Eiya! Grief is a mire. She put her head down and kept walking.

Slowly, the skies cleared to a patchwork. After a day and a night she reached the abandoned shack and sank down, exhausted, beside the dusty harness. Her thoughts chased in circles. She was alone, just as the blood-cloaked Guardian had been alone even though he was sitting in the eating hall among reeves who identified themselves as his allies.

What is a Guardian? she might ask, and she had found one of her answers: A Guardian might walk among humankind, but she was no longer one of them. She never would be again.

MARIT WOKE AT dawn when Warning shoved her nose into her face and slobbered on her. The cursed mare’s coat needed brushing, and her mane was tangled, but her hooves were clean of stones and debris and she was otherwise healthy. By all appearances, the mare was as happy to see Marit as Marit was to see her, curse it all, for there were tears in her own eyes.

5

“Here’s your pay,” said the stable master, holding out a string of vey. He cleared his throat, shifted his feet, scratched an earlobe. “You’re a good worker, no complaints there. You don’t make any trouble. But I have to ask you not to come back tomorrow.”

“I see,” said Marit to her feet. She knew what was coming. She had been through this conversation six times in the weeks she had been in Olossi.

He spoke quickly, to get through the distasteful job. “Custom is off, and that’s besides it being the Flood Rains and fewer folk walking about this time of year due to the weather. Someone is causing trouble on the roads for carters and stablekeepers, for all us honest guilds folk, so we can’t keep our hirelings as we might otherwise want in a better year.”

“Custom does seem low. What do you think is causing the trouble?”

He cleared his throat. She glanced up, meeting his gaze.

Images and words churned: she’s got that northern way of speaking; what if she’s a spy for one of the Greater Houses; I don’t trust ’em; they’re trying to corral all the trade for themselves and their favored clients; anyway, there’s something about her that creeps everyone and no surprise . . .

She dropped her gaze. He took a step away, as from someone who stank.

“Might be anyone,” he said, backed up against the closed door, “ospreys diving for a quick snatch, criminals wandering down from the north, folk wanting to drive a wedge into the carters’ guild and make trouble for them.” His tone picked up confidence. “So there it is. Someone has to go. The other hirelings are, eh, well, it’s your—ah—northern way of speaking. Makes them uncomfortable. I’ve had them on hire for years now, so that makes you lowest roll.”

“First to go,” she agreed with a twisted smile. She had replaced the old sandals she’d taken from the shepherd’s hut with better ones, but after weeks in the city keeping her gaze down she had memorized every stain and nick in the worn leather. Her feet were dirty again, toenails black with grime from stable work. “My thanks. You were a fair employer, I’ll give you that.” She took the vey from his hand, trying not to notice how quickly he pulled his hand back, hoping not to touch her. As if she was a demon walking abroad in human skin.