The first drop hit the back of Common Villager's neck while he was eating supper. He looked up. A dark spot bloomed on the ceiling beam above the table. His wife stopped chewing. His daughter reached out a small hand to catch the next drop. "The rains," his wife said. She did not need to say more. The desert rains came hard and fast, and when they came, they came for days. He had meant to fix the roof last month. He had meant to fix it the month before that too. He pushed back from the table and stepped outside. The village stretched around him in a cluster of wooden homes, thatch and shingle patched over patched, chimneys leaning, fences sun-bleached. Above the flat desert sky, clouds had gathered thick and low. He could smell the wet in them. He had maybe an hour. He wanted nothing more than this. A roof. A wife. A child. A quiet life in a quiet village. He had chosen it, and he meant to keep it. He climbed the ladder with a bundle of straw under one arm and a bucket of clay under the other. The straw hat kept the low sun out of his eyes. On the roof he found the hole fast. A rotten patch the size of a dinner plate, edges soft and black. Bigger than he'd hoped. He knelt and pressed his palm around it. The wood underneath crumbled. He worked. He tore out the rotted shingles and packed clay into the gap. He layered straw over the clay and pressed it down. His hands moved the way his father's had once moved. The first thunder rolled while he was still working. He did not look up. His wife passed a second bucket up the ladder. His daughter watched from the doorway with her arms wrapped around a small clay cup. The rain started before he finished the last corner. Fat drops, then a rush. He flattened the last of the straw with his forearm and drove a wedge of scrap wood over the seam. Water sheeted off the patch and ran down the eaves the way it was supposed to. He climbed down soaked. Inside, the table was dry. The beam above it was dry. His daughter set the clay cup down and clapped once. His wife handed him a rag. "You'll do the west side tomorrow," she said. "Tomorrow," he agreed. He sat down to finish his supper. Outside, past their fence, a neighbor's voice rose over the rain, sharp and scared. Then another. He set the rag down and listened. Someone was shouting about a wagon on the road, and a man bleeding, and a broken circle painted on the side. His daughter looked at him. He stood up.

Common Villager stepped toward the door. The neighbor's shouting had pulled others into the road. Rain drummed the fresh patch above his head. He wanted to sit back down. He wanted his supper. But a broken circle on a wagon was the kind of news that did not stay outside your fence for long. He reached for the door. It was already swinging. His daughter was gone from the frame. He saw her small back at the gate, one hand on the post, straw-colored hair darkening in the rain. She was watching the road. He moved. He crossed the yard in four strides, mud sucking at his boots. Past the fence, the wagon sat crooked in the mud twenty paces off. The paint was fresh. A ring, broken at the top, dripping down the wood in wet streaks. A man lay slumped against the wheel. Someone was crouched over him. Not a neighbor. The crouched figure wore a brown scarf wrapped high over the mouth. Bandages on the hands. Bandages on the ankles above worn sandals. A desert bandit, the kind traders warned about at market. He was going through the slumped man's coat. Common Villager's daughter took another step toward the gate. He caught her wrist. She flinched. He did not speak. He crouched behind the fence post and pulled her down with him. Her cup was still in her other hand. She opened her mouth to ask. He pressed a finger to his lips and shook his head once. The bandit's head lifted. Dark eyes swept the road. The scarf hid the rest of the face. Common Villager felt his own pulse in his teeth. He did not breathe. He put his straw hat between the bandit's line of sight and his daughter's face. Rain ran off the brim in a curtain. A neighbor down the road shouted again, closer now, pointing at the wagon. The bandit's head snapped toward the sound. He stood, tugged something from the slumped man's belt, and moved off between two houses at a fast walk. Gone. Common Villager did not wait. He lifted his daughter under one arm. He carried her back across the yard. She did not squirm. Her cup dropped in the mud. He did not stop for it. Inside, he shut the door and dropped the bar. His wife was already at the shutters, closing them. She had heard enough from the window. "Did he see her," his wife said. Not a question. A demand. "No." He set his daughter down. His hands were shaking. "No. He looked. He didn't see." His daughter started to cry, quietly, the way she cried when she knew she should not be loud. His wife looked at him over their daughter's head. "They're in the village," she said. He nodded. He had wanted a quiet life. The quiet was over.