The paiza won them food and lodging, in a shabby mud-and-straw hut. The people of the lower town, and, once, one of the monks, brought them food and drink, rather stringy mutton, bitter fruit. Uzzia, urged by Pyxeas, tried to pay, for it was clear these people had little enough of their own. But the townsfolk were evidently terrified by the authority of the Khan and would have none of it.

It was a relief for Avatak to let the saddle-soreness seep out of his thighs. But he found it impossible to sleep indoors, in a box of mud. Something in him was drawn back to the huge emptiness of the desert, and perhaps always would be. So he crept out of the house, to a small kitchen garden at the back, and laid out his roll under the stars.

The second night Uzzia came out to find him there. She crouched over him, her smile shadowed. ‘You’ve got an invitation.’

‘From who?’

‘From the woman in the house next door. Or rather, her husband. I know you’ve noticed her – she’s noticed you.’

Avatak knew who she meant. The woman, a good few years older than him, was taller, stockier than most in this country. She had a strong face with a sly grin, and broad hips, and a bust that was heavy, if not firm. She filled her robes well as she went about her chores.

‘I know how that type appeals to young men like you. An older woman, evidently fertile, knows her way around a bed – seems to draw the seed out of you just by looking at you.’

‘What does she want with me?’

‘What do you think?’

‘But you said, the husband—’

‘It is their way, in this country,’ she said. ‘To invite travellers into the beds of the women. This is a small place and isolated; there are probably people here who will live and die never travelling as far as the next village. This is their way to make babies who are not the cousins of everybody else. Do you see?’

‘Oh.’

‘You would be doing them a favour. You will be asked to leave a token, a present, to prove that the deed has been done.’ She sighed. ‘I remember when you would be asked for a flower, a bit of cheap jewellery. Now they ask for food, which changes the whole nature of the transaction, doesn’t it? But these are harder times. Well. We have the food, or can buy it. What do you say?’

He thought about the woman, and felt a warm pressure in his loins. But he thought of his betrothed, and his lover, in far countries. And he glanced up at the cold, unmoving stars.

‘What’s wrong? Are you missing your betrothed?’

‘Not that.’ He lacked the language to express how he felt. ‘The desert.’