"Very well then," Philomen said. "I presume there is a place we can get dinner and stay the night."
"Oh, there is no inn in the village," Alaina said. "Much too small, you know." She hesitated.
"I would ask you to sleep here, but…" She swept out her arm, indicating the clutter and the single bed. "In any event, I am sure you would be much more comfortable staying at the mayor’s house. No, I am sure he will insist that you stay with him as soon as he knows you are here."
"I am sure you know best, Lady," Philomen said.
"He is out on the brook gathering reeds for thatching," the hedge witch told them. "I will have someone send for him immediately." She stood up. "Will you excuse me, Lords?" She bobbed a curtsey and went out.
"Political, huh?" Wiz said once he was sure their hostess was out of earshot.
"Such matters usually are, Lord. At least to some extent. I would suggest that we let her lay this creature." He looked at Wiz. "Unless you have reason to do otherwise."
The man’s tone made Wiz uncomfortable. "No, none at all," he said, looking down at his boots.
"Might I further suggest, Lord, that we stand ready to aid her should the need arise? Her style does not give me confidence in her abilities."
Wiz and Philomen sat in uncomfortable silence for a few minute more. Wiz still wasn’t sure whether Philomen’s coldness grew out of his nature or a dislike for him. A mixture of both, he suspected increasingly.
Alaina came rushing back breathless with the news that mayor Andrew had been summoned from the reed marsh and his wife was preparing to receive them at their house. It would take a few minutes, she told them, but they would receive a proper reception.
Wiz was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with both of them, so he excused himself.
"I want to stretch my legs a bit," he explained.
Philomen nodded. "As you will," and he turned his attention back to Alaina’s latest story.
There wasn’t much to the village, just a gaggle of houses spread out along a narrow lane. Most of them were timber or wattle and daub, but a few of the larger ones clustered around the place where the lane widened into a village square were made of native stone.
There weren’t many people about, or if there were they were keeping out of sight. Once or twice Wiz passed someone in the street who bowed or curtseyed and then moved on quickly. He saw children peering at him from windows and doors, but very few adults.
Either people hereabouts were afraid of strangers or they knew who he was and they were nervous around wizards. Judging from the reactions he got, Wiz suspected the latter.
At the end of the village, where the stream made a looping bend, there was a grove of poplars on a bank overlooking a water meadow. As Wiz approached he smelled smoke and the smell drew him on toward the trees.
Maybe there will be someone here to talk to, he thought.
There was a wagon, hardly more than a cart, and an ox grazing in the meadow nearby. A man in rough brown breeches and a coarse linen shirt was busy building up a small campfire. He was burly with a greying beard and a seamed, weatherbeaten face. He looked up and smiled a gap-toothed smile as Wiz approached.
"Well met, My Lord."
"Uh, hi. Just passing through, are you?"
"Aye, My Lord," the man chuckled. "Passing through on my way to a better life. I am called Einrich."
"Wiz Zumwalt. Pleased to meet you. But why are you camped out here? I thought the villagers put travellers up where there are no inns."
The man shrugged. "I know no one here and I have no claim to guest right. Doubtless a place could be made for me, but the weather is fair. The people are willing to let me pasture my ox in their meadow and gather wood for my fire. That is sufficient.
"Besides," he added, "they have seen many like me recently. Better to save their hospitality for those who are travelling with their wives and children."
Wiz looked around and realized there were three or four other campfire rings under the trees. No one was using them now, but most of them looked as if they hadn’t been long out of use.
"Where is everyone going?"
Einrich grinned, showing the place where his front teeth had been. "Why for land, young Lord. They go into the Wild Wood for land."
"You too?"
Einrich nodded. "I tarry here for a day or so to rest and feed up my ox. Then I am also on my way east for new land."
"All by yourself?"
"My sons and their families stay behind on the old farm to gather in the harvest." He grinned. "They can spare a dotard such as me and this way we can get an early start on our new farm."
Looking at Einrich’s powerful frame, Wiz would not have called him a dotard. Old perhaps, by the standards of the peasantry, but he looked like he could still work Wiz into the ground.
"How far are you going?"
"As deep into the Wild Wood as I can. That way when my sons follow we will all be able to claim as much land as my sons and my sons’ sons will ever need."
"Aren’t you worried about magic?"
"No more!" Einrich said triumphantly. "With the new spell I can defeat any magic in the Wild Wood. Trolls, even elves, I can destroy them all."
Wiz frowned. ddt, his magic-protection spell, wouldn’t destroy anything. It would only ward off magic and tend to drive magical influences away.
Wiz opened his mouth to say something, but Einrich interrupted him. "Oh, it is a grand time to be alive!" His eyes shone like a child’s at Christmas. "Truly grand and I thank fortune that I lived to see this day. No longer must mortals cower at the threat of magic. Now we can walk free beneath the sun!"
"Wonderful," Wiz said uncomfortably.
"Will you join me for dinner, Lord? Plain fare, I fear, but plenty of it."
"No thanks. I think I am expected back at the village for dinner."
Wiz walked slowly back toward the village square, scowling and scuffing his boot toe in the dust of the road. This was what he had fought for, wasn’t it? That people like Einrich could live their lives without having to fear magic constantly. Most of the Fringe and part of the Wild Wood had been human at one time, before the pressures of magic had driven the people back. Wasn’t it just that they were reclaiming their own?
Then why do I feel so damn uncomfortable with Einrich and what he’s doing?
The mayor met Wiz partway back to the village square. He was a stout, balding man with a face red from exertion. He was wearing a red velvet tunic trimmed with black martin fur obviously thrown hastily over his everyday clothes. He had washed the muck off, but the odor of the reed marsh still clung to him.
Mayor Andrew turned out to be almost as garrulous as Alaina. This time it suited Wiz because it meant that aside from complimenting the mayor on the village and making agreeable noises, he did not have to talk.
Dinner that evening was a formal affair. All the important people of the village turned out in their holiday best to honor the visitors. The villagers’ manners were strained as they tried to follow what they thought was polite custom in the Capital. It reminded Wiz of a dinner he had attended once where the principals of an American software company were doing their best to entertain and avoid offending a group of powerful Japanese computer executives. That one turned into a rousing success after both sides discovered they shared a strong taste for single-malt scotch consumed in large quantities. For a moment Wiz considered trying to conjure up a bottle of Glenlivet, but he realized it would take more than booze to help this party.
"What is this thing that threatens you anyway?" Wiz asked Andrew during a particularly strained pause in the conversation as the mountainous platter of boiled beef was being removed and replaced with an an equally mountainous plate of roast pork.