'Then this afternoon, I damn near fell asleep on my feet in the hiring mart. Trouble is that the wagon looks like a peddler's wagon. Folk ask me what I have to sell, not what I can haul. We did have one query, though. Two sisters came up and asked if we were taking passengers. I gathered that the older girl was running away from home to join her sweetheart. A very uncommon-looking girl she was. Her sister had curling dark hair and blue eyes. But she who wished to run away, she had hair red as a new calf's hide, and one eye blue and the other green. She ...' He let his words run down in disappointment. Ki was already shaking her head. 'I know,' he conceded reluctantly. 'I had the same visions of outraged kinfolk. I told them we didn't haul people, and they went away, whispering together. Did hear of one other thing, second-hand. A fellow has twenty chickens he wants to send to his cousin in Dinmaera, about three days from here. A gift of breeding stock to celebrate a wedding.'

'Damn!' Ki hissed. 'Much as I hate hauling livestock, I'd have taken it, if we had the proper wagon for it. But as it is, they'd be inside with us. In this heat.'

'They're supposed to be in stout wooden cages.'

'They'd still stink. And make noises.'

Vandien was taking a cautious sip from his own glass. 'I left word with the fellow next to me that anyone looking for a wagon and team to hire could find us here. I'm starving. Is the food as bad as the wine?'

'I haven't been that brave yet,' Ki replied distractedly.

'Shall we order something and find out, or go back to the wagon and fix something ourselves?'

When Ki didn't reply, Vandien turned to her. She was staring moodily at her wine glass. Her elbow was on the table, her chin propped on her fist. Deft as a cat's paw, his hand hooked her elbow off the edge of the table, snapping her attention back to him.