“They were like marionettes,” I told Chade. “Like wooden things come to life and acting out some evil play. And if they had seen us, they would not have hesitated to kill us for our horses or our cloaks, or a piece of bread. They …” I searched for words. “They aren’t even animals anymore. There’s nothing coming out of them. Nothing. They’re like little separate things. Like a row of books, or rocks or-”
“Boy,” Chade said, between gentleness and annoyance, “you’ve got to get yourself in hand. It’s been a long night of travel for us, and you’re tired. Too long without sleep, and the mind starts to play tricks, with waking dreams and-”
“No.” I was desperate to convince him. “It’s not that. It’s not going without sleep.”
“We’ll go back there,” he said reasonably. The morning breeze swirled his dark cloak around him, in a way so ordinary that I felt my heart would break. How could there be folk like those in that village, and a simple morning breeze in the same world? And Chade, speaking in so calm and ordinary a voice? “Those folk are just ordinary folk, boy, but they’ve gone through a very bad time, and so they’re acting oddly. I knew a girl who saw her father killed by a bear. She was like that, just staring and grunting, hardly even moving to care for herself, for more than a month. Those folk will recover when they go back to their ordinary lives.”
“Someone’s ahead!” I warned him. I had heard nothing, seen nothing, felt only that tug at the cobweb of sense I’d discovered. But as we looked ahead down the road we saw that we were approaching the tail end of a ragtag procession of people. Some led laden beasts, others pushed or dragged carts of bedraggled possessions. They looked over their shoulders at us on our horses as if we were demons risen from the earth to pursue them.
“The Pocked Man!” cried a man close to the end of the line, and he lifted a hand to point at us. His face was drawn with weariness and white with fear. His voice cracked on the words. “It’s the legends come to life,” he warned the others, who halted fearfully to stare back at us. “Heartless ghosts walk embodied through our village ruins, and the black-cloaked Pocked Man brings his disease upon us: We have lived too soft, and the old gods punish us. Our fat lives will be the death of us all.”
“Oh, damn it all. I didn’t mean to be seen like this,” Chade breathed. I watched hiss pale hands gather his reins turning his bay. “Follow me; boy.” He did not look toward the man who still pointed a quivering finger at us. He moved slowly, almost languorously, as he guided his horse off the road and up a tussocky hillside. It was the same unchallenging way of moving that Burrich had when confronting a wary horse or dog. His tired horse left the smooth trail reluctantly. Chade was headed up into a stand of birches on the hilltop. I stared at him uncomprehendingly. “Follow me, boy,” he directed me over his shoulder when I hesitated. “Do you want to be stoned in the road? It’s not a pleasant experience.”
I moved carefully, swinging Sooty aside from the road as if I were totally unaware of the panicky folk ahead of us. They hovered there, between anger and fear. The feel of it was a black-red smear on the day’s freshness. I saw a woman stoop, saw a man turn aside from his barrow.
“They’re coming!” I warned Chade, even as they raced toward us. Some gripped stones and others green staffs freshly taken from the forest. All had the bedraggled look of townsfolk forced to living in the open. Here were the rest of Forge’s villagers, those not taken hostage by the Raiders. All of that I realized in the instant between digging in my heels and Sooty’s weary plunge forward. Our horses were spent; their efforts at speed were grudging, despite the hail of rocks that thudded to the earth in our wake. Had the townsfolk been rested, or less fearful, they would have easily caught us. But I think they were relieved to see us flee. Their minds were more fixed on what walked the streets of their village than in fleeing strangers, no matter how ominous.