“An ancient punishment for adultery,” he explained. “I prefer other ancient punishments. Shunning. Conscription. Death. But you’re a man. Surely you agree?”

“I am not, strictly speaking, a man,” said Chance.

“He had no right,” Danil went on querulously, blinking back tears. “He had no right to judge. I would have married her. I would have been a better father to her son.”

Chance shook his head very slightly. “I believe that you think so . . . in hindsight, at least.”

“That’s another ancient punishment for fornication. Forced marriage. Impossible when one party is already married,” he said morosely.

There was a small silence.

“I hate morality,” he added with sudden harshness.

“You were young,” the woman said. “You thought there was no rush. Few young men are moral. They wait till they are old for that, and even then . . .” She too concluded on a sharp, resentful note.

Danil slid from the boulder and tentatively climbed up and over the seawall as if favoring a body wracked with phantom pain. When he finally stood before them, it was with hands clasped in front of him, screening his lack, flesh and bone managing what mere clothing could not.

“Two guides, and four or five more to follow, I take it?” Chance asked him directly. “Is Galina next? I don’t know her story. Why was she killed? And the child—the case notes never said if the child was living or dead.”

“Don’t be in such a rush,” Danil warned him. “It’s not pleasant.”

“I thought you would know who lives and who dies,” the woman said in surprise. “Don’t you know how many of us there are?”

Chance shook his head. “I don’t know everything.”

“And?” she pressed, a little hardness coming into her voice.

“And I pay little attention to those who cannot make choices,” he admitted. “Choosing is what makes a difference to probabilities; choosing is what makes a human stand out. Millions of infants die before they can make a definitive choice. They barely make a mark on the tapestry.”

She sniffed. “You write off many, old man. Many people cannot choose, not only babies.”

“Perhaps,” he demurred, “but still fewer than you think.”

Her body stiffened, reversing the gradual relaxation of their journey together. “Danil can carry me.”

“If you wish,” Chance said, bewildered by her withdrawal.

He handed her over with care; Danil took her and held her across his arms like a bride. The drape of her dancer’s skirt gave him the screen he coveted, and he knew it well, for he stood taller and looked happier, once more a handsome, well-proportioned man. The woman glanced at him, bit her lip to mask an instinctive smile, lowered her eyes, and muttered, “Better the monster you know.”

“Lead the way, Danil,” Chance told him.

Danil took a step, the light changed, the ground shifted, and they walked once more in the desert.

“So, how did you die?” asked the woman.