in their camp, which they call Zainab. Only the wise woman lives full time in Zainab. From what I can tell, the women of Zainab tend to live for more of the year in Zainab, producing goods from the materials harvested from the herds, but spend a good portion of the year with their families following the herds, as I noticed a good number of packages of peoples' belongings stashed in the empty carapace of a silt-strider. At first I thought they were trade goods or food supplies - but a kind woman - one of the witches, I later learned - laughed at me and explained what they were. I noticed there were no babies or children in the camp, and that same woman explained there was one
baby in the camp - her mother is sick and her father is dead, so the two of them stay at Zainab under care of the others.
Power among the Zainab is organized in a patriarchal structure: the tribe is led by their Ashkhan (the Zainab Ashkhan is tall, heavily muscled, and old, but of a great physical strength and heartiness that makes his wrinkled eyes and ears seem nearly comical and out of place) and power is distributed from the Ashkhan to the Gulakhan, who are chosen from the tribe’s strongest male warriors. Like most patriarchal cultures, the women perform all practical leadership. The wise woman is the heart of the