“Here.” She swung down her pack and pulled from it the goat-meat sausage, the round of salted cheese, and the small sack of oats they’d been given that morning at a hamlet whose livestock had prospered on the slopes over the summer. “You’d be doing us a favor to take this off our hands and share it among your families. It will lighten our load.”

Kem’s eyes got round as he opened his mouth to protest. She gave him a hard stare until he snapped his lips closed and took a step back with a huff of displeasure. Willomo shyly looked Kem up and down in surprise, puzzled gaze lingering too long on Kem’s chest. Realizing he was staring rudely, the lad blushed and looked away. Kem bit his lip, annoyed and flushed. He was a surging wind funnel of emotion these days, not that she blamed him, given everything he was going through. At his age she’d never had the luxury, and she was glad he did, even when it made him tiresome to deal with.

“Best we all get on our way, Elder,” she went on, knowing they would have to let her go. “Sun’s setting. You’ve got a longer walk than I have. Peace of the night to you, Elder. Tiller. Deputy Sentinel.”

She beckoned to Kem and, without waiting for an answer, headed on up the track. It was rude, according to the custom of the villages, but fully in keeping with the perquisites of an imperial official, even one so humble as a deputy courier.

After one hundred steps she risked a glance back to make sure the others had taken the food. Of course they had. Urnesso lagged behind as if wondering if she would change her mind, not that she had ever given him an opportunity to ask again, not after the first time.

Abruptly Kem said, “It’s selfish of him to think you would marry a poor tiller from a ragged hamlet that can’t even feed itself. And give up being a courier, if the intendant would even allow it.”

“Hard to say what any of us would do in his situation. I’ve been asking around.”

“Asking around?”

“In the hill villages. Sometimes a person loses their kin or their home, or a stray relative from a distant village turns up and no one knows what to do with them. Can’t turn them out, but can’t feed them. There might be someone for whom Urnesso’s situation would be a hopeful change.”

“You’re the one who just said none of them ever have enough to eat.”

“He’d do better with a second pair of adult hands in his household to share the work. Who’s to say it couldn’t get better, in that case?”

“But not you, Aunt?” He slid a look her way, testing.