Rowan Ashfield's Arc

Chapter 3 of 5

By first light Rowan had moved the stranger's supplies out of the coat and into a wooden crate near the tent mouth. Bundled yarrow. Comfrey root in a clay jar. A twist of willow bark. Two bone tools Rowan did not know the use of. Rowan arranged the crate so anyone waking would see their own kit within reach. It was a small offer of trust, or a small trap, depending on how the stranger read it. Rowan had not decided which yet. They did not sit inside the tent. They sat twenty paces off, behind a low blind they had thrown together from marsh reeds and four cypress stakes cut from the woodpile. The blind hid Rowan from the track and from the tent both. Through the slit they could see the canvas, the crate, the fire. On their belt lay a short dagger, leather-wrapped, the blade they had kept under the bedroll all night. Rowan rested a hand on the grip and watched the tent breathe with the wind. The stranger woke near midmorning. A hand pushed the canvas aside. A woman crawled out on one elbow, hood fallen back, dark hair stuck to her face. She saw the crate first. She checked each jar, each bundle, counting. Then she saw the empty coat folded beside it, and her shoulders dropped a fraction. She looked around the clearing. She did not call out. She reached into the crate and drew one of the bone tools into her fist like a blade. Rowan stood up from the blind with both hands open. The woman went still. Rowan walked halfway to the tent and stopped. "I dressed the wound," Rowan said. "The comfrey was already in your pocket." The woman studied Rowan's face, then the dagger on Rowan's belt, then Rowan's face again. "Name," she said. Rowan gave it. Rowan asked hers. She waited a long moment. "Elara Thornfield," she said. "There is a price on that name. You should know before you decide anything." She did not lower the bone tool. "Who cut you," Rowan said. "An inquisitor's man," she said. "He is three days behind me. Maybe two." Rowan sat down in the dirt so they were lower than her. They unbuckled the dagger and set it on the ground between them, hilt toward her hand. "I have my own man coming up the track in four days," Rowan said. "Different trouble. Same road." Elara looked at the blade, then at Rowan. She lowered the bone tool to her lap. She did not pick up the dagger, but she did not ask Rowan to move it either. Rowan let out the breath they had held since dawn. The stranger was a healer with a hunter behind her, and Rowan had just tied her trouble to their own.