"What is worse, to my mind, is that the Guild and the Church seem to be working together to cause problems for anyone who does not agree to the rules of the Guild and Church," Gwyna said. "And the High King is letting them get away with this."
"But the twenty human Kingdoms are but a small part of Alanda," T'fyrr objected, flipping his wings impatiently. "They are insignificant in scale! Surely, Harperus, you concern yourself too much with them _"
"They are a small part, it is true, but they are strategically placed," Harperus pointed out. "If there is war among them, as there was in the days before the High King, they can effectively cut us off from many things that we need."
"And as you have often pointed out to me, humans breed like rabbits," Gwyna interjected with some sarcasm. "They may only be the Twenty Kingdoms, but they have spread out to occupy a great deal more territory than they held originally. We aren't a peaceful species, Harperus. And I don't care how superior your weapons are, my friend, enough bodies with spears and swords can take over that precious Fortress City of yours, either by treachery or by siege. While they may not have the stomach for losses that great, they can certainly lock you inside that Fortress for ever and aye."
"That had not escaped our notice," was all Harperus said. But though his tone of voice was mild, she detected an edge to it. "This is the other of the reasons why I was willing to take this particular vehicle. I can leave small devices now that can collect more information without the need for human agents. I fear that we will have need of such information."
Gwyna sighed. "Are we heading for the Waymeet between Westhaven and Carthell Abbey?" she asked. "If we are, that would be a good place to talk to people and to leave one of your little 'collectors,' both. I'm certain that the Waymeet family will give you no difficulty over leaving such a thing."
At Harperus' nod, T'fyrr asked with puzzlement, "What is a Waymeet? You have not told me of this."
"I did not tell you because we were not going there until we encountered our two young friends," Harperus replied. "But Robin tells me that there is a cartwright there, and a cartwright is what they most urgently need at the moment."
"The Gypsies created the Waymeets," Gwyna told the Haspur. "We created them, and we continue to run them, even though now there are a number of non-Gypsies who know about them and use them." She thought for a moment; she had lived with the knowledge of Waymeets all her life, and had never needed to describe them to anyone before. "You find them just off the major trade roads," she continued, finally. "They're a special, permanent camping-place, with a caretaker, certain things like bathhouses and laundries, a small market, and a population of craftsmen. One thing is pretty important; they're all on land that doesn't belong to anyone, not Duke nor Sire, not Guild nor Church. And another; no one stays there more than a few days at a time, except when bad weather really bogs things down. I know there will be a cartwright there, which solves our problem, and there will be people for Harperus to talk to with fresher news than ours."
T'fyrr nodded as he followed her words. "And the caretaker charges a certain amount for the amenities?" he hazarded. "Such things would make camping there more attractive than camping in the wilderness. Civilized."
"Exactly so," she said, nodding. "They're also, as the Old Owl here well knows, excellent places to pick up information, gossip, or both. People speak more freely there_and if I pass the word," she added, a little arrogantly, "they will speak very freely to him."
Harperus smiled. "I am certain of that, Gypsy Robin. For all of us, this Waymeet will be most productive."
Stillwater Waymeet lay just off the main trade road, down a lane of its own that was_currently, at least_in better repair than the trade road. The Sire had not been keeping up his road repairs lately; another sign that the King of Rayden had become lax in seeing that his nobles attended to their duties. Probably the road would remain in poor repair until a Guild Master or a high Churchman had to pass this way. Ruts were the least of the problems along the trade road; much worse were the potholes at the edge of the road that gradually crept into the right-of-way and formed an actual hazard to traffic. By contrast the Waymeet lane was smooth, graded gravel, well-tended, and potholes had not been permitted to form on the edge.
There was a single sign at the joining of the lane and the road, a sign that said Stillwater Waymeet and had little carvings of a bucket of water, a caravan, and an ear of wheat, signifying that water, camping, and food were available. As large as it was, Harperus' wagon negotiated the turn easily, although the wagon filled the entire lane and the wheels were a scant finger length from the edge of the gravel.
Robin yawned discreetly; it had been a very long day, and trying to get their wagon out of the mud had pretty much done her in. As thick as the clouds were, there had been no real "sunset," only a gradual thickening of the darkness. It was dusk now, though, a thick, blue dusk with darker blue shadows under the trees, and she was going to be very glad to stop, get something hot to eat, and get to sleep.
"How long is it to the Waymeet itself?" Harperus asked, probably puzzled by the fact that the long tunnel of trees arching over the lane gave the illusion that it went on without any end. Most of the leaves had fallen from the seasonal trees, but there was a healthy percentage of evergreens along here that kept the lights of the Waymeet from showing. Despite the constant rain, the bitter scent of dead leaves hung in the air along the lane, and the gravel was covered with a carpet of fallen leaves that muffled the steady clopping of the horses' hooves.
"Not far," Robin assured him. "There's a slight, s-shaped bend up ahead that you can't see from here; it keeps this from being a straight line to the road. Keeps people from driving up like maniacs and running someone over."
The Gypsies were responsible for the creation of the Waymeets, building them up from a series of regular camping grounds along the roads. When a camping site always seemed to hold at least two Gypsy families and never was completely unoccupied, people would naturally begin to improve it. After a while, permanent, if crude, amenities (protected fire pits, stocks of wood, bathing and laundry areas, wells) were built at such places, slightly more elaborate than similar arrangements at large Faire-sites. With people always at a site, there was little chance that such amenities would be vandalized, and incentive to take care of them. Then the next logical extension was for someone to decide he was tired of living on the road, but did not want to live in a town_
That unknown Gypsy had settled instead at one of those camping grounds, and had built not only living quarters for himself and his family, but a bathhouse, a laundry, and a trading post, and had begun selling odds and ends to the others who came to camp. This had the result of bringing in more campers; after all, why take the possibly dangerous step of camping alone when you could go somewhere, not only safe, but which boasted some small luxuries? From that moment, it was only a matter of time before others who wished to retire in the same manner found other such sites and did the same thing.
Then someone had the bright notion to open the sites up to anyone who traveled the trade-roads, for a fee.