We met Mishtaw and Creed where we had camped on the mountainside after meeting Tike. Our whole group we had trekked into the inner valleys had come along, including Gard and Colm since they no longer felt comfortable staying in the village on their own. Apparently, since the Dawn Crawler had set down its judgments and the villagers were reluctant to openly oppose the creature they had redirected their ire onto the Pickers.

There was another whisper woman and fire starter with Mishtaw that I didn’t recognize. I overheard that they were there to escort the Pickers to where the Picker bands had been gathered up and were being watched by Jin’s people. At this point if they were found wandering the mountainside they were likely to be treated as troublesome runaways, at best, or as secret death bringers, at worse. The Red Hand, Jika’s band, had been found and brought to the enforced camp.

Jika had recovered from her time under my experimental drink but I wasn’t clear on if she and Kuma were returning to their band with Gard and Colm or if they wanted to keep their freedom for a bit longer. Nor had I quite figured out the best time to talk with her about what had happened. I regretted what the drink had done to her, but I didn’t regret trying to keep her alive and I wasn’t sure I could have made that happen without the energy it had given her.

It wouldn’t be difficult to figure out if she was staying or going. I could have asked her or asked Prevna, but if I was honest, I knew I had put it off so that if Jika did leave before I faced her I could blame the fact that she left for why I had never gotten the chance to speak with her. That it had happened unexpectedly and I couldn’t be responsible for knowing her schedule.

A weak excuse that made my teeth grind together, but I didn’t have the words. Couldn’t hold my head up high and say I was completely right nor swallow my pride and admit that I was sorry, when that implied I had been wrong and that wasn’t completely true either.

Nor was I sure that I wanted to know what Jika’s reaction to me would be. Would she look at me with even more discomfort and fear than she had in the beginning? Would she shrug it off and say I had done what I could? Or would she blame herself for staying with me at Steamer’s Fall when she shouldn’t have?

I didn’t like any of the options and it had been easy to avoid her as she had been mostly keeping to the tent she was recovering in. On our journey up to the meeting point she had also kept separated from me as much as she could.

Perhaps that was the answer in and of itself.

The villagers didn’t bother trying to blindfold us on our way back to the mountainside. At least they were smart enough to realize that it hadn’t worked to hide their village’s location from us the first time, especially when after we were given free rein to explore the inner valleys. But it might have been smarter if they had realized that using a landmark, like the river of molten rock, to travel would have also given away their location in the first place.

Our trip up from the river to the meeting place was shorter than it had been the first time which was a nice bonus from their lack of stealth.

The villagers that had escorted us didn’t know what to think about Creed. When they first noticed a second person in the fog they’d been irritated, but when they caught sight of Creed’s large, muscled bound frame they’d been shocked. Followed quickly by a mixture of anger and horror when they realized he deferred to Mishtaw.

For my part, I didn’t like the new bruises and bandages I could see poking out from their clothes. It made my fingers itch. They were both capable fighters and it was rare that I saw either one injured, let alone both. Which meant either the murdering fanatics were more skilled than the Lady Blue’s fish or Jin was using them for the more dangerous missions. Possibly both. Nor would I have put it past Jin to make dangerous missions even worse with bad supplies or information. Not when she thought she was doing what needed to enforce the goddess’s rule and the commander wasn’t here to keep her in check. I was sure Mishtaw and I were on her list of what needed to be fixed in the sects and she fixed things by breaking them.

Mishtaw clasped Nine Claws’s forearm while Malady and Creed exchanged nods.

My mentor said, “Thank you for minding the troublemakers. Hopefully they didn’t make the search too troublesome.”

“A few hiccups here and there, but nothing we couldn’t handle,” replied Nine Claws.

It was a show for all of us gathered around them. No doubt Mishtaw already knew all about how our time in the inner valleys had gone down to the last gritty detail from speaking with Nine Claws on the wind. The only thing she might not know about was what happened in the Night Cave.

When we had seen Nine Claws later after returning to village I wasn’t surprised to learn that one of her cats had followed us to the cave and she had warned me not to keep taking unnecessary risks. But the warning had more framed around going places I shouldn’t rather than spirits, dreams, and wishes.

The whisper women worked together seamlessly to show the villagers a front of unflappable strength as they traded stories about what had been going on during the purge and the highlights of our time in the inner valleys. Fighting, killing, finding hidden relics and lakes of fire were nothing to the women who served as the goddess’s eyes and hands.

Then it came it came time for the Pickers to stop standing awkwardly to the side and say goodbye so the whisper woman that was waiting in the background could stop wasting her time.

That was when I learned that while Jika was going with Kuma and the others to see her family she had extracted a promise from Nine Claws that she could join the village boys when they were going to be taken to the Seedling Palace for the Trial of Fog or Snow. If she proved herself she could become a fire starter.

I watched her take a deep breath out of the corner of my eye before she approached me. It made me want to scowl but I kept my expression neutral so I could at least hear her out without scaring her away.

“I’ll never drink something you make ever again but you were right. In Steamer’s Fall.” Jika looked me right in the eye. “I’m not going to stay here, pining. Not when I have a chance to go where other Pickers can only dream about.”

I gave her a nod of acknowledgment even as I berated myself for ever pushing her to go beyond the Cut. If I hadn’t I wouldn’t have to worry about her somehow worming her way close to Prevna in the Seedling Palace.

I also offered her the closest thing to an apology that I could get. “I won’t make you drink anything untested in the future either.”

There was an awkward moment as we both tried to decide if we had anything else to say before Jika left to go say her parting words to Prevna. Kuma accosted me before I could listen in on what they had to say to each other.

The large woman thumped me on the shoulder. “Everything’s going back to normal, see?”

I had to struggle not to point out that her people were being held in a camp, that Jika was planning on leaving for the Seedling Palace, that multiple members of her band had died since we first met them. I wasn’t sure how she could say anything was normal, but I was trying to be civil and not say the first difficult thing that sprung onto my tongue.

Still, she must have seen the conflict on my face because she shrugged and added, “Family always finds its way back together and we continue on. That’s how it should be.”

I would be more than happy to never find my way back to my family unless it was to make sure they knew they were nothing to me.

Kuma nodded like I had said something and kept going with the one-sided conversation. “Well, you know where to find me. I won’t forget that you took that knife for me, so if you ever need help with somethin’ let me know what I can do to return the favor.”

I nodded back and she thumped me on the shoulder again before leaving. Gard and Colm didn’t bother with coming over to me to say goodbye and I didn’t cross the group to bring the conversation to them either. Given that we had never gone out of our way to speak to each other, the ending of our acquaintance was just a reflection on the fact we had only spent time in each other’s company due to forced circumstances.

I didn’t miss the moment that Mishtaw gestured for me to approach her. Nine Claws and her had slipped from their show conversation to one with more substance while everyone else was distracted with the Pickers leaving.

Prevna stepped up beside me in front of Mishtaw, summoned with her own gesture. Mishtaw gave us the once over with a critical eye before she sighed. “I shouldn’t be surprised that I have less than a week to analyze the new relic.”

Prevna elbowed me gently in the side. “Just her. The Dawn Crawler didn’t kick out anyone else.”

Mishtaw shook her head, “And how do you think the locals will take to us sticking around their valley when they have her deadline in mind? We can force the issue, but it’s best not to if I want to have an easier time when I need to check on the relic in the future.”

We nodded and she continued, “Give me your summaries of what’s happened since we last saw each other. We can go into details when we’re no surrounded by others.”

Prevna and I did as we were told. It was best not to get in Mishtaw’s way when she was in business mode and right now it seemed she was focused on making sure that all her facts were lined up and there wasn’t anything important missing because someone didn’t think it was important to mention.

Once she got our testimonies Mishtaw gave us a tight smile. “I’m glad you’re alright.” She tilted her head toward Creed. “Go see the big lug.”

Creed clasped us on the shoulders with enough strength that it put Kuma’s thumps to shame. “You’ve done good. Mishtaw might not say it outright, but finding that relic was important. Especially with Jin delaying us.”

Prevna frowned, “What about Petra and Eliss? Where are they?”

Creed’s face pinched before he covered it with a smile. “Back with the Peacekeeper task force. Jin couldn’t deny the Relic Seeker from doing her duty when there’s a newly discovered relic but she could keep a Peacekeeper and her fire starter on call when hands are short and the task force is their sect’s responsibility.”

“Are they alright?”

“As well as they can. Death bringers might be heretics but killing them can turn the stomach more than the fish. Still people in the end.” He glanced back where the mountainside was obscured by the fog before he changed topics. “This fog sure is different with something to counter its effects.”

I gathered that they had taken the mixture that Malady had learned from the Pickers before they entered the fog this time, so they only had a day or so before they would need to protect themselves from the fog again but, one way or another, I wouldn’t be surprised if they were given some of the villager’s resistance drink before the day was over.

Creed and Prevna chatted about lighter topics for a bit until Mishtaw signaled that we’d be moving on. The plan was that first she would meet with the village leaders at the village in a show of good faith before Logar and Morn would guide her and the rest of us back up to the audience chamber like they had when we first saw it. In the meantime, Deamar and Tike were watching over the throne so that all of us could be here to greet Mishtaw. They might not be whisper women or even fire starters, but having someone there was better than no one was the thinking.

I had volunteered to keep watch over the throne like we had before so that there wasn’t last minute stealing attempts like there had been with harp, but Nine Claws had decided that it was better to show a united front by having us all greet Mishtaw and regain some of the village’s goodwill by trusting them to watch over the throne like they had been doing for years.

I wasn’t sure if Tike and Deamar were the best choices to take over the watch on their own, but I wasn’t a fully fledged whisper woman and Nine Claws was. She got the final call, though she also mentioned that a good portion of her spectral cats were watching as well where the boys couldn’t see.