Wrong, something said to him. Wrong, wrong, this map; but he had been wrong once about directions: Idrys had said he was a fool and a difficulty to whatever party included him. And he had no way to say Idrys was wrong.
The horses could not long sustain the hard pace Cefwyn had set riding clear of the village and its stone pens. It was across the fields and pastures they went, away from the rocky hills to the north, and Cefwyn set a slower pace, still in no good humor, speaking to the men Idrys had sent only to indicate direction and prospects of reaching the point they sought, using a certain hill as a landmark. The man who claimed to know this land maintained that the road by which they had come lay due south of that mark.
That was wrong: it was south after some long distance east, Tristen thought: but he found it prudent still to hold his peace. Cefwyn was not in a pleasant mood, and south would do for a while, at least to get them toward the road.
They rode for a long while, until they had come where they thought they should find the hill, and failed to see it; and the man was begging Cefwynʼs pardon just as they actually came in sight of it, and became sure where they were.
I know, Tristen thought. Owlʼs flight over the map in his dream had shown him all this place. It had shown him where hills should be, and the brooks that emptied into each other until they met on Lewen plain, somewhere the other side of the village, if they were going as far as the river.
Which they were not. They were still going directly south, which would lead them into rough land, Tristen thought. It would not be quicker. But no one asked his opinion, and Cefwyn was still short-tempered. He thought Cefwyn had a very good reason to be, counting the men lost and his argument with Idrys.
He was thinking about that, and they were passing quite close to the hill in question, a hill remarkable for a treeless top capped with stone a bald hill, the men called it, and had a name for it: Ravenʼs Knob when they rode across a dark trail in the grass, left to right across their path. He saw it, wondered about it, as the only feature of disturbance in grasstops otherwise as smooth as velvet, a track such as their own horses made. Someone, Tristen thought, had made a recent passage through the meadow and away from the track they took. The trail they had left went up around the shoulder of Ravenʼs Knob.
Cefwyn saw it too, and while they proceeded, one of the lead men rode out for some distance off their course and looked closely at that trail before he rode back again and rejoined them on their way.
One rider, the man Brogi said. Maybe two, Your Highness. Light horse, gone over the Knob and down the other side, by what I mark. Iʼd not be disturbinʼ things further without your order, Your Highness. Thatʼs a lookout over all the valley, that place is.
It was not good news, a fool could gather that much, too. Cefwyn frowned more darkly than he had, since, surely, Tristen thought, men on horses no matter what their business ought properly to be on the roads and not following sheep-paths across the land, unless they were trying to avoid something, as they were.
There had been no horsemen in the village. But he could not say whether there had been in the woods.
It were made a few hour back, Brogi said, further. Iʼd take oath on that, Your Highness.
Perhaps it was Uwen, Tristen ventured in a quiet voice. He said leave the road if need be.
I judge it earlier than that, Highness, Brogi said. The sergeantʼs apter to have gone off south before now. If itʼs his, heʼs lost. Maybe Lord Herynʼs folk, but I wouldnʼt take anything anywise on trust, Highness, not wiʼ what weʼve seen.
If Herynʼs men, Cefwyn said, still, I donʼt trust them.
Highness, said another, older man, our horses are tired. Thereʼll be no running far or fast. If we can avoid stirring this nest, far better we could do that, and get on to the road.
One or two horses, you swear.
That left tracks back there, aye, Your Highness. Not more ʼn three, but that isnʼt saying where they come from or how many might be in camp further on.
The men were all saying be careful. The soldiers could by no means argue directly with Cefwyn, but they spoke their minds as much as they dared. Mʼlord Prince, Tristen said quietly, very faintly and respectfully bidding for Cefwynʼs attention. Master Idrys doesnʼt know this is happening. Is there any way to tell him?
Master Idrys is gods know where at the moment, Cefwyn said shortly. Run hither, run yon across the meadows, and we may gather ourselves gods know what for notice. Idrys may still be engaged at the village, he may have gone south to the road, or he may even have hared off on his own devices for very good reasons, damn his sullen, secretive ways. We go as we are; we stay to the sheep-paths, and bear as we can toward the road where we hope master Idrys will meet us. Gods know whatʼs encamped hereabouts, or whether theyʼve spied us out from the height.
Margreis, Tristen said. That Name came to him, a village he remembered from the map. Isnʼt it near Emwy?
Ruins, Cefwyn said shortly. And how do you know?
From the map, sir.
Margreis is a haunt of outlaws from time to time. And it isnear the Knob. No, best we ride slowly, put no demands on the horses until we reach the road. We risk no breakneck speed on a cursed sheep-path.
That was the order Cefwyn gave, then. It still seemed to Tristen it was far wiser to turn back to the village, where there were walls and doors to lock against men or Shadows. It seemed to him that being out in the land when dark came, as coming it rapidly was, might not by Maurylʼs instruction be the best choice. It seemed to him by what he did remember of the map that they would not find the road before dark even at better speed than they were making, and the notion of them wandering these sheep-paths in the dark looking for hills the man recognized did not seem in any way the wisest thing to do.
But making camp and lingering seemed the worst of all choices sitting where their enemies could come up on them in the dark. He was glad at least Cefwyn was of a mind to go somewhere, if he would not go back to walls and doors they could lock.
Besides, he did not know that he was right; his notions were often right but Names and impressions were coming to him now from moment to moment: bits and fragments of the map, details of land and cover shaping themselves from what he saw as if of a sudden the land around them had become that map of Cefwynʼs, and he could see beyond the hills, guessing which way villages lay, and where the river was.
Cefwynʼs men were still not exactly right about the direction, but the way they were going seemed the shortest they could manage without going through the low hills to the west, closer to the deadly woods: Cefwyn kept them proceeding as quickly as the horses could carry them, over ground stonier and less easy as the shadows lengthened.
And at deep dusk, the sheep-track on which the man had guided them played out at a brook with a high rocky shelf on the other side, so they had to ride along the lower bank and then cross and climb steeply up a sheep-path among the trees.
But that brought them up where there was rapidly no through track at all, only a tumbled lot of stone that nature had not made, with a scattering of trees. It was not the woods they had met before, only a copse of willows that gave way to stone and brush.
An old wall showed through the brush. Paving stones were all along the ground, like the Road, but pale gold. Some stones along the base of the wall were carved with leaves, and some with birds and some with circles. Some had faces, one with pointed teeth peering out from the leaves as if it lurked there in ambush.