They returned to the Elabon Way that afternoon. Selatre exclaimed in pleasure at seeing Biton's mark on the stone that marked the side road. Then, remembering what had happened back at Ikos, she sobered once more. Gerin said, "I'm sorry the stone reminded you of the temple, but I must say you're taking it bravely."
"In part, I suppose, what happened back there still seems unreal, not least because I wasn't awake to see and feel it myself," she answered. "And I lived most of my life in a village not much different from the one we went through. I know life can be hard."
Van urged the horses onto the stone slabs of the Elabon Way. The drum of their hoofbeats, so different from the muffled clopping they'd made on the dirt side road, caught Selatre's notice. She exclaimed in wonder: "Here's a marvel! Who would have thought you could cover over a roadway and use it the whole year around? No mud here."
"That's why they made it so," Gerin agreed. "You catch on fast."
"The work it must have taken," Selatre said. "How far does it run?"
"From the Kirs up to the Niffet," the Fox said. "In the old days, they could command and have folk heed." He clicked his tongue between his teeth, remembering the troubles he had keeping the stretch of the Elabon Way under his control even partly and poorly repaired.
Van said, "Seems to me, Captain, every time we come north toward your holding, we're in the midst of trouble. Last time, we were heading into the teeth of the Trokmoi, and now we're stormcrows ahead of those—things—coming out of Ikos."
"We'd better stay ahead of them, too," Gerin said. "Otherwise we won't make it back to Fox Keep." He pointed to the horses. "We have to get the best we can from them without making them break down. Getting stuck somewhere could prove downright embarrassing."
"That's one word for it," Van said, "and a politer one than I'd choose, too."
Gerin had hoped to reach some lordlet's castle by nightfall; all at once, the idea of sleeping behind walls too high to be easily climbed developed a new and urgent appeal. But the approach of sunset found the wagon on the road with no keep in sight, only a peasant village. The Fox glumly bought a chicken and pushed the horses forward until the first stirrings of the ghosts reluctantly made him stop.
"No sooner than we start out tomorrow, we'll ride past three keeps," he grumbled as Van spun his firebow. The outlander made fire with his usual skill; Gerin killed the fowl, drained its blood as an offering, then gutted it and did a hasty job of plucking before he cut it in pieces for cooking.
"That's the way of things, Captain, so it is," Van agreed. He turned to Selatre. "Ah, thank you, lady—is that wild basil you've found?"
"Yes." She set the herb on the ground so he could pick it up and rub the chicken with it before he put the meat over the flames.
Gerin drew first watch. Selatre curled up in his blanket and tonight fell asleep almost at once. When she began to snore (something Van had mentioned, but not a noise the Fox had thought to associate with someone a god sometimes possessed), the outlander sat up. Gerin jerked in alarm. "I thought you were gone, too," he said reproachfully.
"I nearly was, before I thought of something that woke me right up again," Van said. "Mind you, Fox, I'm not saying a word against aught you've done since the earthquake—you'd best understand that. But—"
"What is it?" Gerin asked, suspicion in his voice. Anyone who prefaced his remarks by denying he was going to criticize always ended up doing just that.
"Well, Captain, all well and good we rescued the Sibyl here, even if she won't let herself be touched by the likes of us. All well and good—better than well and good—you've figured out a place for her at Castle Fox if she picks up her letters as you hope. But we're bringing back with us a lass who's young and not the least comely I've seen—and what will sweet Fand say to that?"
"Oh, father Dyaus." Gerin didn't know in detail the answer to that question, but contemplating it was plenty to make his head start aching. "She'll wonder which of us aims to throw her out of the keep, and she won't think a finger's breadth past that—which will end up tempting me to throw her out even if the notion hadn't crossed my mind till now."
"Just what I was thinking, Captain. Hard to have lustful thoughts about a woman who'd turn blue if you brushed her hand while you passed her a drumstick, but will Fand see it the same way? I ask you."
"Not likely." One of the serfs in Besant's village was a decent potter, not for any fancy ware but for serviceable cups and jars. Gerin had the feeling he'd be busy soon: when Fand got upset, crockery started flying. The Fox scowled at his friend. "Thank you so much. I wasn't going to have any trouble staying awake through my watch anyhow. Now I wonder if I'll ever sleep again."
Van started to bark laughter, then abruptly stopped. "Might not be safe sleeping in the same bedchamber, and that's a fact, seeing how she stuck a knife into that Trokmê."
"Mm—there is that." Gerin tried to look on the bright side: "Maybe she'll take it all in good part, or maybe she'll be so offended when we bring in Selatre that she'll get up on her hind legs and take the next boat over the Niffet."
"Since when did Fand ever make anything easy, outside the bedroom, I mean?" Van said. He didn't wait for an answer—which was as well, for Gerin had none to give him—but lay down again and soon began to snore loud enough to drown out Selatre.
* * *
After a while, what precisely had happened at Ikos began to blur in Gerin's mind with the tale he told of it at every peasant village and lord's holding up along the Elabon Way. The disbelief he met was so strong that sometimes he began to doubt his own memory. Only when he looked to the former Sibyl at his side was he reassured he hadn't imagined it all.
"They're a pack of fools," Van said after the travelers rolled out of the keep of one of Ricolf's vassals.
"Oh, I don't know," Gerin answered resignedly. "Had someone come to Fox Keep with our tale, would you have believed it?"
"They'll find out soon enough whether we're telling the truth," Van said. "And they'll be sorry they think we aren't."
The outlander's pique lasted through a midday meal at the holding of Ricolf himself. Van, though, so loved to spin stories that telling Ricolf about what had happened at Ikos restored his good humor. Ricolf said, "Aye, we felt the quake here, and lost crockery in it, but I'd not looked for word so weighty as what you bring."
Seeing his former father-in-law at least willing to take him seriously, Gerin said, "You'd be wise to start thinking of ways to keep your peasants safe from the monsters as they spread, either by making sure they have a keep they can flee to or by posting armed men among 'em."
"Ah, Fox, you should have been a schoolmaster after all," Ricolf said, smiling not quite enough to take the sting from his words. "You're so good at telling everyone else what he should do; if only you'd try telling yourself as well."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Gerin said.
Instead of answering directly, Ricolf got up from the table and walked out of the long hall into the courtyard. Gerin followed him. Ricolf paused by the well. Gerin started feeling foolish as he walked up to him; if the older baron wanted to make a pleasantry at his expense, he should have ignored it. But he hadn't, and now he'd lose more face by turning around and walking away than by going on.
"What did you mean by that?" he repeated.
"I believe you may not know, so I'll answer straight," Ricolf said. "Anything at all can happen to a person once; the gods delight in keeping us confused so we remember we're not so wise nor so strong as they are. But when a man does something twice, that says more about him than about the way the knucklebones fall."