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that pointed outward, so that he seemed to be looking in two directions at once.
    They approached almost timidly, as if Master Lim might yet leap to his feet, draw his sword, and fillet them like a pair of fish. In fact I couldn’t believe he wouldn’t. But I’d seen enough of death to know that he would never sing his way down a road again.
    “Sit still, girlie,” the walleyed man said. “Don’t go running off now, till we see what you’ve got in that bag. If you try to scoot. I’ll put an arrow in your back, understand? Is he dead?”
    The bowman said, “Dead as old leather,” and slung his bow over his filthy tunic.
    I began to scream then, and wouldn’t stop until the bowman hit me across the cheek. It wasn’t a hard blow; I’d had harder from Detrim, but it stopped my shrieks and I began to sob with hopeless grief. I was too frightened to run away, and in any case my legs wouldn’t have carried me.
    They ignored me while they stripped poor Master Lim of all he’d owned. I couldn’t look, but I heard them sounding pleased over the sword and arguing about how much the sivara would bring. Then they got around to me. They took my bag, the only gift Rana had ever given me, all my food, and even my walking stick. The walleyed man then grabbed my cloak and was going to rob me of that, too, but the bowman said, “Leave it, she’s got little enough.”
    “What for? What do we care?” the other demanded. But he stopped.
    The bowman looked at me and said, “I had a daughter near your age once. Wasn’t your father, was he?”
    “No,” I croaked. I had no idea what they were going to do next. We Durdana didn’t sell or buy human beings, but I knew other nations did. Maybe the men would take me far away to Abaris or the Yellow Smoke Islands and sell me there.
    “Who was he?” the bowman asked. “Uncle? Something else?”
    “My friend,” I whimpered. “He was my friend. He could sing and play music and you killed him!” I was suddenly beside myself with fury, enraged at what they’d done, at the waste of it, and I screamed, “You killed him for nothing! Nothing!”
    They looked away as if shamed. I didn’t know it then, but they were probably farmers driven off their land by hunger and violence, as desperate as me and likely no more evil.
    “He should have been more careful,” the walleyed one said sullenly. “You can keep your cloak. Go on, run off now. We won’t hurt you.”
    “You already have,” I said wretchedly. “Let me keep his sivara for him, at least.”
    They stared at me as if I’d taken leave of my senses. Then, without another word, they turned and hurried into the forest the way they’d come.
    After they were gone, I cried over Master Lim. When I ran out of tears I arranged his body with as much dignity as I could; at least the bowman had taken the arrow away, so I didn’t need to attend to that. I had neither the tools nor the strength to bury him, and I had no fire to bum a lock of his hair for the ritual ashes. But I whispered some prayers and scattered some flowers over him, hoping their beauty would help his idu-spirit find rest in the Quiet World.
    Mid-aftemoon had come and gone by the time I finished. I now wanted to curl up near Master Lim and sleep for a long time, but I knew I had to go on. We had just begun to eat when the bandits came, so my belly was almost empty, and it would remain so till I reached Gladewater. Even then I’d have to work before somebody would feed me, so I had no time to lose. I left poor Master Lim behind, and tried not to think about how the carrion birds, which were already gathering overhead, would treat him once I was gone.
    For a long time all I could think of was how close I’d come to a new life and how two stupid and worthless men had swept it all away. If I’d felt glum before I met Master Lim, I felt worse now, and was so wrapped in my misery that at first I didn’t notice the faint sounds from ahead. When I did, I stopped short