Free Betrayal by Jon Kiln

step plan.”
    Berengar smiled, one said of his mouth twisting up the scar on his cheek.
    An old lady with white hair sticking out in every direction leaned into the doorway. She clutched a robe around in front of her. “Breakfast is prepared, gentlemen. You want me to set you up a knee table here from some old pallets or will you come out like proper guests?”
    “We’ll come out. Thank you, Gorma,” Berengar said to her.
    “As you wish, master.”
    Nisero tilted his head. “Master?”
    “I may own this farm,” Berengar disclosed. “I may have bought it in Gorma and her husband’s name so that they would not lose it and no one would know that I owned it.”
    “Not even Arianne,” Nisero said. “Impressive.”
    Arianne spoke from under her covers on her pallet in the corner. “I can hear you both. Keeping secrets from your family is none too impressive. Every man does it.”
    Berengar shook his head. “Every man, huh? Where does your husband think you are right now, daughter?”
    “Don’t start with me,” she said. “Help me up. I need to go relieve myself before I wet this pallet.”
    He crossed the room and helped Arianne to her feet. Nisero looked around thinking that it would be hard to tell the room had been further fouled even if she did urinate in the corner.
    A pig hobbled by the doorway on three legs, missing one of its front feet.
    Arianne held her back gingerly as she exited the room. From the hallway, she called out to them. “Don’t go on any grand quests without me.”
    Her shadow broke the light coming from the foyer of the old inn, and then the light of morning returned once she was outside.
    “Will she be okay out there?” Nisero said, worried.
    “You can go ask her, but I don’t think she’d appreciate it,” Berengar responded. “You brought her in riding on horseback. I’m sure she can handle this. We are isolated enough on this property.”
    Captain Berengar stood and Nisero followed him out into a banquet hall on one side of the building. Large holes opened through the wood paneling and stone. Some of the openings ran nearly from floor to ceiling. Nisero saw weeds lining the property and scant corn fields beyond that. The stalks and leaves were drawing yellow and crisp, indicating time for harvest.
    A cow lifted its head from the weeds and peered through at the old woman plating out fried eggs, boiled chicken and ham hock.
    She looked up as Berengar approached. “I hope this is sufficient, master. I did not know how many were coming when you sent word.”
    “This is a king’s breakfast, Gorma. I would not ask for any more.”
    As Nisero took his seat and Gorma poured him wine from a pitcher, an older man in drab leather walked up and lifted a few pinches of meat from the table, before continuing on.
    “Are you not joining, husband?” Gorma asked.
    He spoke as he walked toward the front of the ruined inn. “No, excuse me, master. The corn requires my full attention this day.”
    “Of course,” Berengar said.
    Nisero looked out at the cow bowing its head to chew up the weeds again. He wasn’t sure why everyone still insisted on using the door when so much of the wall was missing.
    “Who are you going to contact?” he asked Berengar.
    “I’d rather keep that close to breast until I have some answers,” Berengar said between bites. “It will be better if you don’t know them. I’m going to travel out to meet with a few contacts and then return with whatever I find.”
    “When you say you will go, sir,” Nisero looked up from his plate, “it sounds as if you intend to go alone.”
    “Traveling with you and getting spotted before we have a destination might end our efforts before they begin. Arianne will stay here with you until I return. Then we need to deal with reality of her situation too.”
    “What do you intend to do with me, father?” Arianne rounded the corner near the collapsing stairs and approached the table in a waddle. Nisero thought she looked to