On a cleared space of ground, the eagle rider set a bone whistle to his lips and blew a shrill blast. Shai slurped from the ladle, saw Mai watching the reeve. Seeing Shai, she came over. North of the border, she walked openly as a woman.

"What do they say?" She took the ladle from his hand, dipped, and drank neatly.

"What do who say?"

She hung up the ladle from its hook. A pair of drops stretched off the curve of the cup, parted, and fell onto the glassy surface. Drip. Drop. "The ghosts."

"What are you talking about?"

"These bandits. Are their ghosts saying anything?"

"How would I know?"

She looked at him. He hated that look. She had changed since they departed Kartu Town and she became a married woman. He had always been her trusted older uncle-even if only by a few years-yet now he felt he was the younger one. "I know you see ghosts, Shai. Anji knows it, too. You admitted as much to him out in the desert. Anyway, you're a seventh son."

"What does that have to do with it?"

"Seventh sons see ghosts."

"What about seventh daughters?"

"Who ever has seven daughters? Just tell me! We're not in Kartu Town anymore. You aren't a witch here."

"How do you know? Maybe they'll burn me alive like they do in the empire. Or hang me, or tie me to a post and shoot me full of arrows, or poke me with spears until I'm all full of holes. You don't know anything about this place!"

"You shouldn't be afraid. Anji isn't."

"Then why don't you ask him what the ghosts are saying?" he snapped.

This revelation did not disturb her. Of course she already knew Anji saw ghosts! She considered him with a placid expression, but he guessed from the tilt of her chin that she was annoyed. "He doesn't hear ghosts. He only sees them. What you hear might help us."

When he only looked at her, she continued as she would to a particularly slow slave child who needed each least task explained at length several times over. "Help us. From the ghosts you can learn of any danger that might be ahead… learn the customs of the Hundred

… Shai! The ghosts can teach us, warn us, even if they don't mean to. If we know more, we'll do better in our new life, don't you think?"

"You don't understand ghosts, Mai. They only talk about the past. What lies in the future no longer exists. That's why they're ghosts."

Which was why ghosts were often boring, as these were, bawling and bleating like so many discontented sheep:

Captain Beron! You betrayed us, you sheep-tupping son of a bitch!

I didn't mean to eat that rabbit. It isn't fair I was exiled for such a little thing! Forced to live the osprey life. I never wanted it! Why won't you forgive me? Why can't I go home?

I hate you! I hate all of you! Piss on you all!

"One thing, though," he said, because he found it so curious that he had to share with Mai. "You know how the arkinga here sounds so strange."

"They speak it wrong," she agreed. "Sometimes I can't understand them."

"I don't notice it so much with the ghosts."

"Maybe ghosts only speak the language of the dead. What are they saying?"

The only way to be rid of her questions was for the company to start moving, and the caravan wasn't ready. He'd never seen people slower to get moving in his life! The Qin stood beside their horses, not by a whisker betraying they might be impatient to go.

"Some person named Captain Beron betrayed them. Don't eat rabbit meat-it'll get you exiled. Now I don't want to talk about it anymore. How can I know it's safe here? In the empire, they burn those who believe in the Merciful One. What would they do with me?" When he spoke of the empire, he remembered how that Beltak priest had imprisoned the essence of a ghost, trapping it forever within a simple wooden bowl.

She touched his arm. "Are you all right, Shai? You're pale."

He looked around to make sure no one was within earshot. Mai's slave women were busying themselves by the cart Mai had obtained south of the pass through some clever trading of silks and woolens given to her as a wedding gift by Commander Beje.

"Can't you see? I've seen so many ghosts. I don't want to become one myself by speaking when I should have remained silent!"

Her expression softened. "I'm sorry. Of course you've had to keep it secret all your life in Kartu. I can see why you would still be anxious."

It was almost worse when she gazed at him with sincere concern. "How do we really know it's safe here?" he demanded. "Captain Anji made common cause with that eagle rider awfully quickly."

She shrugged. "Sometimes you have to know when to leap. Anyway, he liked him."

Abruptly, many of the horses whinnied and startled and shied. The big eagle landed with a whomp in the clear zone. The reeve fastened himself into his harness, and the eagle launched itself skyward with a mighty thrust of legs and wings whose strength and majesty brought tears of admiration to Shai's eyes. Mai touched fingers to heart, her gaze open with awe. They both followed the raptor's flight until it vanished away over the trees.

Chief Tuvi called out and, when he had their attention, waved merrily at them and signaled toward the horses.

"We're leaving!" Shai said with relief. He wiped his eyes and went to join the ranks.

The angry ghosts did not follow as the caravan trundled out the northern gate. But they hadn't ridden more than a few lengths when Shai saw an almost transparent wisp trudging along the road, a whipcord man-shape who had such an antique look about him-as though he had lingered in this spot for a hundred years-that Shai actually stared, wondering who this ghost was and where it came from. He had a strange idea that he had seen that face recently, but he couldn't place it. The ghost did not even look at him. As he turned in the saddle to watch it fall behind, it reached a broad stone placed beside the road like a marker, and vanished.

For the first three days after leaving Dast Korumbos, they traveled through heavily wooded hills, and although the road bent here to the left and there to the right and at intervals hit steep upward inclines as they climbed out of a valley, on the whole they headed northeast and downslope until Mai thought her tailbone would never stop aching. The Qin never tired or ached, so she refused to complain and had Priya massage her in the evening.

"Sheyshi should massage you, and you should massage Sheyshi." She lay on her stomach, with her head turned sideways so she could see with one eye. Her hair was caught up against her head, tendrils fallen free along her neck. "You must ache, too."

Priya smiled as she rubbed Mai's buttocks. "This is an easy life, compared to what came before."

"I wish I was a horse," Sheyshi whispered. She only ever whispered.

"Why do you wish you were a horse?" Mai asked. "Oh. Ah! Yes, right there!"

Sheyshi did not answer. She was the most reserved person Mai had ever met, closemouthed, not at all confiding.

"Horses are free," said Priya.

"Sheyshi, do you wish you were free?" Mai asked. "When we have found a place to live, I'll make sure you can earn extra zastras-or whatever they use here-to earn money toward your manumission. That's perfectly fair. Commander Beje gave me your bill of sale. That amount is what you must earn to buy your freedom."

The girl colored, stared at her hands, then lifted her gaze to look at Mai as daringly as she ever had. "I would like to be free," she whispered. "But that isn't what I meant. I dream sometimes about things. I dreamed I was a horse, running over the grass. It felt-it felt-" But after all, that was too much confiding! Sheyshi squeezed shut her mouth, twisted her hands and, to make herself busy, offered Priya more oil for the massage even though Priya's hands were moist and Mai's flanks smoothly coated.