Plain Kate

The flattery made it obvious that Niki wanted something. Plain Kate wanted to wince, but the man just said, “And who have we here, Nikolai?” He was soft-voiced, slender, wearing a blue shirt with a green kerchief knotted round his neck: kingfisher colors.

“She is, this is,” Niki sputtered, “Plain Kate. Orphan girl, orphan to Piotr Carver.” He drew Plain Kate forward into the crook of his arm. “Behjet, she needs a place.”

“Among the Roamers, you mean?” The man, Behjet, wiped his palms on his groom’s apron. “That’s no small thing to ask. Where is she going?”

Plain Kate pulled away from the soft, doughy warmth of Niki and answered for herself. “Away.”

“Hmmm,” said Behjet. “And why’s that?”

From far off, Plain Kate heard Taggle’s yowl of victory. The cat was establishing his dominance. Finding his place. “Because.” Kate swallowed. “Because they’ll kill me if I stay here. They think I’m a witch.”

“Which she’s none of,” Niki added.

“Ah,” said the young man softly. Like all the Roamers, he had dark skin and wide, uptilted dark eyes. They were horse deep and horse soft; they made him look kindly. But still he didn’t move.

Niki fluttered his hands. “And you were saying you were in need of a carpenter, that you had to fix your wagons in every other town and wished for a carpenter among you. Plain Kate is a woodworker.”

“A good one,” added Kate. Her voice came out level. She was proud of that.

Behjet blew through his lips, whuffling like one of his horses. “Taking in a gadje—it’s not for me to decide. But let me take you to meet my mother.” He started off across the close-cropped, drizzle-gray grass.

Plain Kate pulled on her pack-basket and hurried after him, with Niki trailing. “What does ‘gage-eh’ mean?”

“Gadje-eh,” Behjet corrected, pulling her g toward z. “It means ‘not one of the Roamers.’ It’s not the kindest word, and I’m sorry for it. But you must not think that because we have no walls, we have no ways. We are not wild men, for all that we are not welcome most places. Now then.” They had come to the wagons. They were small, with high wheels, their beds wooden and heavily carved, bright with paint. Their decks were covered by canvas pulled across bows of wood. On the back steps of a red-painted wagon, an apple-faced old woman was plucking a rooster. She was bundled in green and yellow skirts and many scarves. Gray hair frizzed from under her turban and dripped into her dark face.

Niki did not bow, but he twisted his hands in front of him as if he thought maybe he should. “Mother Daj,” he said.

“Daj,” said Behjet, who did bow a little, and then added something in another language. It seemed to Plain Kate like a long speech, and she was frustrated. If her fate was being decided, she wanted to understand.

Behjet fell silent. Plain Kate found the woman looking at her, her eyes small and bright as a hawk’s among her wrinkles. Copying Behjet, she bowed, but said nothing.

“A carver, eh?” the woman drawled. She used the rooster’s beak to point at Kate’s objarka. “Just fancy work?”

Plain Kate planted her feet as if about to fight. “Plain and fancy. Boxwork, wheelwork, turned wood. But mostly carving.” She took off the objarka, which her father had called a masterpiece, and passed it to the woman.

She turned the dark wooden cat round and round in her dark hands, put its little nose to her big one. “She’s a good blade, Mother,” said Niki. But the old woman ignored the baker, intent on Kate’s objarka and some internal question. At last she said, “Well, we could use a carver, and that’s sure, child.” Her head was still down, as if she were speaking to the carved cat. Then she looked up, her face soft with wrinkles. “And though you keep it from your face, I think you could use us. You have your own gear? Your own tools?”

Plain Kate nodded.

“I can’t promise you a place. But come with us to Toila. A month on the road. We’ll sniff each other out.”

A test. Plain Kate understood tests. She nodded again. A lump was tightening in her throat, but she wasn’t sure if it was hope or fear.

“Well, then,” said the woman. “I’m Daj. Or Mother Daj if that sets better on a town tongue. And you’re Kate.”

“Plain Kate,” she corrected.

Daj raised her eyebrows, but before she could say anything, Taggle sauntered up. There was a fresh scratch across one ear and a dead rat in his mouth. He dropped the pink-footed body at Daj’s feet and stood there grinning. Plain Kate winced. “I also,” she said, “have a cat.”

“A fine beast, Mother Daj,” put in Niki. “A famous mouser.”

“Well,” said Daj. “A useful pair, then. Welcome, cat.”

And Taggle nodded.

¶

Plain Kate, at Daj’s gruff coaxing, swung her basket into the wagon bed, and Taggle, with no coaxing at all, sprang up beside it. “Did you see?” he said, arching his back into her hand, preening. “My gift has proven that we’re useful.”

“Taggle,” Kate hissed. She looked round. No one had heard.

The cat sulked. “One would think praise was in order.”