Our campsite was not visible from the bottom of the lane leading up to Farmer Ned’s farm, but once the riders got to his farmhouse and looked back they would be able to spot us through the trees. I could certainly see them well enough to know that the three riders were members of the royal guards, and that had me feeling a bit nervous. To tell the truth, the sight of even three of the royal guards made me feel a lot nervous. I gathered my wits about me, for I had the strong suspicion we were about to face our first test, and I hoped with all my might we would not fail. I alerted the Princess to get ready.
Now we would see if Yola’s careful work would withstand close scrutiny by anyone who had only a drawing or a description of the Princess to go by. I was not sure that the change in hair color and the slight application of makeup would pass a close look by someone who knew the Princess well. I was about to find out. The royal guards took their time looking about the farm, and then it was our turn. As they began to head our way, I motioned to Carz to skedaddle into the woods and find a nice thick pine tree to hide out in. He seemed to understand and soon was hidden from view. I hoped that Farmer Ned had not mentioned Carz. If the royal guards, for some reason, were looking for a female rover who traveled with a hunting cat, I did not want to make it easy for them.
The burly royal guard who dismounted, and seemed to be the leader of this group, looked as if he had traveled hard and had not had much rest. I could imagine that was true. The search for the Princess needed to be discreet, so the royal guards loyal to the Regent had to be spread pretty thin. He, like the others, showed several days growth of beard and their uniforms were stained and dusty. His mood appeared as travel worn as his clothing, for as soon as his boots hit the ground, he barked out his questions.
“Who are you, and where did you come from?”
I did not feel it was appropriate to be clever and suggest I had come from my mother and Da, so I answered correctly that I was Anissa Anissasdatter, and I had just been at the Snoddleton fair. As I was giving my information, it occurred to me that we had not given Kiaya a last name, and a more-than-mild panic set in.
“I am the widow Kiaya Solaugsdatter, and I have been traveling with my husband’s family to the smaller markets in the area until this week,” the Princess said, with her eyes downcast and her whole demeanor looking convincingly sad.
I was impressed. The Princess might not know how to do the simplest of chores, but she was of a quick mind, and it would seem, did well in adverse circumstances. She also had the wits not to offer more than was asked. We had talked about that over the previous days. We had concluded that the more you try to expand a lie, the more opportunity there is that you will give the listener information that would reveal the lie.
“Have either of you seen anyone out of the ordinary?” the royal guard asked.
“No,” I responded, as did the Princess, unless you counted a whole group of very short folks who lived in cliffs. “We have met up with very few folks, and those we did see seemed to be heading towards Springwell-over-Hill.”
“And why have you two not headed towards the fair?”
At this point I needed to decide how much I wanted to tell this group. Did I say I had veered off the road to Springwell-over-Hill in order to pick up my cousin’s widow, or did I tell them we were taking a break to make more items to sell? Since a glance at our campsite would show wood shavings on the ground by my turning lathe, and since Kiaya was holding her knitting in her hands, I decided to go with the latter.
“I am new to the road this year, not traveling with my parents, and didn’t know what items would sell best, or sell at all. So far it has been a good fair season, and I’m running low on some items that have sold well. It’s difficult to make more stock and run a booth at the same time at a fair. We have taken this week to work and then hope to head on to the Lambkin fair.” Wanting to turn the attention away from us, I asked him what brought the royal guards here.
“We are searching for some thieves who stole something important from the Regent,” he answered.
It was all I could do not to laugh at this point, for I had a picture in my mind of the Princess dressed as a night thief, breaking into the Snoddleton royal manor, and stealing herself. I had to pull my attention back when he began talking again.
“I would look in your homewagon now.”
Whatever happened to please and may I? Not wanting to create a scene by protesting that he had no right to enter my home, I led the way to the back steps and opened the door. He climbed up the steps, looked in, and seemed to satisfy himself that I did not have whatever it was he was looking for stashed away in my home. After his cursory look once more around our campsite, the royal guards left, and I began to breathe more normally.
“The Regent must be getting rather desperate, since that is the second group of royal guards to stop at this farm in the last week,” Kiaya stated. “Even if he sent every royal guard out, this is a big land, and I do not know how he expects to find me, had I been kidnapped and hidden away somewhere. I wish we knew what is being said about my whereabouts, since I am obviously not in Snoddleton any longer.”
Since I could think of no answer to that question, I returned to my work and got a great deal more done before it was time to settle in for the night. The rest of the time at Farmer Ned’s farm went smoothly, although Kiaya never did become adept at milking the cow. The more time we spent there, the more I began to question the idea of going on to the Lambkin fair. Maybe it would be better if we just stayed here until it was time to move towards the capitol. That might suit us, but even friendly Farmer Ned would begin to think it odd that rovers were spending several weeks at his farm this late in the fair season. Our livelihood is dependent on the fairs and markets with the hope of several commissions for the lean times. Staying here would make us look odd and thus attract attention to ourselves. No, it was time to pack up and head to Lambkin.
I had talked to Farmer Ned about routes. I did not want to spend a lot of time on the road and hoped he might know of a short cut that would avoid the woods I was worried about. He did not, but he said he had not heard of there being trouble there in quite some time. We packed up at dawn and went to say goodbye to Farmer Ned. He had traded some staples I had grown low on for some chair repairs, and I had also fixed his kitchen table so it did not wobble. He had said he might not know how to eat at it now that it was sturdy once again. His contributions to our larder were welcome and meant we did not have to stop at a village on our way to Lambkin.
It would take us about a full day and a half to reach Lambkin. We traveled the morning without incident and met very few others on the road. The road traveled up and down crop and grass-covered gently rolling hills. The fields were interrupted by hedges or stacked stone fences with scattered farms seen down side lanes. Traveling like this could lull one into thinking that all was right in Sommerhjem, but the farther we traveled from Farmer Ned’s farm, the more tense I became. By late afternoon, the fields we had been traveling through became rockier, and the farms spread farther apart. Soon we found ourselves in a sparsely forested area, and I began to hope it would continue that way, but I could see a denser forest ahead of me. If we did not continue, we would be hard pressed to make it to the Lambkin fair the next day. I thought my friends would already be worried enough with us being gone almost a week and them not knowing my plans, plus I worried about my Da, as I am sure he worried about me.
The further we drove down the road through the woods, the darker it became, and all too soon, I knew the light would desert us, making setting up camp more difficult, so when I saw a space where I could pull the homewagon over, I did so. Not wanting to venture into the woods to look for firewood, and since this narrow swale I had pulled onto really did not allow much room for setting up, I told Kiaya we would be having a cold supper and turn in early. I really did not want to leave the horses hitched to the homewagon, but there was really no place to tie them out, so I loosened their tack, watered them, strapped on feed bags, and hoped for the best. As a precaution, I placed chocks in front of all the wheels to keep the homewagon in place, not that that would truly help if the horses became very frightened. I could only hope with all my might that a wicked storm did not blow up this night.
After closing and locking the doors, Kiaya and I sat at the table talking quietly, she knitting and I whittling. She shared some stories about what it was like to grow up in a palace, and I told her a little about the fairs I had attended. I was again reluctant to discuss my life, for it was hard to keep separate the time I spent with Da, Mother, and Nana on the road, the time I lived with Da and Nana in our cottage by the sea, and the life I had made up for Nissa Anissasdatter. Soon it was time to blow out the light and retire. I had not thought I would fall asleep easily, but the ride and the mounting tension of the day had worn me out, and I was asleep not long after my head hit the pillow.
I do not know how long I had been asleep when something roused me. I think it was Carz pawing at me, but for some reason I just could not make myself wake up. I thought I was dreaming about the homewagon moving, but then I thought that was probably just because I had been driving the homewagon all day. I slipped back into sleep only to be awakened a short time later, feeling an uncomfortable lump beneath my hip. My bed does not have lumps, I thought groggily, and tried to reach for whatever it was, only to discover I could not move my arms. As I became aware of that, I also became aware that I was not lying down but sitting up with my back against something hard. I could now sense a flickering beyond my eyelids and with great caution opened my eyes a slight slit. I was sorry I had.
What I could see without turning my head was a fire directly in front of me, though some distance away. There were several men sitting around the fire, talking too softly for me to hear what they were saying. If I shifted my eyes a bit to the left, I could make out a pair of feet and legs that were bound, as were mine. I hoped they belonged to the Princess. I shifted my eyes to the right but could see nothing of significance. I worried about what might have happened to Carz. Had he gotten away? Had they hurt him? I did not want to think of any other possibilities.
Just as I began to wonder how the Princess and I had ended up trussed up like holiday geese, I caught a whiff of something and tried to get my foggy brain to latch onto what that smell was. I must have dozed at that point, for the next time I became aware of my surroundings, the fire had burned lower, and there were now four lumps asleep around the fire pit. While I had been asleep, my mind must have been working, for I remembered what the smell was. It was from the smoke of the noorler weed, which if inhaled can produce sleep. Whoever had us must have literally smoked us to sleep and then removed us from the homewagon. Taking a chance that if whoever had us had posted a guard hopefully that guard was not looking my way, I opened my eyes and turned my head ever so slowly to try to get a better idea of the situation we were in.
With the rise of a half moon, I had enough light to get a vague idea of the area in which I sat. We appeared to be in a small glen surrounded by trees and low brush. I could not hear anything other than an occasional snore coming from near the fire pit. As I slowly turned to my left, I found myself looking into the frightened eyes of the Princess. I am sure my eyes looked just as frightened to her. Neither of us spoke. I tried testing the bonds that held my arms and hands, and nothing gave. I wondered what these folk wanted with us and what had happened to my homewagon. I could not hear horses nearby.
I was still trying to get my bearings and was concentrating on listening to see if I could hear anything of worth when I heard the sound of someone or something approaching. It turned out to be several someones who rudely woke the others. One of the newcomers seemed to be the leader of this crew and began asking questions.
“Did you have any trouble?”
“No, sir. That noorler weed worked just like you said it would, and the locks they had on that homewagon were child’s play. Big cat got away though.”
I did an internal sigh of relief knowing Carz had escaped, seemingly unharmed.
“What big cat?” the leader asked.
“Biggest ol’ cat I’ve ever seen,” the man said.
“T’was a hunting cat,” a female voice stated. “Bowled Axel over as if he were a feather.”
“Sprained my right arm, it did,” complained Axel.
“Other than that, there was no trouble?” the leader asked impatiently.
“Everything is taken care of. We hid the homewagon like you told us and brought those two here,” the first speaker said, indicating us with a nod of his head.
“Good. I’ll talk to them in the morning. Then we’ll dispose of them. Having access to a rover homewagon will fit in quite nicely with our plans. Now I’m tired, and morning will be here all too soon. Shane, you take the last watch.”
The entire group settled once again around the fire, which had been built up. I found myself shivering from the damp cold that had penetrated my clothing, which I was glad I had not changed out of for sleep. Outwardly I tried to look calm, but inside I was screaming for help.