Burek looked to either side. “Ploughland once,” he said. “Furrows grown over with grass—and grass that grows in damper places. Cow-paths … it’s pasture here. Rougher than behind us.”

“Easier to conceal people and animals in, wouldn’t you say?”

Burek looked again. “Not as flat as it looks at first,” he said. “Yes—that—” He pointed to a sinuous line of thicker growth in a slight hollow. “That could be a hidden stream.”

“When I was here last,” Arcolin said, “this, where old furrows show, was ploughland and that over there was grazed short. There’s a spring in there somewhere—it’s boggy across the way—but a good gravel-bottomed pool. That’s where they watered the village herds, back then. But I don’t see a regular path to it now. The population’s down, from that war, but you’d think they’d still use the water. Now they’re watering cattle upstream from the village. That’s not good practice.”

“I noticed that, yesterday,” Burek said. “I didn’t know this other water was here.”

“Land hereabouts, the water runs generally east—wiggling north or south, but meeting the Immer downstream of Cortes Vonja … it’s all in the Immer drainage. My guess is someone else is using that water now. Someone who knows a trail through the bog on the far side, so they can come to the village through the woods to the east.”

They were almost up with the cohort now; Arcolin waved; the wagon guards signaled ahead and Stammel halted the cohort for them to catch up. The soldiers moved back into their places, and Arcolin spoke to the teamsters and guards.

“We’re being watched,” he said. “I want everyone alert, both sides and behind—notice everything and I’ll take your report at nooning and evening. That headman was lying; the others were scared.”

Once in the lead again, Arcolin changed the formation, putting out flanking scouts for the first time. “We need the practice,” he told Stammel. “I don’t think anyone will attack today, but just in case.”

“Mounted or afoot, sir?” Stammel asked.

“Mounted, so we don’t slow,” Arcolin said. “Stay in sight. I’m most interested in who’s watching from near the road, and in assessment of the cover.”

“Notice the animals,” he said to Burek, when they were moving again. “The scouts are out far enough that they shouldn’t disturb rabbits and birds nearer the road. We should see a little movement of animals into the cover beside the road, but anything moving out of cover toward the scouts means something else is in there.”

Nothing showed for almost a glass, in Arcolin’s estimation. The pasture land continued to roughen; along the line of the unseen stream, brush thickened to a line of scrubby trees. Then, as that bore away eastward, a flock of pink-fronted doves racketed up and away, and downstream of them, another.

Arcolin held up his hand; the cohort halted. “They’d need someone closer,” he said to Burek. On the right, ahead, the ruins of what he remembered as a herder’s night-shelter canted sideways; next to it, a thicket had grown up where he remembered a small cattle pen. “There, for instance. Let’s see what happens when our flanking scout gets closer.”