“You can conceal yourself under the veil and go anywhere you wish,” said Mai, “and no one would recognize you. We could go out together, veiled in that way.”

“Everyone who saw us knowing we were Silvers!” She spoke the common word for her people with a biting lilt. “Afterward we would have to face my grandmother, and your husband, dear friend. I do not have the courage to attempt that.”

The glamour of twilight passed; night settled, and with it the daytime sounds of rumbling cart wheels and casual traffic. Water burbled through the complicated system of pipes that fed the fountains of the compound. Now and again they heard the fire watch clapping through the streets, or a swell of singing from one of the temples, and once they heard a man’s startled shout.

Eliar said, “The waters represent death? And the far shore is the existence we hope for after death?”

“No,” said Priya. “To arrive on the far shore is to follow the path of awakening.”

“There was still a light burning in your office when I came in,” said Miravia.

“That was Keshad. He never stops working. I don’t think he sleeps.”

“Your factor?”

“One of them. He’s young, but knowledgeable. I don’t know if any of the Ri Amarah ever had dealings with him. He was a slave to Master Feden.”

“Any merchant in Olossi knows better than to send slave factors to deal with my people. It would be terribly insulting.”

Mai glanced again at Priya. Would Miravia hate Mai if she knew Mai had slaves of her own? Surely Miravia already knew, and looked the other way. And yet, Mai could not see the harm in it. Everyone kept slaves, who could afford to do so. Slavery was what happened to people when they had lost everything. Yet that did not mean slaves were not human. When folk mistreated their slaves or forced themselves upon slaves who had no recourse but to accept unwanted attentions, that was cruel.

“Cruelty is always wrong,” she said.

“Yes, of course,” said Miravia with a surprised look. “Slavery is cruel because it deprives a person of their own life and of their honor. It is always wrong to permit slavery.”

This was treacherous ground.

Mai said, “Anji means to take a boat across the sea to look at the work being done in the Barrens, on our new estate, which I might remind you I have not seen—”

“Not that it isn’t a hundred mey away from any kind of lively markets!”

“Don’t remind me!” Mai laughed. “I will visit there twice a year to check on the herds. It sounds very much like Kartu Town, all dust, only with no market to liven the day. Many women who hope to marry the soldiers will be sent to live there the year around. Can you imagine!” She took a segment of sunfruit and considered its moist flesh, then popped it in her mouth and sighed as the sweet juices cooled her throat. “After the attack on Tam and Seren, Anji decided to increase the recruitment for the militia on the Olo’o Plain. He rode upriver with a company. He is sure another attack will come.”