He knew exactly when he had lost her, but not exactly where. He had lost her before, many times, as she had lost him in turn. They'd always found each other again quickly enough.
This time, years had passed. He searched on. He still had their vardo, the intricately-carved and luminosly-painted wagon with straight wooden walls that sloped out like a loaf of fresh bread as they rose to meet the eaves of the roof. When they were together, he had called it home.
It was her vardo, really. She had built it, and had carved every image: flowers, cats, constellations, chickens, and children.
He had only painted the wagon. He was a painter by trade.
She was a painter too, and a builder, and a carver, and she made the healing potions. Little vials of concentrated magic, to treat all manner of ailments, were stored in neat rows inside the glass-fronted china cabinet.
Almost all their income had come from her potions.
Since he had lost her, he had refused to sell any. He had only used one vial to treat his mule, Toro, when the loyal beast had been bitten by a grey mamba, and would have surely died without it.
She would have been unhappy, he thought, if she knew that he had been avoiding helping anyone with her potions throughout his long, lonely search for her.
He couldn't bear to part with anything she had touched. And it would only be a little longer. He was close; he was sure of it. As sure as he had been the first year, and the second, and still now, in the twelfth.
This was not an ending, he knew. She had told him, once, that when they reached the ending, if he wouldn't realize it himself, she would tell him.
She promised.
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