The fifth trader turned out to be a girl dressed as a boy.
“Do you even realize what you’ve got yourself into, kids?” asked Vlada in a voice full of sincere pity.
Young, brave, stupid. Greenies. Children. It’s an adventure to them, a child’s play. Take your honey, ride to the nearest city, sell it, buy something cool, go back… What can go wrong, really?
“Is something wrong?” wondered Astrakh. He saw the warrior woman frown at his words and the tall man behind her nod in a grim and menacing manner but he still had no idea what was going on.
“It’s a miracle that you’re still alive,” explained Vlada, “that nobody has cut your throats yet.”
Astrakh turned pale and swallowed nervously…
“You’d be an easy game even for a band of maskaks,” Vlada continued. “You have to join a big caravan, with guards and all, if you want to travel by the road with a load of goods. Going like this will get you killed! You have no idea how lucky you are…”
“Fools are always lucky,” Sereg put a word in too.
Astrakh quickly bowed to Vlada and her companions and called his little team of wannabe traders aside to have a word with them. The conversation they had was short and emotional, all frantic gestures and loud whisper. Several minutes later, Astrakh approached Vlada again; her, not Sereg. She must’ve looked like the leader of the group to him or, maybe, seemed less scary that her grey-haired, tall, grim friend.
“Please,” begged the young trader, “let us come with you to the nearest city. We’ll pay, I swear! As soon as we’ve sold the honey…” his last words sounded as pitiful as a kitten’s first meow.
“We don’t want your money,” said Vlada, “but we’ll see you to the city… What was its name, Sereg?”
“Handel.”
“Exactly. Once you’re done with selling and shopping there, join a caravan. The other merchants will give you a hand, especially if you share some of your famous honey with them. They all know how hard it is in the beginning, so they help young people like you. You’ll be alright, kids.”
“Thank you! Thank you so much!” The poor boy looked so grateful! He was likely an inch from falling to his knees and kissing the ground Vlada stood on…
“Why?” asked Sereg later, when they were back on the road with the young traders walking a dozen steps ahead of them.
“I couldn’t just leave the kids behind,” Vlada shrugged.
“Osaro, an old Wanderer I once knew, used to say,” Kan’s shy voice joined the conversation, “that all our deeds, good or evil, return to us in the end.”
To Kangassk’s surprise, both worldholders turned their heads to him, gave him a long look, and nodded in approval without saying a single word.
Some other day, he would have been immensely proud of himself for something like this; today, he wasn’t. He barely felt anything at all. The apathy, so unusual to Kan, seemed a heavy burden pressing unseen at his shoulders and made every step harder. What was going on with him? At first, he blamed his conscience that kept picking at him for his thoughts about Vlada back in Tammar and his fight with Sereg in the Dead Region, but no, there was something else. He felt sick…
“The Region of Shamarkash!”
Kangassk found himself in the creaking, wobbly cart, comfortably seated among the honey pots with the Encyclopedia of No Man’s Land in his hands. He read snatches from the book outloud, raising his voice high at the end of every phrase and flinging his arms like a madman. The audience – two worldholders and five merchants – laughed wildly.
“The ancient poet named Mal…ko…nemershghan! Oh my, what a name! Well, that guy said:
‘This alien land I saw at dawn,
It was my morning dream.
Three fearsome blazing suns there shone,
Two clouds, with lights agleam…’
What kind of poem is that, I ask you?” Kan commented boldly. “Three suns! Was he drunk, that Malconemershghan, or what? He saw double… no, triple!”
The audience cheered… and there, Kangassk woke up. What seemed naturally funny while he had been dreaming turned into complete nonsense on his waking up and made him cringe, blush, and wish to disappear. Also, he still felt sick.
Kan saw a patch of the dark, starry sky above his head, then the faces of the people surrounding him came into focus: Vlada, Sereg, and the merchants; all of them looked troubled.
“He’s delirious now,” said Klarissa, Astrakh’s little sister.
Vladislava touched Kangassk’s brow.
“Yeah, and he’s burning up,” she said and bit her lip, thinking. “Any ideas, Sereg?”
“Well, there is not much we can do here without magic…”
“Magic!” Astrakh exclaimed. “Oh wow, you’re mages! So why don’t you just, you know, cast a healing spell or something?”
“Because,” Sereg lowered his voice, “we’re still deep in the No Man’s Land. The healing spell may work, may fail, or may explode in my hands and incinerate everything in a hundred meters radius around it, it’s all chancy here. Want to risk it?”
“No…” Astrakh’s head drooped.
“Hey,” Vlada waved her hand at them in an impatient gesture, “stop it you two!”
“Maybe, we can still help him without magic?” Klarissa spoke up, still as shy as ever. “We have a bag of medicinal herbs with us. I can make him a potion and add some honey to shake off the fever.”
“Do that,” Vlada said to the girl and then turned to Sereg. “I think he caught something in the White Region. Come, let’s talk in private.”
Sereg nodded and stood up. Before following Vlada, he stopped to cast a glance at Kangassk. The boy lay on the ground, his eyes rolled back again, and frantically chanted Malconemershghan’s poems.
Vlada and Sereg walked along the stunted, dusty trees growing at the side of the road. The worldholders wanted to put enough distance between them and the mortals before speaking freely, unheard and unseen.
“Sereg,” said Vlada as soon at they stopped, “Kangassk’s illness scares you, I can see it in your eyes. If it wasn’t for you, I’d think he’d just caught a cold or his stomach hadn’t got along with wayfarer rations and spring water; it’s his very first journey, after all… But you…”
She put her hands on his shoulders in a long-forgotten gentle gesture. Sereg made a step back, startled like a man rudely awakened from his sleep, and turned away. He stood there for a while in complete silence, watching the stars twinkle in the dark sky and the sharp horn of the moon shine through the fleeting clouds. There is no way to look a tall man into the eyes when he doesn’t want it, he just lifts his chin up and leaves you wondering below…
“Sereg,” Vlada called to him in a quiet voice and added all of a sudden, “Sergey…”
The Grey Inquisitor lowered his eyes to meet hers.
“For ages,” he spoke slowly, like in a dream, “I haven’t heard this name… It feels strangely nice to hear it again…”