The Hob's Bargain

saw, and I knew any number of people from Beresford. I glanced at Wandel, and he shook his head—he didn’t know any of them either. Kith, though, narrowed his eyes and nodded his head slowly.
    â€œI see your point. I’m Albrin’s son, Kith, and in the field there’s a bay gelding I trained eleven summers gone for a man named Falkin from Beresford. If he’s here, he’ll vouch for me.” He nodded toward Wandel. “This is Wandel Silver-Tongue. If there’s some of you mountain folk who spend time in town in the late spring, they’ll recognize him.”
    Ah , I thought, that’s why I don’t know any of them . There were several clans of trappers living in the mountains above Beresford. They were loners for the most part, staying to themselves except when they traded fur and meat for other goods in town. Obviously they’d been in a better position to survive the flooding than the townsfolk had been.
    â€œAnd the woman?”
    I answered for myself. “I was married to Daryn of Beresford less than a fortnight ago. He died at the hands of raiders the same day the mountains fell.” I patted my horse’s neck. “He left me Duck, here, and an obligation to his home village.”
    A tall, thin man with haunted eyes shook his head. “Be careful, brother mine, the wraith that knocked on my window last night bore the face of a man I knew. If my window weren’t on the third floor with nothing for a man to climb up, I might have let him in.”
    â€œAh, stuff and nonsense, Manta. If Kith died, he’d be a demon full-grown, and not some pathetic haunt reduced to aping the living!” scolded a voice I knew full well.
    Danci pushed past the men as if they were cattle, though she didn’t reach the shoulders of the smallest of them. “It’s no use hiding that smile, Kith, I know you’re glad to see me—and it’s about time you got here.”
    If Kith smiled, I missed it. I swung off Duck’s back, but before I could find somewhere to put him, one of the young men on the porch took the reins from me.
    â€œI’ll loose him with the others,” he said, softly enough that he didn’t interrupt any of the questions going on around us.
    I caught his arm and shook my head. “No,” I said before I knew I was going to. I projected my voice over the general conversations. “We have to leave before nightfall.” A deepening dread was growing upon me, as it had the day Daryn had died.
    Kith turned toward me. I shook my head again, ignoring the others. “I don’t know why, but it’s important.”
    It had something to do with the defeat clinging to the faces of all of the people in the inn yard, even Danci; the weariness that left the children creeping slowly out the inn door instead of running to see the strangers. Even the wariness of the men seemed to be unnatural. Then, again, I was still spooked from the vision of the king’s bloodmage—and maybe from yesterday’s attack.
    Wandel grinned reassuringly. “We’ve learned to listen to Aren’s hunches. If you don’t have a pressing reason for staying, I would urge you to come with us to Fallbrook—though that might be jumping out of the pot into the pit. Fallbrook’s been invaded by a band of raiders.”
    â€œIf we’re outside at night, the haunts will get us like they did Leheigh the first night we were here,” said the man Danci had called Manta.
    â€œMy brother’s right,” agreed Ice, who seemed to be the leader. “At least something killed Leheigh, and what it left behind didn’t look like the work of anything I’ve ever seen before. It’s going to take more than a woman’s hunch to make me travel at night.”
    Kith pursed his lips thoughtfully, but when he spoke, his voice was dangerously soft. “I’m going. If you’re wise, you will come, too. Aren’s got the sight , and she knows things that we cannot.”
    â€œTier, go get Chatim and Falkin,” commanded Danci briskly. “I’m going with Kith. Anyone who wants to come with us, can.” No one argued with her. Not that I was surprised; I’d never been able to argue with her.
    The young man who held Duck’s reins gave them back to me and ran to do Danci’s bidding.
    Danci turned back to Kith. “They left to check out the other inn and to pick some