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When the twig snapped, old reflexes kept her still. She dared not even raise her head. Only that stillness saved her. They walked past on the other side of the thicket, and when they whispered, one to the other, she knew by the whispery flute of their voices and the harsh unintelligible words that Eika stalked these woods.
Ai, Lady. Were they hunting for Steleshame? Would they never let the refugees rest? Would they find her? She knew what they did to children.
But she kept her hands buried in the dirt, the smell of onions sharp in her nostrils, and prayed to the Lord and Lady, lips forming unspoken words. If she could only stay still, and hidden, they would pass by without seeing her. Then she could run back and warn Matthias—and all the others.
She heard the snick, like a nail flicking against a kettle, heard a hiss of air and then a sudden grunt. A howl of rage pierced the air not ten paces from her, at her back. She dared not move. She stifled a sob, grasping onions and dirt in her hands as, behind her, foresters converged on the Eika and a bitter fight ensued.
”Don’t run,” Matthias had always counseled her. “If you run, they’ll see you.” And anyway, if she ran, she’d probably never find this trove of onions again.
A man shrieked. Branches snapped and splintered in a wave of sound, and a heavy weight hit the ground so hard and close behind her that she felt the shudder through her knees. An arrow thunked into wood. Metal rang, meeting another blade. A man shouted a warning. Many feet crashed through the undergrowth and someone cursed.
Then came many voices raised at once, running feet, undergrowth torn and broken, and a drumming like many blows thrown down upon the earth—or on some object.
Silence.
She dared not raise her head. A thin liquid puddled by her left hand, lapping over and wetting her little finger. It stung like the kiss of a bee. Moving her head a bare fraction, she risked a glance back over her shoulder.
An outflung hand reached for her. Eyes stared at her, and lips pulled back from sharp teeth, a mouth opened wide in a last grimace. Every part of her that was not her actual physical body bolted up and fled, screaming in terror—but her training held. She did not move, and after an instant of such terror that her stomach burned, she realized the Eika had fallen, dead, almost into her hiding place.
Farther away, she heard foresters talking.
“I only saw two.”
“They scout in pairs.”
“Where’s their dogs?”
“Ai, Lord, have you ever seen their dogs, lad? Scout with them dogs and you tell everyone where you’re passing. They never scout with their dogs, and it’s just as well for us. I swear the dogs are harder to kill than the damned savages.”
“What do we do with these two, now?”
“Leave them be and let the maggots and flies have them, if such creatures can even eat Eika.”
Shuddering, she picked herself up, wiping her fingers clean of the greenish liquid that had oozed from the wound where an arrow had embedded itself in the Eika’s throat. She had harvesting to do. The onions came up easily, but she trembled as she worked, even knowing the Eika couldn’t hurt her now.
“Hey there! What’s this?”
Men thrashed through the undergrowth and she glanced up to see two of them hacking at the thicket, then peering over the broken and crushed leaves, at her.
“Ai, I know you,” said one of the foresters. “You’re the child what came out of Gent early summer.” He didn’t ask what she was doing; he didn’t need to. “God’s blood, but you came close to having your throat slit, lass. You’d better get back to town.” He waved his companion away. “What have you found there, child?”
“Onions,” she said, suddenly afraid he would take them away from her.
But he merely nodded, pulled a colored stick from his belt, and stuck it beside the tree to mark the find. “Don’t take them all, now. That’s the problem with you folk, you take everything and don’t leave anything to go to seed for next year. You must husband what you find, just as a farmer saves seed to sow and doesn’t use it all for bread.”
She stared at him, waiting for him to move off, and he sighed and stepped back. “Nay, child, I’ll take nothing from you. We’re better off who live out here than you poor orphans nearby the town. That Gisela, she’s a cunning householder and would indenture you all if she had room for it. Go on, then.”
She jumped up and scuttled away, clutching the precious onions against her. After she could no longer see the foresters, she stopped to make a fold in her skirt, laying the onions in the fold and tucking the fabric up under her belt, a makeshift pouch for her new treasure. She peered up through leaves at the sky. It was hot, if not unpleasant, but well past noontide—time to be heading back so that she would not be caught out after dark. She arranged her shawl on her back to drape over one shoulder and around the opposite hip. With a practiced backward motion she filled this sling with firewood: anything loose, dry, and not too heavy for her to carry.
Thus laden, she arrived back at camp in the late afternoon. She drew her sling of firewood over the lump in her skirt, hiding her trove of onions as she cut across the camp on her way to the tannery. Once this stretch of ground had also been woodland, harvested under the supervision of Gisela, mistress of the holding of Steleshame which sat on the rise above. Now Anna saw only stumps where there had once been scrub forest. Goats had eaten the last of the greenery except in the carefully fenced and hoarded vegetable patches. All the scattered seeds had long since been eaten by chickens and geese, and any least stick or twig had gone to cookfires. When the rains fell, mud washed every pathway into a river of filth that wound through the maze of shelters and huts.
Here, at Steleshame, many of the refugees from Gent had encamped last spring, washed up like sticks and leaves after a flood. News of so many children had excited the concern or greed of folk living west of the holding, and about a third of the orphans had been taken away to towns and villages, some to good situations, some, no doubt, to bad.
But hundreds remained behind. Most had nowhere else to go. Some refused to leave the vicinity of Gent, while others were simply too weak to attempt to walk to more distant settlements. Not even Mistress Gisela’s displeasure could force them to move on.
Into this camp Anna and Matthias had wandered just after midsummer. Matthias had been lucky to trade intelligence about Gent for employment at the tanning works, which lay outside the Steleshame palisade next to the sprawling refugee encampment.
Now as late summer heat became stifling, a sickness afflicted the weakest in camp. Certain wisewomen called it a flux, a curse brought on by the enemy’s swarm of malevolent helpers. Others called it a spell called down on them by the Eika enchanter, while yet others blamed the presence of malefici—evil sorcerers—hidden in their own camp. Every day a few parties of desperate souls trickled away, seeking their fortune elsewhere. Yet for every person who left, another would likely wander into the camp a day or week later telling tales of Eika atrocities in some other village within reach of the Veser River.
