In the village, young men and women mingled with older farmers returning early from their fields, and craftspeople breaking from their labor to socialize. A metalworker’s forge sat temporarily abandoned, the embers of the forge smoldering. A leatherworker’s supplies were set up, a newly-cleaned hide draped over a workbench. A large crate near to Zoe’s right was surrounded by women with their flat caps turned sideways, thin scarves wrapped loosely around their necks, hands of playing cards held close to their faces. Around the circle, one woman would slap down a card and shout something. Their speech was either too quick or too slang-laden for Zoe to easily translate. Their language, alternating between rasping and melodic, was familiar to Zoe – but not natural to her. She wondered idly if Kalai or the other guards had noticed the roughness of her speech. Perhaps they would write off any challenges she had as the consequence of a difficult road traveled.

Passing by the card players, Zoe raised a hand in a weak wave, and the women looked up at her all at once. Their faces creased, eyes drawn down, and their laughter ceased for a moment. One turned to the other and whispered something, then another snorted loudly and threw down her next card. “Looks like you’re on water filtration duty, Marga!” She shouted triumphantly.

Another of the women – the one called Marga, Zoe guessed – grumbled and stood up, but there was a slight smile on her face as she did so. Her eyes met Zoe’s for a moment, and Zoe stood still. Marga glanced down at one of the other card players, who met her gaze. “You’re too good for that job, are you?” Marga shook her head vigorously, laughed, threw down her remaining cards, and turned away, adjusting her hat and vest as she started off.

Zoe nearly stumbled as Arshay shouldered into her from behind, pushing past and continuing to make for the gathering hall. “What’s wrong with you, Zoe? We need to move.”

“Don’t talk to your commander that way. I’m in charge of this operation.” Zoe bristled and turned to glare at Arshay.

Over Arshay’s soldiers, she saw that one of the other guards was walking towards the group of scouts. Not Kalai – he hadn’t told the newcomers the other guards’ names. This one glowered in Zoe’s direction as he approached, crossbow shouldered. The weapon was pointed away from any person, sure, but his hand twitched near its trigger. Zoe raised her head and snapped of a quick greeting gesture to the approaching guard. “What is it?” she asked, trying to make her voice sound wearier even than it really was.

“Oh, don’t worry about it. I’ve just got to escort you to the hall and keep an eye on you for a while, make sure you’re okay.” The guard didn’t sound too happy about the prospect. “Abundance of caution and what have you.”

“And you are?” Arshay spoke up, pre-empting Zoe’s nervous glance with a wave of his hand behind his back.

“Eksha. I’m on guard duty. Isn’t that obvious? If you couldn’t figure that out, there may be little hope of your staying here past those three days.”

Zoe stepped in front of Arshay and shook her head. “If we need to stay longer, rest assured we’ll find ways to help. I’m sorry for my friend’s behavior. It’s just been a long and stressful journey, and –“

Eksha held out a hand, palm face-down and grunted. “Don’t apologize. I get it. These are stressful times, for all of us. Just try and keep your tongue in check, is all.”

Zoe nodded and turned again toward the gathering hall.

When the scouts arrived there, with Eksha in tow, they opened the door to the sound of accordions, drums and singing. A group of six or seven Valers, men and women mixed, were gathered around one of the largest tables in the open entryway room. They moved around the floor with their instruments and their voices, a whirl of cloth and metal, so quick that Zoe couldn’t count them exactly. The song they were singing sounded oddly like a dialect from Gaurlante, with Crescian cadences. Zoe could only tell half of what the words meant.

We haven’t --- mind is –

Taking away – sending away

Come -- north – south –

Everywhere – only here –

Remember –

Zoe crossed between tables and made her way to a the corner of the room, where a man in an immaculate dress shirt stood polishing a glass, and smiled at Zoe. Two young women already sat at the small bar, one perhaps only a teenager. They were arguing, while the younger one kept reaching for the glass on the bar in front of them, and the older kept dragging it away.

“Hilda, you really shouldn’t.”

“Don’t tell me what to do! I’m not a little kid anymore, I want to try it.”

The older sister’s eyes flashed in plain anger as she pulled the glass away from her younger sister. They still didn’t seem to have noticed Zoe or her companions as they approached the bar. “Just because mom wants you for the Reapers –”

Zoe stopped in her tracks, blinked, and breathed in. Stay cool. Don’t give yourself away. You didn’t hear anything.

“—doesn’t mean anything. You’re too young for alcohol, it’ll mess up your brain and leave you unable to do what’s needed.”

“And just because you’re bitter doesn’t mean you get to lord over me!” The younger sister waved her arms indignantly. “Does it?” The bartender looked on with the vague, detached bemusement of a professional. Approaching behind the two and pushing into a seat, nodding to the bartender, Zoe noticed something peeking up from the back of the younger sister’s neck. It was a tattoo, depicting a winged serpent, the red ink glowing from within. The young sister grabbed at the glass on the bar again. “Kamila!”

The elder – Kamila – grabbed Hilda’s arm and held tight. Her face grew wrathful again for a moment, then softened. “I promise that once you’re a bit older and you’ve finished your training I’ll take you wherever you want to celebrate. Is that alright?”

“Right…” Hilda sighed. “I do wish you could, but you really can’t come with me?”

“Yeah, I wish that too. Stupid rules, huh? I bet I’d make a great Reaper. I mean, I’m a better fighter than you.”

Zoe spoke up. “Yeah. Stupid rules. Hey, barkeep, I’ll buy the little one whatever she wants – well, just one of whatever she wants. I don’t have a lot of coin and don’t want to be responsible for a drunk.”

The two sisters turned and looked over at Zoe. Past them, Zoe could see the other scouts, even Arshay, blatantly dumbstruck by her boldness. Arshay’s face practically screamed to her What are you thinking???

But Kamila laughed, slapping at the bar and meeting Zoe’s gaze with steel eyes and a grin. “And what stretch of wilderness did you crawl out of, huh? Have we seen each other before?”

Zoe gave a long blink, a performance. She hoped it was a good performance.

“Oxdal,” she said.

Kamila’s expression became grave, and Hilda’s lower lip quivered a bit. Zoe thought she could see the shimmering of a tear in the younger sister’s eye. Kamila put her hands back on the bar. “Ah, shit. Sorry. Fucking Invictus morons.”

“At least they let me go,” Zoe said, sardonically. “They could have killed me.” She hoped that didn’t sound too defensive.

Hilda sniffed. “I hate them,” she whispered, and Kamila laid a hand on her sister’s shoulder, without looking away from Zoe.

“Well, now that you’re here, you’ll be safe. I’ll tell you what, if anybody tries to mess with you you want me to show them a thing or two?”

“Kamila, you can’t say that!” Hilda cut in again.

“Hey, what do you know?” The jab was playful, this time. “But stranger, I hope you’re not planning to buy my sister booze.”

Zoe chuckled. “Well, if you insist, then I won’t. You can’t stay a kid forever, though.”

Eksha, the guard, approached suddenly from behind and sat down next to Zoe. He looked over and past her. “Chatting up strangers, are you?”

“So you do have ears!” Kamila grinned and threw up her arms, then downed another gulp of whatever was in her glass. “I learn something new about you every day.”

Arshay tapped Zoe on the shoulder and whispered to her. “Let’s talk.” Zoe stood up.

“Just a minute.” Loudly she asked, “what is it?” Then followed Arshay away and towards the middle of the room. He whispered to her, approaching the musicians sideways. The noise of the instruments and the singing served to obscure their conversation to Eksha, who watched from the bar.

“What do I do now?”

“Return to Captain Cigdem,” she said, leaning toward Arshay. “Tell him the lay of the land. I’ll handle this end of things – looks like I’ve already found a Mirshalite or two. Just give me a few hours before you all come back here, alright?”

***

Arshay nodded. “Yeah, alright,” he said, calling over the music as he led Zoe back away from the revelers. “I’ll go back for your pack.” Zoe nodded.

“Thanks, my friend.” With a quick hand-clasp – in the style of the Valers, of course, forearms parallel – they separated and Arshay left the building. The last thing he saw before closing the door behind himself was Zoe settling down at the bar again, between Eksha and those two sisters – one of whom appeared to wear a tattoo of power. Arshay said a brief prayer for Zoe’s safety as he departed.

On his way back through the village, Arshay was struck by the ramshackle condition of the place. It disgusted him. Back home, this would be a pigsty or a fallow field. A little extra humidity, slightly heavier air, could do this to a place? It was honestly shameful that people could live – such base creatures were these. The sparse laughter from around the village and the singing voices drifting through that drinking-hall’s window only grated on Arshay’s nerves.

That overbearing, ratty guard Kalai stopped Arshay at the entrance to the village and held up a hand. “Hey, where do you think you’re going? Didn’t you just get here?”

“Zoe dropped some stuff not too far from here. I’m going to go see if I can find it and bring it back.”

Kalai stared at Arshay for what felt like a long time. Arshay tried not to let his eyes drift, until the gaze became awkward and he glanced over Kalai’s shoulder, out of the village. He kicked at the dirt beneath his feet and blew out a slow breath.

“All right, well, be careful out there,” Kalai said, leaning against a post and motioning Arshay back. He nodded, wrinkled his nose, and stepped past the guard and out of the village. Though the terrain was unpleasant, just being outside of Etyslund was a sudden relief to Arshay – no longer surrounded by those people, their noise. He made for the trees beyond the village, and when he was far enough away, checked over his shoulder. Kalai was not watching – the man had turned and was looking back into the village at something going on, some bit of entertainment. Arshay smiled at his own assessment of Kalai – the man might be on guard duty, but he was no soldier at heart. That tattoo, though, was worrying – Arshay had heard something of those emblems and their affect on Abrist magic.

Instead of going into the woods, he turned sharply left and began to climb up and around the hill. A ten minute journey brought him to the back of the hill overlooking Etyslund, where Cigdem, Fatih, and Plato waited along with a dozen more soldiers. The captain was seated on a large rock away from the rest of the unit, looking out at the marshes to the southeast where he’d stashed their vehicles. Arshay approached Captain Cigdem straightaway and performed the salute. “Captain Cigdem, Zoe and the scouts are embedded in the village. They suspect nothing. Zoe also wanted me to tell you that she thinks she’s already found Mirshalites within the village. When we go in, she’ll lead them out to be taken.”