The Desert Spear

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