“Or leave your children orphans. Or watch them tortured before your eyes, if they believe you really know where I and this woman and her two sons have gone.”

“You’re a terrible friend to have,” said Eko.

“I am,” agreed Wad. “But then, I could have left you to your fate, not caring.”

“You’d never do that,” said Eko. “That is not the man you are.”

You don’t know the man I am, thought Wad.

As if she heard him, or guessed from his face, Eko said, “I know you better than you think.”

“Because you saw him crawling from a tree?” her little brother Bokky teased.

“Because he did bring them here,” said Eko. “He remembered us.”

“I wish he hadn’t,” said Levet.

“He remembered we were kind to him,” said Eko, “and so when he needed kindness for someone else, he came to us.”

“Yes,” said Wad.

Eko faced him boldly. “If you said that I would need to marry someone to save my family,” said Eko, “I would do it.”

“But I won’t say that to you,” said Wad.

“You’ll keep us safe,” said Eko. “From everyone?”

“I’ll take you to a place that I believe will be as safe as anywhere on Westil. More than that I can’t promise. I won’t be there to watch. It’s the best I can do.”

In the end, had they a choice? They gathered their few possessions, and Wad made a public gate for them, and they stepped through it, one by one.

Anonoei watched them do it, she and her sons.

Wad turned to her, when the last of Roop’s and Levet’s family had gone. “Now you know what it looks like,” he said.

“Going through a gate?” Anonoei asked. “I have fallen through the gate of my prison a hundred times.”

“What trust looks like,” said Wad.

“They’re not mages,” said Anonoei. “What choices do they have?”

“I don’t know what powers those children might have, and for all I know the father has some power with vegetables, or the mother a way with snakes. They have choices, as many as you have.”

Anonoei laughed. “I have as few as they, you’re right,” she said. “Perhaps they seemed weak to me because they love each other.”

It was such a shocking thing to say that Wad had no answer for her.

“I lived too long at court,” said Anonoei. “I have seen people owned, desired, and coveted, and I have seen people used, but few were loved, and few were loving.”

“You love your sons,” said Wad.

“I barely know my poor broken children,” said Anonoei, resting one hand on Enopp’s head, the other on Eluik’s shoulder. “Aren’t you going to follow those farm folk, and introduce them and the treemage to each other?”