He sat, saying nothing as he regarded the ripples in the pool with an expression so even that she began to grow nervous, thinking maybe he was very angry.

“Anji?”

“Marshal Joss told me a disturbing tale. Is it true?”

“That spirits attended the birth? I think so. I don’t know what to call them, truly, for they were like strands of silk more than spirits, but I felt such calm and protection at their presence. Now they’re gone. Sometimes I wonder if I dreamed it.” But when she turned to regard the waterfall, white skirts of mist rising where the water met the pool, she knew she had not.

“That he entered the chamber of birth,” said Anji.

Chief Tuvi whistled under his breath.

“The marshal brought me here safely. If we hadn’t turned back, I’d have lost the baby over the sea, for it came that quickly. Miyara—the other reeve—told me it is traditional for an aunt and uncle to witness the birth.” She watched him closely, not sure how to interpret his steady expression, but he glanced at the chief and shrugged as if to dislodge a weight, his shoulders relaxing.

“Uncle, eh? Then we must accept how things are done here in the Hundred. He’s a good man. It can’t hurt the child to be related by such bonds to the man who now stands as commander over all the reeves of the Hundred.”

Of course his words rolled out like so much nonsense. At first breath, she wondered what any of this had to do with the quiet woodland surrounding them, with the sun’s glamour setting the peaks in bright relief against a rich blue sky, with the brown earth under her slippered feet, and the whisper of a breeze in her ear bringing with it the faintest chiming lure of a distant melody sung by unseen voices.

She licked dry lips. “What do you mean, Anji? What has happened?”

“Hu!” He laughed for the first time, and she laughed, seeing his happiness in the quickness of his smile and the way he looked sidelong at her, almost flirting. “Grim news, truly, and a difficult path ahead. But it’s true it’s hard to feel the shadows in this place, as if the gods hold their hearts here.”

Sheyshi brought bowls of spiced tea, and the men settled more comfortably on the stone wall while Mai adjusted the pillow under her to cushion the places down there where she was still rather sore.

“I can’t sing,” he added with another smile, “although I know how you love your songs. So for you, plum blossom, and only for you, flower of my heart and mother of my son, I will tell you the story of the events of the last many days as a tale.”