El QaaM
ajor Ariya Zana paid twice the listed fare to secure space on the southbound bus due to arrive in an hour at the crowded, dust-blown terminal near the center of the town. The ticket agent was a greedy thief who cursed the sobbing woman being bumped to make room for her, but Zana tolerated the injustice as this was the last bus of the day running toward Baalbek. When the agent disappeared into the crowd looking for anyone else willing to bribe him for a ride out of El Qaa, she quietly slipped the displaced passenger some money. It made Zana feel a little better and would certainly help to feed the bewildered boy being dragged around behind the woman. She still had a significant amount of money left from the roll she took from Scimitar’s dead body. It was likely a stipend from the A
