Chapter 23: Rice Harvest

The terrace was gold from wall to wall.

Shiori stood at the stone rim with her sleeves rolled and looked at eleven years of failed seed standing tall and heavy in one night.

"The frost took the northern stalks every year," Kaedan said, beside her.

His voice was odd.

"This year the autumn was warm, and the first rains came soon, and nobody forgot to flood it."

"Nobody?"

"Nerei flooded it every morning for a month, because she was sick of me worrying."

Behind them Nerei was counting sickles in a crate with her ears flat, trying not to be seen to care.

"There's no one else in the keep who knows how to cut it," Kaedan went on. "I've only ever grown it. I've never harvested."

"Twelve years."

"Twelve years of watching it die."

She took his hand.

"Then let's learn together."

By noon half the keep had climbed to the roof.

Cooks, grooms, guards and clerks, the old grey wolf with his coat off and his sleeves rolled.

They all carried sickles and followed Shiori's instructions with great earnestness.

"Low," she said, "cut low. Bundle it like this. Hang it upside down on the poles."

"Why upside down?" the old wolf demanded.

"To dry."

"Why does it need drying?"

"Because the king wants to eat it."

The old wolf grumbled and went on cutting, and Kaedan, who was somehow better at it than anyone, grinned over his bundle at her.

Bram came up the stairs puffing, with a satchel over his shoulder, and stopped at the top with a scowl.

"Girl."

"Bram."

"A moment."

He took a rolled paper from the satchel and held it out.

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