Chapter 8: Page Of Wands

The early fall days stayed warm, but grew shorter. The leaves falling off the trees were more a concern to Zeb and his group. They made it impossible to walk quietly, and the shade, which had hidden them from unwelcome attention, disappeared with the leaves. They moved deeper into the woods to escape the roving groups of farmers that walked the edge of the woods to collect nuts and watch for bandits.

The food caches were all dried or preserved food, and meant for the deep winter. The men didn't want to eat the food that was going to keep them from starving when the snow fell. Instead, they went back to hunting rabbits and squirrel and collecting nuts and berries. After the rich eating of summer, their stomachs growled and complained, but they told themselves that it would be worse in the winter, and much worse if they ate their stores too early.

A more serious problem was the cold. Zeb didn't pay much attention to the temperature, though it annoyed him when his hands didn't work. The others buried themselves in leaves and woke shivering in the morning. They all had sniffles and sneezes, and Oaf developed a wracking cough. If Zeb didn't want to lose his band of men they would have to make another raid on a farm - this time for bedding and clothes.

The next morning, they set out to the edge of the woods. It rained for the first time since the leaves fell. In the summer the rain barely made it through the canopy of the forest. Now there was no escaping the cold rain. Soaked and miserable, they reached the fields. No one was out and about.

"They are all inside staying warm," Oaf said between coughs.

"Of course," Rat, the smallest of the group, said, "so we go and take blankets and stuff. How are we going to keep them dry?"

"How does Chancy do it?" asked another one: Zeb didn't care about their names.

"He has houses, Chancy does," Oaf said.

"We don't need Chancy," Zeb said. "We need something to keep you dry and warm." He pointed toward the farm that was barely visible through the rain. "They have what we need. Let's go get it."

He started walking across the plowed field, his men straggling along behind him. It took them a while to make it to the farmhouse. The mud from the field coated their boots and weighed them down. It also made the ground slick; two of the group fell and were covered with the cold muck. When they made it to the farmyard, Zeb scraped the muck from his boots with his sword, while his men did the same with whatever they could find.

When he looked up, there were three men holding farm tools standing in his way.

"Move or die," Zeb said, "we need clothes and such to survive the winter."

"We don't want to hurt you," Rat said, "but we will if you force us to."

The farmers looked at each other, then at the motley group in front of them. The bandits looked more miserable than dangerous, but Zeb ignored the rain and the chill as he waited for the farmers to decide if they wanted to live or die.

"We have some old coats and blankets, some oilskin to keep it dry," one of the men said. "You can warm up in the barn while we fetch it."

"Rat, Oaf, go with them," Zeb ordered. "Take us to your barn."

They were shown to the clapboard barn. Heat from the animals warmed the air. Steam rose from their clothes. One man stayed with them in the barn while the other two took Rat and Oaf to fetch the clothes. He pulled out an oilcloth and gave it to Zeb.

The other two men returned with wool coats that were worn and ragged, but still warm. Zeb's men put them on gratefully. Zeb set his down by the oilcloth.

"We will be watching. You tell anyone that we have been here, I will kill you."

"Take what you need then leave us alone. That is all we ask."

A chicken wandered out into the open.

"Supper," Zeb said.

"No!" came a high pitched shriek and a tiny girl ran out of a stall and poked Zeb with a pitchfork, but she was too light to wield it effectively.

Zeb swept his sword against the wooden shaft and it snapped. He raised the sword to kill the child, but his arm refused to strike. Zeb shook with the effort of trying to make his arm do his bidding. The man stepped in front of her and shielded her.

"Please," he begged, "she is just a child. A chicken won't feed all of you. There is a young pig in the last stall. Take it instead."

Zeb nodded and waved his hand at Rat and Oaf. They went to the stall and led out a small pig on a rope.

"Give me your shirt," Zeb said, secretly relieved that his voice worked. He lowered the sword. The farmer stripped off his shirt and handed it to Zeb, who dropped it into the bundle. His men rolled up the oilcloth and they left the barn. Zeb went last, looking hard at the three farmers. This time they walked along the edge of a pasture to avoid the mud. Oaf led the pig, which squealed and complained at the cold. The forest was as cold and damp as the fields but their wool coats were still warm in spite of the wet.

Zeb drove his men deep into the forest. They found a rare pine tree to shelter under and looked over their spoils.

"Look at this," Rat said, "oilcloth, ropes, rags, even coats."

"Don't forget supper." Another poked at the pig rooting in the forest floor.

"That was quite something with the kid," Oaf said. "I thought you were going to kill her for sure." He shook his head. "I wouldn't have thought about threatening her to get more from her old man. He must love her something awful."

"Love?" Zeb said. "He was just weak."

After some experimenting, they got the oilcloth hung up so that they could sleep almost completely dry. Rat got a fire going. The meat from the pig lasted them almost a week.

The day after they finished it, the first snow fell.

The snow curtailed their movement. Not only did it soak into their boots, making their feet cold and numb, but also give away their position to any who sought for them. People were looking too. They found out from a man who stepped out of the snow one day and looked at their camp with a mixture of approval and concern.

"Nice set up you have here," he said, holding up his hands to show them empty of weapons.

"We're doing alright," Oaf said. His cough had vanished with the coming of the snow.

"Be careful. Some folks were raiding farms this summer. That always gets them riled up. There will be squads through doing 'winter training'. If they find you, it'll mean trouble."

"We are fine," Zeb said.

"The usual invitation is out," the man said, "if you want to join Chancy you are welcome. We could always use some extra hands through the winter."

"And how can Chancy be so generous?" Rat asked.

"He has...connections. We sell lumber and do some other little jobs."

"These are mine," Zeb said, "I will take care of them."

"Alright, then, good hunting." The man vanished into the snow as quickly as he had come.

The snow started coming thick and heavy. Zeb sent Rat and Oaf to fetch supplies from the caches they'd made. Though he didn't say anything, his side bothered him where the girl had scratched him. The constant cold made healing slow. The men huddled under the oilcloth and tried to stay warm with their tiny fire.

Zeb trained constantly with his sword, as much to test that he again had full control of his body as to stay warm.

Day by day, a cold ache worked its way through his body. It wasn't a result of the winter weather, but the mage's curse at work. Zeb wasn't moving toward the mage's goal and pain was the price for disobedience. He counted each small ache and went to sleep telling himself that he would not serve any master in this world or any other.

Winter grew colder, and even with the food caches throughout the forest, their diet grew bland and thin. Even Zeb's drill with the sword couldn't keep the mage's curse at bay. He fought the pain, but started losing his grip on the sword. Rat had him chewing willow bark, which was as disgusting as anything Zeb had yet eaten, but it helped for a time.

They spent more time sitting around a tiny fire in the shelter of the oilcloth and talking about what had driven them to the life they were living.

"Big man like me," Oaf said, "everyone wants to test themselves against me. If I pound them in self-defense, I am a bully. If I let them pound on me, I am a coward. All I want is to be left alone."

"Heh," Rat said, "at least you could fight back. I had no chance at all. Even the boys were beating on me. Only thing they wanted from me was the cures I learned from my ma. Then a new priest come to town who didn't like the folks going to Ma. They burned her while they made me watch. If I so much as whispered a complaint, they would have burned me too. Left as soon as they turned their backs."

The other men had similar stories. Tales of how life had treated them poorly. All Zeb would say was that he would serve no master. The men nodded and went back to their own complaints.