“The people from here, where did they go? Do you perhaps know? The innkeeper, Marcin Prahl and his wife? Do you know, by any chance? Did you hear?”

The vagabond, judging from his reaction, either didn’t know, hadn’t heard or was ignoring Reynevan and his questions. Or was deaf. Reynevan rummaged in his pouch, wondering by how much he could deplete his modest resources. He caught sight of a movement out of the corner of his eye.

A child was sitting beneath the squat stump of a tree hung with icicles. A girl, ten years old at most, black-haired and as skinny as a small, gaunt crow. Her eyes—which were fixed on him—were also corvine: black and glassily unmoving. The tramp blew on the embers, muttered something, stood up, extended a hand and mumbled something else. Fire shot from the pile of brushwood with a crack. The Little Crow gave a cry of joy. It was a strange, whistling—quite inhuman—noise.

“Jon Malevolt,” Reynevan said loudly, slowly and clearly, beginning to understand who was before him. “The beguiler, Jon Malevolt. Where might I find him? I have business with him, a matter of life and death… I know him. We are companions.”

The vagabond placed the pot on some stones arranged around the fire. And raised his head. He looked at Reynevan as though only then aware of his presence. His eyes were piercing. Lupine.

“Somewhere in these forests,” Reynevan went on slowly, “live two… two ladies. Experts in, hmm… experts in the Arcane Knowledge. I’m a friend of those ladies, but I don’t know the way. Might you show me the way?”

The tramp looked at him. Wolfishly.

“No,” he finally said.

“What do you mean by ‘no’? You don’t know them? Or the way? Or perhaps you won’t tell me?”

“No means no,” said the Little Crow. From the top of the wall. Reynevan had no idea how on earth she had climbed up there—and unnoticed to boot—from under the tree where she had been sitting.

“No means no,” she repeated in a whistle, pulling her head between her thin shoulders. Her dishevelled hair fell onto her cheeks.

“No means no,” the tramp confirmed, adjusting his cap.

“Why?”

“Because.” The tramp indicated the burned buildings with a sweeping gesture. “Because you lost your reason when committing this crime. Because fire and death lie before you, and behind you are smoking remains and corpses. Yet you dare ask a question, m’lord? Ask for directions? Ask the way? Calling yourself a comrade?”

“Calling yourself a comrade?” the Little Crow repeated like an echo.

“So what?” The tramp kept his wolfish eyes on Reynevan. “So what that you were there—one of us—on Grochowa Mountain? That was then. Today, you—all of you—are infected with that crime and blood as though with the plague. Bring us not your illnesses here, stay well away from us. Begone, fellow. Begone.”

“Begone,” echoed the Little Crow. “We want you not here.”

“And then what? Where did you go then?”