Awenasa snorts at Anno's questions. "You think I want to be here? I no wish to leave home. I no want to be here but I have no choice. If I not keep going, my people die."
She frowns as she thinks, "And why matter if happy?"
The Shoanti feels like screaming at the sky in frustration but the spirits obviously didn't care if she was happy or not. "If you refuse, I can't make you." She reconsiders, "I could but I won't."
She fixes her gaze on Anno. "But you said you like me. If you don't lead me through swamp, someone else takes me who doesn't keep word and then I die lost in swamp and my people die. I told you only honourable guide to take me through. If you suggest someone else you trust then acceptable to me."
'Death is not the worst thing." Anno opines, voice quiet in the dark. He drops the hook and shortly hauls up another struggling fish. It plunks in the bucket with a loud clunk.
He laughs when Awenasa says she could make him. "You think so?" His dark outline turned toward her, face a blank mask in the night. "Maybe...maybe."
More silence and then, "Honor. What does it get a person? Honor does not fill your purse, it does not fill your belly and it doesn't fill your dreams. A hollow promise, Awenasa. That is what honor is. A chain, strung around your neck, for others to pull and prod."
Then, without warning the waterman straightens, grabbing his full bucket.
"Very well, I will take you Awenasa Windkeeper. We shall go where the chains of honor have bound us. Maybe we will find their ends, eh?" he looks up at the night sky, unmarred by moon or cloud. The stars dance above, bright and gleaming, sure as ever.
"We leave tonight. The swamp is best started at night. Let's hope your friends are not yet asleep."