Minar didn’t know what to make of Saakhi Por. She had a clue or two about Imay, the tact wrapped around tactics and brown-eyed charm of a navigator who knew his way around most situations. He played to his strengths among those weaker than him and to his vulnerabilities around those who had higher protective instincts. If she had met him at a less friendly situation, he would have been the one to keep an eye on for a strategic attack.

She could identify him. His words and actions aligned with one another.

Saakhi was a conundrum with every waking second she spent around them. It had been two weeks since she had lodged at Swatan but there wasn’t much to get a clear picture about her. Minar could track the path of a storm clearer than the intentions of this rogue archer with a hummingbird’s thought-train.

“He woke up from a damp pyre,” Saakhi started, her fourth prompt for the evening’s game. They were supposed to be sculpting pieces for the order received from Nuyyan which was due in a month, but it was late and the firelight cast shadows over the ground as they chatted while working. Minar wasn’t the most skilled at art, she never had been even with a brush, which meant that she was more useful helping Oorja and clearing the dust that gathered while the others worked. Imay had accompanied Piba to Jevadhi to deliver the monthly produce of jackfruit that would barter them rice, and Saakhi had opted to stay behind so she could help them with the sculptures.

Which, in her mind, meant regaling horror stories and roping everyone into spinning them along with her.

“Why is it damp?” Nami asked and Saakhi clicked her tongue, throwing a stray piece of chipped wood behind her, skimming the girl’s head without target, “A damp pyre makes no sense, it -”

“-wouldn’t burn anything, much less a human,” Ezhil took over easily, turning Nami’s complaint into a part of the story as he addressed the group, “But it had burnt him. Flesh had melted off his arm and fire had eaten through his belly. On charred bones and with no recollection of how he had gotten there, the new ghoul looked around for guidance.”

“Great, now he’s a ghoul,” Tejo muttered and grunted when Ezhil kicked at her ankle to continue, “What?”

Ennila was the most talented sculptor among them, a gift that would be passed on to Ezhil if he ever chose to practice, but she was also one with a light heart. With a wink thrown at Minar, she began clinking her bowl gouge against the empty basin beside her feet, in time with the passing seconds. Tejo sputtered and looked at the others for help. The rules of the game had been simple, though Saakhi had a funny habit of adding more if she wished to, but the basic two remained.

Those who interrupt must continue if nobody else did. Those who didn’t continue had to do the rooster’s job the next day.

The clinking got louder with Ezhil joining his mother and Minar raised her brow as Tejo eyed her pleadingly. If there was ever anyone who disliked storytelling, it would be the teenager who had no patience for continuity or pulling tales from the air. It was ironic that she hated waking early just as much.
Minar shook her head and turned to sweep up the splinters from her spot as the seconds dwindled to the final count.

“There were carvings on the logs,” she spoke without looking up, picking the larger chunks by hand, “Deep gouges made in determined lines, half broken away from words like the hand had been too tired. He had no memory of this, just as he didn’t of burning or surviving a fire, but he was a ghoul now. He had never been that before and he didn’t know how to be one. So he read those lines, angry and stern in their command, still dripping from the ashes of his skin that weren’t wet like the pyre. Dragging his feet till he could climb down, till his sole and skeleton could stand on the ground instead of the wood, he read his reason to be this new form.”

Nobody spoke, the pin-drop silence behind her not stopped by metal clattering, and Minar shrugged at Oorja when he nodded at the waiting group.

She heard footsteps and a familiar tinkle, turning back in time to see Piba enter. Imay was following behind him but Minar’s eyes caught on to the unnaturally serious expression on Piba’s face, feeling a frown come onto her face as she stood up.

Before she could ask anything, his eyes slid over to Saakhi and then back to Minar, pointedly tilting his head to the side signalling that they needed to speak away from there. Imay finally came to stand beside his travelling companion but his eyes were having a whole different conversation with his sister. Minar dusted her palms on her waist-cloth and looked at Oorja, who simply nodded without asking too much. He looked confused but he knew that Piba and Minar had their own trust level that didn’t need monitoring or interventions.

Minar slipped away from the group and Saakhi got to her feet, following suit without being invited. Minar would have stopped her but Imay looked at Piba with a questioning glance and Piba nodded shortly, leading them to his uncle’s workshop. Val had long since gone to sleep with the rest of those who didn’t have artistic pursuits or energy to try, and his cold enclosure served as a getaway for whatever Piba had to discuss in private.

“Who’s in trouble?” Minar looked between Piba and Imay, shutting the door behind her as Saakhi came to stand beside her. There was an odd tension in Piba’s eyes, conflicted between frustration and hesitance, so she turned to Imay with a pointed gaze. The shorter man simply held his silence and eyed Piba’s frame out of the corner of his eyes.

“The kid,” Piba’s fingers were sharp as he signed, pointing at the door behind her before he continued, “isn’t who we think she is.”

“Which kid?” Minar turned to Imay but could feel Saakhi curse under her breath, “Be clearer or we’re going to be here a long while.”

“It’s Nami,” Imay spoke up when Piba exhaled hard and looked worriedly at Minar, “When we were at Jevadhi we found out that there’s a bounty placed.”

“What did she do?” Saakhi sounded tired but Minar could tell that something was deeper here, something more than a simple bounty.

“She didn’t do anything,” Piba eyed Saakhi for a long minute before meeting Minar’s gaze, “The bounty was placed for her not on her. The Nek family is looking for her and have sent out messages seeking information. She was taken from Agapura where she had been with an envoy.”

“Taken,” Minar repeated, feeling her head spin for a minute before she frowned, “Wait, Nek family? Why are they looking for her?”

“Because she’s in their foster care,” Imay revealed, scratching at his forehead, “She’s under the tutelage of Lady Kasak Nek Davihar. So now both the Nek family and the entirety of Nuyyan is looking for her.”

Kasak. Of course, it had to be yet another person from the past.

“You told me she was an orphan who needed help,” Minar said, turning to face Saakhi as she heard her own heartbeat thunder against her ears, “How did you know that?”

“It’s what she said,” Saakhi shrugged and if she was calmer Minar would have seen the tension lining the cavalier gesture but she didn’t have space for calm at the moment. Her eyes narrowed, the noise building up in her thoughts.

“She said and what, you picked her up on a trip across lands?” she verified, bite seeping through her tone, “A kid you didn’t know before tells you something and you suddenly decide to add her to your reckless adventure spree?”

“Reckless?” Saakhi scoffed, “It’s reckless to trust someone to be telling the truth when they say that they’re an orphan? Just because she lied doesn’t mean that I’m the one who made the wrong choice here.”

“Right, you’re the one with the right choices,” Minar countered, “A long list of wise decisions we’ve seen, haven’t we?”

“If you’re going to be accusing -”

“The first time you told me about Nami, you had dropped her off in the care of a teenager,” Minar reminded, “You decided that Val, a stranger to you, was a good choice to follow to a place you’ve never been to, and brought an unknown child with you. Seem like the right choices everywhere.”

“In both these situations, it seems like you don’t trust Ezhil and Gunshi,” Saakhi pointed out, meeting word for word, “If we’re worried about wrong decisions, what does it say that you don’t trust the people of your place?”

“Me trusting people I’ve known for years is not equal to your poor judgement skills”
“Right, it’s just your paranoia of everyone who doesn’t answer to you.”

“Trust me, if I was paranoid,” Minar lowered her voice and her eyes flashed as they stared at each other, “you’d not be just answering questions right now.”

There was a knock against the door, a skittering of knuckles against wood, making Piba move. Minar looked away first and Saakhi turned with her to look at the door as it was opened.

“Is Nami here?” Tejo asked when she saw Piba and looked over his shoulder at Minar, seeming hesitant before continuing, “She came here a while ago to tell you that she’s resting with me tonight but I haven’t seen her come back.”

Minar felt the realisation knock into her when she shared a look with Piba. If Nami had overheard them -

Without waiting for any further talk, she walked out of the room and let the others handle Tejo. She heard footsteps dog her own as she rushed out to look for the kid, but didn’t try to stop them.

Saakhi kept pace as they both made their way to the outskirts of the area, neither of them speaking. They didn’t need to, this one time.

They were both good at running and hiding, and the best place to seek first was where nobody would venture.

The woods.