"What do you mean?" asked one of the men. His accent was thick, but Ahl could understand him.

Perig gestured. "Those two are women."

The man frowned. "They don't look it."

"Ahl, pull off your tunic," Perig said.

She did as he asked, dropping the tunic and unfastening the band that held her upper breasts. The moment she was bare, the men looked down. This was encouraging. In spite of being pirates, they had not lost all sense of right behavior.

"Put on your tunic," said one of the men in a stifled voice.

She picked up the tunic and pulled it on.

"There is a baby on the ship," Perig continued in his usual pleasant voice. "The other woman, the one holding the stick with birds, is the mother. I assume you're planning to kill us or maroon us. But you can hardly kill women or maroon them with unrelated men."

"How do you know what we can do?" asked the man who had spoken previously. Most likely he was the leader.

The men around him looked uneasy. One said, "Jehan," in a nervous tone.

"And why are these women traveling in disguise with men who aren't relatives?"

added the man named Jehan. "I know foreigners lack self-respect, but this seems worse than usual."

"Why don't you disarm us, which is the obvious next step, and then we can talk,"

said Perig. "If you've left the Taig cook alive, you might give the birds to him."

Jehan swung his sword. Perig fell.

"Goddess!" cried Cholkwa, falling to his knees beside his lover. Ahl was certain now. She heard love in the young man's anguished voice.

Perig sat up, feeling his head.

"I used the flat," said Jehan. "But if he keeps talking, I'll use the edge."

"He'll be quiet," said Cholkwa and stood, helping Perig up. His hands, on the older man, seemed as careful as if he were holding a fragile treasure: something made of glass and gold.

"Now," said Jehan. "Give us your weapons."

They went down the beach, still carrying their birds, surrounded by pirates. Now Ahl could see beyond the Taig ship. There was another ship, somewhat smaller, outside the harbor entrance, blocking escape. Obviously it belonged to the pirates. Squinting against the glare of sunset, she tried to make out details, but couldn't tell if there were pirates on the Taig ship.

Clearly they held the beach and the remaining sailors on shore: a group of seven, two injured, one badly. The Taig cook was wrapping an already-bloody bandage around his chest. Guards stood around the prisoners, holding weapons that had belonged-- Ahl was almost certain-- to the Taig.

"Are the rest dead?" asked Ahl.

"Some," said the cook in an angry voice. "Most were on the ship, repairing the rigging. They are still there, guarding it against capture."

One of the guards said, "My cousin Jehan thought it would be a good idea to attack from the land. That's where you seemed to be, if your smoke was any indication. If we came sailing in from the west, you'd see us and make preparations. Better to circle to the south -- the island would hide us – and land a party in the little southern harbor, then come through the forest and take you by surprise."

"It worked," said Jehan stubbornly.

"We don't have their ship," said the guard.

"We'll get it," Jehan said. "In the meantime, we have dinner."

"And two women," said one of the other pirates.

"What?" asked the guard. He was a stocky man with dark fur going silver over his shoulders. In Ahl's opinion, he looked sensible, not a trait she associated with

piracy.

"I'm a woman," said Ahl. "And so is she."

"This is turning into a perplexing mess," the guard said. "What are two women doing on a Taig ship, disguised as men? Taig women don't travel, and why would any woman disguise herself as a man? Surely you know how dangerous it is! We could have killed you by mistake."

"Can I speak?" asked Perig.

"If you want to," said the guard. "And have something useful to say."

"He's one for chattering," said Jehan in a warning tone.

"Let him chatter," said the guard. "I want information."

"These two women needed to get south in a hurry and went in disguise, because they couldn't find a women's ship."

"Are you related to them? You don't look similar."

Perig hesitated briefly, then tilted his head in assent. "The women in our lineage are tall and have an authority we men lack."

"Which lineage?" the guard asked.

"Tesati," said Perig.

"Not one I know."

"It's to the north," said Perig. "At the edge of the Great Central Plain. Or rather it was there. The Unraveling has destroyed much. Another family overwhelmed ours. The men are dead, except for us."

"Why are you alive?" asked Jehan.

"We weren't home when the end came. Cholkwa and I are actors and often travel."

"Actors!" said the guard, looking interested.

"When we did come home, we found --" Perig smiled briefly. "No home. Our male kin were dead. The family that killed them, the Chaitin, had gathered in our female relatives and the children. We should have killed ourselves. It would have been the decent thing to do. But we found these two hiding out, along with Leweli's baby. They didn't want to be Chaitin. There are women who hold this kind of grudge."

Everyone was listening intently, of course. It was a good story, told excellently. But now Ahl saw a look of confusion on the Taig cook's face, followed by a look of horror. The cook was remembering the night before, she thought. Perig and Cholkwa had made love on the beach. The Taig sailors had noticed and been undisturbed. Traveling companions often give each other this

kind of comfort, provided they are the same sex and not related. But if the two actors belonged to the same family, the act was incest. The cook opened his mouth, then closed it and glanced down, going back to work on his injured comrade.

A near thing! And not over. The cook might still decide to denounce the actors.

"Maybe we should have given our kinswomen to the Chaitin," Perig said. "They would have been safer; and there is always something offensive about the idea of women without a family. Such things happen to men. We know it! But women should live inside a double wall of matriarchs and soldiers.

"These ethical problems are never easy to untangle. In the end we decided to rely on the old rule, which says that men should not make decisions for women.

That power lies in the hands of their mothers and their female relatives; and they were not available, nor were they kin, since they had become Chaitin, while these two remained Tesati. They asked us to escort them south; and we agreed out of loyalty, which is not the foremost male virtue. That, of course, is

directness or honesty. But loyalty is one of the five."

"I told you he talked a lot," said Jehan.