“Brenna and the two children go south with Mother Renn’s carts tomorrow morning,” Tavan said, resting his hand on the horn of his anvil. “My brother-in-law has room on the second ox team for our bedding chest and the three pots you just mended, and Leni can walk beside the tailboard where the road is flat.”
Nara nodded. “The first cart train leaves the hospice gate an hour after sunrise. Pera will walk with them as far as the ferry turn.”
“Good,” Tavan said. “Then once their wheels clear the willow milestone, I’m coming back up the lane to keep the coal fire lit in the lower forge shed behind your sister’s hospice.”
By the hawthorn hedge, Seyun shifted his weight slightly on the frozen ruts. His hand tightened around the ash staff.
Even from a dozen paces away, the tactical complication of Tavan’s statement was obvious. An evacuated village was clean shape. Once the carts rolled south, every house below the hospice became empty stone that the defenders didn’t need to worry about when deflecting falling shale. A limping metalworker staying behind at the lower forge meant one more living body within range of stray debris, one more person who couldn’t run fast if a retaining wall buckled, and one more hearth smoke column rising at the foot of the slope.
