Chapter 34: The Miller

It was another two days’ walk before they came across the first evidence of the rebel soldiers harassing the countryside. The road took them over a low ridge, and where the land sloped downwards to their left, there was a village below straddling a narrow river, on the bank of which stood the black burnt-out remains of a mill which still sent snakes of smoke into the steely gray sky.

“What do you think?” Hima asked.

“Mills burn down, it’s possible it has nothing to do with the rebels,” Nydra said, but nothing about the look of concern on her face was convincing.

“What does your gut think?” Peteri whispered at her side.

“That we should investigate.” Nydra nodded and so they followed the winding path down the hillside towards the village and its fifty-odd houses. It wasn’t as lively a place as one could expect, even for a place of its size. There was almost no one outside, and some of the ones that were chose to retreat back into their houses at the sight of their group approaching.

“Maybe it’s best if we appear less hostile,” Peteri suggested, putting his bow away and strapping it to his back. Nydra followed suit, taking her hand off her sword and instead removing her helm and holding it under her arm. Hima, for her part, took her arms out of her cloak and made them visible while Miro … looked about as hostile as a dormouse and therefore did not need change anything.

As they entered the village, a few brave souls remained outside, going about their business but with eyes fixed on the newcomers, including one young man with no shirt on, displaying impressive muscles as he chopped wood. Miro had to admire the man’s misplaced ambition of acting as a threatening deterrent, because Miro knew that even though he was holding a hatchet, Nydra would be able to dispense with him before he even knew he was in danger.

“I’m sorry if we frightened you,” Nydra announced, “But we mean no harm.”

They were resoundingly ignored. An elderly couple washing clothes in the river didn’t even bother to look back to see who was speaking.

“Is there anyone who can tell us what happened here?” Nydra tried again and got about the same reaction, except for one old woman, bent forward by age but with eyes fiery and fierce, who stood on her porch and grumbled, “Just leave us alone.”

“Would if we could,” Nydra said, not loud enough for any of the villagers to hear, “But I think we’re too close to something here.”

While Nydra turned, casting her keen eye around the village, Miro wandered towards the burnt-out footprint of the mill, the blackened millwheel half-collapsed into the river. It reminded him of the barn that he had burned down when he was a kid, practicing his power in a place where only someone his age could possible conceive – a wooden structure full of hay. At least the mill did not contain the charred remains of the sheep that failed to escape the fatal error of the one entrusted to keep them safe.

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He heard behind him a set of determined footsteps, and found a tall woman, with dark wavy hair framing a tired face, walking towards them. She approached closer than any of the other villagers but still stood at a cautious distance.

“Are you the village leader here?” Nydra asked.

“I’m the miller,” the woman said coldly and then, looking at the former mill with glistening eyes, added, “‘Was the miller’ would be more correct nowadays.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Nydra answered, projecting her voice loudly, wanting as much of the village as possible to hear this exchange.

“Are you? Or was that your people who are responsible?”

“Those are not our people. But we do wish to track them down, and to find out what happened here.”

“It’s my son who can to tell you what happened. But I don’t think he’s in any mood to speak to strangers at the moment.” Miro couldn’t believe he hadn’t seen him earlier, but from behind the miller emerged a boy, a few years younger than Miro, who had managed to remain hidden behind the woman who was unmistakably his mother, with the same triangular jaw and dark brown skin. “Come, I’ll let you know what he told me.”

The woman turned and led them upriver in the direction of a house sitting on the riverbank.

“I was in Stash Creek when it happened,” the miller said as they walked, “Yanik saw the soldiers approaching from the house. We heard what they’d been doing in these parts but this was the first time they came to our village, and when they did, they headed straight for the mill.”

“That must have been terrifying for you,” Nydra suggested gently to the boy, but he just shrunk further away from them and closer to his mother’s side.

“It was,” the miller confirmed with a hint of pride, “And still he went out there to meet them. They said that since they were offering us protection that the King in the south would not, they required payment and supplies. Yanik refused and they laughed and told him it wasn’t a request. Then when he tried to bar their entry to the mill … foolish boy.” She mussed up his hair and pushed him along with her hand, a gesture both appreciative and chastising. “They burned the mill down. By the time I returned, they were all gone.”

They made it to the miller’s house, but Nydra said that she hoped to know more about which direction this company of rebel troops might have gone in, so the miller invited their group inside to continue the conversation.

Before they entered, though, Nydra pulled Miro aside and whispered, “Miro, we’ll go ahead and chat with the miller, I need you to hang back and have a talk with the boy.” A surge of hot frustration shot through Miro – it didn’t matter what he said, they were still going to keep treating him the same.

“No, you are not sending me to the kids’ table again,” he said as firmly as he could, though he could hear his own voice cracking.

“Lad, this isn’t about you. The miller’s son looks shaken out of his wits and he might not have said everything he knows, especially around his mother. Someone should talk to him, and Hima doesn’t strike me as doing too well with children.”

Anger was replaced with embarrassment and an appreciation for being deemed useful. “Sure thing,” Miro said. “I’ll see what I can find out.” What he’d already known, and what no one else had brought up so he safely kept to himself, was that according to his health bar, the miller’s son was a mage.