At exactly that moment, Abi suddenly felt as though someone was watching her. Stev’s head came up, and he stared at her. Under the cover of his voluminous sleeves, the Mage began frantically sketching tiny sigils in the air between his legs, and Korlak’s crow went as rigid as a stuffed bird.

Even the hinnies stirred uneasily. Only Jicks seemed unaffected, but her eyes narrowed as she paid close attention to the rest of them.

“We’re being scryed,” Korlak mouthed. Abi nodded slightly.

She didn’t need to tell them to act normally except for poor Korlak, who just hid his hands in his sleeves and slumped over, staring at the fire. She and Jicks and Stev began what would have sounded like an ordinary conversation to an outsider.

“I want to try for a couple hares tomorrow,” Abi told them. “We’re making such good time I think it’s worth my going off the road for some fresh meat to put in the pot.”

“From the look of the countryside and the tracks on the road, your odds should be all right,” Jicks told her. “I don’t see signs of a lot of travelers coming this way.”

Stev chimed in with his favorite recipe for hare and another for grouse. Jicks scoffed at the idea that he had ever hunted grouse; he replied with indignation. Abi teased him. And all the while, she felt those unseen eyes on them.

Then, as abruptly as it had begun, the feeling ended. Korlak’s fingers wove, and his posture relaxed. “They aren’t watching us anymore,” he said aloud.

But Jicks didn’t relax at all, and neither did Stev. “We let the fire die down, and smother the coals in ashes,” she said tersely. “We crawl into the wagon. When I give the signal, we crawl out the back, each take a hinny and make for the trees.”

“But—why?” Korlak asked, bewildered.

Abi answered before Jicks could. “That scrying probably means the Karsites were looking for us. If they’ve decided they’ve found us, they’ll attack tonight. We can afford to lose the wagon. We can’t afford to lose the hinnies. All that magical and priestly protection on the wagon might hold, or it might not, so we don’t want to be inside when the demons attack. But the hinnies don’t have much of that protection, and the demons will almost certainly attack them if they are within reach.”