chits left? Will you tell me about it? I don’t want to pry, if it’s none of my business.”
“I won’t take it as prying, Stavvy. No. I’ll tell you, if you promise not to repeat what I say to anyone else—except Morgot, of course.” They crossed the street and went down a twisting alley which ended in a miniature plaza protected from the wind by high side walls and decked with tables. They occupied one of these, piling basket and shopping bag in an empty chair. When the steaming pot had been delivered, along with a saucer of sweet, jam-filled biscuits, Joshua poured for each of them then leaned on the table, hands curved around the steaming cup. “I came back partly because of the war between Annville and Abbyville.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“No reason you should. It was twenty years ago. I was eighteen. I was in the Abbyville
