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.'
'I can't afford that today! Not after the Qin commander took those two bolts of linen at half the price they're worth! I'll give you three zastras for five peaches.'
'Mistress Zaldra, my father would beat me if I came home and told him I'd undersold by such a price. But since you are such a faithful customer, I can offer you five peaches for four zastras.'
She smiled. 'I'm sure I can get a better price farther down, but you have a good heart, Mai'ili. I'll have five, then.' She handed over four zastras and pointed to the fruit she wanted, then turned to the slave boy. 'Don't bruise them, Orphan, or it'll be a beating for you!'
The child limped forward. Mai gently placed each one in the basket he carried and, when he glanced shyly up at her, she smiled at him until she saw a flush darken his cheeks. 'Go on, Havo,' she said in a low voice, calling him by the name he had once had, back when he had had a family. Poor little boy. 'Just walk softly. You'll be fine.'
His lips trembled. He wouldn't be fine, but it didn't hurt to show him kindness.
'Orphan! How slowly must you move?'
He hobbled after his mistress.
Mai watched him go, then greeted another customer. 'Ah, Master Vin. You are well today?'
'Always well when I see your pretty face, Mai'ili. I see you have peaches but I am also needing a melon. What's the market rate?'
'One zastra a peach today. That's what everyone is charging.'
'Okay. What about the melons?'
He took his time choosing, smiled at her, flirted a little although he had a perfectly nice wife who often bought fruit from Mai's cart as well. Still, what harm? He made only the barest effort to haggle, enough not to shame himself, so she always got an excellent price. She was settling his produce into his market basket when Ti returned.
'Why? Why? Why?' Ti swung the empty bowl in a circle. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were round with indignation. 'Why do they have to come into the marketplace? Can't they just stay in their fort? Every clan has to deliver supplies there anyway, so why do they have to come out here?'
'Hush, girl!' exclaimed Master Vin, now pale and nervous. 'You know what they do to folk who speak against them!' He grabbed his basket from Mai and hurried away.
'You didn't get any kama juice, Ti?'
'Hu! Those Qin soldiers! Walking through the market like they own the place!'
'The Qin rule us. Of course they can walk anywhere they please.'
'I hate it! Don't you hate it, Mai?'
Mai sighed and rearranged the peaches now that she had lost the ten best off the top of the pile. A different pattern of stacking would display those remaining to better advantage. 'Hating doesn't change things, Ti. Remember what happened to Uncle-'
'Don't say his name! His ghost will haunt us! It'll spit at us when we're not looking!'
Mai finished with the peaches without replying, knowing Ti could not stay still for long.
'If I go around through Spice Alley I can get to Abi's stall without running into them again. I'm so thirsty. If I don't drink something now I'll die die die! Here they come.' Ti flounced off in the other direction as Mai, startled, looked up.
Five soldiers strolled down the middle of the dusty street. They wore the typical dress of the Qin military: knee-length black silk tunics that tied down the front and were slit for riding, belt and sword, baggy trousers, soft boots, and their hair up in a topknot in the back. It was actually kind of amusing to watch. Although the four soldiers and one officer strolled rather than marched, although they paused now and again to survey the contents of a blanket laid out over the ground or to point at bowls or pots or fruit arranged in a handcart or wagon, they did not swagger, much, or shove their way through the market throngs like bulls. Yet folk melted away. Conversations faded to silence. Market women trembled, and one old man offered the Qin captain a melon, which the officer
