But the beshti had not called out after the water at Pori: they had seen for themselves a hazard and smelled a smell that ruffled the ridge of hairs down their backs—Marak recalled that fine line of fear on the nape of Osan’s neck, just before he had known there was trouble. Tails had gone half-up, and stayed bristled, even now. The beshti left the promise of water and traveled back to their own caravan without a sound, thirst and self-preservation at war in their keen instincts. Only once in the next hour the beshti stopped, braced their feet, snuffed the air. The earth trembled slightly. But as it proved no worse, they resumed their progress toward the distant caravan.

Lelie, drained of tears, had seized hold of Marak’s coat at that instability and held on after that for dear life, not releasing her hold. She was bruised and scraped from the fall, but the makers were surely attending to that. It was the wound to her soul, her mother’s casual forgetfulness, that the makers could not cure: Norit had never asked to have her back, and as he rode, Marak stroked her hair gently, told her in a low voice that all was well, that they would go down to a safe place… half lies, all, making it sound easy, making it sound like tomorrow, when the next instant was Lelie’s tomorrow, in her young perception, and her mother rode dazed, lost in Luz’s visions.

Soon, tomorrow, very soon now.

How many fathers must be making that desperate promise today, short of water, themselves short of strength… and how many fathers must be giving up their ration to their children today, not knowing themselves where the end of this was, not knowing whether it was wiser to consume the water themselves, to keep their strength, or how much privation a child could bear?

“Luz,” he said aloud, to the presence behind Norit’s glazed steadiness. “Can you bring water to us at the bottom of the climb? We need your help. Too many of these people will die. Can you send Ian? Can you lead us to water closer to the cliffs?”

He begged for help. He bargained with their fate. Pride was nowhere in his reckoning. He prayed to a second goddess-on-earth for a miracle their Ila could not provide, and all the while the skin between his shoulders was uneasy, as if they had not shaken all the vermin off their track. He felt calamity organizing around them, and the people for whom he held all responsibility were in greater and greater disarray.

Marak, Marak, Marak, was all his own voices said in reply. He saw the sphere and the rock and the rings, twice repeated. That was the help Luz gave. She had done better. She had reached him before, and now found nothing to say to him but that: go, go blindly, giving him no reasons.