The morning after the feast I woke early feeling smug because I also felt great. I was leaving the tent when I encountered Jethro. He had a certain glow about him that I took to mean that things had gone well between him and Anika.

“I didn't expect to see you up so soon,” I said.

“I don’t know what you mean,” said Jethro. “I had an early and very sober night. I heard that you and the Outlanders had your own private party.”

“I’m feeling great. Some of the others might not be though.” I thought about it, trying to work out how bad the others might have it. “Saleh should be fine, he was only drinking fizzy water. Asser has that Dwarf constitution so he shouldn’t be too hungover. Sarah’s got that Orc constitution, so maybe about the same. Akira has some poison resistances that come from his class so he might not be too ill. Varma has a bunch of status effect resistances and that supercharged metabolism perk so she’ll probably be fine too.”

Suddenly I was feeling a lot less smug.

“Amris might be feeling a bit fragile,” said Jethro. “All that tea drinking will not have prepared him for keeping up with your constitution. But that’s not why I’m here. Agnes sent me to get you. We’re to bathe and then head to her tent. She needs help moving stuff and then we’re getting breakfast on the Citadel.”

“Agnes needs help moving stuff? Like what? The road? The woods themselves?”

“The quicker we wash, the quicker we find out.”

###

We arrived at Agatha’s tent just as she finished taking it down and rolling it up. I didn’t see any of her furniture laying about, or any containers that could hold it all, so I assumed that she did indeed have that Dimensional Storage money. There was a stack of smallish boxes, chests and crates but none of them were big enough to contain the furniture.

Agnes was accompanied by one of her assistants, a young woman who, I deduced from her dark clothes and pointy hat, was some kind of apprentice witch. She was also a new mother. I deduced this from the small baby that she wore in a carrier strapped to her chest. She was also wearing a nursing shirt. The carrier and shirt was a combination I’d seen a couple of times in Arkadia.

Nursing shirts have deep flap fronts that allow for easy breastfeeding. It only takes a moment to adjust a baby carrier so the baby can feed, hands free. Most new mothers in Arkadia stay at home but occasionally you’ll see one out and about with the baby happily clamped in place. I saw a baker in Moonstone simultaneously feeding her baby while kneading a batch of bread dough. I’ve no idea if it was hygienic or not but it was one of the most impressive feats of multitasking that I’ve ever seen.

The woman grabbed a couple of of the boxes off the pile and I noticed that she had a black ribbon tied around her upper arm.

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“Let me help you with that,” I said, grabbing three of the chunkiest looking chests from the pile. “You’ve got enough to carry.”

“This all has to come on the Gondola with us,” said Agnes, “But first, stand still a minute.”

She tied a black ribbon round Jethro’s right upper arm and one around mine. She tied them tightly, then adjusted the bows, then gripped the knot on each one and I felt a burst of source and felt that we were somehow linked.

“You’ll see a few people with ribbons like that from now on. Black is for the Black Woods and it means that you speak for me. If you give orders to Black Woods troops then they should obey you as if I’ve spoken. I know that you’ll be getting blue Moonstone ribbons from Gertrude too.”

“How many colours are there going to be?” I said. “Did anyone check that Beast-Kin can tell them all apart?”

“We can worry about that later,” said Agnes, “It’s only the black and the gold ones that are out so far. Now get this all loaded into the Gondola. Maria knows where it is. I’ve got to go and check on something.” She handed the rolled up tent to Jethro and swept off before anyone could ask anything.

I followed the assistant, whom I presumed was called Maria, to one of the Emergency Gondolas and we began to load it with the boxes and chests. I helped Jethro lay the rolled up tent down then said, “Aren’t you going to introduce us?” when Jethro tried to head back to the pile.

“You’ve already met,” said Jethro.

“But not really,” said Maria, “And I read in one of Agnes’s books that most Beast-Kin recognise people by smell more than by sight. I must smell very different now.”

Had I been recognising people by smell? Maybe, a bit, but surely not by smell alone. I took a deep breath and tried to pick up a little of her scent. There was something familiar there but I couldn’t place it.

“I suppose so,” said Jethro. “It was dark and your face was much puffier then too.

“I was pregnant,” said Maria, “I barely recognised myself.”

That’s when I knew who she was. “It wasn’t just the pregnancy hormones,” I said, “It was that you mainly smelled of fear and panic.” She was the pregnant young woman who’d stumbled into our camp one night, fleeing a violent husband.

“I see you’ve had the baby then,” I said, as we headed back to the pile of chests.

She patted the infant’s head, with a doting grin and said, “The only good thing to come out of my old life. I walked away from everything else when Mistress Agnes agreed to take me on as an apprentice.” She grabbed another couple boxes from the pile. She went to reach for a third one but I grabbed it first.

I gave her my best Hyena scowl. “I’m sure you’re quite capable of moving all this stuff yourself but if Agnes had wanted you to do it she wouldn’t have told us to help. So let us help.”

###

It didn’t take us long to load the boxes on the Gondola. Agnes returned soon after we’d loaded the last one.

As we loaded and then ascended toward the Citadel Maria filled me in on her life story. She’d been on that “eldest daughter of a large family” to “matriarch of her own family” pipeline. She’d never thought of any other career until her husband revealed his true colours and by then it had been almost impossible to get away from him.

I didn’t ask if she knew what had become of him but she seemed to sense the unasked question. “Agnes is very sure that I’ll never have to worry about him again,” she said. “I haven’t asked how she’s so sure because I don’t want him taking up any more space in my memory. For whatever part you had in that, I thank you. Little Walder thanks you too.” She turned the carrier toward me so that I could see the baby’s face, angelic in sleep.