The rain stopped late the first afternoon, so they didn’t have to camp in it.
Soon after sunup on the third day, they reached the Saw Pit Road, an actual road with the tracks of wagons and carts. Kithro said it crossed over into the Big River drainage to the north, but they turned south. Now it was Wolf who took the lead. By late morning, the creek beside the road had grown considerably, and the draw it cut had become a narrow valley, with clustered farms. At one of these they left the road, riding eastward on a wide, well-beaten trail. Blue Wing came down then, calling to Macurdy, and they stopped to wait. There were men ahead, he said, “waiting with bows, in a place where many trees have been cut down.”
Wolf nodded. “The commander had trees felled to block the woods,” he said. “Any king’s men can only come in on the trail. Men will stop us when we come to it, and ask questions, but there’ll be other men watching us before we ever reach the woods.”
They rode on. Shortly the trail left the cleared land, entering another forested draw. After a quarter mile, they saw abatises ahead, one on either side of the trail, presumably extending to the steep slopes that flanked the draw.
Macurdy had never seen or heard of an abatis before. Many trees had been chopped down, to lie on top of or diagonally across one another, their tops pointing more or less westward toward possible intruders. No one could ride through them. Even walking would be impossible, he told himself, for anything much bigger than a weasel. Anyone riding through the draw would have to keep to the trail, which could be defended by a handful of spearmen backed by archery.
When they reached the abatises, two men stepped out from behind trees; one of them ordered the travelers to halt. He talked with Wolf, whom he recognized, and got Kithro’s name, then sent the second man trotting on foot up the road. A minute or so later, Macurdy could hear the dull thud of hooves ahead, galloping off eastward.
Half an hour later, a dozen well-armed men arrived on horseback, to escort and more or less enclose Macurdy’s party. Six in front and six behind, herding them farther down the trail. They’re organized all right, Macurdy thought, and trained, by the way they do things.
Less than a mile farther on the draw widened, and they entered an oblong basin. Three or four hundred acres had been cleared for pasture, some of it planted now to corn and potatoes, the rest a drill field. The grassy look of the surrounding woods told of livestock pasturing there, too. The rebel camp was at the near end, eight longhouses, and more under construction. Wollerda occupied an old log cabin, which served as both headquarters and living quarters.
The commander himself stood in front of it, waiting for them, and as they approached, Macurdy recognized him—the man who’d eaten with them once at an inn, and asked Tossi about dwarf swords. He was medium-sized and maybe forty years old, Macurdy guessed, and fit-looking, though not as physically hard as the escort he’d sent.
Wollerda recognized him, too, but it was Kithro he gave his attention too, pumping his hand as the two exchanged good-natured queries and comments. Now Kithro half turned, looking at Macurdy. “Pavo,” he said, “I’ve brought someone I think you’ll be glad to meet: Curtis Macurdy. He’s taken over Orthal’s band. We call it Macurdy’s Company now.”
Macurdy and Wollerda stepped up to one another and shook hands, Wollerda examining him. “Macurdy and I have run into one another before,” he said to Kithro, then spoke to Macurdy. “How did you get rid of Orthal? From what I’ve heard, he wasn’t someone who’d step down.”
“He didn’t. We rode into his camp to volunteer, and he decided he didn’t trust us, so he made us prisoners.”
Wollerda’s eyebrows twitched. “And then?”
“Then I killed him, and his men made me their commander.”
Wollerda cocked an eye. “Well. Best we go inside and sit down.” He beckoned them into his headquarters, and seated them on split-log benches. “Now,” he said, “there’s got to be a lot of that story you didn’t tell.”