A merchant stood now in the yard of the inn, beside a cart stacked high with barrels. He stamped his feet and blew into his hands. The barrels were unmarked and the merchant nondescript, his coat and boots plain, none of his six horses bearing a brand or ornamentation indicating from which kingdom they came. The innkeeper burst into the yard with his sons, gesturing to them and to the horses. He yelled something to the merchant and his breath froze in the air. The merchant called back, but not loudly enough to carry to the thick stand of trees outside the clearing, where Katsa and Bitterblue crouched, watching.

“He’s likely to be Monsean,” Bitterblue whispered, “come up from the ports and making his way through Sunder. His cart is very full. If he’d come from one of the other kingdoms, wouldn’t he have sold more of whatever he’s carrying by now? Excepting Lienid, of course—but he doesn’t have the look of a Lienid, does he?”

Katsa rifled through her maps. “It hardly matters. Even if we determine he’s from Nander or Wester, we don’t know who else is at the inn, or who else is likely to arrive. We can’t risk it, not until we know whether one of your father’s stories has spread into Sunder. We were weeks in the mountains, child. We’ve no idea what these people have heard.”

“The story may not have reached this far. We’re some distance from the ports and the mountain pass, and this place is isolated.”

“True,” Katsa said, “but we don’t want to provide them with a story, either, to spread up to the mountain pass or down to the ports. The less Leck knows about where we’ve been, the better.”

“But in that case, no inn will be safe. We’ll have to get ourselves from here to Lienid without anyone seeing us.”

Katsa examined her maps and didn’t answer.

“Unless you’re planning to kill everyone we see,” Bitterblue grumbled. “Oh, Katsa, look—that girl is carrying eggs. Oh, I would kill for an egg.”

Katsa glanced up to see the girl, bareheaded and shivering, scuttling from barn to inn with a basket of eggs hung over one arm. The innkeeper gestured to her and called out. The girl set the basket at the base of an enormous tree and hurried over to him. He and the merchant handed her bag after bag, and she slung them over her back and shoulders, until Katsa could barely see her anymore for the bags that covered her. She staggered into the inn. She came out again, and they loaded her down again.

Katsa counted the scattered trees that stood between their hiding place and the basket of eggs. She glanced at the frozen remains of the vegetable garden. Then she shuffled through the maps again and grabbed hold of the list of Council contacts in Sunder. She flattened the page onto her lap.

“I know where we are,” Katsa said. “There’s a town not far from here, perhaps two days’ walk. According to Raffin, a storekeeper there is friendly to the Council. I think we might go there safely.”