“Oh for the love of the gods,” muttered the large, tattooed man, and the lady warrior began to laugh.
Jade’s cheeks grew pink, but she maintained eye contact with him.
I said, “Then tell us please.”
The man with the braid tore his gaze from Jade and said to me, “Not more than an hour, madam. It’s only a matter of sorting out the formation of all these wagons, horses, and people that holds us up. I would ready yourself for a call down the line to start moving towards the dust road.” He looked back at Jade and said, “Maybe you’ll grant me the gift of your name, lady? If not today, I understand. I’m very patient. I’ll ask it next time I see you.”
Jade crossed her arms and simply blinked at him.
The lady warrior made a clicking noise with her tongue and tapped her heels to her mount’s sides, the big man and the man with the braid following suit. The one-eyed man gave me a tight smile from under his hood before he followed his fellow scouts.
“Odd folks,” Ilsit said as they rode away. “Scouts? Who in the hell are they? They’re not Perpatanian. That one even sounds Tintarian.”
“I think they’re Vyggian,” I offered, declining to also add that I had already had a run-in with the one-eyed man.
Tessa made ahmmsound. “I think you’re right. I’ve met some people from The Flavored Three. Ruskar mostly, not so much Sibbereen and Vyggia, but that is what they sound like. What in hell are islanders doing on a low country settlement’s pilgrimage across the continent to Perpatane?” she asked.
“Think those horses were Sibbereen, all of them,” added Ilsit.
We were perplexed, but we took the scout’s advice and climbed back up into the wagon. He was correct. Before long, a dozen soldiers were riding up and down the line of wagons, guiding each into a row of two or three, and we were instructed to make for the dust road at a slower pace for the first day.
It took the entirety of the caravan, which stretched far out before us and behind us, several hours to leave the settlement’s territory and reach the broad, flattened dust road that cut across the lower half of the continent, according to the few maps I had seen. It would take us out of all the land referred to as the low country, through villages and townships that were extensions of Eccleston, into the flatlands that were Eccleston mining districts and finally, to Perpatane, over their border into their nearest city, Skow, the City of the Tower.
We rode in silence, and then I reminded everyone we had already discussed that two of us would walk during the day to relieve the horses. Ilsit and I jumped down and walked alongside Zara.
“Was it just me or was that one with an eye patch and a hood looking at you?” she asked me. “I know you’ve bedded a fellow or two since your man passed. Was he one? Kiss and tell. I am already bored by this.”
I gave her a look of mock offense. “I’m a decent, churchgoing woman. How can you say such things to me?”
14
NOW: BREAD
The first day was endless. We were all silent as we began to comprehend the reality that there were moons of this ahead. When the sun was lower in the sky but still bright, another unit of soldiers rode down the line from the front and ordered wagons to all come to a slow stop.
“Now we make a little camp alongside the road, and in a few hours we can collect our bread rations from the army,” said Tessa. “They dole out loaves every other day.”
When do we deliver the moss?Fox signed.
“Tomorrow night,” Jade suggested. “Or in the middle of the night tonight. During dinner, we could walk up and down and look for the garlands.”
Ilsit and I sighed. “I cannot walk another step,” I said, trying to speak before Ilsit could say the same but more foully.
We were all sitting on a quilt Jade had laid out, watching the goats now tethered to the back of the wagon eat the grass on one side of the dust road alongside the five horses. The chickens were pecking and clucking inside the collapsible pen Tessa had constructed out of spiked dowel rods and rope.
Daisy was curled up in Fox’s lap, but her orange eyes were on the hens.
Stop worrying, my apprentice signed, catching me eyeing the fox.
“What happens if someone wants to use the road and comes across a couple thousand people camped out in the middle of it?” Ilsit asked.
“Suppose they just have to go around,” Tessa said.
We ate baked potatoes Jade had made and wrapped in linens. She had packed a whole sack of them and said she could bake them in a fire pit each night for our dinners the next day.
“We should halve these tomorrow night,” Tessa sighed, stabbing her tin spoon into her potato. “This is a lot of food for one body. Plus we’ll have bread. Now, look, Robbie. I’m going to ride Zara up and down the line tomorrow during the day while you rest. I’ll look for the garlands. You can deliver the moss tomorrow night. Probably best if only one of us goes.”
“You’re supposed to stay in line,” Jade protested. “They told us not to ride or walk out of formation from the rows.”
