Naomi slinked by, unnerved by the old woman’s stare, and took the next available right turn out of the alley. It meant an extra block of walking in the wrong direction, but the narrow alley was quiet and devoid of prying eyes, or crazy old ladies talking about the wells going dry. Speaking such a dangerous rumor could spread fear and panic through the districts like wildfire. The younger woman had been right; the rains always came during the month of Haden, just after the spring equinox. They had to.
But what if they didn’t?
The washerwomen not being able to fill their tubs would be the least of the city’s problems. Without the Haden rains, the early crops would fail. The aquifers would not fill, so the late crops would fail, too. The city wells would go dry. The parched earth would crack apart and swallow man and animal whole in a thirsty, wasted death.
Naomi shuddered at the thought and wished Adibe wouldn’t talk so much during their games of Ur. The old man liked to share stories from hundreds of years ago when the rains didn’t come and the last guild war had ravaged Ka’veshi. How the old man knew of such things, she had never asked, and so she always took his frightening tales with a good heaping of salt. He lived in a washerwoman’s house, after all, so what could he truly know? She wasn’t even certain he could read.
Not that being unable to read meant you were stupid, Naomi reminded herself. No, Adibe wasn’t stupid. Of that she was most certain of all. Then again, turning the corner and finding Adibe stooped on his porch next to a large four legged, horned beast made her think Adibe might be a little crazy.
Naomi skidded to a stop on the stones and rubbed sand from her eyes, thinking perhaps the heat waves were making mirages in the middle of the city. But no, the beast was real, like some overgrown goat with two leafless trees growing from the top of its head. The horned head turned her way to stare at her with large brown eyes, and Naomi’s legs went stiff despite her thoughts to run in the other direction. The animal made a low rumbling snort, not sounding at all like a goat, then it stepped three paces back to reveal a figure previously hidden by its immense size.
The strange looking boy paused in his conversation with Adibe and glanced over his shoulder at the animal’s sound. His clothes were odd, much too heavy and layered for western Orynthian weather, and decorated with delicate embroidery that could put the Weavers guild to shame. Sunlight sheened off silver thread, dark leather, long auburn hair and a piece of metal jewelry clamped to the underside of a pointed ear.
Naomi’s eyes widened and her throat went dryer than she thought possible. An elf. There, standing in her alleyway, was an Elvan boy. As her initial shock at seeing an elf for the first time passed, her confusion compounded into suspicion. What in Ishkar’s quill would an elf be doing in the Washerwoman’s district talking to an old man like Adibe?
“Ah, Naomi!” Adibe called down the alley and waved a beckoning hand. “I hoped you would soon come home. We have a special guest you should meet.”
Naomi, try as she might, couldn’t get her feet to take a step forward. The elf boy opened his arms, showing off long sleeves in forest green cloth laced-up over an undershirt of creamy white that led to soft leather gloves of an earthy brown. He made a half bow, which Naomi would normally associate with pompous entitlement, but the elf somehow made it look graceful and not at all a display of his status being well above her own. Still, that anyone would think to bow to a street mutt like her made his posture unintentionally amusing.
“I am Serenthel,” the elf said then patted the horned animal’s neck. “And this my friend, Forfolyn. He’s quite gentle, I assure you, and there is nothing to fear from me, boy.”
Boy. Apparently the Elvan didn’t know an Orynthian girl’s name from a boy’s.
Naomi sucked in a breath and made no move to correct the elf, instead taking on the more masculine posture she used while evading the Snatchers at night. In her short, rough life, she’d learned well that it was better to be assumed a boy than noticed as a girl, especially when strangers were involved. From his stoop, Adibe let out a quiet chuckle, but also let the assumption stand.
“Come, come,” Adibe encouraged. “This man has come a long way and has brought a rare treasure. You must see it!”
Man? Naomi didn’t know about that, but she kept her laugh to herself. With steps made in feigned boyish bravado, she approached the odd pair at Adibe’s insistence. The elf stood taller than the boys his age in Ka’veshi, but she’d always heard rumors the Elvan were tall, and willowy, and too delicate for the realm of humans. Why this one had come to the most densely populated human city in all Ellium only drew Naomi’s suspicion more tightly around her.
“My greetings to you, Naomi,” Serenthel said, his strangely formal dialect adding to the noble air held about him.
It made Naomi all the more uneasy, but she managed a nonchalant raise of the chin. “Hey.” Lowering her pitch strained her throat, but she believed herself practiced enough at it to fool a fish out of water like this elf. She did, however, give the beast Forfolyn a wide berth as it attempted to greet her with its large nose.
“Forfolyn is an elk,” Serenthel informed. “I see by your eyes you have not encountered one before?”
“No.”
