There was a pause as everyone waited for his response. Rojer’s eyes flicked around the room, and it seemed as if every woman was holding her breath. Why? They had given no thought to him at all a moment ago.

But then it hit him. I’m the offended.

He smiled, slipping into a Jongleur’s mask as he straightened his back and met Inevera’s eyes fully for the first time. “After hearing them sing, I’ll not break the set. Sikvah’s voice is more important to me than her purity.”

Inevera relaxed slightly. “That is most forgiving of you. More than this harlot deserves.”

“I’m not deciding anything yet,” Rojer clarified. “But I would prefer she not be subject to…undue stress that might affect her voice before I do.” Inevera smiled behind her gossamer veil as if he had passed some kind of test.

Elona took Rojer by the arm, yanking him back. “This will affect the dower, of course.”

Inevera nodded. “Of course. If you will agree to chaperone, the girls may stay in the son of Jessum’s wing, that he might accustom to them and ensure their lack of…stress before he makes his decision.”

“Oh, my mother is an excellent chaperone,” Leesha muttered. Inevera looked at her curiously, as if unsure about the sarcasm in Leesha’s tone, but she said nothing.

Rojer shook his head, as if coming out of a dream. Did I just get promised?

Abban arrived just before sunset to escort them to the whipping. Leesha made a last check of the herbs and implements in her basket, breathing deeply to quell her churning stomach. For what they did to Wonda, the dal’Sharum deserved no less, but that did not mean Leesha wanted to watch their backs torn open. After seeing how lax the Krasians were about healing, though, she worried the wounds might infect and kill the men anyway if she did not treat them herself.

In Fort Angiers, she and Jizell had weekly treated men off the magistrate’s whipping post, but she ’d never been able to watch the punishment without weeping, and usually turned away. It was a horrid practice, though Leesha seldom had to treat the same man twice. They took the lesson and remembered.

“I hope you understand the honor my master pays you and the daughter of Flinn by administering the whipping personally,” Abban said, “rather than leaving it to some dama who might be lenient in sympathy to their act.”

“The dama have sympathy for rapists?” Leesha asked.

Abban shook his head. “You must understand, mistress, that our ways are different from yours. The fact that you and your women walk freely with your faces and your, ah…” he waved a hand at Leesha’s low neckline, “charms showing offends a great many men, who fear you put illicit ideas into the minds of their own women.”

“And so they sought to show Wonda her place,” Leesha said. Abban nodded.

Leesha’s brow furrowed, but her stomach suddenly calmed. Intentionally hurting another human being went against her Gatherer’s oaths, but even Bruna had not hesitated to hand out a few painful lessons to folk who failed to act civilized.

“My master has commanded that the Damaji attend as well, with their kai’Sharum,” Abban said. “He wishes them to see that they must accept some of your ways.”

Leesha nodded. “Ahmann said it was much the same when he met the Par’chin.”

Abban’s face remained carefully neutral, but Leesha saw his coloring change slightly. It wasn’t surprising that Arlen had that effect on people even before he began to tattoo his flesh.

“My master mentioned the Par’chin?” Abban asked.

“I did, actually,” Leesha said. “I was surprised that Ahmann knew him, too.”

“Oh, yes, my master and the Par’chin were great friends,” Abban said to Leesha’s surprise. “Ahmann was his ajin’pal.”

“Ajin’pal?” Leesha asked.

“His…” Abban’s brow furrowed as he searched for the proper term, “…blood brother, perhaps you would say. Ahmann showed him the Maze, and they bled for each other. Among my people, this is as binding as having the same blood in your veins.” Leesha opened her mouth, but before she could say more, Abban cut her off.

“We must leave now, if we are to arrive in time, mistress,” he said. Leesha nodded, and they gathered the rest of her delegation from the Hollow, including Amanvah and Sikvah, who attended closely to Rojer.

They were escorted to the town circle of Fort Rizon, a huge cobbled ring at the center of the city eyed with a great well and surrounded by bustling shops. Leesha saw Rizonan women shopping as well as Krasians, but though they still wore their Northern dresses, the women’s faces were wrapped in cloth that draped over their necklines as they went about in public. Many of them stared wide-eyed at Leesha and her mother, walking about uncovered, as if expecting their dal’Sharum escorts to turn on them at any moment.

Many of the Krasians had already gathered, including the Damaji in their canopied palanquins and many Sharum and dama. Three wooden posts had been erected in the circle, but there were no shackles or ropes to be seen.

There was a commotion and the crowd turned to see Jardir enter the circle, followed by Inevera on her palanquin and his other wives in tow. Leesha counted fourteen of them, but had no idea if that was all. They came and stood next to Leesha and the Hollowers, close enough for Leesha to smell the Damajah’s perfume.

Jardir walked to the posts, waving his hand at the Spears of the Deliverer. The three dal’Sharum needed no urging and no escort, walking out into the square and stripping to the waist. They knelt and touched their foreheads to the cobbles before Jardir, then stood and wrapped their arms around the poles with nothing to hold them in place. The one whose arm Wonda had broken had the limb in a white cast.

Jardir reached into his robe, pulling free a three-tailed whip of braided leather, with sharp pieces of metal woven into the last few inches of each tail.

“What is that?” Leesha asked Abban. She was expecting Jardir to use a simple horsewhip. This seemed more brutal by far.

“It is called the alagai tail,” Abban said. “A dama’s whip. They say being struck by it is like the lash of a sand demon’s tail.”

“How many strokes will they each get?” Leesha asked.

Abban laughed. “As many as they can stand for. Sharum are whipped until they lose their grip on the pole and fall.”

“But…that could kill them!” Leesha said.

Abban shrugged. “Sharum are great warriors, but not known for their intelligence or instinct for self-preservation. They think it a test of manhood to endure as many strokes as possible. Their brethren will be betting to see who endures longest.”

Leesha scowled. “I will never understand men.”

“Nor I,” Abban agreed.

It was brutal to watch, each strike of the alagai tail leaving bright lines of blood on the backs of its victim. Jardir gave each man a stroke before returning to the first, but Leesha didn’t know if it was a kindness, or an attempt to keep them from growing numb to it. She flinched with every blow, feeling as if it were striking her, too. Tears streaked her face, and she wanted nothing more than to flee the awful scene as the backs of the men became huge open wounds that showed their ribs to the world. None of them even cried out or had the sense to fall.

At one point she looked away and saw Inevera watching the proceeding with utter calm. She saw Leesha looking her way, and sneered at the tears on her face.

Something broke in Leesha then, a flare of anger acting as a ward against the suffering of the men. She straightened her back, dried her eyes, and watched the rest of the whipping with the same cool detachment the Damajah showed.

It seemed to go on forever, but at last one of the warriors fell, and then another. Leesha saw warriors exchanging coins over the results, and wanted to spit. When the last man fell, Jardir nodded to her, and Leesha rushed out to the men, pulling out the thread, salves, and bandages she had prepared. She hoped she had enough.