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“Nor I,” I croaked, my thirst making me sound like nothing so much as her corvid, Dalgatha. I wondered, did the sleeping bird lead her out of her dream as the sleeping cat had done for me? It wasn’t worth talking about with my throat on fire, though.

I was glad to find my boots together.

In the end, through luck or providence, I found everything but the other stocking.

The rain came the next morning and saved our lives.

And with it, the slavers, who changed them forever.

15The Slave-Makers

The rain woke us.

We had stumbled in dawn’s first light and then fell in a patch of cozy grass.

I think we both had the same thought—that this might be where our bones were found, or lost, and it was as good a place as any. I had never felt so tired, or so miserable. I remember thinking, as the soon-to-die will, about my life. Not the good points, like, but things I’d left messy. Would I truly then never see my ma, or my sister, or my dear stammering niece again? I thought to free Bully Boy, but then remembered my death might free him. Best to leave him without thirst or hunger a few hours more.

Galva mumbled something to me in Ispanthian.

“Yah,” I croaked. “T’s’been a pleasure. Go well. To your Bride. You’ve earned. Her kiss.”

The next thing I knew I was half choking on water, for the rain that came was no drizzle but a torrent. The clouds had bunched as they will, thwarted by the Thralls’ sharp tops, until at last they had burst through and loosed their guts with fury.

I snorted and rose, quickened by the moisture.

Thunder boomed, and I laughed, though this turned into a cough. I spread my arms and my fingers and shouted as well as I could, “Thank you, Fothannon!” True, he’d done fuck-all, but it amuses him to be thanked for nothing, as he prefers to be asked for nothing.

“If you are through being religious, help me gather water. We do not know how long this will last.”

And so I stood up my mug and spread my oiled leather cloak so there was a dip in the middle and spread clothes from my pack so they might be soaked. Lightning cracked nearby, but neither of us ducked, for having come so close to dying slow, a quick end seemed no hardship. Bully stirred in his ink, as lightning will sometimes free a sleeper, but I supposed he’d had enough of a leg-stretch in the borderlands of death.

And then, as quickly as it had come, the storm was gone.

We drank from our mugs. We wrung our poured water from our clothes into Galva’s skin and drank half of that. There was little left, but enough to keep on. As the rain didn’t look to have made it far past the Thralls, it seemed the decision to hug close to the mountains and head south had saved our lives.

We were so occupied with re-stowing our gear that we noticed the riders too late to hide from them.

And now you’re thinking, Riders? Are there horses on these strange plains? No, friend. It was not horses these riders rode but camels. Which are to horses as turds to good bread. The creatures we were about to meet were ugly, bad-tempered, foul-smelling, and prone to spit—besides all of which faults, they rode camels.

When I spotted them, some thirty in all, and pulling carts besides, I hit Galva on the shoulder.

“Merda,” she said, and I knew that word.

“Shyte, indeed.”

She crouched low.

“Don’t bother,” I said, glad I’d strung my bow. Not that it would make any difference to whatever was about to happen. It’s just the principle, isn’t it? When meeting strangers, a strung bow might be useless, but an unstrung one always is. “Just keep walking.”

I noticed that a few of them had large red hats. Wostran hats. Not like the floppy bit worn by our shyte guide in the Thralls but big puffy ones like pillows. Were these Wostran war hats? I’d heard about them, but never seen one.

“Maybe they are merchants,” Galva said hopefully, but didn’t believe herself.

Ten of them broke off from the rest and headed toward us at a fast trot. Of these, some had bows, some had spears. And some had what we thought were spears until I noticed nooses at the end.

Catchpoles.

“Yeah, they’re merchants, all right. But you won’t like what they’re selling.”