In those three hours, no one had spoken, aside from functional suggestions and Macurdy's few orders. For one thing, Macurdy's ruined mouth made talking painful. Melody's and Jeremid's thoughts were mostly on the possibility of capture, and why on Earth they were doing this. Macurdy's were on escape, and on how hard he dared push the horses. He was willing to wear them out, if it resulted in pursuit being abandoned, but he dared not break them down. Because of his size, he'd taken two of the company's larger horses, but even so, he was a heavy burden for them.

When a meadow came into sight ahead, Jeremid said they'd best stop and let the horses graze a bit. Macurdy agreed. They took time to hobble them; there were hobble straps in every set of equipment, and they couldn't risk losing a horse.

Their pursuers would undoubtedly have a pack horse carrying a sack of oats, Jeremid said, which meant their mounts would hold up better. And the White River lay less than an hour's ride ahead, if they kept pushing. There they'd have a choice of either swimming their horses downstream or up, or straight across. Which with luck would confuse and delay pursuit.

So they rested less than twenty minutes. At the White, they swam upstream, even though it was harder on the horses. Then, instead of coming out on the other side, where their tracks would be looked for, they came out on the west bank again, and followed it upstream for several miles, on foot again, leading their horses to rest them. The hope was that their pursuers would overlook the west bank option.

At length they reentered the water, crossing this time. Then Macurdy led off eastward through untracked forest. Until, abruptly, a voice froze them. "Macurdy! Macurdy!"

None of them spoke. Their eyes scanned the woods.

"No no, Macurdy! I'm up here! Blue Wing!"

They looked up in unison to where the great raven sat in a tall, thick-boled walnut tree.

"I saw you crossing the river, and wondered why humans would be riding so far from any road or trail." Blue Wing paused. "Why are you?"

"We're in trouble," Macurdy said, "and we think men might be following us. Soldiers with hounds. We're trying to leave a trail they won't find."

Blue Wing said nothing to that, and it seemed to Macurdy that the bird comprehended neither his problem nor his strategy. A raven's solution to danger would be flight, he supposed. "I wonder," Macurdy called, "if you'd do me a favor?"

"Ask and find out."

He described the road they'd fled on, and the form that any successful pursuit would take. "I will look and see," Blue Wing said, and with a thrust of legs and wings, lifted into the sky.

They rode on then, not hurrying, for this was old forest, long unburned, and though the hills were mild, the ground had gotten pocked and humped, over the centuries, from the tipped-up roots and mouldering trunks of windthrown trees. Only once did they pause, to shoot and gut a turkey. Three miles farther, they came to a small isolated clearing, more or less level, with a cabin and outbuildings of logs. From a little distance, their roofs looked more or less intact, but saplings were already invading the clearing. There was still abundant grass though, beaten down and grayed by winter's frosts and rains, and tinged green by the new growth beneath it. Macurdy wondered why the place had been abandoned.

By then the sun was low. They rode over to the buildings and dismounted, hobbling the horses and leaving them to graze. Inside the cabin, things had been smashed, and bones were scattered around, the broken skulls human.

"Troll work!" Jeremid breathed the words, sounding spooked. The stock shed had been similarly vandalized. There too bones lay scattered and broken, with skulls of a cow, a calf, a horse.

By the time they'd looked it over, Blue Wing had found them. "No one is following you," he said. "I flew above the river to the road, and then westward quite a distance. With the trees still bare, I couldn't possibly have missed anyone. I saw not more than two riders together, and no hounds at all."

Jeremid looked at Macurdy. "What now?" he asked.

"We camp," Macurdy said. "There's plenty of wood in the woodshed. We'll take turns standing watch and keeping fires going, in case the troll's still around here somewhere. We can picket the horses inside them."

Without anyone actually suggesting it, they made their beds in the hay shed, where there were no bones, fluffing up the hay in the driest corner. The decaying roof wouldn't hold out serious rain, but it would hold heat somewhat, and protect against a shower.

Macurdy selected eight fire sites close outside the cluster of buildings, and they carried a pile of firewood to each. There was a well in front of the cabin, its white oak shoring still intact, and they raised water from it. Blue Wing announced he would sleep on its sweep. Then, in front of the hay shed, Macurdy lit the cook fire with the pass of a hand. Jeremid stared big-eyed.

"Where did you learn to do that?" he asked.

"The shaman at Wolf Springs taught me. He said I had talent, and trained me in the evenings for a while."

"Could you have, uh, set fire to Zassfel this morning?" Jeremid asked.

Macurdy shrugged. "I never thought to try."

As they roasted the turkey, dusk began to settle. Eating wouldn't be easy for his damaged mouth, so Macurdy had taken an iron pot from the cabin and was stewing turkey in it. Rust stew, he thought drily as he raked coals around it.

"It's hard to believe no one's chasing us," Jeremid said quietly. "Could the bird be lying?"

Macurdy shook his head. "We're old friends from Wolf Springs."

"I believe him," Melody said. "My father was commander in his time, and a councilman since. We grew up, my brothers and I, being lectured by him. A platoon sergeant can get away with a lot, but what he did last night?" She shook her head, then cut off a slab of half-roasted turkey breast. "Of course, what you did was damned extreme, too, but you were justified."

"Justification's not all I had," Macurdy mumbled. "I had to try getting away without getting chased and caught. So I humiliated him, and pretty much crippled him for a while. That way, one of two things would happen. He might go crazy, and order the men out to get me at all costs-or he might cave in and order nothing. Or maybe he was in too bad a shape to give orders. After that it would depend on the captain, but he wouldn't send men out till after someone took the story to him. Or he might write it off and bust Zassfel."

Inwardly he grunted. Face it, Macurdy, you wanted to get even. It felt good, beating them up like that. Whatever; the good feeling was gone now. Heavily he got up and circled the buildings, lighting the watch fires.

Jeremid had volunteered to take the first watch. Now, as dusk thickened, he left with spear and sword. Using mostly his back teeth, Macurdy gnawed briefly on a piece of stewed turkey, his eyes watering from the pain. Eating, he decided, would be more of a problem than he'd feared. After a few minutes, he and Melody went into the shed and made nests in the hay. "It's going to be a cold night, Macurdy," she murmured. "We could keep warmer if we lay close together. The way you lit those fires, you could keep us both warm."

He sighed. "Melody, I'd like to. I really would. But I told you my marriage vows."

She frowned. "I never heard of anything so ridiculous. For a wife, yes, but for a husband?"

"For a husband it should be the same."

"Not for a husband who's a Hero."

"Maybe not, if he's an Ozman. But I'm not a Hero any longer anyway." He paused. "If I was married to you, would you like me to, uh, hump other women?"

That stopped her only for a moment. "I wouldn't care. It's expected. As long as I had you when I wanted you. But you wouldn't, because I'd give you all you could handle.