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parents are buried.”
    Wordlessly, Mewick went with him. Nothing had changed in the clearing except for the lengthening of the shadows. What had to be done did not take the two of them long, digging with shovel and hoe in the soft earth of what had been the garden. When the two graves had been filled and mounded over, Rolf gestured at the pack which Mewick had laid aside, and asked, “Have you anything there that…? I would put some spell of protection on the graves. I could pay you for it later. Sometime.”
    Frowning bitterly, Mewick shook his head. “No. No matter what I said before, I have nothing here that is worth the giving. Except some food,” he added, brightening just slightly. “And that is for the living, not the dead. Could you eat now?”
    Rolf could not. He looked around the clearing, for the last time, as he thought. Lisa had not answered to his renewed calling of her name.
    Mewick was slowly getting into the harness of his pack again, seemingly hesitant about just what to say or do next. “Then walk with me,” he offered at last. “Tonight I think I know a place to stay. Not many kilometers. A good place to rest.”
    The sun would soon be setting. “What place?” Rolf asked, though he did not feel any real concern for where he was going to spend the night.
    Mewick stood considering the lay of the land, as if he could see for a distance through the woods. He looked to the south and asked a couple of questions about the roads that skirted the swamps in that direction. “It will be shorter, I think, if we do not go around by road,” he said at last.
    Rolf had no will now to debate or even to think. Mewick had helped him. Through Mewick he was maintaining some hold on life and reason, and he would go along with Mewick. Rolf said, “Yes, we can go cross-country if you like, and come out on the road near the swamp.”
    True to this prediction, they emerged from the scrub forest to strike the south-going coastal road, just as the sun was redly vanishing behind a low cloudbank on the sea-horizon. From the point where they struck the road it ran almost perfectly straight south for about a kilometer over the level land ahead of them, and then curved inland to the left to avoid the beginning of the swamps.
    The woods having been left behind, there were open fields stretching on either side of the road, all unplowed and untended. In two places Rolf saw houses standing deserted and half-ruined in their abandoned gardens. He kept walking on beside Mewick, feeling himself beyond tiredness, feeling floating and unreal. He could generate no surprise when Mewick stopped in the road and turned to him, slipping the pack from his own back and holding it out to Rolf.
    â€œHere, you carry for a little while, hey? Not heavy. You be an apprentice magic-salesman. Just for now, hey?”
    â€œAll right.” Indifferently he took the pack and slipped it on. Gee-gaws and trash, his father had said, speaking of the things that the smooth-talking magic vendors peddled from farm to farm.
    â€œWhat is this, hey?” Mewick asked sharply. He had spotted the outline of the handle of the little kitchen knife, made visible now by the pack straps tautening the shirt around Rolf’s waist. Before Rolf could make the effort of answering, Mewick had pulled the knife out, exclaimed in disgust, and pitched it far away into the tall roadside weeds. “No good, no! Very much against the law here in the Broken Country, to carry a weapon concealed.”
    â€œThe Castle law.” The words came in a dead voice through a closed jaw.
    â€œYes. If Castle soldiers see you have a knife—ha!” Apparently anxious to defend his action in throwing away Rolf’s property, Mewick seemed to be making an effort to scowl fiercely. But he was not very good at it.
    Rolf stood with shoulders slumped, staring blankly ahead of him. “It doesn’t matter. What could I