Sophia led them inside the Council House, which sat at one end of the central plaza around which all the other cabins were situated. The plaza had been beaten down of grass, leaving a largely earthen field where dances and games were held. The Council House, the largest of all the camp's buildings, was a seven-sided building constructed of young saplings and mud, and it housed the sacred fire (this time in a fireplace with a hearth that vented through an actual chimney). It resembled a courtroom inside, with its pew-like seating, podium, and side tables. Here, Sophia had told them, was where the government made its plans, where the children received their schooling, where justice was meted out in disputes between neighbors, and where people were married.

As soon as Murphy saw Carol enter, he dropped the pumpkin seed in his hand and ran to hug her. Then he hugged his father, who scolded him, "Hell were you thinking, giving Dixon the slip and confronting two armed men twice your size?"

Murphy put a little balled fist on one hip and said, "Well, they surrendered soon as they saw me!"

"Didn't surrender, son. Just didn't have a mind to kill you. If they'd had a mind to kill you, you'd be dead."

Murphy frowned. "I thought you'd be proud."

"Am proud you're brave," Daryl assured him. "Scared you're foolhardy. Work on that second one, huh?"

"Yes, sir," Murphy murmured with disappointment.

While this exchange was taking place, Sophia saw Dixon, who did a double take at her womanly appearance before laughing and hugging her. When he pulled away, he said, "I barely recognized you."

"My mom said you married Beth?" Sophia asked. "She's well?"

"She's great. She's home with our new baby, Lilly. And our son Otis. Our daughter Patty came with me, but she's back at our temporary camp. I didn't want to bring her until I knew what I was getting into here."

"But ya brought Murphy?" Daryl asked.

"Well, I couldn't have left him if I tried," Dixon insisted. He peered at the sleeping baby cradled in the sling Sophia wore. "Tala told me you married Carl?"

"Yes. This is Koo-wi-s-gu-wi, but you can call him Koo."

"Hey, Koo," Dixon whispered to the sleeping baby. He looked up and met Sophia's eyes. "I'm really sorry to hear about Carl."

"He died a hero." Sophia took in a shaky breath. Seeming to steady herself, she continued, "And his reflection lives in his son."

"I can definitely see the resemblance," Dixon assured her. "But he has your freckles. The freckles you used to have, anyway."

Murphy walked over to Sophia. He cocked his head to the side, and his strawberry-blonde bangs fell over his Dixon-blue eyes. "That Indian told me you were my sister."

"Tala?" Sophia asked. "He's a full-blooded Cherokee." She smiled indulgently. "They don't call themselves Indians."

"He's done a lot of 19th century reading," Carol explained. "He's a big James Fenimore Cooper fan."

"You're a good reader?" Sophia asked him.

"I can't read worth a dime!" Murphy exclaimed. "Buy my Pa reads to me every night."

Sophia smiled at Daryl. "Your pa, huh?"

"And Mark Twain," Daryl added. "Boy's a big fan of Huck Finn."

"But not of Huck Finn's pa," Murphy said. "That guy was kind of an asshole."

"Language, Murphy," Carol warned.

"Pa says it all – " Murphy took one look at Carol's expression and murmured, "never mind. Sorry." He looked at Sophia again. "You're supposed to be dead."

"Murphy—" Carol said.

"- Well, fortunately, I'm not." Sophia was clearly trying not to laugh at this point.

"Then how come we have a cross in the graveyard at Alexandria with your name on it?"

Carol tensed. What would Sophia think to know they'd buried her? They'd yet to broach the subject of her coming back to Alexandria with them. Even if she wasn't already somewhat inclined to stay with her new family, then that news might -

"- Maybe for the same reason there's a cross with our mom and dad's name in Qualla," said Sophia, interrupting Carol's thoughts. "Or was, before we were overrun by flood and fire and the wendigo."

"Win who go?" Murphy asked.

"The walkers. I thought Mom and Dad were dead. I'm sure they thought I was dead, too. And I needed some kind of closure." She looked from Daryl to Carol. "Maybe they did, too." Carol nodded, with mixed sorrow, guilt, and relief. "So we had a funeral, me and Carl and Patrick, for our loved ones. Not everyone in Fun Kingdom," Sophia admitted. "That would have been a lot of crosses. But for everyone who lived in the House of the Future."

"I wish I could have seen the House of the Future!" Murphy exclaimed. "Did you really have a refrigerator full of soda? And boxes full of candy? And a moving ramp for a staircase? And voice-activated blinds? And a room full of stars?"

Sophia's smile was huge. "We did. And we had a television and a DVD player. You probably don't even know what those are."

"Oh, we've got a television. And a DVD player. But we're only allowed to watch one movie a month." Murphy rolled his eyes, as though that were the silliest restriction he'd ever conceived of.

"What?" Sophia looked wide-eyed at her parents.

Maybe this would be the selling point that drew her home, Carol hoped. "Our community—Alexandria—it has power, from solar and water and wind—some power, anyway. We do have to conserve to make sure the water and septic pumps keep running. Because we have indoor plumbing! Toilets and running water! Showers, even. Rationed showers, but, still…it's…" She almost said better than what you have here but fortunately stopped herself. There was no way Sophia wouldn't take that as an insult. They'd clearly built a lot here in a short time, and they had worked hard to do it. "It's nice. We have a lovely house." Granted, they shared it with a lot of people, some of whom were living in the attic and garage.

"We live there, too," Rick said. "Me and Michonne and the kids."

"The kids?" Sophia asked Rick.

"Well, you know Judith," Rick replied. "She's nine now. And Michonne and I have a son. RJ. He's five."

"Anyone else have babies I should know about?"

"Glenn and Maggie have Hershel," Rick said. "Named after…you know. He's just a little younger than Murphy."

Murphy peered into her sling. "If you're my sister…and he's your kid…then…" Murphy reared back and opened his mouth wide in surprise. "I'm his uncle!"

This time Sophia couldn't keep from laughing. "That's right."

"I'm an uncle! Just like Pa! And Uncle Rick! And Uncle Aaron! And Uncle Glenn! I'm Uncle Murphy!"

Either Murphy's exclamations or Sophia's laughing disturbed the baby. Koo stirred, fussed a few seconds, and then went back to sleep when Sophia gave him her finger to suck on.

"I told the others we might spend the night here," Dixon said. "So they won't be worried if we don't come back to camp right away. I mean…not that I'm trying to invite myself o – "

"- Of course you can stay," Sophia said. "For as long as you like. Waholi will let you all sleep in the Council House, I'm sure. Mom and Dad and Murphy, you can stay in my cabin if you want, if you don't mind sleeping on the floor."

For as long as you like. They would be guests, Carol thought. For as long as they liked. Did that mean Sophia had already decided not to go back with them? She was afraid to ask.

"Father Nicholas and Dianne are guarding the camp now," Dixon said. "They already came back with a deer, and I filled them in on everything." He turned his attention to Sophia. "Rosita will probably want to see you and Patrick tomorrow, when she hears you're alive. She's here somewhere, in the forest hunting."

"I'd love to see her. My mom didn't mention Oscar…he didn't make it out of Fun Kingdom?"

Dixon shook his head. "Rosita's been with a guy named Ozzy for about five years now. They haven't made it official, but they have a kid named O. Ozzy's a good guy. They live in Mount Vernon."

"Not in Alexandria?" Sophia asked. "You have more than one camp?"

Dixon laughed. "Oh, wait until you see. We have a coalition."

Before Sophia could reply, Murphy exclaimed, "What's that bone and string thing I saw outside?"

Sophia smiled. "It's for a game. Ring and pin. You swing the bone in the air, and then you try to put it through the hole. You want to try to play?"

"Do I win anything if I get it through the hole?"

"My admiration," Sophia assured him.

Murphy had only been playing in the plaza for a minute when a Cherokee boy about his age ran up to him to tell him he wasn't doing it properly and to show him how. Meanwhile they received word Patrick was conscious. They were taken to see him in the infirmary, a small, dome-shape structure constructed of river cane, sticks, and plaster, which was sunken partially in the ground. It looked to Carol from the belongings in baskets as if the medicine woman lived here, always ready to serve her patients, she supposed.

Murphy begged to return to the plaza to play with his friend after meeting Patrick, and Carol let him go.

"I thought I'd hallucinated when I saw Daryl and Dixon in those woods," Patrick said when Murphy was gone. He was on a mat on the floor, propped up by pillows and blankets in a sitting position, his leg freshly stitched and outstretched. "I'd lost some blood…I'd been there awhile. I think I'd been out but woke up when the second round of wendigo spilled out of the trees. I couldn't have fought them off in my state, with all my arrows spent. Thank God you came when you did. It's like you were sent by the Great Spirit."

"Dunno 'bout that," Daryl said, "but glad to see you alive, man."

"Man." Patrick smiled. "You never called me that at Fun Kingdom."

"Well…'cause you weren't one then."

"I'm so sorry about Carl," Patrick told Rick. Rick's nostrils flared. He was hearing that a lot today.

"How bad did your wound turn out to be?" Sophia asked.

"Walela says I shouldn't rife a horse for two months. Or run. But I'll get back my physical prowess eventually."

Sophia chuckled.

"What, I have physical prowess." Patrick smiled self-deprecatingly and wiggled a bushy eyebrow. "All the ladies think so."

"Did Kelly come by to visit?" Sophia asked. "She was worried about you, you know. She even headed one of the two search parties."

"Stop," Patrick insisted.

"Stop what?" Sophia asked innocently.

"Trying to push her on me. Or me on her. I shouldn't have to get together with someone for you to stop feeling guilty about the fact that you're never going to want…" He trailed off as though suddenly remembering they had company.

"I just want you to be happy, Concotocko," Sophia insisted. "You're my oldest and dearest living friend."

"I am happy. I'm alive, and I figured out the best path to run the irrigation. And I got to see old friends come back from the dead today." He smiled at his visitors.

The medicine woman, Walela, came inside the infirmary. "Too much stimulation," she told them. "Concotocko needs his rest."

3:15 PM

Sophia had pulled her mother aside for "a walk." Daryl got the impression she wanted some alone time with her mama, so he didn't try to insert himself. Rick was looking after his awake and now lively grandson while talking to some man who used to be a cop, and Dixon was riding back to their temporary camp to fetch his daughter now that he knew it was safe here. He would also let everyone know he and Daryl and Carol and the kids would be staying in the Cherokee village for the duration of the hunting trip.

So Daryl went to check on Murphy, whom he found playing a new game with his new friend in the plaza. This one seemed to involve a lot of wrestling. Tala was sitting outside his cabin in a rocking chair overlooking the plaza and vaguely watching the boys as he smoked a pipe, occasionally saying something like, "Not so rough, Jistu. You're bigger than him."

"Yeah, but Murphy's scrappy."

Tala looked up at Daryl, who had come to stand nearby.

"But my boy doesn't know his own strength."

"Your boy?" Daryl asked. "That's your kid? How old is he?"

"Eight."

About Murphy's age. The man who was apparently dating his daughter had a child the age of his child. That didn't sit well with Daryl. "Adopted?"

"No, he's the fruit of my loins," Tala replied with a smirk. "I had him when I was twenty-one. Toward the start of all this." Well, that wasn't so bad then, Daryl thought. The man was still under thirty. Just. Daryl was in his mid-forties now. "My wife…she died when Qualla fell."

"Sorry for your loss," Daryl murmured.

"They've made fast friends." Tala nodded to the boys.

Murphy broke loose of the other boy's grip and ran in a zig-zag toward his father. "Can I have a sleepover in Jistu's cabin tonight? Can I? Can I?"

"Uh…well… 's rude to invite yourself."

"I didn't! Jistu did!"

"It's fine with me," Tala said. "Jistu was going to spend the night at the grandparents' cabin, but as I no longer have plans for tonight…I can house both boys."

"Yer parents are still alive?"

"Not my parents. The grandparents. They play grandmother and grandfather to all the children in the village, help with child care. I can even feed Murphy dinner if you like. That way you adults can have a more serious conversation with Wohali this evening. I suppose we have a treaty of sorts to make with your people."

"So I can have a sleepover?" Murphy asked.

"Well, ask your mama when you see her," Daryl told him.

Murphy ran back toward his friend, shouting, "My pa agrees but he has to get permission from my mama!"

Tala chuckled. He lowered his pipe, and the smoke curled in the air, tickling Daryl's nose with its sweet scent of tobacco. It had been a long time since he'd had a smoke. Carol didn't like him trading for Mount Vernon tobacco. She thought it was a terrible waste of ammunition. He had smoke about twice a month now, but he'd been hoarding ammo for the hunting trip for Murphy's rifle, and it had been a good two months since he'd last indulged.

"Fuck that smells good," he murmured.

"Can I offer you a some? I have another pipe inside."

"Yeah. That'd be great."

Tala's cabin was as small and as spartan as Sophia's inside, but with a second cot for the boy instead of a crib, and the rocking chair was currently outside. It was extremely tidy, not an item of clothing strewn anywhere, and when Daryl saw the low stone table set for two, with clay goblets beside the pottery plates and candles in a holder in the center, Daryl was suddenly reminded that Tala had been expecting a date with Sophia tonight. He wondered if he'd also been expecting to get laid, since his original plan was to send his son to the grandparents for the night. "How long you and Soph been dating?"

"What? Oh, Deyani? I suppose that depends what you consider to be dating. I've been quietly wooing her for about four months. She's been responding favorably for about four weeks." He drew out from his hutch a pipe that was smaller and considerably less ornate than the briar one he held in his own hand. The smaller pipe looked like it had been constructed using maize.

"Guess that's what they mean by a corn cob pipe."

"They're cheap but effective," Tala replied. "No break-in period like these." He raised the long briar pipe in his hand, set the lip between his lips, and let the pipe hang from his mouth as he removed a few pinches of tobacco from a clay jar and placed it into the bowl of the corn cob pipe. Then he slid some kind of small, three-in-one tool from his pocket and used the nail-shaped prong to tamp down the tobacco.

"I ain't never smoked a pipe before," Daryl admitted. "Just rolled cigarettes. Occasional cigar."

"Well, it's not rocket science. The taste is different, but I like it."

"You grow a lot of tobacco?"

"The land makes it easy," Tala said, "and it's good for some medicinal purposes, but you can't eat it, so, no…not a lot. I planted some in my own private garden behind the cabin in May and harvested it in August. Enough for personal consumption. And enough to trade a little." He put the unlit pipe in his mouth and took a test draw. "Air's flowing. It's packed right." He handed the pipe over to Daryl. "Put it in your mouth." Daryl did, while Tala took some kind of stick and lit it with a match. "You don't want to use the match itself," he explained. "Sulfur alters the taste of the tobacco." He aimed the flame toward the bowl and moved it in a circular motion. "Gentle even draws until it's lit. I said gentle!"

Once the pipe was lit, Tala led Daryl back outside and eased into his rocking chair again. Daryl took a seat on the other side of the open doorway on a sanded tree stump that he was pretty sure was meant for a chair. "Burning my tongue."

"You can't chain smoke it like a cigarette. Take slow, steady puffs, or you'll get tongue bite. It's for savoring."

Daryl slowed his puffs until the sensation improved. Then he raised an eyebrow. "Shit's strong."

"It'll give you a light buzz," Tala agreed.

"You ain't put no peyote in here have you?"

Tala rolled his eyes. "Peyote doesn't grow in West Virginia."

"Know that. Only grows naturally in the limestone soils of the Chihuahua dessert in south Texas and north Mexico. But this is givin' me a buzz." Daryl motioned with the pipe to the cowboy hat hung on the back of Tala's rockling chair, with the feathers hung down from the headband. "What do the feathers mean? One for every man ya killed?"

"How barbaric. Did you grow up in the backwoods, watching a lot of John Wayne movies?"

Daryl had grown up in the backwoods. "Hell's wrong with John Wayne movies?"

Tala chuckled condescendingly, and that riled Daryl, who said, "Ain't Tala a girl's name?"

"It's unisex," Tala replied thinly.

"Is it though?"

"How would you know?"

"Read books where it's a girl's name."

Tala smiled self-deprecatingly. "Well, it has made me a fighter."

Daryl chuckled. "Like 'A Boy Named Sue'?"

"Johnny Cash fan?"

Daryl shrugged. "He's a'ight I guess." His defensive tension was gone now after the lighter exchange. "Hey, thanks for the smoke, man. And thanks for not killing my boy when he pulled a rifle on ya."

"You're welcome."

"So, the feathers?"

"They're just a decoration."

"Why you got five, and Soph only has four, and the big honcho has six then?"

"You have to find them by chance. You can't go plucking them or seeking them out. They're gifts from the Great Spirit. They fall from the sky like an omen."

They smoked in silence for a moment, watching the boys play. Tala lowered his pipe. "Is Deyani going back with you? To your camp in Virginia?"

"Haven't discussed it yet," Daryl murmured.

"She belongs here," Tala insisted, "with her tribe. She's not a child. She doesn't need raising anymore."

"Well, think it's up to her where she belongs, ain't it?" Daryl asked. "Ain't up to you."

"No, indeed," Tala agreed gloomily. "Nothing is up to me. Every good thing is taken in time. Fate is a cruel spirit." He launched himself from his rocking chair into a standing position and paced forward, calling, "Jitsu! I told you not so rough! You're much bigger than him!"