As the line kept moving, more carts rolled into the city without so much as a snag. The attendants met them with the same neat precision each time.

Ghosts and wraiths in borrowed faces, hands quick, backs straight, eyes that never quite learned how to squint into sunlight.

They moved almost like clockwork, and Radeon could not help his amusement.

They were unaccustomed to the press of humans and the stink of sweat and the sight of food in abundance, yet they did their best not to fumble a job this lucrative.

He even let the ghosts and wraiths eat as they worked. The reason was simple. A human mind understood warmth at once when it saw someone chewing.

It made the dead seem less dead. What's more, the hunger of the ghosts was sated. It was not simply shooting two bird, but sniping two great eagles with a stone's throw.

Yet there was a hollowness to them that no amount of efficiency could fill.

Ghosts did not gossip. They did not tell hopeful stories to make a weary man keep walking. They did not leave an impression beyond the work done and the silence after.

He needed living hands too. People with crassness in them, who could grin, grumble and tell tales so tall a listener had to scoff.

Loyal enough to stay behind when the road looked easier.

So he went to wake Fay.

Resentment still sat in Radeon's gut, sour from the lie, but he had chewed it down until it stopped cutting.

If Fay had not ridden her luck the way she did, not even half of what he held now would exist.

She roused like someone dragged up from deep water. Her eyes blinked, unfocused, then found him.

"Master, where have we come to?" she asked.

"Still in the Voulgrim Evershades." Radeon pointed at the three other disciples sprawled nearby. "Wake them first. All of them."

Fay pushed herself upright, hair a mess, then did as told. Radeon pressed a thin booklet into her hands, the paper crisp, the ink still sharp.

He turned to go, then paused and looked back at her bent over the pages.

"I can trust you with something this small, right?" he asked.

Fay did not look up. Her hands were already on the charcoal, marking the tasks that needed doing.

"Master, allow me," she said. "I will handle it."

The booklet laid out where the miners would go. Who they would be assigned to. What came next.

Once the others were shaken awake, Fay climbed the stage of the great hall.

The miners had noticed the air first. Fresher, cleaner, like the world had rinsed its mouth.

They wanted to spill outside and stare, but the sharper ones warned them back.

A ghastly cloud did not appear in the sky and vanish without leaving trouble behind. Not in any world worth fearing.

They watched Fay. Their faces still held the dull look of people braced for what lay ahead.

Fay steadied her breath, channeled qi into her throat, and spoke so even the men at the back could not pretend they did not hear.

"All miner households will undergo training. Hospitality, accounting, and the tending of plants."

A few murmurs tried to rise, then died when she did not soften.

"Master has already determined where each of you is best suited, given your present abilities. Your wages will be discussed with your instructors."

Spice Cure, Gauge Point, and Good Chip began moving through the crowd, passing out papers and tapping shoulders, sending people left or right in quiet streams.

Even the children received designations, small slips pressed into small hands.

Parents who could not read worried at once, leaning into neighbors, asking what the marks meant, what had been written over their sons and daughters.

They learned quickly it was not a chain so much as a map.

Play in a certain area. Train martial forms. Learn letters. Learn numbers. Answer simple questions.

Simple work for minds that had only ever been asked to swing a pick and survive.

Shears, doting over his grandchild Thimbles like the old man was guarding a candle in the wind, raised his hand and could not keep the tremor from his voice.

"You're saying the little ones'll be set to work. Aye, but what of their bellies? What do they eat? And... And here do they lay their heads at nights?"

"Those missions are voluntary. Only for those who choose to undertake them. As Master Radeon said, it is to grant them equal opportunity to learn the martial arts... and even to cultivate."

Shock. Disbelief. Extreme bafflement. Shears's shoulders began to shake.

Then he barked a laugh so loud it startled the nearest row. He slapped his thigh like he had won a wager.

"You saw it, then! Dumb Biscuit and Crust! Aye, and fools the lot of 'em, as I've ever said. I knew the Venerable were putting us to a test."

The hall broke into noise. Some laughed with him. Some wiped at their eyes and pretended it was sweat.

They had not expected reward to come so fast, and not with such a high handed flourish.

Fay let the sound roll a moment, then cut through it before it could turn sloppy.

"It is true, you will study under these masters," she said. "But you will still work hard. Any favor may be withdrawn. You know Master does not tolerate sloppy workmanship."

Working hard? Sweating for a meal? The miners understood those words more than anybody else.

They had lived them until they could not imagine another life, and when they looked at what was being offered, it did not seem hard at all.

"You may go now," Fay said. "The masters are waiting by the door. Follow them, and address them with proper respect."

She opened the huge wooden doors, and white robed men waited beyond, each holding a banner marked with the insignia of his craft, red cloth stitched with gold thread.

The miners filed out in uneven lines, still blinking like men stepping into a dream.

Outside, their carriages and bucks were being tended with careful hands, and those hands wore white sleeves too.

It was a small thing, and it landed heavy. Respect, given.

What were they? Mere mortals. Yet cultivators tended to their animals.

Shears shuffled close, hat in hand, words stumbling over each other.

"Sir, uh… we'll mind our own deer. Best you don't burden yourself with our animals."

The white robed man shook his head. Others miners tuned in at once, hungry for any clue about how this new world worked.

"Young man, breathe easy. See to the charge Master Radeon has laid upon you," the attendant said. "Learn your new craft. The ghosts will tend the beasts, that much is provided for."

The wraith paused, caught himself, and chose his next words with care.

"Ahem. What I mean to say, rather, is that these cultivators are of such age and practice their skill seems almost ghost-like. You understand, correct?"

Several other wraiths and ghosts in the skin of men nodded, all calm smiles and patient eyes, made to soothe a crowd.

Shears and the other miners did not question further. They knew enough of the Radeon's temper now.

If they could not master the crafts set before them, they would be left behind, as Biscuit and the eighteen families had been.

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