staring at the cart. It was piled with boxes and bags. I saw a crate with chickens and another with puppy noses sticking out of it. A dog was tied to the cart by a length of rope. From the look of her, she was the puppies' mother. Eleven people, boys and girls of different ages, stood around it, waiting for us. A pair of sorry-looking cart horses sagged in the shafts. They looked as if they expected nothing but bad out of life.
"You aren't taking all this with you?" Nory demanded. She had told the boys to pack only what would fit a small bag. I had even seen the small bags.
"You let us worry about what we take, Nory. You and the little ones can ride right here." The boy giving the orders was Treak, the one whose hair went every which-way. Now he patted a spot on the cart where Nory and the littlest children could sit. "Jesy can drive."
"Thanks, Treak." A wiry blonde girl with the thickest spectacles I had ever seen—Jesy—clambered onto the driver's seat. Nory settled Meryem and a small boy, then climbed up beside them. Another boy offered me the reins to the horse I had left with Treak earlier that morning. It was freshly combed and saddled. The boy held out his free hand, palm up.
He wanted payment? I asked, "What's your price? I don't have any money."
"A ride to the inn." He was a cheerful fellow, black as shadows, with ribs that showed against his skin. None of these kids was what I'd call plump. "I'll save myself a few blisters that way."
I slapped his open palm with mine to show we had a bargain. Then I mounted and pulled him up behind me. Once in the saddle, I rearranged Luvo in his sling and rode out ahead of the cart.
Traveling on horseback, I tend to forget the bumps in the road. I was halfway to the village when I heard a nasty-sounding rumble and thump behind me. I glanced back. The cart's front wheel had gone into a deep rut. There was another bump as it came out, followed by the crunch of breaking wood. The little ones screamed. The other kids shouted. The dog barked; the puppies replied. The chickens shrieked. I turned my horse so my rider and I could look.
"Oh, ringworms," the boy whispered. He dismounted to help. The cart leaned to one side, the rear left wheel bent in under the box. The left front wheel was also bent. The axle was broken. The cart was going nowhere.
"Hog puke, dog dung, and navy snot!" Treak jumped up and down in the road. Now he looked like someone who could break furniture in a rage. "Lakik's curses twelve times on the scum swiller who fixed this last!"
"Oswin did." Tears rolled down Meryem's face. "Don't you yell at Oswin, Treak! I'll cut you!" From somewhere she had gotten a small dagger. She held it like she knew how to use it.
Pirate kids, I thought, and sighed.
Nory took the knife away like she'd had a lot of practice. "Kill Treak later, Meryem. Get down carefully." She and the driver, Jesy, climbed down and helped the children get off.
As some of the kids cried and others asked what they would do now, I made a mistake. I let my weariness and my need for food run my mouth. "I knew this was a bad idea! Carrying all these things, for what? Those ships will be packed! Surely Oswin told you that. It's why you had orders just to bring a few things, not all this." I waved my hands at the cart. "When the volcano explodes, you'll still be here with all this junk—"
"It is not junk!" Nory stared up at me. Her eyes looked like blue-gray ice in the winter sun. "What do you know? I bet you've never done without in your life! I'll bet you never had to run from anywhere with just the rags on your back! Every one of us has left our whole lives behind more than once, so don't you preach! We have to save what we can!"
I ground my teeth. "And if they don't let you bring it on the ships?" She had a nerve, talking that way to me. She didn't know the first thing about what I'd had to do.
Meryem grabbed a beat-up looking thing that maybe was a doll once. "I have to have Dolly. Dolly's my family."