Three times in that period, I saw travelers pass. The couriers who served the king passed every day, but other than them there was little traffic on the road this time of year. Once it was a train of wagons pulled by oxen, heading toward Gettys. The men driving them were hard-eyed, and both the first and the last wagon had guards perched on the wagon seats, long guns slung across their knees. Plainly they wanted nothing to do with anyone. We stared at one another, but no one called out a greeting.

Another day, it was a man riding a horse and leading two mules laden with furs. He was headed west on the road. He nodded to my “Good day”

but kept on his way. And the other traveler I saw was a tinker with a wagon pulled by a mismatched team. The wagon was painted with pictures of his wares, but the bright panels were thick with dust and the tall yellow wheels of his wagon were crusted with mud. I was on the edge of the stump field. I waved my arms at him, hoping he’d stop. I wanted to see what tools he had for sale. He waved back at me, but then stirred up his team to a trot, plainly disinclined to pause. I shouted after him, but he was gone, leaving only dust hanging over the road in his wake.

Often the children would come out to watch me at my tasks. I began to teach them the nursery rhymes I knew, the counting songs and memory games. They liked the one about the farmer calling his five goats. Kara wanted to learn how my sling worked. I made her a smaller one, and set her targets. She became a fair shot, but Amzil seemed reluctant to let me take her out to hunt. I could not decide if she did not trust me alone with the child or did not think it a proper task for her.

I cut firewood every day. It became a wall between Amzil’s cottage and the hut where the old man lived. At night, our fire was more generous and it filled the small space with both warmth and light. One night I took it upon myself to be the storyteller, and it flattered me that Amzil listened as attentively as her three small children. I told them two tales that my mother had told me when I was a boy, and then I found myself telling a story that I did not remember hearing, yet I knew I was not making up. It was the tale of a young man who sought to avoid doing a task that his mother had given him, and of all the misfortunes that befell him as a result of his attempt to ignore his duty. The ending was, in a way, quite comical, for when the boy finally surrendered and went to do his task, he found that his mother had already done it. The children seemed to enjoy the story, but after Amzil had put them to bed she said to me, “That was a rather strange story.” Her tone made it clear that she did not quite approve of it.