This late in the year it was still hot even with the sun set and the night rains coming in. Her skin glistened. She brushed moisture from her eyes and swiped the back of her neck. She glanced toward the gate, where the shadows hid him.

“You don’t pray with me. You carry one of the bowls that the slaves of the southern god carry. It imprisons their souls. But you don’t pray their prayers, either.”

Uncomfortable, he shifted to ease the pressure on his seat.

“If you truly believe in the southern god, Kesh, then you should pray to him. If you don’t, you shouldn’t carry that bowl.”

She strolled back to the fire, poured a sludgy mix of khaif and rice porridge into their cup, and held it out to coax him out of the darkness. “Aren’t you hungry?”

He slouched into the light. She waited until he took the cup, then spooned gruel for herself straight out of the pot. They ate in silence. The khaif went straight to his head. As always, the buzz made him feel reckless and irritable.

“Why should I pray to any gods? What have the gods ever done for me?”

“Sheh! For shame! How could we be here, without the gods? How could anything have come into existence? The gods ordered the world. But it is our prayers that hold it together.”

“You have to believe that because you served in the temple.”

She lifted the spoon to her lips, sucked in the gruel, then licked clean the spoon. All the while she stared at him. He didn’t like that look.

“What are you accusing me of?” he demanded.

She gestured, and he handed her the cup. She measured out another portion and returned the cup to him. Then she removed the pot from the tripod and scraped out the leavings.

“Well? Say something!”

She finished eating and set the spoon into the pot with a gesture of closing. “We’ll ford the river at first light.”

BEFORE DAWN, THEY led the horses down the path into Candra Crossing. The ginnies, riding on Bai’s shoulders, were drowsy and irritable. In the heavens, the boldest stars still shone, while a blush lightened the east. Birds twittered. No wind stirred. It was already hot.

They approached along a dirt path that ran parallel to West Track behind the riverside row of buildings. Trampled fields marked where a large host had camped, and animals had grazed. The army had left shallow ditches stinking with refuse and offal, still swarming with bugs many days later.

A few buildings had burned down. The doors of the temple dedicated to Sapanasu had been smashed, and the counting house was singed. The compound dedicated to Kotaru, the Thunderer, was stripped of weapons and stores. Bai paused outside the gates of the temple to the Merciless One, carved with Her sigil: the bloom of the lotus pierced by a dagger. Like the rest of the town, the Devourer’s temple was abandoned. When Keshad peeked through the half-open gates, he saw only dust and dead plants, and a solitary stone bench where a single passionflower had fallen, its color withered to a pale pink.