Bastion

was directed at him just as the ladies finished tuning and were about to start.
    Mags. I know you can hear this. Bear and I did well. We’re up at the front. We’ll talk back at the caves.
    That was Amily. He thought about Mindsending to her to ask if she and Bear had run into anything he and Jakyr should know about, then he realized that if she had, she would have found a way to get a message to him. Everyone in the village knew where they were all day, after all.
    So he relaxed and stayed alert, but he prepared to enjoy himself.
    Might as well enjoy himself. There was a cold ride back to a cold Waystation waiting them at the end of the evening.

10
    A t the end of four days, he and Jakyr packed up their things and headed back to The Bastion. He was not sorry to leave that Waystation; it was drafty, and they had to heat stones in the fireplace to warm their beds enough that they could get to sleep at night. The only reason they had eaten well was because Jakyr had been warned to carry a sizable purse with him to buythe things that they should have been offered. So, that was one village. If the rest of them were going to be just as “welcoming,” well . . . that cave was going to look very good.
    Actually, it was appealing right now. There had been ice on the water in the buckets inside this morning. Despite stoking the fire, they’d only gotten the temperature in the Station to the point where the ice melted before they left. He was looking forward to a steam bath as soon as possible. Maybe the next village would be better.
    “Are we going back to the cave or on to the next village?” he asked, as they rode away from the little Waystation on the morning of the fourth day. The third day had proceeded without any drama at all. The people of the village had still been standoffish, and the Headman had marginally thawed but still was not what one could call “friendly.” But prowling around with his shields down still yielded nothing they needed to concern themselves with. Jakyr summoned everyone together again, announcing that anyone who wanted to appeal a judgment or bring a grievance up could come to him, and still there were no flares of anger, or guilt, or . . . anything, really. Mostly a wish that the Herald would stop interrupting work.
    “Back to the cave,” Jakyr said with resignation, as the Companions loped their way down the trail to The Bastion. “I see now why the Guard supplied us so well, why I was told to carry money, and why everyone suggested we use The Bastion as the hub of a wheel instead of riding the usual pattern. If all the Waystations are neglected like the last one, we’ll have to bring three days’ worth of supplies with us to each of them. I wish now we had a pack animal, but I suppose we can carry enough grain and some hay that the Companions will be all right.”
    :We’ll be fine. We have a knack for taking care of ourselves when we need to.:
    “Dallen says not to worry about him and Jermayan,” he reported.
    Jakyr smiled faintly. “Jer said much the same thing. It’s true that somehow they seem to be able to find food where not even a goat would be able to browse.”
    “I’m glad we have Lena and Lita and Bear with us. It will make getting real information out of these people much easier,” Mags noted, ducking under a branch. “The people in this district seem to be just as suspicious of authority as the people down around Nikolas’s pawn shop.”
    “Not suspicious of authority,” Jakyr corrected, holding aside another branch on the overgrown trail. A moment later, Mags did the same on his side. There was room for them to ride side by side; in fact, there was room for the caravan, and there were faint traces of its wheels on the ground, where the fallen leaves had been crushed into the damp earth. Mags had to wonder, though, how many times they would be able to use it . . . how many of these “roads” would stay passable and for how long. “They are perfectly content with their own people who are in authority, like the Headman. It’s outside authority they have a quarrel with. They think that they can do just fine without us. All they see is what we demand of them and conveniently forget what they get from us.”
    Mags pondered this, then tucked it into the back of his mind. He needed to think about that. It might come in handy if he had some answers to toss back at anyone who objected openly, and he knew enough now about governance to put together