“Bandits,” I said in answer to Oreg’s look as I mounted and lead the way out of the bailey.

“My brother spied them near our farm and Da sent me here for help.” There was a hint of accusation in the boy’s tone. Three people, it implied, would not be much help.

The air was chill with the coming winter. We’d taken the last of the harvest in this week. Oreg said he thought it might snow soon, but today the leaves still clung to the branches of the rowan and aspen in bright clumps that stood out against the dark greens of the pines and firs. Pansy, my stallion, snorted with pretended fear and shied violently when a falling leaf fluttered too close. In battle, not even a heavy blow would cause him to step to the right or left without my request, but outside of serious work, Pansy loved to play.

The shortest path to Atwater’s farm skirted the edge of the mountains where the land was too rocky to plow. The farm was isolated in a hanging valley away from the other cultivated fields of Hurog. That isolation had lured bandits into thinking it was a target before, but none of them had ever managed to take anything from Atwater. I didn’t think that was going to change today.

The turf was still soft enough that the steady trot I’d set was unlikely to cause the horses much stress. People were another matter entirely.

“We need to hurry,” said the boy for the third time. I’d had a gentle mare found for him, but I needn’t have. He sat her bareback (his choice) and was impatient with the rest of us for holding him back.

“Never arrive for a fight breathless,” snapped Tosten.

“If they overran your farm, we’d smell smoke by now,” I reassured the boy, shooting Tosten a repressive look. “They might not have seen the farm, or your father may have driven them off or killed them. Either way we don’t have to hurry. There can’t be very many of them, or I’d have heard about it before they made it this far onto Hurog lands.”

“Don’t worry about Tosten, boy,” said Oreg cheerfully. “He’s as impatient as you are.”

Tosten sank into silence. Oreg, in contrast, was unusually lighthearted, teasing the boy until he smiled—at which point my brother let his stallion speed past us. With a glance at me, the boy sent his mare cantering after my brother—obviously hoping I’d hurry after both of them.

“I wish you wouldn’t bait Tosten,” I murmured to Oreg.