They came to a village nestled between three hills. An open town, with no wall to defend it, it was a cluster of stoutly built log houses centered on a common well. One of the larger homes had a porch. As they passed the open door, Kiya sniffed.

“Beer,” she said.

Darpo added, “Someone’s roasting a joint of beef.”

“A tavern!” Miya reined up. “Civilization at last!”

Tol would have preferred to ride straight through, but his own stomach growled in response to the smells of cooking. He turned Shadow toward the porch. A rangy, barefoot boy in dirty hide trews came out and tied their mounts’ reins to a hitching post. Tol gave him a few coppers to watch their animals.

Dismounted, they stretched knotted limbs. Tol warned them to say nothing about who they were or where they were going.

This early, the hostel’s only inhabitant was the innkeeper. She was a sharp-eyed old woman with a face like a hatchet. Tol and his companions affected an air of laconic indifference and seated themselves around a rude trestle table. Once they were settled, the innkeeper came over.

“Well?” she said, raising thin gray eyebrows.

“Beer. Bread. Meat,” Tol intoned. She gave a twitchy nod and headed off to the rear of the house.

The common room was dark and low ceilinged, and smelled strongly of smoke and spilled brew. Shafts of daylight slanted in through chinks in the ill-fitting plank walls and dust motes tumbled lazily in the light. The floor was dirt, covered by a layer of crumbled pine bark. The surface of the table was crisscrossed by knife cuts.

The old lady returned, laden with food and drink. She fairly staggered under her load, and Frez would’ve gotten up to help her. Tol tapped his arm to halt him. Soldiers of Ergoth might assist a burdened old woman, but stray wanderers would not be so polite.

Despite her gaunt appearance, the innkeeper was strong. She made it to the table without spilling a drop or losing a single loaf. She doled out the victuals with practiced ease. Every diner received a flat loaf of hearth bread and a wooden mug of dark beer. In the center of the table, the woman placed a steaming rib roast, sliding the hot meat from her platter directly onto the none too clean tabletop. Food dispensed, she held out a red, work-worn claw.

Still maintaining his tight-lipped pose, Tol put what he thought was a stingy amount in the old woman’s hand, two silver pieces. She took the money readily, testing each coin between the only two molars in her head, then left them.

Darpo and Frez, accustomed to more civilized ways, were a bit nonplussed, but the Dom-shu sisters overcame any reticence they felt and began slicing off slabs of beef.

“Not bad,” Kiya declared of the food.

Miya agreed through a mouthful of bread.

Tol took a sip of beer. The brew was young and raw, no older than his last haircut, but the flavor was surprisingly good. He drained the mug quickly.

Just then a stranger entered the rough tavern. Silhouetted in the open doorway, he surveyed the room with hands on hips. As he sauntered their way, Tol’s party continued eating but kept wary eyes on the fellow.

“Greetings,” he said, halting in the shadows three paces from their table. “Do you belong to those horses outside?”

Miya swallowed beer and said, “Yes, what of it?”

“We don’t see horses much around here, that’s all. Passing through?”

He stepped into a shaft of sunlight. He had a pleasant face, round cheeked and swarthy, with dark hair cut in a bowl shape, and narrow, gray-green eyes. His chin was clean of whiskers and his ears upswept into points, but his solid build proclaimed his mixed parentage.

When Tol said they were indeed only passing through, the half-elf came closer. Clad all in dark brown leather, he had twin daggers in his sash belt, pommels out for quick drawing. Tol tensed and knew Kiya, Darpo, and Frez were likewise on guard.

The stranger smiled, lifting his arms slightly away from his sides, as though to reassure them. “I see you are obviously prosperous folk, but would you be interested in a fair-paying job?” he asked.

“What sort of job?”

“A simple one, excellent sir. Escorting a few wagonloads of goods to the coast.”

Tol would’ve smiled, but he realized the gesture could be misunderstood. This slippery fellow had taken them for mercenaries-a reasonable error-and wanted to hire them to go just where they intended to go anyway!

“How much?” asked Miya, rising to her feet. She was a head taller than the half-elf, and her eyes were alight with interest. She could reduce even the hardened street merchants of Daltigoth to tears with her relentless bargaining.

Unlike most men, the half-elf seemed unperturbed by the Dom-shu’s size. Looking up at her calmly, he replied, “Since you’re mounted, one gold piece per day.”

It was a respectable offer, but Miya barely even considered it. By the time she was done, the stranger had agreed to one gold and one silver per rider per day, plus two meals per rider. After a glance at Tol, Miya sealed the deal.

“My name is Orlien,” their new employer told them. “I’m a merchant hereabouts, and I need to get four wagons to the coast in four days. Is that well with you?”

The deadline would require fast moving, but that suited Tol, and he agreed. Smiling broadly, Orlien bade them come to the corral on the west side of the village when they were done with their meal.

Once the half-elf was gone, Darpo said, “If he’s a merchant, I’m the empress of Ergoth.”

Kiya was nodding. “Those knives he wears are assassin’s tools!”

Her words had triggered a bitter memory for Tol. His boyhood friend Crake had left Juramona to seek his fortune in Daltigoth. Instead of wealth, Crake had found a career as a hired assassin and spy. He’d carried knives much like Orlien’s. Crake had learned of the nullstone and tried to take it, and Tol had been forced to fight his former friend to the death. Although more than a decade had passed, he’d never told anyone the identity of the assassin he’d killed.

Ironically, it was that victory that had helped bring him to the attention of Prince Amaltar and the emperor. It also had further strengthened his resolve not to reveal the millstone’s existence.

As these thoughts were flashing quickly through Tol’s mind, he said, “Well, whatever he is, this ‘job’ suits our needs very well. We’ll need a ship to take us across the gulf to Ergoth. Orlien must have a ship waiting if he’s on such an urgent schedule. One way or another, the ship’ll take us to Ergoth.”

Careful to avoid the appearance of haste, Tol’s party finished their meal then ambled outside. The corral Orlien spoke of wasn’t hard to locate in so small a village. By a single barn and pen four wagons were drawn up. Rather than the usual oxen, two sturdy draft horses were hitched to each wagon. Horses were rare and expensive in the hill country, as Orlien himself had noted when he greeted them. If he owned eight of the animals, he was not a poor man.

The first two wagons were loaded, their freight covered by thick tarpaulins and secured by crisscrossing ropes. Each of the last pair was framed with wooden hoops supporting a canvas roof that hid their cargoes.

Orlien emerged from the barn, followed by a fearsome henchman. Hugely muscled and scarred, the fellow had tufts of curly white hair sticking out all over his enormous body. One eye was gone, the socket covered by a leather patch. He wore furs and rested a dwarven battle-axe on his meaty shoulder.

“Greetings, noble friends!” Orlien called, spreading his arms wide. “Time is short. Shall we get underway?”

“What are we carrying?” asked Tol with feigned indifference.

“Goods I acquired locally: rough gems, medicinal plants and mushrooms, honey of the mountain bees, and other such. My trade. My life.” Orlien smiled again.