VI.

Two Pines was a typical Barrens hamlet. The village huts were circular, the walls made of stone and the roofs thatched. Smoke from the evening cooking fires blew through the smoke-holes at the tip of each roof. The sound of hammer on steel drifted up from the village smithy, a sign of prosperity in such a little place. Down in the valley the workers were just leaving their painfully cleared plots of land. The crops- barley, cabbages, turnips; whatever grew well in the damp climate- were kept well separate from the common land in the hills above. There, sheep and goats owned by the luckier or the wealthier villagers were allowed to graze freely.

There were plenty more animals this year, thought Hunnah contentedly. She took unreasonable pleasure at the way the little settlement, so close to the border, was thriving. It hadn't always been that way she thought. Just for a moment, fire and smoke flashed behind her eyes. She ignored it, as she had learnt to. That was in the past, and it had happened to a different person. Meanwhile she was home, or at least in that part of the world she thought of as home whenever she travelled outside the monastery.

'Home' was underneath the carefully tended watchtower; a raised platform on solid stilts with a rare iron bell hung from it. It was a stout little cabin, one of the few wooden buildings in Two Pines. Tonight there would be a soft bed for her, and warm food. But first she needed to see Panketla, the village headwoman, and she had an idea where she would be.

"You can sleep at my cabin tonight," she told Coin as he followed her down the trail to the hamlet. "The waystation has beds for two. Better food too."

"Isn't there an inn or some place with a barn? I hate be a burden to you after all you've already done for me."

The boy's voice was honeyed as he spoke. Hunnah felt a twitch of amusement at his painfully obvious attempts to assert his independence.

"Heh-heh! An inn in Two Pines? I must tell Panketla that one when we find her!" she laughed "Look around you Coin; even the animals sleep with their owners at night. If you fancy a night on straw and a ladle of turnip soup for your dinner you can ask about. But unless you've a mind to bend that back of yours in the fields tomorrow, you'll not have much luck."

"I can pay," he protested "I have money you know."

"Ah-ha, I thought that horse of yours didn't ride away with everything. But you won't find it much use up here. Two Pines is the largest settlement for thirty miles. The rest are all small farms, one or two families. Up here the people trade only with the monastery and amongst each other. Money is no use up here, there's nothing to buy with it. Barter goods or work, that's the only way."

Frustration, disgust and amazement blended across Coin's face. "I can't stay here," "I don't know anything about farming! I buy my food, I don't grow it!"

A thought struck him. "How will I get my supplies," he demanded "If the villagers won't sell me them? You promised me I could find fresh supplies if I followed you here!"

"No," she corrected him, her good humour beginning to evaporate as they walked past the first stone hut "I brought you here because the law tells me to. The waystation is well stocked for just such occasions. If there's something you need from the village, you can pay me and I'll barter stores with Panketla for it. The monastery can find a use for your stolen money."

"You seem to know an awful lot about my money considering how little we've been travelling together. I suppose you've 'seen my sort before'."

She stared up at him as they turned the corner of the hut. He wore an ugly sneer as he stared back down at her. Anger pulsed through her at the affected world-weary cynicism. What did he know about anything?

"You're michos, a bad traveller. There are always people accused of crimes fleeing across our border from the Kauld. Most of them are clansmen, but there are a few like you, outsiders. We won't hand you back to the clansmen, but we don't want you here either. You brought trouble on the border today, you'll eat valuable food tonight, and you'll have to be watched all the time because we can't trust outlaws like you," she ticked her points off on her fingers as she spoke, "We owe you shelter and a guide while you stay inside the law, but you can't stay here. We can't afford burdens like you."

She turned to look at him out of the corner of her eye as she spoke, but he simply stared coldly back. Hard words had stopped moving this boy a long time ago.

"At least there'll be food then," he said blandly "Oh, you can take me with you when you visit the headwoman. I'll take you up on your suggestion; I'll trade healing for my own supplies. No need to deplete your precious stocks."

He wanted the excuse to be present when she spoke to Pankelta, Hunnah realised, perhaps to see what the headwoman had to say when she saw the stranger and heard Hunnah's news about the skirmish on the Road. Or perhaps he thought he could bribe her. Well, she was more worried about what the headwoman would have to say about today's deaths. Let the boy find out he was stuck for himself, it was the only way they seemed to learn at that age.

VII.

Pankelta was standing outside the smithy with the rest of the fieldworkers, passing out cups. A cask of cider, traded for tools with the Order, had been rolled out and broken open for the thirsty farmhands. Two Pines had no inn, but you could always find a friendly face or two clustering around the warmth of the forge in the evening. Sedge the blacksmith pretended to grumble about it, but he never seemed to mind the small children who hung about throughout the day, pestering him with questions.

Pankelta was a human, like most of the villagers, an old woman at forty-three with a stooped back from years of fieldwork. Her face crinkled up in a smile though as she saw Hunnah pushing her way through the crowd. If she was tired from her day she hid it well.

"Hunnah! Why you're early! We weren't expecting you until tomorrow. Here, have a drink- no really, I haven't touched it."

Hunnah accepted the cup held out to her with a nod of thanks. She took a sip and smiled acknowledgement at the others greetings, ignoring the curious glances at Coin. Pankelta found a fresh mug and filled it from the cider barrel. The two stepped closer to the clanging of Sedge's anvil, and Pankelta sat down with a grateful sigh, leaning her back against the smithy wall with closed eyes. Hunnah rested against the wall standing, and spoke softly into the headwoman's ear.

"There was trouble up near the Bright Rocks. A runner made it up to the Road, that outsider boy who's here with me."

"Another one, eh? That's the third you've brought in this season. That bitch on the other side of the Rocks is tearing about like a cat through a flock of pigeons. You'd think she'd feel secure by now. It's not like her father left many friends."

"A clan chief's got to have an heir before they can take their Seat," said Hunnah "Zia has no children, her father saw to that. She had to blood-bond her half-brother Fain into her line. She can control him easily enough; he's only a baby. But she's got no heir of age to succeed her, and as a usurper herself, that makes her vulnerable. An ambitious Seigne could topple her if they had time to gather support. This way they each scatter back to their holds to avoid her, and their warriors are far away chasing fugitives up and down the country."

"Humph, perhaps. I think she's just mad like her father. It runs through that family just like crooked backs do through mine."

"There'd be nothing wrong with your back if you would just rest it and stay out of the fields," said Hunnah, glad to leave an uncomfortably topic to revisit this old argument. "You'll need another trip to Mito to crack it back into shape soon. Have you been using that ointment I brought you?"

"Yes, foul stuff that it is. It does help the ache in the mornings. But I can't stay out of my fields Hunnah, they need tending. Besides, what kind of headwoman doesn't work? Only a dead one, that's who. I suppose as old and decrepit as you think I'm getting you'll stop bothering me with all your politics soon as well."

Pankelta had three children, two nephews and three nieces who had all worked on Pankelta's plots since childhood. Pankelta insisted she supervise their efforts from dawn to dusk every day to 'make sure they're doing it right. They miss things you know'.

Hunnah opened her mouth, saw Pankelta's bright eyes watching her, and gave up.

"Do you want to see him now?" she asked weakly instead.

"Yes," said Pankelta "Well boy, you can stop hiding back there now. We need to talk. Get out where we can see you."

Pankelta's eyes weren't as sharp as they had been either, another thing she refused to acknowledge. Realising the old woman's problem, Coin stepped closer sharply. Hunnah paused for a second, but he remained silent. Annoyed, she spoke to cover his rudeness.

"He says he's from Mitras. I found him facing five men, Kauldsmen and a scout, where Tains's Road passes the dyke, just before the Bright Rocks. Pankelta, they'd chased him across the borderlands and onto the Road. When I challenged them, they attacked me too."

Pankelta lost her bantering look at Hunnah's news. This was more serious news for her hamlet then an escaped fugitive claiming sanctuary.

She asked in a strained voice "They'd passed the Rocks? Sweet Shan! Wait. How many of them did you kill?"

"Four," Coin spoke up suddenly "The Beshtel got away."

"So they know you've escaped and will probably have made for here," Pankelta said accusingly, watching Hunnah. She shrugged helplessly back.

"Probably. Yes. I'm afraid so," she said helplessly "There really was nowhere else to go, Pankelta."

"Even so, even so," the headwoman muttered "The price of that waystation of yours is costing us more then we had bargained for here, Hunnah." She focused on Coin suddenly "Boy! What have you done to make Zia Kauld's men come raiding into our lands? Why were they chasing you? Answer me now. Or I'll run you out of this village without your boots and you can try walking the next eighty miles in your bare feet."

"Pankelta-," Hunnah began to protest. It wasn't that she liked the boy, but she'd brought him here. The headwoman only waved her off impatiently, and Hunnah throttled back her sudden anger at her friend. Pankelta made Two Pines' choices, not Hunnah, but dammit, there would be words later.

"Talk," she said. Coin hesitated then saw the closed look on their faces. Perhaps his nerve faltered, or perhaps he was tired of being berated and wanted to win a friend. Either way he lost the insolent look he'd worn ever since Hunnah had met him. He stooped and reached into his pack. Hand closed around it tightly, he brought an object up for their inspection.

"I took this," he said simply.