“Ya blind?” the woman pressed. “Dumb?” She took a step closer, waving her cane in the air before Adare’s nose in the way a horse breaker might show a beast the halter. “Sweet ’Shael, ya ain’t sluggish in the head, are ya?”

“No,” Adare managed finally, trying to keep her voice low. The old woman had drawn too much attention already.

“Good,” she snapped, “ ’cause I got more than plenty a’ crazy with this brain-buggered arsehole.” She jerked a thumb at her brother, shook her head in irritation, and half turned back to the wagon. Adare started to blow out a sigh of relief, but the woman hesitated, cursed under her breath—something about letting the fool girl wander—then, with obvious reluctance, rounded on her once more, stepping in close this time. “What’s with the cloth on your eyes?”

“Nira,” the man interjected, shaking his head and peering suddenly up into the sky, “the young woman’s attire is really none of our business. The clouds,” he waved a vague hand, “they are our business. The clouds and the sky and the rain . . .” He trailed off, staring blankly into the distance.

“Oh bugger off with your business, Oshi,” the woman snapped. “Child’s standing ’ere like a poleaxed steer, baffled as a bitch in heat, and you’re on about business. What about fixing the fucking lashing while you’re at it, eh? What about that business?”

She turned back to Adare, waving her over imperiously.

“Quit standin’ there like a silly slut and let me have a look at the problem. River blindness, is it? I’ve seen plenty river blindness, and a strip a’ cloth is no way to handle it. . . .”

Adare tried to back away, but the knot of people had tightened around her as more pressed in from the periphery. She could try to force her way free, but that seemed likely to draw more attention than the old woman herself.

“It’s not river blindness,” she muttered. She knew as soon as the words were out that the lie was foolish. She’d already told Lehav that she did have river blindness, but this woman seemed intent on checking the injury for herself. Adare raised a nervous hand to the blindfold. “I don’t think it’s river blindness,” she said again, a little more loudly. “I don’t have the bleeding or the lesions.”

“Let me have a look,” the old woman said, stretching up and frowning. “No good hiding from the truth.”

Adare jerked back. “I’m not hiding,” she snapped, more loudly than she had intended. More heads turned and she cursed herself silently. “It’s a normal case of dimming,” she went on more quietly. “My physician said binding them, shielding them from the light, would slow the damage.”

The old woman spat on the broad flags. “Physician, is it? How many pretty gold suns ya toss his way for that fine piece of fuckery?”