She blinked at him; for a moment he thought she was going to cry. “Mamay?” Her eyes dulled as if a film had slid across them; she shivered and gulped, then she flung herself at him, hands clutching his robe, head, butting into his breasts. “Mamay, Mamay,” she wailed.

“Hush, bebe, hush, we’ll find your mama, diyo, we will.” He could feel the small body shuddering against him, feel the shudders fading; there was a last, small gulp and she lay heavy in his arms. “Diyo, my honey, oh diyo my sweeting, I wish…”

Ailiki went trotting off, jumped into the small sailboat Reyna had moored to a post at the side of the landing. Her tail curled around her, the beast crouched on one of the thwarts, her head up, her ears pricked as if to say, what are you waiting for?

“Well, look at that, b6b6.”

Faan turned her head, blinked at the mahsar. She sighed, started sucking her thumb, too worn out, he thought, for anything more.

“That’s a sign if I ever saw one, my honey.” He shifted his grip on her, got to his feet and started toward the boat.

“Abey’s Sting,” he said suddenly, “I’d forget my head…” He looked down at the child, pulled a sad face for her that made her giggle round her thumb, then hauled her back along the landing to the basket he’d dropped when he dived for her, explaining as he walked that he didn’t dare put her down, she moved too fast and chances were she’d be in that River before he’d taken two steps.

She was turning into a dead weight, heavier with every step. He shifted his grip again before he bent for the basket. “I know now why women have hips,” he murmured. “How in this crazy world does a baby like you gain fifty pounds whenever she feels like it?” He straightened, jiggled her higher and got his arm crooked under her. “Vema vema, honeychild, it’s back to the boat we go and off to find your mama. DownRiver first, I think, look round the Koo. If your people know they’ve lost you, they should be looking for you. Trouble is, a hundred things could happen so they don’t know when you went off, or where.”