“Fort Unity,” the passenger wagon driver called over her shoulder. “Caravan camps here for one day, two nights. Next stop, Prisa.”
Agna could have leaped up, or sat backwards on the bench like an excited child, or even talked to the Yanweian if she had to. She managed to wait, and made sure that the lid of her trunk was locked. The caravan flowed into the field like a breaking wave, each wagon and rider finding a predetermined place. Agna noticed that the field was already dotted with open-air fire pits, small stone rings with the remains of old ashes in the center of each. They made a grid across the campsite, with a large fire pit in the center. These, then, would be the assigned spaces rented out by the trade company.
The passenger wagon found its place and finally, blessedly, stopped. Some of the passengers bustled around, collecting their things; several of the younger passengers picked up identical rucksacks, slapping one another on the back. The remaining passengers eyed the vacated seats and sneaked around to claim better spots. Agna would leave them to it. She was free. Her back howled when she stood up, but no matter. Rest, and hot water, and freedom!
The Yanweian hefted one of the Benevolent Union’s tents on the opposite shoulder from his lute. “I can come back for the other one,” he said, the first words he’d spoken to her in a day and a half.
“Yes. Good. I can help once I get all of this unloaded, and buy what I need, and find out where I can have a bath–”
He was already turning away down the aisle. So rude. She reversed the boarding process to bring her trunk back to solid ground – lining it up at the edge, climbing down and breaking its crashing fall as best she could – and scurried after the Yanweian. She assumed that he knew where he was going, the way he’d known about camping and the caravan and every other twice-cursed thing they’d encountered thus far, but his path turned out to lead to the nearest guard. Agna groaned aloud and hung back while he conferred with the guard, then trudged along where the guard pointed.
“Do you know what you’re doing?” she panted, as the Yanweian stopped beside a small enclosed cart painted with the trading company sigil.
“Yes,” he snapped.
The owner of the cart emerged – a thin, distracted Kaveran man with glasses. The Yanweian was polite with him, she noticed darkly. After consulting some papers, the trading company representative waved at them to follow him, around the rows of wagons and fire pits.
The trio reached one of the unclaimed spots; the trade company representative nodded at them and headed off. Agna dropped the strap of her trunk. Her knees wobbled, and she struggled to stay upright.
The Yanweian sighed, unstrapping the tent from his shoulder. “Stay here, then. Take all the straps off of this, and get it unrolled. Can you do that?”
“Of course,” she snapped.
“Good.” He piled up his backpack and lute case, leaned the Benevolent Union’s tent against them, then headed back the way he came.
Her fingers still obeyed her commands, more or less, so Agna unbuckled all of the fastenings lashed around the tent. The carrying strap came off with them, leaving a long, heavy roll of canvas wrapped around several wooden poles. She dragged it to an open patch in front of the fire pit and shoved it open, half a turn at a time. Once it was unrolled, the construction made a little more sense. It was a few paces to a side, a heavy canvas envelope with a sloped roof, propped up with poles at the corners. There were ropes and metal stakes connected to it at some points, as well. She had seen enough drawings in books to get the general concept. She located the door – such that it was – and dragged the tent around so that it faced the fire pit, like the other tents being built around them. She laid the poles out parallel, and uncoiled the ropes. And there her expertise ended. She couldn’t leave the trunk unguarded, even locked. Agna sat on her heels by the deconstructed tent and waited. If the Yanweian said one sarcastic thing when he returned, she would kick him in the shins, or throw one of the stakes at him.
In a few minutes he returned with the other tent slung over his shoulder, lugging some folded wooden contraptions in his arms. Those made yet another pile. At close range, Agna identified a folding table or two and a couple of stools. Equipment for the clinic, as the agent had mentioned.
The Yanweian stretched his shoulders and swung his arms. “We don’t have to set this up until tomorrow. Let’s just get the camping one up.”
“Fine,” Agna replied.
With an almost admirable lack of bile, he directed her to hold here and pull there, and in this manner they assembled the tent. Agna followed him inside and sank to her knees again. It was half the size of one of the dormitory rooms. One door that tied shut with canvas straps, no windows, no interior walls. Just the door and a flap in the roof – the only source of air or light, apart from the door.
Agna crawled back outside to breathe. She could rent a carriage back to Vertal. She had plenty of money for that. She would even have enough after that to buy passage back to Nessiny.
Rone would be disappointed with her. Her parents would be proven right. It would be the same as giving up.
She breathed in the open air until the urge to cry subsided. Not now, not yet. She could rise above this. She had trained at the finest institute of higher learning in the entire world, and her mentor was the greatest swordsman in the modern age, and she would not disappoint him. She had learned everything there was to know about healing, and history and business management and Kaveran grammar besides. She could do this.
To calm herself, Agna made a mental list of the other things she had to do. She had to find somewhere to take a bath. She had to buy something to sleep on. She would need clean clothes for after the bath. She would need her mirror and soap and hairbrush. Her toiletry kit, apart from the mirror, was held together in a bag with a clasp. She unlocked the trunk, located her kit and her mirror, and untangled a fresh dress, underclothes, and her towel from the tumbled morass.
The Yanweian’s voice was cautious as he picked through his backpack. “If you want the bathhouse, it’s at the back of the campsite, on the opposite side. Closest to the hill that goes down to the stream. It’s a big tent with a steam cloud design on it.” His finger wiggled along a wavy line in the air.
Agna blinked. “Oh. ...Thank you.” She gathered her armful of belongings and turned to go.
The Yanweian’s voice stopped her again. “I asked where you could buy a bedroll, too. There’s a clothes and linens seller who has them.”
Agna turned. He wasn’t looking at her. He had laid out a cooking pot – the inane thought ran through her head, so that’s how it works! – and a teakettle. The ordinary, civilized objects were jarring on the bare ground, next to a circle of stones.
A hot bath and some sleep. And no more backbiting. That was all she could ask for. “Thank you,” she said again. She didn’t have the heart to add, of course you’d know what to do, you apparently know everything, or did you think I couldn’t figure all of that out on my own?
Agna walked across the camp toward the baths. All of the water was still cold, the bathhouse owner explained; they hadn’t stoked the stove yet to heat it. So the fee to rent a cubicle in the tent was halved. It didn’t matter, Agna insisted. The bathing facilities were rudimentary, just small wooden tubs for soaking and stools and basins for washing, but at least they were private. In another half hour she was clean again, and redressed in fresh clothes. She was shivering, and her hair was damp against the back of her neck, but she didn’t care about that.
She nearly skipped back to the campsite with her bundle of laundry. The Yanweian had built a fire in the pit and was heating water in the teakettle. She forgot to say something superior. “Where did you get the water?”
“From the stream. The food vendor seems to sell it when the caravan is moving, too. This water is good for now, though.”
Three whole sentences. “I see.” Agna pulled her trunk into the tent and parked it on one side. The Yanweian’s luggage was already stacked on the other side. S
o they had claimed sides, like a dormitory. That, at least, made sense. She tossed her laundry in the corner, unlocked the trunk, and refilled her purse from the money box inside.
“You wanted a water barrel and something for food, right?” she asked breezily, emerging from the tent.
The Yanweian looked up. “Oh. Yes. Are you going now?”
“I don’t see why not.” She had revived; she had a plan; she could take anything.
“Mm. I don’t know where the textile merchant is. Just that there is one.”
“I’ll find it,” she shrugged. “Easy enough.”
***
Agna carried an empty water barrel stacked on top of a latching chest full of dishes and utensils, with a tied-up bedroll slung over her shoulder and a blanket draped over her arm. It was awkward to slog all of it across the campsite, but the triumph of doing so without the Yanweian’s help outweighed every bump and stumble. Agna plunked her armload down by the fireside.
“Ha.”
The Yanweian drank the last of his tea and got up from the ground – the ground! “Oh... you didn’t have to get such nice things.”
Agna stretched her back. “Tch. They’re not that nice. Besides, you have to have some self-respect.”
The Yanweian weighed the barrel in his hands. “I’ll... I can pay you back. Not right now. When we open the clinic, I’ll start.”
She would have been offended by his stinginess, had his demeanor not been so hesitant and subdued. Maybe he didn’t have enough money, somehow. How embarrassing. Agna shrugged. “I don’t mind if you owe me. I’m sure that it will all come out evenly in the end. I didn’t add it up, anyway.”
He didn’t answer at first, looking at the things she’d bought, and irritation clouded her sense of accomplishment. She’d done it right. She’d taken care of things. He had no right to ruin that. Finally, the Yanweian set the barrel down just outside the tent door and poured the rest of the boiled water into it. “I’ll go and get some more water.”
Agna merely nodded, hiding her relief at not having to carry anything else. The Yanweian took the cooking pot and teakettle and headed off toward the stream.
One task down. She could buy some food next; she’d passed a few carts selling basic edible things – cheese and eggs and rustic bread. Enough to make a start.
First, though, setting up – furnishing her room, she thought, and snickered to herself. Her new bedroll was of higher quality than the Yanweian’s, which appeared to be military issue, but it was still inadequate for any reasonable person. Agna unrolled it across the floor on the side of the tent that she had claimed as her own and stretched out to test it.
Agna startled awake when a beam of orange-gold light hit her in the face. “Ow!”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t–”
“Ugh.” She sat up. Her head seemed to be stuffed with salt and rocks. The Yanweian had opened the tent flap, and the light slanted in over his shoulder.
“Err... I, um. Got some food if you’d like to make yourself something to eat.”
She stretched; her muscles were somehow less cramped, despite having slept on the ground. “I’ll subtract that from your debt for the storage containers.”
She’d meant it as a jab, but he smiled faintly. “Thanks.”
Agna emerged into the early evening and sleepily rifled through the food he’d bought. There wasn’t much, but then, they would be on the road before long. She managed to toast some bread over the fire and melt some cheese over it, and brew some tea in her new teacup. Even that was a small victory. The Yanweian, meanwhile, wandered off.
When her dinner was finished and all of the pots and plates had been washed, the daylight was still strong enough to read by. Agna dug through the ruins of her trunk to find the flat wooden box that held her writing paper and pens and ink, and settled by the fire – on the ground! – to write.
Dear Rone,
I hope you are well, so that at least one of us might be.
The Benevolent Union has placed me on an assignment that I can only describe as loathsome. I’m following the trade caravan as it makes its way around Kavera, to give healing aid to the people. It’s boring and dirty and hard, there are no proper – anything, I am expected to sleep on the ground, and the fellow agent they’ve assigned to me is sullen and inclined to offense.
I miss you and Esirel, and my family, and the Academy, and Murio, and civilization.
I will be here for a year. I will finish my contract with the Benevolent Union at a proper assignment, and until then I shall make the best of what little I have. My thoughts are with you, also, because your work now must be more meaningful and dignified than this.
Yours, etc.,
Agna
She sealed the letter, addressed it to Rone in care of Tenken Grim – who now, at last, seemed like a real person – and pondered the idea of drafting a letter of complaint to the Benevolent Union headquarters. Perhaps later; she lacked the mental stamina to truly take them to task.
Agna fetched her shoes from the tent and set out to survey the camp and to determine which merchant could handle her mail. A few questions directed her to the master of records, who turned out to be the highly strung trade company employee who had shown them to their campsite. The mail runners, he informed her, would deliver mail to him. She could pick up any incoming letters at his wagon when they were camped.
She completed her slow circuit around the camp, wandering back and forth along the lines of tents. The rows closest to the road were incomplete, with a few tents and shuttered wagons bearing apologetic signs: Closed, Open Dawn-Dusk, Please Come Back Later. Beyond the first few lines, the camping tents began, mixed in with some smaller wagons and a few larger coaches. The Captain’s wagon was parked near the middle of the camp, along with the passenger wagon and the master of records’ wagon. In the center of the camp, some of the merchants were building a bonfire while others gathered around to talk. Agna kept moving.
Back at the Benevolent Union tent – Agna could not yet think of it as her tent – the Yanweian huddled sullenly next to the fire.
“The others are starting a bonfire,” Agna offered archly. “You might find more agreeable company there.”
His eyes narrowed a fraction, but his voice was polite. “No, thank you. I don’t want company.”
“At least we agree on something.” She slapped open the tent flap and discovered, upon stepping into the tent, that it was nearly pitch dark inside. So much for reading, or repacking her trunk. She would have to either stay here in the dark – limiting her activities to sleeping or fuming – or venture back outside.
Fine. She rolled the trunk through the door and turned it to rest across the fire from the Yanweian, where its raised lid would block their view of one another. Perhaps it was childish. So be it.
She extracted the entangled articles of clothing, tumbled books and other articles and sorted them out into piles. She devised a new system that would, with some luck, survive the next leg of the journey. The bedroll had to be carried across her shoulder or under her arm – it wouldn’t fit inside the trunk – but everything else fit, somehow.
Agna took a deep, satisfied breath, locked the trunk, and took a seat on its lid. The perch put her head a couple of feet over the Yanweian’s, which helped her mood as well. She felt self-conscious slipping the key on its chain back into the bodice of her dress, but he wasn’t looking.
“Might be a good time for a song,” she offered.
“I practiced for a while when you were out posting your letter,” he said, flexing his hands.
She looked at him again; he’d also changed clothes and shaved. At least he was as civilized as that. The silence rolled over her, and in the distance she heard chatter and singing. It was a world in which she had no interest, even though they were relaxed and entertained there. Agna got up and left.
Fifteen minutes later, she returned with a lantern and a bottle of oil. The Yanweian swallowed whatever complaint or demurral he’d bee
n preparing, and she chose to grant forgiveness for it.
One small lamp lit the tent well enough to read. Agna settled in with her copy of The Wanderer, wrapped in self-satisfaction. The smell of damp smoke drifted in from the outside a minute before the Yanweian slunk in. Agna said nothing; it was triumphant enough to watch him curl up with one of his books and read by her light. She’d add that to his tab, too. Then again, what might irritate him more than that?
“I’ll call it even for the lamp,” she remarked. “Since you knew how to set up the tent.”
“All right.”
No good. He was barely listening. Agna gave up and turned her attention to her own book. It was still irksome that she’d only been able to bring a few books, and would have to cart around any more that she bought here. She might part with some of her own eventually – she could always buy another copy of most of them – but the dictionary and Blackhall’s Human Anatomy would have to stay. She would keep her copy of The Wanderer, because it was her favorite. And she would keep the book that she’d bought on the waterfront back in Murio, the one at the bottom of her stack of books. She didn’t want to admit that she had brought it in lieu of something more dignified. She wouldn’t admit the fact that it was one of her favorites, too.
But until she ran out of space or became sick of them all, she could read the books she had brought a few more times. Besides, she supposed that it could be worse; the Yanweian only seemed to have two or three books on hand. He’d spent some time on the passenger wagon paging through his own reference books, and he joined her now, even though Agna took it as a tacit admission of defeat.
The Yanweian clearly enjoyed reading. He looked relaxed for once, sprawled out on his bedroll with his book open on the floor. The lamplight was kind to his face, as was the rare absence of suspicion and tension. Rude, incomprehensible, scornful, impatient and strange, yes, but not stupid, and, despite her early assumptions, not uncivilized. Agna realized that she was staring at him, and snapped back to her book as her face grew warm. She turned toward the wall, holding her book high enough to catch the light, until she was too sleepy to prop it up.
The Healers' Road Page 4
