“Even better. After Colnora, lodging in a public house might not be too smart. There must be a few people there that still know you. I’m sure someone will lend a hand and put us up for a while. We need to go somewhere off the beaten track.”
“You don’t honestly think anyone is still following us. I know the empire would want to stop Arista from reaching Gaunt, but I doubt anybody recognized her in Colnora—at least no one still alive.”
Royce did not answer.
“Royce?”
“I’m just playing it safe,” he snapped.
“Royce? What did Cosmos mean back there about you not being the only ex-Diamond in Warric? What was that talk of ghosts all about?” Royce remained silent. Hadrian glared at him. “I came along as a favor to you, but if you’re going to keep secrets …”
Royce relented. “It’s probably nothing, but then again—Merrick could be after us.”
Hadrian lost his look of irritation and replied with a simple, “Oh.”
“Anyone going to tell me who Merrick is?” Arista asked. “Or why Hadrian doesn’t want to go home?”
“I didn’t leave under the best of circumstances,” Hadrian answered, “and haven’t been back in a long time.”
“And Merrick?”
“Merrick Marius, also known as Cutter, was Royce’s friend once. They were members of the Diamond together, but they …” He glanced at Royce. “Well, let’s just say they had a falling out.”
“So?”
Hadrian waited for Royce to speak and, when he did not, answered for him. “It’s a long story, but the gist of the matter is that Merrick and Royce seriously don’t get along.” He paused, then added, “Merrick is an awful lot like Royce.”
Arista continued to stare at Hadrian until the revelation dawned on her.
“Still, that doesn’t mean Merrick is after us,” Hadrian went on. “It’s been a long time, right? Why would he bother with you now?”
“He’s working for the empire,” Royce said. “That’s what Cosmos meant. And if there’s an imperial mole in the Diamond, Merrick knows all about us by now. Even if there isn’t a spy, Merrick could still find out about us from the Diamond. There are plenty who think of him as a hero for sending me to Manzant. I’m the evil one in their eyes.”
“You were in Manzant?” Arista asked, stunned.
“It’s not something he likes to talk about.” Hadrian again answered for him. “So if Merrick is after us, what do we do?”
“What we always do,” Royce replied, “only better.”
The village of Hintindar lay nestled in a small sheltered river valley surrounded by gentle hills. A patchwork of six cultivated fields, outlined by hedgerows and majestic stands of oak and ash, decorated the landscape in a crop mosaic. Horizontal lines of mounded green marked three of the fields with furrows, sown in strips, to hold the runoff. Animals grazed in the fourth field and the fifth was cut for hay. The last field lay fallow. Young women were in the fields, cutting flax and stuffing it in sacks thrown over their shoulders, while men weeded crops and threw up hay.
The center of the village clustered along the main road near a little river, a tributary of the Bernum. Wood, stone, and wattle-and-daub buildings with shake or grass-thatched roofs lined the road, beginning just past the wooden bridge and ending halfway up the hillside toward the manor house. Between them were a variety of shops. From several buildings smoke rose, the blackest of which came from the smithy. Their horses announced their arrival with a loud hollow clop clip clop as they crossed the bridge. Heads turned, each villager nudging the next, fingers pointing in their direction. Those they passed stopped what they were doing to follow, keeping a safe distance.
“Good afternoon,” Hadrian offered, but no one replied. No one smiled.
Some whispered in the shelter of doorways. Mothers pulled children inside and men picked up pitchforks or axes.
“This is where you grew up?” Arista whispered to Hadrian. “Somehow it seems more like how I would imagine Royce’s hometown to be.”
This brought a look from Royce.
“They don’t get too many travelers here,” Hadrian explained.
“I can see why.”
They passed the mill, where a great wooden wheel turned with the power of the river. The town also had a leatherworker’s shop, a candlemaker, a weaver, and even a shoemaker. They were halfway up the road when they reached the brewer.
A heavyset matron with gray hair and a hooked nose worked outside beside a boiling vat next to a stand of large wooden casks. She watched their slow approach, then walked to the middle of the road, wiping her hands on a soiled rag.
“That’ll be fer enough,” she told them with a heavy south-province accent.
She wore a stained apron tied around her shapeless dress and a kerchief tied over her head. Her feet were bare and her face was covered in dirt and sweat.
“Who are ya and what’s yer business here? And be quick afore the hue and cry is called and yer carried to the bailiff. We don’t stand fer troublemakers here.”