carry a basket like that.”
“We can pay some of these farmers for their stuff.” Xavier looked at Shanti earnestly. “We’ll pay them, and send them on their way. They’ll be glad to leave, and it probably won’t take much gold. Then we can get in that way.”
“This will work, Chulan,” Rohnan said with a hand on her thigh. “Have faith in those around you. It is their turn to make miracles.”
“Get out of my head, Rohnan.” Shanti slapped his hand away.
“We are too different from this land to sneak.” Mela spread her arms and looked down at her body. “Even if we colored our hair, we would raise suspicion. We need to let the boys and girls go, Chulan, and get us in back.”
“We not climb you.” Sayas looked at the wall.
“Not with the Captain guarding you as he does, anyway.” Mela winked at Shanti. Seriousness then took over her expression. “But he’s right. We can’t climb the wall. I can’t, anyway. Send the boy in. He is invisible when he wants to be.”
“I’m not a boy,” Leilius muttered.
“I bet they have prostitutes in there.” Alena shrugged. “Once I get in, I can get close to the guards that way, I’m sure. They won’t expect me to slip something in their drink.”
Shanti glanced around the group. Confident eyes and eager expressions looked back. They didn’t want to give up or turn back. They didn’t want to pick another city that gave them some realistic chance at survival. They wanted to reach for the unattainable, and find a way.
Emotion punched her. Helplessness, fear, anxiety—the likelihood of losing everyone to this venture was so real. She couldn’t bring herself to give the direction and lose more of those she loved to the Graygual.
Without warning, a palm slapped across her face. Her cheek burnt as her head swung to the side. When she looked back, Alena knelt in front of her with a hard expression. “Shake this off. You shake it off, S’am. There’s work to be done.” Alena sat back on her hindquarters, sounding amazingly like Molly, the nursemaid from the Westwood Lands, for a second. “Now. What’s next?”
“I would rather have gone as a rich merchant,” Leilius murmured as he shuffled down the lane toward the gate of the city. “Hunch more, Xavier. They’re going to know you’re not downtrodden.”
Xavier bent his spine and tried to look straight ahead of him regardless. Not only did it look funny, but it would not fool any intelligent person.
“Like you have shit on your face, idiot!” Leilius elbowed him. “Like S’am just punched you in the ball-sac.”
The toe of a woman’s boot came up between Xavier’s legs. It smacked into his crotch before disappearing again. Xavier grunted painfully and collapsed, dropping his sack of grain and clutching his balls. He curled up with his face in the dirt.
“Maybe that was a little too hard,” Maggie said. She didn’t sound sorry.
Leilius took a couple of steps away. She was turning into the female equivalent of Sanders.
“C’mon, up you go.” Maggie hoisted Xavier up. “I just wanted to make sure you didn’t get us all killed. You’ll be fine. Walk it off.”
Xavier wheezed out unintelligible words. His face was strained and bright red.
“So…let’s have Alena walk up front with Ruisa and I, then.” Leilius motioned her forward.
They changed positions before Leilius felt a hard mental prod. The feeling weakened his knees for just a moment. The others winced. S’am was telling them to get going.
Trying not to look back toward the hedge where everyone had returned to watch, Leilius picked up Xavier’s pack and handed it to him. Each of them had sorry and holey-looking garments that were a few sizes too big. Stains and rips marred the threadbare fabric. In their sacks was miserable grain from soil that had been stripped of nutrients. At least, that was what the Shadow and Shumas had both agreed on. They’d overworked the land, not rotating it as they should have to keep fertility in their fields. They hadn’t been able to produce enough to satisfy the Graygual, so they pushed the land harder, until it was near the end of any production at all. Judging by the look of them, and the constant wailing of their too-thin baby girl, famine was not far away.
Leilius blew out a breath. “It is a sad day when one gold piece would buy all this.” He started walking.
“Very sad.” Rage tinged Maggie’s voice instead of sadness.
“It’s going to raise suspicion, though, what