Cheeyt moved toward Nuttulch and Saknuu with her hands tightening on her weapons. She felt someone squeeze her upper arm, then Singmij said, voice light, “You don’t have the energy to maim them right now and you might regret it later.”

She glanced at the other woman, surprised and feeling something else that she wasn’t going to think about. Singmij smirked and moved over to crouch in front of Tseetsaa, speaking to the younger woman gently.

Some of the fury and tension had flowed out of her body at the touch. “Why aren’t you two on the first barge back to Wumaltsmaas?” Both of them were refusing to meet her eyes.

“Couldn’t just leave you,” Saknuu muttered.

“Yes, you could have. You should have. I’m in the middle of a job! A job that you made harder. Do you see t his?” She spread her arms to indicate their battered appearance. “We were attacked by people who are hunting my client. They weren’t on our trail until the two of you tried to take on a horde of Bakfathi by yourselves!”

Both of them looked down and mumbled apologies like the little children from the neighborhood. And this was why Cheeyt had stayed friends with them for so many years. They always apologized. They just never changed their behavior. But she couldn’t have them endangering her family. It was bad enough her family was here.

“Cheeyt, may I talk to you for a minute?” Nuliyaa was there, off to the side, and her annoyance flared. Because she knew what her sister was going to ask.

She stomped off to the other side of the wagon with her sister. When Nuliyaa turned to face her, mouth opening for whatever argument she had planned, Cheeyt cut her off with, “You’ve seen how they are. Do you want to risk that?”

“Can we risk not having them along?” Nuliyaa asked.

At the question, the quiet voice, she realized Nuliyaa was scared. Nuliyaa, who was always so sure she held the right of it.

Part of Cheeyt flared in triumph. She’d told Nuliyaa. She’d told her how dangerous this work could be.

But the rest of her tiredly pointed out that if she had truly feared for her family, she would have stopped their coming. Somehow. Neither she nor Kachaark had any reason to believe that Tewmisyu would be compromised, that new pirates would be plaguing the river (though she or the barger should have suspected that the change in boat traffic to Riverport would bring out the opportunists), or that the same poachers who had taken Chesfi before would find them again in Riverport. They did have enough people and resources to deal with the problems they had expected.

Did she like admitting that? No.

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“We’ll make it clear they cannot drink while they’re with us,” Nuliyaa said.

Cheeyt sighed. “And how will we pay them?”

“Oh, we’re not.” At that, Nuliyaa crossed her arms. “You’re right. They’re probably at least partially responsible for this trouble. This is how they apologize. We can feed them. That’s it.”

Nuliyaa was scared and angry. Nuttulch and Saknuu were going to have to be on their best behavior around her for a while.

“If they drink?”

“They’re out. We can let Miyt handle that.”

A smirk quirked up her lips as Cheeyt snuck a glance at their mother. Miyt was speaking to the two men with her arm around Tseetsaa, eyes narrowed. Kachaark lifted his head at that moment, meeting her gaze. He looked resigned.

“All right. They can come with us to Spires. We shouldn’t need them in Nengmek.”

Nuliyaa looked like she disagreed, but she nodded.

Hours later, Singmij settled at Cheeyt’s side as she cleaned and checked her weapons. “You need something?” Cheeyt asked.

“I need to gather information about the poachers,” Singmij said.

Cheeyt’s head shot up. “You’re leaving?” Why did that thought bother her so much?

“No. I’m not going to abandon you when you need my help.” Then Singmij looked amused as she tilted her head toward the malk. True to Sinchach’s assessment, she had stretched out across a blanket soon after Nuttulch and Saknuu had arrived and seemed to be sleeping deeply. “And if I leave, Chesfi will leave to do her own investigation, which is not something any of us want. I’m asking your permission to do some interviews.”

“Nuliyaa is responsible for the people side of things.”

“And you’re the one who would be most uncomfortable if I just started talking with the others without your input.”

“Oh.”

“Do you have any objections?”

“No.”

“Mind if I start with you?”

“I suppose not. I can talk and work.”

“Excellent.” Singmij hopped back up. “I’ll do the same.”

She returned with her crossbow and ax. As she started her cleaning, she asked, “What were your impressions of the attack?”

“Organized,” Cheeyt answered immediately. “But the group doesn’t work together well.”

“Why do you say that?”

“They were prepared for us. They had a mage, and that mage was either new or hired specifically for us. The mage wasn’t well utilized.”

“What else did you notice?”

“They seemed to be a mixed group.”

Singmij’s eyebrows twitched up slightly. “You don’t think so?” Cheeyt asked.

“I do.” Singmij scrubbed a little harder than necessary with the oiled rag in her hands. “It’d be nice if we could just blame the poaching on the Bakfathi, since they’re causing so many other problems. But there were not only Bakfathi in that group.”

“No,” Cheeyt agreed. “I would say most of them were city-staters. Maybe you haven’t found them because they aren’t shipping down the river. They’re moving their prisoners overland.”

“And then crossing the river at the Wumaltsmaas docks.”

“Or at Aapa Mapri.”

“When your sister found Chesfi, she thought the wagon was coming from the riverside wharf and headed toward the seaside.”

“Nuliyaa is more familiar with the city interior than the dock areas. I’m not saying she’s wrong, but she was guessing.”

“Mm.” They worked in silence for a couple of minutes. “Do you have a guess as to which city-state most of the attackers hail from?”

“I could make a better guess if we’d heard them speaking, but since we didn’t have an opportunity to chat before they tried to kill us, no.”

“Perhaps the next time we meet them, I’ll have the opportunity to change that.”