The charcoal burners fled. And alerted the village. Angry knights had also been known to burn down villages.

A fierce argument was indeed raging in the charcoal burners’ clearing. Buko of Krossig was yelling so loudly that he frightened the horses being held by the pages. Paszko Rymbaba was gesticulating, Woldan of Osiny was fulminating and Kuno of Wittram was calling on the saints as his witnesses. Scharley was keeping fairly calm. Notker of Weyrach and Tassilo of Tresckow were trying to reconcile the feuding parties.

The white-haired mage was sitting on a nearby tree stump displaying contempt.

Reynevan now knew what the argument was about. Samson had filled him in as they fled their pursuers, and he was dumbfounded.

“I don’t understand…” he said when he had calmed down. “I don’t understand why you decided to do something like that!”

Samson turned towards him. “So you’re saying that had it been one of us, you wouldn’t have made any attempts to rescue us? Not even desperate ones?”

“No, of course not. But I don’t understand how—”

“That’s exactly what I’m trying to explain to you,” interjected the giant, quite forcefully for him. “But you keep interrupting me with your outbursts of righteous indignation. Just listen. We found out they were taking you to Stolz Castle to kill you soon after. Scharley had spotted the tax collector’s black wagon earlier, so when Notker of Weyrach unexpectedly happened along with his comitiva, the plan suggested itself.”

“To help them rob the tax collector in exchange for help in freeing me?”

“Couldn’t have put it better myself. That was the agreement. And when Buko of Krossig found out about the venture, most probably because of someone’s wagging tongue, he had to be included, too.”

“And now we’re in it.”

“We are,” Samson calmly agreed.

They were. The discussion in the charcoal-burners’ clearing was becoming so fierce that for some of the parties, Buko of Krossig in particular, words were no longer enough. The Raubritter walked over to Scharley and seized the front of his jerkin in both hands.

“Say it’s been called off one more time,” he wheezed furiously, “and you’ll regret it. What are you telling me, vagrant? Perhaps you think that I have nothing better to do than waste time traipsing through forests hoping for some spoils. Don’t tell me it was in vain, because my hands are itching to—”

“Calm down, Buko,” Notker of Weyrach said placatingly. “Why resort to force before we’ve tried to work this out? But you, Master Scharley, if I may say so, have behaved poorly. It was agreed that you would track the tax collector from Ziębice, that you would inform us which route he would take and where he would stop. We waited for you. It was a collaborative venture. And what did you do?”