The cart looked much the same as it had when Marcus and Kit and the others had hauled it as part of the last caravan from Vanai half a decade before. Two of the boards on the stage had been replaced recently, and the new wood stood out brightly from the old. Kit put a trembling hand to it. A tear tracked down his cheek.
“Hey, you old bastard,” a rough voice called from behind them. “Watch whose cart you’re feeling up.”
The woman, thin across the shoulders with dark hair pulled back in a braid, swaggered across the yard. Two men walked behind her. When she reached them, she fell into Master Kit’s arms. The two men wrapped arms around the pair until all four were in a tight knot of affection and humanity. The larger of the men turned his head to Marcus.
“Good to see you too, Captain,” Hornet said.
“Always a pleasure.”
Hornet pulled back an arm, inviting him into the huddle, but Marcus declined with a smile.
“Cary?” Master Kit said, half choked with sobs. “What are you … how did you come back here?”
“You made an assumption there,” the other man, Smit, said. “You see how he made that assumption?”
“I did,” Hornet said, grinning. Cary only looked up at Master Kit with a smile of defiance and pleasure. She looked like a child whose father had come home from a journey of years.
“You’ve been here all this time?” Kit said, disbelief in his voice. “This same yard for … ? How can that be?”
“Cithrin came by with a little side work,” Cary said. “Brought us enough money we could sit tight for a time.”
“Been pretty much playing to dogs and pigeons the last six months, though,” Smit said. “Nothing like being in one place seasons in a row to take the novelty off a production.”
“We’re all still here, though,” Smit said. “Sandr left for about two weeks once, but the girl caught on to him and he reconsidered.”
“Why did you do this?”
“So you could find us when you came back,” Cary said. Her eyelashes were dewy. “Because you were coming back. You couldn’t leave us behind.”
“But I had no way to know that …” Kit said, and then ran out of words.
“You see? That’s the problem with always playing the wise-old-man roles. You start taking them off the stage with you and thinking you’re Sera Serapal with all the secrets of the dragons in your purse and acting like it’s miraculous every time you’re wrong about something. I always knew you’d rejoin us. I only made it easier for you. And,” Cary said before he could object, “I was right.”
Master Kit laughed and spread his arms. “How can I argue against that?” he said. “Thank you. This is the sweetest gift the world has ever given me. Thank you for it.”
Cary nodded once, soberly. “Welcome home,” she said.
Geder
The first group of Anteans to be initiated into the mysteries of the spider goddess stood in the great hall of the new temple. The pearl-white ceiling arched above them all, and fine chains with crystal beads flowed down from the top like dewdrops on a spider’s web. Three walls of the hall were glowing with lamps fashioned from shells that glowed soft gold, but the south was open, and Camnipol stretched out below them. The carts in the streets were no larger than Geder’s thumbnail, the heads of the people as small as ants. It had taken him the better part of an hour just to walk up to the hall, and his thighs ached a little from the effort.
The dozen initiates knelt in two rows of six, their heads bowed. Their robes were simple ceremonial white. For once, Basrahip was the center of attention with Geder sitting at the side. The huge priest stood at the dais with the open sky behind him. A smaller banner with the eightfold sigil hung behind him, and the light coming through the cloth made it seem bright.
“The life you once knew is over,” Basrahip intoned. “The veil of deceit will soon fall from you. In this time, you will be lost and vulnerable, but we, your brothers, will stand at your side. You will hear the truth in our voices, and we will lead you to see the world as it truly is.”
“We accept this gift,” the twelve initiates said as one. They bowed their heads to the floor.
Basrahip lifted his hands and began to chant ancient syllables. Geder felt the terrible urge to cough and swallowed hard to try to keep the sound from interrupting. As he wasn’t an initiate, he wasn’t strictly speaking supposed to be there, but Basrahip had given permission for him to be present for the welcoming. After that, things became private and mysterious, but from what Geder had read that was true of any cult. He didn’t take the exclusion personally, though he did wish Basrahip had been a bit more forthcoming about the details of what the men would be going through. It was only curiosity, though.