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Veduci said calmly.
    “You look like bandits to me,” Haft said bluntly. He kept his hand near his axe.
    Veduci’s face twitched but showed no other reaction. His two companions began edging back to gain fighting room, and cast worried looks at Haft and the others.
    Alyline suddenly interjected, “If you have women and children, bring them in. Let us see them. Then we will know if you are refugees.”
    “But—”
    Alyline cut off Haft’s protest with a sharp look. “Bring them in now,” she commanded.
    Veduci gave her another appraising look—yes, she did have rank here—then turned to Spinner and Haft.
    “Leave your men here while you fetch your people,” Spinner told him.
    “Make sure your women and children are unarmed,” Haft added with a wicked grin.
    Veduci shot him a hard look and turned to the forest.
    “Your weapons, please,” Spinner said to the other two.
    The two exchanged a wordless glance. One looked at the armed men around them; no one held a weapon in his hands, but all looked ready. He nodded to his companion, and they unbuckled their sword belts and handed them to Fletcher, along with their bows. Nobody demanded their quivers, so they kept their arrows.
    “Keep moving,” Haft shouted at a knot of people who had stopped to gawk. “Move along, you’re getting too strung out.” The caravan moved on.
    The end of the refugee column was passing when Veduci emerged from the forest with a clot of women and children. They were as he had described.
    “You, come with me,” Alyline said to a young woman whose stomach was swollen with child. The young woman nervously took half a step back, then obeyed Alyline’s peremptory gesture. The Golden Girl put her arm over the woman’s shoulder and leaned her head toward her. She led her to the other side of the road and down it a bit, talking quietly as they went.
    “Where are the rest of your men?” Spinner asked.
    “Standing ready to rescue our people if need be.”
    “That’s fair,” Fletcher said before Spinner or Haft could reply. “We’ve given them no reason to trust us yet.”
    “We don’t know who they are yet either,” Spinner said.
    “We know who you are,” Veduci said.
    The others looked at him, and Spinner gestured for him to continue.
    Veduci nodded at the caravan now just past. “You’re the Eikby people. You defeated the Rockhold Band when they attacked you, and you bested the Jokaps too. The Jokaps will catch and kill us if we remain by ourselves. They catch us when we’re with you, maybe between us we’ll kill so many of them they won’t kill all of us.”
    Spinner didn’t say so, but he agreed with Haft that Veduci and his people were bandits. Fletcher hadn’t expressed an opinion. Alyline either didn’t think so or didn’t care. What should they do? Veduci gave a strong argument for the bandits being refugees seeking the protection of a larger group. But would they actually join the Eikby refugees, or would they wait for a chance to rob and run away? And what would they
really
do if the Jokapcul caught them on the road?
    Alyline hustled back with the pregnant woman she had taken aside and broke his chain of thought.
    “Spinner,” she said preemptively, “we’re taking these people with us. They need help and we can give it.”
    “But—”
    That was as far as he got before galloping horses demanded his attention. He looked back along the road to see five horsemen racing toward them. He stepped through the group toward the approaching horsemen and waited. The lead horseman was Birdwhistle, who Haft had left in command of the rear point.
    “A troop of Jokapcul lancers are coming at a canter,” Birdwhistle said breathlessly as he leaped off his horse. “They’ll be here in five minutes or less.”
    “Where’s the rest of the rear point?” Haft asked. He had four more men back there someplace.
    “In the trees, running this way.”
    Haft gave a disgusted grunt. The lancers would arrive first.
    Somehow