Surnat takes them to an eating-house where the Oxan Chiefs have invited them for dinner. It is not a large restaurant but it is clean and neat. A large table is placed in the middle of the room. The restaurant is seemingly reserved just for them. Tirad looks at the decorations, ancient objects from the pre-rain times: large intact mirrors, glass crocks and glazed earthenware as high as Tirad’s waist. Surnat send Dalia and her mother to the kitchen, obviously they are not allowed to dine with them. Tirad wants to intervene, but it would only make Dalia more uncomfortable, having to eat dinner with so many strangers. Dalia doesn’t complain and follows the kitchen maid out of the room. Tirad hasn’t seated on his chair yet when seven men enter the room. They are all wearing exquisite clothes made from shiny fabrics of all kinds of colours: red, yellow, green and black! The only colourful fabric found in the Saviour Ship is the purple turban of the Circle members. They all sit by the table and introduce themselves. Lealy asks Tirad to allow her to leave and go to the kitchen with Asin and Dalia. She is probably uncomfortable to dine with these men.

The maids put the dishes on the table. Hardas is the oldest of the chiefs and asks the guests to start eating.

“Tonight, we will feast only and tomorrow night, we shall discuss the serious matter of the refugees, in my house,” he says. The men start putting food in their plates. The relishing smell of food combines with the sound of the men talking. Tirad peeks at a dish filled with chicken kebab. The chiefs have done their best to treat them perfectly. But Tirad could never eat chicken. The Oxan Chiefs usually bring two live chickens to the Saviour Ship for the end of the rain season festivities. It is considered the most delicious and luxurious dish that is served only for the third tier and higher disciples. Tirad had seen the chickens slaughtered and plucked, when he was a boy. But it is not only the spilled blood and the sad memory he has from his childhood that makes him reluctant to the expensive food, he doesn’t like the taste and the stiff texture of the meat that is so hard for him to digest. He stretches his hand towards the roasted fish. It’s good that Dalia isn’t here, for they would never serve raw fish at such feasts. She has more chances of finding her own kind of food in the kitchen, and eat it without being embarrassed.

Mart is too busy talking to the chiefs, that he totally ignores Tirad. He seems too close to them as if he has known them from before, while Tirad has seen a few of them in some of the Saviour Ship festivities and has never spoken to them. The chiefs also ignore Tirad, even though Mart and he are both of the same ranking and on the same mission together. Tirad feels air pressure in his ears probably from the pressure difference of sea and the land or maybe the hum in the room. He can hardly swallow his food. He wants to get back to the port and return to the Saviour Island with the first boat. Surnat is sitting next to him. Kicks his arm with his elbow and makes jokes trying to bring Tirad out of his thoughts. He points to Tirad’s empty plate and puts a piece of chicken in it. Tirad thanks him and to avoid having to eat it, he starts a conversation with a lowered voice, asking Surnat about the suspicious death of the pregnant women. Surnat’s smile vanishes and after a short pause, he says he had sent all the reports to Hurmaz. But Tirad wants to know whether or not Surnat knows the boatman who had found the last body. Surnat believes the boatman had left the Island the day after and strokes his brown beard as if he is trying to take out some useful information from there.