“A quattro,” she muttered. She had seen one once before, in the armoury at Castle Araluen. They were an Iberian weapon—an assassin’s weapon—designed for throwing. With four blades spinning rapidly through the air, it was almost certain that one would strike and penetrate the target. She realised that this was what had whizzed over her head and thudded into the tavern door. She shook her head slowly. Thank providence for that sharp stone in her foot, she thought.
As she replaced the quattro, she heard the rustle of paper and discovered a second compartment at the rear of the satchel. She pulled it open and looked inside. There was a single folded sheet there.
“We’ll look at that later,” she said softly, then stood, considering what she should do about the dead man.
In the end, she decided to leave him where he lay.
If she roused the village now, there would be questions asked. How had she managed to overcome a grown man—and one armed with a long dagger and a pouch full of quattros? What was she really doing here? What was in the papers she’d found on him?
Inevitably, her real identity, and Will’s, would be discovered. It would become obvious that he was not a harmless itinerant worker but a King’s Ranger. And that would give a warning to the Stealer and his gang that they were being pursued.
If that were the case, they might slip away to another fief and Will and Maddie would lose track of them.
If she left him here, his friends might well wonder what had become of him. They might hear that he was found dead in the village high street. But they would have no idea how it had come about. They might suspect. But they wouldn’t know.
Coming to a decision, she scanned the surrounding ground, finally catching a dull gleam of metal in the moonlight. It was the lead shot she had hurled at him. She retrieved it, then turned and walked quickly back to the inn, pausing to prise the two quattros from the timber of the door frame. Then she slipped back upstairs to the attic, after locking the front door.
She was awoken early the following morning by a hubbub in the street. Peering out her narrow window, she saw a small crowd gathered round the black-clad figure on the ground. He had been discovered by a dairyman, on his way to bring his cows in from the village green for milking. He had raised the alarm and now eight or nine villagers clustered round the mysterious dead man. They wondered aloud where he had come from and what had happened to him. His black clothing and weapons indicated that he had been up to no good.
Eventually, he was placed on a litter and carried to one of the houses. They would arrange a burial later.
His presence, his purpose and his death were a mystery. And in a small village where extraordinary events rarely happened, it would be a topic of conversation and speculation for months, perhaps years, to come.
But among all the theories that were discussed, nobody ever associated him with the young girl in the attic of the inn.
Thirty-eight
By the time Will returned Tug to the little clearing outside Esseldon and resumed his farm worker’s garb, it was well after dark.
He hurried back along the road to the village. Unlike Maddie, he wasn’t nervous about the dark shadows under the trees that lined the road. But he was no fool and he knew that dark forces were at work in this part of the world. As a result, he kept his hand near his saxe knife as he strode along. His bow was unstrung and, along with the quiver, concealed inside a canvas wrapping.
The lights blazed in the inn and there was a babble of conversation coming from the crowded tap room. It was the end of the week, and the villagers were relaxing after six days of hard work.
He stowed his bow and quiver in the bottom of the handcart. The stable was dark, the lanterns unlit. Maddie, of course, had slept in the inn the previous evening. It was logical to assume that she was there now.
He made his way to the main building, pushed the door open and was greeted by the noisy babble of voices and the smell of good cooking, woodsmoke and spilt ale. A few people looked up, recognised the itinerant farm worker who had been in the village for several days and lost interest in him. By now, they all knew his story, prosaic as it was. Jerome was behind the bar, passing two full tankards to a customer. He caught sight of Will, smiled and beckoned him over, drawing another foaming tankard of ale as Will crossed the crowded room, threading his way between tables and chairs and their noisy occupants.
Jerome placed the tankard on the bar in front of Will.
“You’re back!” he said cheerfully. “Any luck?”
Will grimaced. “Not a skerrick. No work at any of the farms for an honest man.”
“How about a dishonest one?” Jerome grinned.
Will shook his head, managing a faint smile in return. He took a deep draught of the ale before he replied. As he’d told Maddie, he didn’t make a habit of drinking ale but it would be out of character for a farm worker to refuse a drink.
“None for one of them either,” he said. “It’s hard pickings these days.”
“It’s a bad time of year to be looking for casual work,” Jerome agreed. “And you missed all the excitement here.”
Will cocked his head curiously. “Excitement? What’s been going on?”
“Man found dead in the street—just a little way down the road.”
“Who was it?” Will asked.
But Jerome shrugged. “That’s just it. Nobody knows. Nobody’d seen him before until Neville Malton found him yesterday morning, sprawled in the middle of the road with a huge wound on his forehead.”
That detail definitely got Will’s attention. There were several weapons that could leave a mark like that on a man, but the one that sprang to his mind was a sling. He glanced round the room for some sign of Maddie. Then he turned back to Jerome.
“What did he look like?” he asked.
“Big feller. Dark looking. I’d say he was a foreigner. Had one of those long, droopy moustaches that foreigners wear. And he was all in black. Up to no good, I’ll be bound, and someone went and settled his hash for him.”
At that moment, the door to the kitchen banged open and Maddie appeared, laden with four platters of steaming roast meat and vegetables. She wended her way through the crowd to the table that had ordered the food. The four men sitting there cheered as she set the platters down, joking with her and thanking her for saving them from death by starvation.
They were cheerful and friendly and meant no harm. Maddie smiled at them, a little wanly. She seemed bothered by something, Will thought. Then she looked up and noticed him at the bar, and he saw relief flood across her face.
“That’s a good girl you’ve got there,” Jerome said, noticing the byplay between them. “A hard worker and good with the customers. I won’t be charging you for that room she’s been in. And I’ll toss a few coins into her purse as well. Matter of fact,” he added, “you can use the room tonight if you choose.”
“Thanks. We may do that,” Will said.
Maddie was looking meaningfully at him, and now she jerked her head towards the door that led to the stableyard. The message was obvious.
He drained the last of his ale. “I’ll just go and say hullo,” he said, and turned to follow Maddie out of the stableyard door.
“Tell her to take a good long break,” Jerome called after him. “She’s been working hard all evening. Best waitress I ever had,” he added, thinking to himself that it was a pity that Maddie and her father wouldn’t be staying long in the village.