What’s a gilav? Tris inquired silently.
Caravan boss, answered Briar. Like the captain of a ship.
Daja looked at her vine. One tendril had wrapped around her finger, catlike. She felt a bubbling emotion in her chest, one that threatened to cut off her breath. They can’t have it two ways, she told herself. Either I don’t exist, or I do. They must want this very badly, to make an offer to a trangshi.
“We Blue Traders have a saying,” she remarked, staring off to Polyam’s side. “When three parties bargain, no one wins. Tenth Caravan Idaram must bargain with me directly. Me. Talk to Daja Kisubo the trangshi, or there will be no talk at all.”
Frostpine grinned and put an arm around her shoulders. Sandry clapped; Briar whistled his approval. Even Rosethorn and Tris smiled.
Polyam shrugged. “Since I heard nothing, I can transmit no offers that are impossible to meet.” Turning, she hobbled off after the other Traders.
Daja tightened her grip on the iron, wishing she could go with them, could return to the kind of life where she had always known the rules.
We’re your people now, Sandry told her in mind-talk.
They threw you out, added Briar. Or were you forgetting?
“Frostpine!” A short man with gray-bristled cheeks stood in the doorway, glaring at them through dark eyes buried in wrinkles. He dressed like a craftsman in a knee-length green tunic, loose brown breeches, and leather slippers; a round white cap covered his hair. “I never bargained for your apprentice doing magic here, all unsupervised.”
“Neither did we,” Frostpine said, walking toward the owner of the forge with Daja in tow. “Daja Kisubo, this is Kahlib ul Hanoh, the village smith.”
Daja hoisted the iron vine into a better grip. Bowing, she nearly fell over, unbalanced by her creation. “Sorry about the magic,” she said, red with embarrassment.
“I hope you didn’t leave any loose—it acts oddly, if it isn’t used in the working,” chided the smith. “I’m not a mage, but I’ve dealt with them enough to know.”
“I think it’s all in the vine,” muttered Daja, looking around. They had learned to see magic over the summer, a useful side effect of their magic coming together. She used that vision now, but the only silver gleam of power she could find was on the mages.
Frostpine clapped her on the shoulder. “Why don’t you go back up to the castle and have a bath?” he suggested. “You look wrung out.”
She was also filthy, Daja realized. Soot from the iron vine streaked her skin and clothes from her neck to her knees. Even for a smith, that was a lot of dirt. “All right,” she said quietly.
“Take that with you,” ordered Kahlib. “I don’t have time to keep an eye on it.”
Daja settled the branching iron in her arms, bowed again to the smith, and trudged out of the forge.
Rosethorn turned to Briar. “Now all the excitement’s over, student of mine, how would you like to see the gold of Gold Ridge?”
Five months ago Briar had been a street-rat and thief: the mention of riches still had power over him. “You want to show me gold?” he asked. “You don’t have any use for it.”
“This kind I do. Come on.” With a polite farewell to Kahlib, Rosethorn drew Briar outside and led the way in the walk up the road to the castle. The dog Little Bear sat in front of the gates, plainly waiting for one of his people to return. When Rosethorn and Briar turned short of the dog’s post, following a lesser road that headed up into the rough ground south of the castle, Little Bear followed them.
Their new road narrowed until it was more of a track, broad enough for two people to ride abreast. Steep and twisty, it led deep into huge rock formations.
“What kind of gold would they keep outside the walls?” Briar demanded, toiling along. He hadn’t thought anything else would be up here—what kept bandits from attacking the castle from behind?
“You’ll see.”
Rosethorn said nothing more, and Briar saved his breath for climbing. At least the view through the breaks in the rocks was pretty or it would have been if so much of the valley below had not been hidden in smoke. When the trail leveled off, Rosethorn stopped for a rest, coughing. Even Little Bear sat, his tongue hanging from the side of his mouth.
“Are you all right?” Briar asked his teacher gruffly. He didn’t want to seem mushy or anything, but sometimes at night he woke up cold and sweating from dreams that something had happened to Rosethorn.
She took a water bottle from her belt and drank, then rubbed the mouthpiece on her sleeve and passed the bottle to him. “Blasted smoke,” she explained after a few breaths. “And the air’s thin this high up. Take a look.” She waved an arm to her right, where the ground dipped. Briar walked over and blinked to make sure he wasn’t seeing things.
Here on the mountain’s edge someone had carved out a pocket valley and terraced it. To the northeast, where the far rim should be, he saw a stone wall, manned by soldiers. So much for anyone sneaking up on the castle from behind, he thought, squinting at the small valley. They would have to come over that wall, which looked difficult.
In the pocket valley, rows and rows of plants stood between irrigation ditches that were almost dry. To Briar’s sorrow, the plants were all sere and brown, dead or dying.
“The gold of Gold Ridge,” Rosethorn commented, sounding better. “Or what’s left of it.”
“How can plants be gold?” he asked.