Fannie was fearless. The warhorse would carry Awa far, beyond Hezram’s reach. Good citizens shunned runaway transgressors or dragged them back to the huts. If Awa and Meera rode warhorses, folks would think twice before giving chase. Griots claimed warhorses could outrun death. Awa would head for the Bog River Gorge or the sweet desert and look for Bal and Yari. If she had survived, surely they had too. She felt stupid giving up hope when escape was so near.

Rokiat led them from the burial grounds past the warhorse corral to the temple. No need to sneak through a tunnel—they were a work detail. He stopped at a side gate and whispered to the guard, a drunken fellow who laughed too loud at whatever Rokiat said. Stringy hair covered his face and fluttered as he made rude noises with his lips.

“Burial detail is better than blood watch,” Rokiat insisted.

“I’ll bet.” The guard leered at Awa and Meera. He reached for Meera’s breasts.

Awa smashed him with Tembe’s pot. “Not tonight,” she yelled, as surprised as he was. “Not tonight.”

“These two are mine,” Rokiat said. Awa punched the guard hard, for emphasis.

“Fine.” The guard swallowed wine. “I like watch. Nobody bothers me.” Inside Green Gates, he was safe from marauding barbarians, and acolytes avoided the warhorse meadows. He could drink himself senseless. “I never do blood work.”

They marched on. At the temple door, Rokiat kissed Meera one last time and fumbled with his keys. An acolyte barged out the door and down the steps. He vomited on sacred crystals in the square. Rokiat gagged at the man’s misery or perhaps at the stench wafting from the temple. Rokiat was used to meadow air. Awa and Meera steadied him and they wound through the Temple’s back corridors.

Preparations for the Sun Festival were in full swing. Dim chambers were filled with the breath bodies of Hezram’s spirit slaves. They lay on straw mats and were chained to the walls, eyes open and unblinking. They smacked slack lips, struggling for air, and tore at rags covering their bony figures. Skin and muscle dissolved into dust. Soon there would be nothing for a smoke-walker to return to. Void clouds hovered above the wasted bodies.

Rokiat covered his mouth. Awa and Meera held their breath as they passed chambers with gurgling cauldrons where acolytes poured Hezram’s tree oil and blood concoction into the mouths of new spirit slaves chained to stone benches. Awa looked away from limp bodies. Why carry their last pains with her? Better to remember people when they were alive. A careless acolyte got his finger chomped to the bone. He howled.

“We’ll be burying him next week.” Rokiat shuddered. “How many tonight? Ten? Breathing void fumes, acolytes rot inside—blood’s not even fit for Hezram’s conjure.”

Awa grunted. Acolytes deserved sickness and death.