"Thank you, Brother." Toby bowed. He normally disapproved of friars, men who ought to find themselves honest labor instead of wandering around the country telling other people how to behave. Even monks were a cut above friars, if they performed useful functions like caring for the sick or providing hospitality to travelers. However, this old man was the first of the pilgrims he thought he might be able to like.
Then he noticed that Brother Bernat's eyes were surprisingly clear and dark for so old a face, and they were appraising him with more than normal curiosity. "So you are truly your own man, are you?"
He almost seemed to be hinting at something, and Toby felt a shiver of unease. All these pilgrims were infested with curiosity.
"I answer to no one!" he snapped. The friar frowned.
"He's very big!" Pepita said accusingly. She was pretty, elfin, and probably undernourished. She was also a welcome distraction from the friar's disconcerting inspection.
Toby went down on one knee. "I can't help it. You're very small, but you will grow bigger. I don't know how to grow smaller."
She giggled. "I want to ride on your shoulders!"
"Child," Brother Bernat said reprovingly, "remember your manners!"
"I don't see why she shouldn't," Toby said, glad of a chance to demonstrate some civility for a change. He cupped his hands for her. "Mount!"
Instantly she scrambled up to sit on his pack and clasp her skinny legs around his neck. He stood up, making her squeal in delight. Her grip on his helmet tilted it to an uncomfortable angle, but her weight was trivial.
"You should not encourage her, my son," Brother Bernat said, but he was smiling again, sunshine on an ancient mountain.
"She's no burden. Pepita, you are our lookout. Watch for bandits and shout if you see any. I'll send her back in a day or two, Brother."
"You also travel to Montserrat, Tobias of the strong arm?" Father Guillem rumbled. "For what purpose?"
More nosiness! "We agreed to escort a lady there, Father. While I'm there, I shall ask the tutelary to foretell my future."
A frown seemed to be the monk's natural expression. "Spirits are not oracles. Seek out some fairground huckster if you want your fortune told—but waste only money you do not need."
"I have never known such money, Father. Is the tutelary unable to see the future or merely unwilling to reveal it?"
Father Guillem's manner chilled even more. "You raise heavy matters for a social chat, Tobias. A private discussion when we are camped would be a more appropriate setting."
"Why do you ask, Tobias?" Brother Bernat inquired softly. "Does your future seem especially clouded?"
The dark eyes were rummaging through Toby's soul again. He decided he was outmatched—which Hamish would certainly have told him must be the case, had he asked before he started this absurd fencing. He had not intended to cross wits with the two clerics, but how did one down swords in such a contest?
"Every man's future is clouded, surely?"
"No."
"No?"
Brother Bernat smiled with the benevolent tolerance of the very old for the very young. "Come and talk with us this evening. You are an interesting young man, Tobias."
Definitely nettled now, Toby barked, "In what way?"
"Your eyes do not match your eyebrows. No, I do not mock. Your strength lies uneasy upon you. You have the bones of a fighter and the soul of someone else."
Was that only a lucky guess, or was the monk detecting the hob in him? Demons could do that, but he did not think any unaided mortal could. It was Father Guillem who was the acolyte, an acolyte being a sort of adept. But anyone could be a hexer, even a friar.
"I don't think I know how to answer that remark, Brother. I'll take your little girl for a walk."
Toby strode off, cursing himself for a dimwitted boor. He seemed to be putting up every back he met. His ill temper was soon dispelled, for Pepita twisted his helmet, drummed her heels on his chest, and shouted, "Faster, faster!"
"Faster? Who do you think I am, Thunderbolt?"
"You're bigger than Thunderbolt."
And more stupid. He hadn't made many friends so far. There were only two more pilgrims to meet, and they had halted about thirty paces ahead. The don must have told them to wait there, because he was some distance out in front, heading for a rocky knoll.
Toby stopped to let Hamish and Francisco catch up. "You realize that you have to carry me on the way back, don't you?"
That made her laugh. "Which of you? The one inside or the one outside?"
He caught his breath. "Pepita, what do you mean?" She was only fantasizing, surely.
"Nothing," said the piping voice overhead. "Just, when I was looking at you, I could sort of see two of you. I can't from up here. That's very curious, isn't it? I'll ask Brother Bernat. He'll know what it means."
As long as she didn't ask the Inquisition! He wished he could look at her and judge how serious she was, but all he could see of her was little brown feet in shabby sandals. "Do you often see two of people?"
"No," she said airily. "Just you and Brother Bernat."
The sensible thing to do would be to gather Gracia and go. These pilgrims were nothing to him. Traveling in company was more pleasant and normally safer, but it would not be safer for him if Pepita started babbling her fancies to everyone else. The slightest whisper of demonic possession led straight to the Inquisition.
The chubby squire and his pony arrived, accompanied by Hamish, who gave Toby a reproachful look, which he had certainly earned. Even Francisco seemed a little less convivial.
"The last members of our company, senores—or should I say first, since they travel at the front?—are the esteemed Senores Brusi. The father, Salvador Brusi i Urpia, is a man of much importance in Barcelona, a silk merchant." Francisco dropped his voice to a squeak. "Very wealthy! And his son, Josep Brusi i Casas."
"They saved their hides by running away when the rebels came?"
Francisco cleared his throat, although his eyes had started to twinkle again. "I expect they had urgent business in Granada or Seville."
Brusi Senior had found himself a low wall to sit on while he waited; it appeared to be a relic of an ancient sheepfold. He was a shriveled raisin of a man, small and bent, but his eyes were sharp enough and his little prune mouth screwed up in disapproval as he watched the strangers approach. If he was rich, his garments were plain enough not to show it. His horse was a roan mare of quality, though, with smart trappings, and his two packhorses were worth plenty in these troubled times. All three of them needed a good grooming.
The boy holding the mare's reins was about Hamish's age, but sallow and gawky, with the listless air of a humble, bookish clerk, and already showing some of his father's stoop. He wore a knife in a sheath on his belt, but no sword. The Brusis were not fighters.
But they were wealthy, and Senora Collel might be. Why had they not obtained better protection? Had they underestimated the perils of the journey or been misled by the don?
Francisco made the usual introductions.
"More guards?" Salvador Brusi snarled. "At whose expense? I shall hold the don to our agreement, to the last dinero."
"The don is a man of his word, senor," Francisco said smoothly.
"Bah! And what does he know of these two, hm? Rogues! A pair of footpads who will cut our throats in the night and steal our horses!"
"I wouldn't want them," Toby said. "Not in that condition. Why don't you look after them better, old man? They're walking gorse bushes."
Brusi bristled. "Insolence!"
"I give what I get. If we did want to steal them, we could knock your brains out this instant and let Don Ramon ride his hack into the ground trying to catch us." Toby's Catalan was far from fluent, but he had obviously put over the gist of what he had tried to say, for Brusi was scarlet and spluttering. "Tonight my friend Jaume and I will curry your mounts for you—for a suitable fee, of course—and get those ticks out of their coats before they go sick and die on you."