"Gleb?" the little girl, Yvett, called. Thatching season was over. Harvest was here, and Gleb worked the scythe in a simple rhythm, over and over and over again. It ached his muscles, worked parts of his back and arms he hadn't used in ages. But he was using them now as he gathered bushels of grain.

"Gleb!" Yvett called again.

She raced into the field, wearing a bright scarlet dress, presumably so he'd see her and not cut her in half, too. Children all wore scarlet during harvest so they were not easily missed when they came into the fields, which could often be quite dangerous in the usual browns and greys of the area.

He leaned his scythe on the ground and brushed the sweat from his eyes as the sun beat down upon his bare black back. "What need ye, tin' Yvett?" he asked, making sure he smiled properly so as not to frighten the girl.

"Mum says you'll be here for Harvestfest. Will you? Will you, Gleb?"

He shrugged languidly, muscles jumping catlike under his skin. "Time comes will be tellerin', tin' Yvett."

"Please be here! Please stay, Gleb!" she said, her hands clasping sweet and innocent under her chin, eyes huge and glowing like stars swollen in the blackest sky.

"What be the urgence, then, that be makin' ye so right 'sistful?"

She giggled. "There's a dance, Gleb. Won't you be my partner? Won't you stay and... Won't you stay?"

Gleb blinked at her. "Time comes be tellerin'," he repeated, more gently this time. "But I'll be mindful yer requesterin', tin' Yvett."

She giggled, nodded, and ran off, turning around after a moment to shout, "Thank you!" before scampering off through the grains again.

Gleb shook his head, hefted his scythe, and started to reap again, in a much more literal sense than he had for some time. He had every intention of being gone from here before such a promise would come to pass.

They were lost. Feivel knew it as he stood on the top of the hill, watching Janice and Kendra wander off in search of a stream or something to wash their feet in at the very least.

Feivel had never been lost in his life.

It was a matter of knowing that most of his life was spent on the plains, and the days that weren't were spent in the service of his Lady, deaf and dark and silent. She had never abandoned him nearly so promptly as this. Usually he had to drag people places, kill men, or even just show up to witness something so he could tell his people about it at the Times of Trading.

But he couldn't feel her push, couldn't feel her pull, couldn't feel her at all, all over again.

He started to doubt he could feel her at all. Was she casting him off? It wouldn't surprise him. She had Gershwin. He was a better channel for her deeds, but he was always by far more faithful.

Until now.

And he hated himself for this seed of doubt that was creeping into his heart. He had to dig it out, burn it brightly, before it grew to a small shrubbery of doubt, and then choked out her presence in his heart. He would not stand for that.

In serving her, he served all men. He served history and heroes. He served his tribes, the Those That Stayed, the men far to the south, even the Indallans from beyond the Sea of Gildesh. He could not just leave this life.

In serving her, he was finally happy. In serving her, he was contented.

But was she?

He stared at the departing silhouettes of Janice and Kendra as he considered this.

At length, he calmed himself. Now was not the time to make this decision. He wasn't in reach of the Temple of the Hand of Fate. Not yet. He would wait, and he would hold his faith until she told him never again to answer. She was his Lady, even in excommunication. And he would follow her push to the very end of him.

Marley knew something was amiss by the way the girls looked at her as she came into the surgery that morning.

"What now," she sighed.

"Well, umm..." Agnes began, but she stalled horribly, and Lina picked up where she left off.

"Agnes' sister has been talking," she said firmly.

"Agnes' sister talks quite a bit," Marley said dismissively.

"She's been talking about you, Ma'am," Agnes whispered.

Marley leaned againts her counter, crossed her arms over her chest, and looked imperiously at her girls. "Has she now?" she drawled. "And just what has this little whore-mouthed skulk said?"

Agnes looked away a moment, blushing red on behalf of her sister, then she turned back, an unusual fire in her eyes to match the fire on her cheeks. "She says you're a witch. She says you've seduced General Farrow. She says you've snatched away his very soul. She says you've set your sights on the heart of the army, that you'll do in our father, Doctor Ridges. She's lying, Ma'am. I know she is. But they won't see it. You've got to lie low."

Marley's amusement slowly faded to a glare as Agnes spoke.

Thedis spoke up, too, beside her friend. "My mother insists I stop studying with you," she breathed. "I don't want to stop. I want to learn more. I want to learn how to stop this from happening to me. But..."

"If we stay, Ma'am, they'll turn on us next," Lina said quietly. "It's already starting with the younger ones. They won't turn on me yet, but I'm sure it's a matter of time."

"Go," Marley said quietly, glancing to each of them. "I release you."

Not one of them moved.

"GO!" she roared to smother the sob that choked her at the thought of saying it a third time.

Still none of them moved.

"We're not leaving, Ma'am," Lina said firmly. "That's what we're here to tell you. They'll have to kill their daughters, all of them, because we're not leaving."

Marley stared at them in awe.

"We want to learn," Thedis insisted. "There's so much you know that we haven't begun to understand. About herbs... And about life. They won't explain it to us, and we'll be staggering around blindly forever. I don't want to be blind. I want to know. There's got to be more to life than this."

Marley stared at them all. "You'll burn, too," she said quietly.

"Then we'll all burn together," Agnes insisted.

"Oh, gods, what angels have you sent me?" she breathed, tears brimming in her eyes.

She blotted them away, then nodded. "You want to learn, then?" she asked.

The girls nodded firmly.

"Then you won't learn anything standing around here. Lina, prep the surgery. Young ones, go gather gromlies from the lane. Agnes, Thedis, start doing inventory on the herbs. I'm sure we'll be low on something soon."

They exploded away in all directions, and Marley wanted nothing more than a stiff drink right then. Unfortunately, that wasn't an option.

She hurried into her reception room, and unlocked the doors to allow the first few patients for the day.