Worry quickly replaced relief. Had she gone back? Thrown herself into peril for fear of his own fate? Were she and Fafnir caught by the Red Caps to be tortured and set ablaze, like the poor shepherds?

“The other men?” Padric asked suddenly. “Did any of them survive?”

The man’s broad shoulders dropped slightly and a resigned expression filled his face. “I thought to ask you the same question.”

Padric had known the answer, of course, but this man must have held out some hope. A hope Padric had just dashed with his own pointless question.

“Faabar…he might have…”

The man waved him off. “Warriors were dispatched to the village. They returned and reported nothing of the fomori. Only the burnt bodies of good men.”

Anger flared up in Padric. This fool did not need to tell him, he had been there.

“Good men that stood alone while the Thegn’s warriors hid here and did nothing!”

The outburst did not change the man’s expression. “How were they to know?”

“The herbalist…he rode here to raise the alarm.”

The man shook his head. “He did not come.”

Padric’s face fell, his anger dissolving. “But, he…”

The man stood and went to the window, looking out as he spoke.

“We awoke to smoke on the horizon and the warriors marshaled…but the women and children of Hog’s Wallow were outside the walls before they could ride. They said a piskie had come and warned them of a Red Cap attack and then led them to safety with the help of some steel-mongering dwarf. The fate of the town was written on the morning sky, but of a helpful Fae-girl there was no sign. Goblins have raided and vanished. And now you say the gnome was sent here as well? The Fae have ever been practiced at elusiveness.”

Padric had heard enough from this leech. He flung the blankets away and spotting fresh clothes folded on the table, he rose. He managed one step and then his quivering legs betrayed him. The man caught him as he fell and guided him back to the palette. Padric felt a helpless babe, naked and weak in the man’s stable grip.

“Food would be wise before attempting that again. I shall have some brought up to you.” The man rose and went to the door.

“But after,” Padric said before he could leave. “I would still speak with the Thegn.”

The man inclined his head without mockery. “And so you have,” he said. “I am Kederic, called by some the Winetongue and you are welcome in my holdfast.”