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older sister has two daughters. I saw her suffer. I also saw her joy when she held those newborns, and how much she adores her girls now. I know for a fact that she’s said the pain and suffering were nothing compared to becoming a mother. I didn’t mean to be disrespectful to the laws, I merely wondered if you had ever considered that maybe there could be another way.”
    Perrin sat back, stunned by the boy’s boldness. “As I said b efore, Zenos—no, I’ve never considered violating the laws of the land. At least, not that one,” he confessed with a small smile.
    Zenos hazarded a small smile too, but it seemed to have a sad undertone. “Understood, sir. I shouldn’t have . . . well, never mind. That’s about all I have for you today.” He made to get up out of the chair, but Perrin was struck by a thought and held up his hand to stop him.
    “Zenos, one question: exactly how did the Guarder know the farmer was planting corn? He would have been across the upper canal there. For all he knew the farmer was dropping peas or pumpkin seeds.”
    Zenos hesitated. “Too late in the season for peas, and pumpkins aren’t sown in rows.”
    “But would the Guarder know that? If we plant corn in rows, might we not plant everything in rows?” Shin pressed. “I’m not exactly a gardener, as you might have guessed, but I do know that seeds are very small and difficult to identify from a distance.”
    Zenos looked perplexed for a moment. “Maybe he went out at night and dug up the seeds, just to see what had been planted?”
    Shin pondered that, along with the odd look his volunteer tried to conceal. He seemed to be worried that he hadn’t asked the Guarder how he knew what seeds were planted.
    “Possibly,” Perrin decided. “You’re dismissed, Zenos. Reme mber—extra food for our babbling Guarder tomorrow. Let’s see if sweet bread doesn’t loosen his tongue even more.”
    Zenos stood up, apparently relieved. “Thank you, sir! Hope I have something promising tomorrow.”
    After he left the room, Perrin whistled under his breath. “Six or seven children?” he whispered.
    He sat quietly for a minute, lost in thought.
    Then he forced himself to shake the traitorous thought out of his head.
     
    ---
     
    The second year of Mahrree and Perrin’s marriage had flown by even more quickly than their first. It was a nauseating, exhausting, sweet, gratifying, terrifying, sleepless, fantastic blur.
    There were many events and funny things Mahrree had decided she should would write down, but she always forgot until it was in the middle of the night and she was up with someone small, or using the washroom, or was awakened by the churning in her belly or the snoring of her husband, or by an irrational fear, or by a leg itimate concern, or simply up because nothing had waken her up and she was worried that nothing was waking her up. That’s when she thought she could record what she wanted to remember, especially those days in the last Raining Season when she and Perrin sat on their bed on the floor in the gathering room and did nothing but watch Jaytsy and tend to his stitches. But even then she kept putting off stepping away from it all just to record it for later.
    Before she realized it, it was the 38 th Day of Weeding Season again, 321, and the evening of their second wedding anniversary. This year the Shin family was celebrating. Half of the family was asleep; the other half would be soon. The sky was a magnificent combination of swirling deep reds, purples, and blues, but Mahrree was the only one who noticed it.
    They were on a blanket in the middle of their now very small yard in a bed of yellow weedy flowers. Their garden had shrunk co nsiderably since the latest addition to the house was completed several weeks ago. Perrin had done most of the work himself after his stitches had healed.
    Tonight Jaytsy kept leaving the blanket to practice her new trick of walking. She loved to hoot after the occasional cart and