All at once, Mai walked up beside him, hands cupped before her. She opened her hands to reveal three tiny beaded nets. "O'eki found these. I forgot to give them to you before."

"Who is O'eki? That's not a Qin name."

"It's Mountain's name, as you should know," she said tartly. "He found them. Here. They belong to you." Anji called to her. She pressed the objects into his hand and walked away.

Cornflower had tied off the ends of her braids with these tiny beaded nets. He had wondered often enough what it must feel like to touch her hair, as these once had, to feel the texture of those fine strands as a caress on the skin. He shut his eyes and listened, wondering if he could hear her ghost in the objects once worn by her.

She had not been dead when these had come off her. They'd been discarded, like ruined clothing. Her pale gold hair had been unbound, just like that of the figure he'd seen taken by the storm.

With a groan, he cast them onto the ground, then picked them up and tucked them into the lining in his long sleeves next to Father Mei's gold. What good was he, who was no better than his brothers, all but Hari? He had lusted after her just as they had, and it hadn't been kindness that had stayed him from pressing his body onto hers. It had been simple stubbornness; he didn't want to be like them. He didn't want to follow in their dreary footsteps and do the predictable things they did. He didn't want to want what they wanted. So he'd pretended not to want her, and by ignoring her, had left her waiting under the lean-to, easy prey for the storm and the demons that rode it.

Nothing-good boy. That's what his mother had always called him.

"Hu!" Chief Tuvi strolled up to him. "That's some good-tasting water once the dirt is filtered out of it! There's a hand of daylight left, Shai. You want to see if you can hit anyone with that spear? We'll make a soldier of you yet. You're a challenge, sure enough, but we're not afraid of anything, not even your clumsiness!"

His particular companions were waiting-Jagi, Pil, Seren, Tam, and Umar-with their usual hearty grins, calling him names as they taunted him to come over and get the wits beaten out of him.

What a fool he'd been, moping all those years for the reward he'd never get, his family's love and respect. A better prize lay within his grasp. These soldiers teased only when they liked you.

He was one of them now. He found his staff and joined them. He got the wits beaten out of him, and enjoyed it even as they mocked his clumsiness.

Only later did it occur to him to wonder where Mountain had found the bead nets and, once he'd asked him, how unsatisfactory Mountain's answer was.

"Right up by the big rock where we were camping when the storm hit, Master Shai. Just lying there, like she'd torn them off. Or they'd been torn off her."

Midmorning the next day they rode out onto an escarpment from which they could view the spectacular Mariha Valley sprawled below. Irrigation canals cut the land into a bright patchwork beyond which the lush colors faded quickly to a dull yellow-brown. The old city was a vast honeycomb seen from above, ringed by stout walls and graced by a lake at the center where, Tohon said, priests had once worshiped their ancient god and now the Qin watered their horses. There was a holy tower dedicated to the Merciful One, recognizable by its tiered rings, and a second monumental building concealing a courtyard within a courtyard which Anji told her was a temple for the worship of the god Beltak, one of the manifold names given to the Lord of Lords, King of Kings, the Shining One Who Rules Alone. Next to the Beltak temple lay another palatial structure.

"Is that a second temple?" Mai asked. "It has two courtyards, too, but they're separate, side by side, not one nested inside the next."

"That's the royal palace, built in the Sirniakan style," said Anji. "The larger courtyard is where men congregate and the separate smaller courtyard is for the prince's women."

"How strange," said Mai. "Do you actually mean to say that women cannot go where the men congregate, and men cannot walk in the women's courtyard?"

"I mean to say that in Sirniaka, the palace women-a dozen wives, a hundred concubines, and all their serving women and slaves-are sequestered, kept completely apart. Only the master, his sons, and his slaves can visit the women's quarters. Any other man who tries to walk there would be killed. Executed."

Mai laughed. "That's a good story! It's quite a big palace, though. There must be lots of people living there in order to need two courtyards that big."

"You don't believe me?" Anji raised an eyebrow in that sweet way he had of showing amusement. He was so handsome!

"How could people live that way? Women kept apart! And so many that they need a place that big! How could one man keep so many women? Two wives is plenty, as the old song goes."

"You don't believe me," repeated Anji, shaking his head. "It seems strange to me now, I admit, because I've lived among the Qin for so many years, but it didn't seem strange at all when I was a child."

His words caught her up short. She'd been about to laugh again, but he was perfectly serious. He was, briefly, a stranger, looking at her through eyes whose glance had recently become so very intimate.

Tohon whistled. "Captain! Best keep going. I think we're being followed."

"They'll see our dust."

"True, and our tracks. We need only reach Commander Beje's posting before they reach us."

Anji signaled. Chief Tuvi whistled, and they set off again, riding at a bruising gait that jarred her up through her teeth. Now and again they would reach a vantage point from which they could get a good look behind them, and always there rose that telltale haze of dust, moving as they moved, hard on their trail.

In midafternoon they rode down into a green vale watered by three streams trickling down from the heights. An old stone watchtower on one slope had been abandoned and replaced with a fortified villa on lower ground. It was a one-story compound surrounded by a small orchard, a garden, a single field of grain, and an inner wall of stone and outer palisade of logs ringed by a ditch. Sheep grazed between the two walls. A black Qin banner flew from the gate. They crossed a narrow bridge, single-file, and the gate was closed after them by a silent guardsman.

"This way." Tohon led them across the pasture and through a second gate, guarded by stone dragons.

Inside lay a stableyard, dirt raked in neat lines. Captain Anji dismounted and gave his reins to Sengel.

"Come," he said to Mai. "Bring Priya."

No one else-not even Sengel and Toughid, who shadowed Anji everywhere he went-was invited to accompany them. There were guards on the walls and a score of soldiers lounging in the stableyard, all armed. The captain's troop dismounted but did not otherwise disperse, as if they expected to have to leave at a moment's notice.

"Are we safe?" she whispered to Anji as Tohon led them into the shade of a long porch. "Who do you think is following us?"

He paused before entering. The terrace was floored with sandstone, recently swept, but the pillars, eaves, and roof of the porch were all of well-polished wood. A youth knelt at the far end of the porch, not even looking up as their footsteps tapped on stone; he rubbed at one of the pillars with a linen cloth.

"We are safe with Commander Beje," Anji said. "Look. There are faces in the pillars."

The subtle faces of guardian animals peered out from the wood. They leered or snarled or smiled, each according to its nature, and as they crossed the porch and entered the interior, Mai had a fancy that one of the guardian beasts winked at her. Inside they crossed an empty room to a wall of screens that, when slid aside, revealed a quiet courtyard. Their shoes crackled on gravel. Like the first room, the courtyard lay empty except for a quartet of low benches surrounding a dry fountain shaped like a tree with bells hanging from the branches. No wind disturbed the bells. It was utterly silent. A sliding door led them into the dim interior of another immaculate room with wood floors and no furniture whatsoever. All the windows were shuttered, filtering the light through white rice paper. The air smelled faintly of cloves.