"These people are scared shitless by you, Mildred," J.B said.

"White folks in Montgomery used to feel the same about my parents."

"She looked triple-stupe me," Jak said, sitting himself at the dusty table and pulling a wooden bowl in front of him.

Ryan joined the boy. "You're right, Jak. But it's different to the way they look at Mildred here. She terrifies them, because I guess they've never seen anyone black before. But it's almost like the opposite with you. Your hair's pure white, and that sort of impresses them."

The food was excellent.

Ryan thought the meat was rabbit, but Krysty assured him it was hare, roasted over a fire with sprigs of thyme pushed beneath the skin to give it a marvelous tangy flavor. It was served with a sauce of sugared cranberries. There was also a shoulder of mutton cooked with leeks, mushrooms and sweet potatoes.

A dark caldron of iron held a simmering stew of herrings and some other, unidentifiable fish in a vegetable stock; a wooden platter was piled high with sun-ripened apples, sweet and delicious and crisp to the teeth; there was a tankard of foaming ale and beakers made from horns, and some bubbling, fresh milk. Two loaves of flatbread with salted butter completed the repast.

"That ale smells wonderful," Doc said, breathing in its odor with a beatific smile.

"Run a radiation counter over it before you touch it," Mildred suggested,

"How's that?" J.B. said, his hand hovering over the earthenware jug.

"You heard that slave girl."

Ryan punched his right fist into his left palm, angry at himself for having missed it. "Yeah! Course. The guy who lived in this hut and all his family died. He was the brewer."

"And the symptoms sounded a lot like radiation poisoning of some kind," Mildred added. "If I had to make a guess I'd say that something's happened up the coast."

"Hot spot?" Jak asked, helping himself to a generous ladling of the fish stew, slopping some on the table in his eagerness.

"You mean somewhere that there's a higher than usual leakage count? Yeah. Could be. But it has to be something kind of recent or the whole of this village would have been snuffed by now."

"How about the rest of the food?" Krysty asked. "If it's in the water, then mebbe the fish could have absorbed some of it."

Mildred nodded. "But it's hardly likely a few small meals can hurt. You'd need repeated low dosages over months for any significant health risk."

"If you'll forgive me," Doc said, "I don't think I'll sample that beer, even so. But the hare can surely tempt me."

After some hesitation, they all sat around the table and tucked into the meal. Within twenty minutes almost everything was gone.

No one touched the ale.

Jorund Thoraldson, with a half a dozen of the senior men of the ville, appeared shortly after the companions had finished eating.

"You are relishing the food that?.." He noticed the empty dishes. "I see that you have. Yet our best ale is not to your liking?"

Ryan stood and faced the baron. "We come from a ville where alcohol is forbidden by our religion. But the milk was good and the food was marvelous. Thanks for it."

"Now we should talk of the future, Ryan Cawdor. Of you and your friends. And the women."

"Talk away, Baron."

"The women can leave."

"How's that?" Krysty asked. Her temper often flared close to the surface. She stood and turned to stare at the huge figure of the Viking leader, her green eyes flashing with anger.

"Now, now. Markland has its rules, its laws that go back to the beginning of history. You are all here, and outlanders must pay our price of living here. We have agreed to let the black live, have we not?"

Ryan rubbed his chin and sighed. "One way of looking at it, Baron. Course, another way would be to say that our man beat your man. Left him chilled, facedown in the water. That's a different way of looking at it."

One of the other Norsemen whispered something to his karl, and Jorund nodded. "Sooth. We should not fall to bickering over this. The women must leave this hut to live with the other unmarried women in their longhouse at the center of Markland. There they can help the other women at their duties."

"Like sewing and cooking? That kind of stuff, Baron?" Krysty asked with a venomous sweetness.

"If you don't guard your tongue, you flame-haired slut, then you'll find yourself at the stone, paying the blood price for..."

"Jorund!" one of his men said with an urgent, alarmed snap to his voice. "Take care of what you say to them."

The huge Viking turned his head slowly, like some great wounded beast, seeking the speaker. Jorund's pale eyes were veiled with his own anger, and Ryan noticed specks of white froth at the corners of his lips.

The eruption of blinding anger was an impressive and frightening sight.

"Egil?" The word was drawn out and splintered, like corn between two massive stones.

"Yes, Karl?"

"The words I heard through a berserker's mist came from you."

"Yes. You were..."

Thoraldson nodded. "I know, friend. My ears heard the words I was uttering, but my mouth could do naught to check them."

Ryan was, as ever, at Krysty's elbow. He leaned toward her, lips scarcely moving, his breath not stirring a tendril of her long scarlet hair. "Better do it."

She nodded. "How long?"

"Day. Two at most. There's some double-bad things in this ville."

The baron of Markland caught their whispered conversation, and he turned to Ryan. "My anger took me from myself for a moment. I fear that I came near to... What do you say?"

"Krysty and Mildred will do what you say. They'll go and live in the house with the other women of your ville. But they are not, and never will be, yourwomen. Or anyone else's women. They are our companions, free and equal in every way."

"Right on, boss," Mildred said, grinning at Krysty. Jorund Thoraldson stroked his long blond mustache and looked down for a moment at his feet while he considered Ryan's words. "You will not leave Markland until we say you may. Nor the women. But it shall be as you say. Now, they can go with the thrall. She can show them where they will live. You stay here."

"The tests?" suggested one of the Vikings, a walleyed man with a jagged scar across his face.

"Tests?" J.B. said.

Jorund smiled what looked to be a genuine, happy smile. "Aye. We have seen how your oldest man can butcher one of our best swords. We wait eagerly to see how you three fare as warriors."

"What are these tests?" Ryan asked.

"Halfway between nothing and a small thing, outlander," Jorund replied. "Since you are to be with us, we must know your mettle." He waved a dismissive hand. "Do not worry."

"I don't. But it would help some to know what kind of things you're going to throw at us."

"Trials for a warrior."

That was all he'd say. The Norsemen left the hut. Almost immediately the girl with the iron slave collar came and led Krysty and Mildred away, leaving the men behind to wonder what the next dawning would bring.