As Venalse had said, the next day was much the same, although they left the river after a few hours to climb towards a gap in the northern ridge. A boulder turned as if to watch them as they walked past, the air was thick and green in a gully, fluorescent bats hung like exotic fruit from the branches of a tree, fruit that chittered and shifted restlessly. Camp was a small clearing a little way along the ridge from the trail, a quiet stretch of shadowed grass. Kosohona was the first to notice a hunched form hobbling out from the woods, indistinct in the twilight. At her exclamation, the others looked up and scrambled to their feet. The figure came toward them slowly, an old woman hung about with shawls, one drawn over the head.

Hands hovered over hilts or felt for quivers, but no-one wanted to make an aggressive move. Chrys, brought up on stories told in yurts at night of the fates of those who offended the elderly, and especially the eldritch elderly, scooped some stew into a bowl and went forward.

“Mother, will you come and be warm at our fire, and take food with us?”

“Beware the night when you cannot see the wind!” advised the crone.

“Your words are engraved on my mind, honoured lady. Come warm your bones.”

“Fortune smiles on the three-legged dog!”

“Again, I will remember. What food and warmth we have is yours to share.”

“When all else fails, look to the edge!” And with that the old woman drifted away into the forest.

Chrys waited a while, then walked back to the fire. “What did she say?” asked Rakt, “For that matter, what did you say?”

Chrys was puzzled. “Could you not hear her?”

“Mostly, but you were talking in some language I don’t know.”

“Was I? Oh, oh yes I did. I took her for something from the stories I heard in my father’s yurt as a child, and spoke to her in Rayat. She replied in the same. I don’t know why an old woman out here would speak Rayat, but she did.” She translated the conversation and they puzzled over it for a time to no result before giving up and going to sleep.

As Venalse forecast, they departed the trail late the next day, and the going became much slower. At the valley bottom the undergrowth was thick, higher up, the ground steep. Chrys supplemented their rations from any burrows they found, discovering by experiment that anonymous cubes of meat were more acceptable than any dish where the occupants were identifiable on the plate.

Chrys and Grymwer could practice minor spells as they walked, allowing them to become more accustomed to the Wild’s lively etheric flows. The others took time at the end of the day to spar or run through weapon-forms and hand movements. The first evening, Chrys, Grymwer, Rakt and Venalse sat on a log and watched Doryid and Kosohona train with swords.

“It’s interesting,” Venalse observed “that their orders use quite different styles, even though both use the sword as their focus. Kosohona is more about point than edge and her footwork is more fluid than Doryid’s. Her’s is more suited to open order, his to tight ranks. Takes both, I guess.”

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“Doryid’s moves are something like what we learned in the marines,” Rakt added. “There’s not a lot of room on a ship, so fights are close order with lots of shoving.”

“Did you see many fights?” Chrys asked.

“Only two serious ones. One was when we went to help a big Fire Island trader that was attacked by two pirate brigs. It was inshore, with no room for manoeuvre, so we boarded over the bow and had to fight the length of the deck. They fought hard because they knew they faced execution. Mostly I remember the press and the struggle to stay on my feet. The other was when we were sent in to break up a clan-fight in a village. I nearly got brained by a roof-tile. We were only at sea three months out of every six, and most of the time it was peaceful. I saw a fair number of the ports between Kurkroh and Mer Ammery.”

“Sounds like a good life if you’re young and unattached,” Chrys commented. “What made you leave? I mean, I’m here because I’m curious and the alternatives don’t appeal, and Doryid, Kosohona and Aitonala are here because their Orders put them forward, but you had what sounds like a good career.”

“So I did. I liked it well enough, once I was through training. When my family offered to buy me a commission I was unsure, but I had to do something. They have a ship’s chandlers business in Tonish and it does well, but not well enough to support me in idleness. Also, I had no bent for the business, and my older sisters do.” Here Rakt broke off to point out a neat move by Kosohona.

“In Tonish we have carnival every year,” he resumed. Chrys smiled, remembering carnival in Mer Ammery. “Anyway, at carnival I met a young lady, and we were being ... umm, very friendly when some man burst in and tried to stab me. I threw the sheet over him, took his knife away and tossed him out the window. Well, through the window, actually. Then I looked at the knife and saw the emblem of a powerful family, and the young lady told me he was her betrothed, and she the daughter of another family of equal power and wealth.”

Rakt paused, then went on. “We have sayings, that carnival is apart from ordinary life. ‘You cannot spend carnival money’ is one. One is supposed to ignore what happens in carnival when it is over. I had my doubts the young man and his family would keep to the custom, especially as he landed at the feet of a very gossipy dowager. And he broke his leg. I did not want my family to suffer, so I sold out and went to Mer Ammery. That is where I saw Ferdino’s offer.”

“They have the same custom in Mer Ammery,” Chrys remarked. “I was very glad of it after my first carnival, for it stopped my friends from teasing me about, oh, any number of things I had done. I hope your move worked for your family.”

Rakt nodded. “My going was victory enough. Mother writes that the business goes well. Indeed, they picked up some from families who knew the story. I did stay away from dark alleys in Mer Ammery though. That it put me out of range of most assassins was one of the attractions of this job. I still have the knife,” he noted inconsequentially.

“I’ve known a few Wild-runners with similar motivation,” Venalse said.

“Ship’s chandlers, eh?” Grymwer put in. “I probably know your firm. My folk own two ships and I grew up on board. I called at Tonish a few times when we were on the run up to the Hada ports, and again this year on my way back from Salweil.”

“Indulge my curiosity and tell me what brings you here, rather than somewhere out on the Green Sea?” asked Chrys. “You don’t have to, of course,” she added.

“It’s no mystery. The short answer is the Brahnak Loot. My folk are based in Brahnker City, but we follow the old teachings, the ones that say we should treat all people as we would wish to be treated ourselves. When the treasure was stolen, things started to get uncomfortable for folk like us. So my mother wrote to say I should not come home. They are going to sell up, and this lookedlike a good way to earn enough to help cover what they will lose. If we survive, of course.”

“I did not need that last part,” Chrys said. “I refuse to die on my first trip into the Wild.”

Venalse and Rakt looked at each other and shrugged.

Kosohona and Doryid put away their weapons and went to meditate. The others went to sleep.