The unusual sound of the clopping of hooves coming towards their campsite made him look up from his fire. "Who or what could that be?"
Rune shrugged, and looked over to Gwyna, who also shrugged. Odd. It's plainly someone with beasts. What can he want with us?
A weathered old man, a horse-trader by the harness-bits attached to his jacket, came around the corner of the half-shelter. He led a pair of sturdy pony-mules of the kind that the Gypsies used to pull their wagons and carry their goods, and stopped just as he reached conversational distance. The beasts stopped obediently behind him, and one nuzzled him and blew into his hair.
"Be you a minstrel called Rune?" he asked, looking directly at her.
Rune nodded in surprise.
"Can ye name me yer ma and yer village?" the old man continued.
"My mother is Stara, who last worked in the Hungry Bear Inn; that's in my old village of Westhaven," she replied politely. This had the sound of someone trying to identify her for some reason. Possibly a letter from Amber? But why send it via a horse-trader?
"An' who would ye say's yer best friend there?" the man persisted, though just as politely as she.
"That's an easy one," she said. "I only had one good friend when I left: Jib, the horse-boy."
"Then ye be the Rune I be lookin' fer." The man doffed his hat, and grinned. "Yon Jib's the lad I took on as m'partner this spring, an' damn if he ain't done better nor any on' us had reason t' think. He sen's ye these liddle lads, by way'o thanks, he says." He proffered the lead-reins, and Rune rose to take them, stunned with surprise. "He says ye's a right 'nuff lass, an' ye know how t' take care of a beast-I mind ye got a gyppo there by ye, though-" he nodded towards Gwyna, who nodded back. "There ain't none born can take care 'f a horse like a gyppo, so's ye make sure'n lissen t' the lady, eh?"
"I'll do that," Rune promised solemnly, too stunned to say anything else. "These are Vargians, right?"
"Aye," the man replied. "An' good lads, too. I wouldna let 'em go t' none but a gyppo or a friend or friend a'the lad. He's a good lad, Jib is."
"That he is," Rune replied faintly. This was a little too much to take in all at once. "One of the best in the world."
"Aye, well, I seen ye an' yer man an' yer fren' here at Faire, an' ye got all th' right friends," the man told her, so serious in his frankness that she couldn't even think of him as being rude. "Free Bards, eh? Free Bards an' gyppos, ye're the best folks on th' road. So, I'll tell Jib I caught up wi' ye, an' give his presents, an' I'll tell 'im ye're doin' right well. He'll be happy fer ye."
He turned to go, and Rune stopped him for a moment with one hand on his leather sleeve. "How is he, really?" she asked anxiously. "Is he all right? Is he happy?"
The man smiled, slowly, like the sun coming out from behind a cloud. "I reckon," he chuckled. "Oh, I reckon he'd say he's all right, though since he's set on weddin' m' girl an' I know her temper, I dunno how all right he'll stay! Still-they'll be settlin' down, I 'spect. Her mam had same temper, an' we never kilt each other enough so's ye'd notice. Like as not ye'll catch 'em both at Midsummer next year."
And with that, he put his hat carefully back on his head, and walked back down the road in the darkness, leaving Rune staring after him with the mules' reins still in her hands.
"Well, that solves one big problem," Gwyna said, breaking the silence. "And I know where we can get a wagon cheap, if you're willing to stay over a day while we get it refitted. I know I've got a third share's worth of coin. How about you two?"
"Oh, we have it," Talaysen replied, as Rune broke out of her stunned state, and came over to the fire for a couple pieces of wood for tethers and some rope for hobbles. "And draft beasts are always the expensive part of fitting up a wagon, am I right?"
Gwyna nodded, then rose and came over to look at the new acquisitions. She patted them down expertly, running her hands over their legs, checking their feet, then opening their mouths to have as good a look as she could with only firelight to aid her.
"A little old for a horse-mule, but middle-aged for ones out of a pony," she said, giving them both a final pat, and turning to help Rune stake them out to graze. "Especially for this breed; just like Rune said, they're Vargians. They'll live thirty useful years and probably die in harness, and they can eat very nearly anything a goat can eat. Hard to tell without pushing them, but their wind seems sound; I know their legs are, and he hasn't been doctoring them to make them look good." The same one that had blown into the old man's hair nuzzled her. "They're gentle enough even for you to handle, Master Wren!" She laughed, as if at some private joke, and Talaysen flushed.
"Here, let me see what they're called." She nudged the mule's head around so she could read the letters stamped on his halter in the flickering firelight. "This lad is Socks, evidently. And"-she squinted at the second halter-"the other is Tam. Good, short names, easy to yell." She left the mules, who applied themselves to grass with stolid single-mindedness. "I like your choice of friends, Lady Lark," she concluded. "It's nice to have friends who know when you might need a mule!"
The mules were a gift that impinged perilously on "too good to be true," and Talaysen pummeled his brain ceaselessly to reassure himself that neither he nor Rune had worked any of their "magic" to get them.
Finally, he slept, conscience appeased. They had not been anywhere near the animal-sellers. There had been no way that the old man could have heard them sing and been inadvertently magicked into giving them a pair of beasts. The mules were, therefore, exactly what they appeared to be: repayment of Rune's generosity to her old friend. When Rune had explained what she'd done, Gwyna had questioned her about the amount of money she'd sent the boy, and Gwyna had nodded knowingly.