It was a week before harvest season when the traveller first came to the village. Tucked up in the folds of an ancient mountain range with barely a safe path back to civilisation, visitors to the village were rare indeed.

And yet the traveller came. Swathed in furs and animal hide, a wide-brimmed hat protecting his face from the elements, he walked into the village, leaning on a cane he had evidently cut from one of the gnarled oak trees that covered the lower steps of the mountain.

The village had no name. In truth it was nothing more than a series of stone huts scattered along a central dirt path with some barely farmable scrubland around its extremities. The villagers were hard people. Hard of eye and hard of heart. They clung tenaciously to the side of the mountain, defiant in the face of nature’s onslaught - the rain and the snow and the bitter wind that swept down from the craggy peaks to the wide valley below.

As the traveller approached, the villagers seemed to sense the intrusion. Heads turned from everyday tasks - from grindstones and cooking fires, from milking stools and ploughshares. They looked up as one, heads turning to the place at the edge of the village where the traveller would appear.

And one small girl left her games in the dirt to run cautiously alongside the traveller as he hefted the pack in his shoulder and made his way to the largest hut in the centre of the village.

The hut wasn’t much to look at really. It was certainly bigger than the ones around it and the thatch was better maintained . The walls were hung with dried herbs and winter flowers. A plume of smoke rose through a central hole in the roof and carried with it the smell of roasting meat. The traveller strode up to the entrance and without pause, ducked his head and entered the hut. The little girl, silent as shadow, quick as song, ran up to crouch beside the stone walls, pressing her ear to the cracks in the old structure. Her face was unreadable, her eyes alert.

Inside the hut, the village elder rose from his table - unsure what to make of the new arrival and caught tortuously between curiosity and anger. He swayed where he stood, his nose twitching oddly like he was waiting for a sneeze that would never come. The village wasn’t much. It was an arse-end outpost of humanity that, by all rights, should not be able to survive on the meagre scraps that nature provided it. But he was also very much of the opinion that it was his arse-end outpost and so naturally he feared the change that this newcomer might represent.

Yet visitors to the village were almost unheard of from one moon span to the next. The elder smoothed the edges of his moustache with greasy hands and eyed the pack on the stranger’s shoulder hungrily.

“You’re far from home, stranger. Far from anywhere if you’re walking these roads.” A stout cudgel leant up against the nearest leg of the table, the elder reached for it slowly and deliberately. “Around here a man’s home is his fortress. We can’t abide just anyone walking in, careless as spring.” His fingers reached the handle of the cudgel as the traveller smiled and spread his hands wide.

“My apologies, friend. I meant no harm by it. As soon as I arrived in your village, I made straight for your dwelling. It’s obviously the home of a man who wields some power hereabouts. I thought it best to come and throw myself on your mercy without delay. I didn’t mean to seem rude or forthright.”

The elders hand paused on the cudgel. Instead of gripping it he merely left his fingertips resting on it. Like a caress. His chest swelled.

“Oh. Right. Well, yes, I suppose I am the man to come and see at that. And I appreciate your humility in seeking my counsel. What brings you to us this day?”

“I confess it’s not a happy tale.” The traveller shifted the weight of his pack and winced. He indicated the burden with an incline of his head. “May I?”

“Of course. Put it down on my table here.”

With a grateful nod, the traveller swung the sack onto the table, reaching to massage the shoulder joint where it had rested with an appreciative sigh. The sack itself came partially open at the mouth, inside were the most beautiful sheep skins the elder had ever seen.

The traveller continued as he rolled his shoulder and stretched his neck from side to side. “I had a disagreement with the rest of my pa—rty.” Curiously he stumbled over the last word, his smooth delivery becoming uncertain for a moment. But he smiled and continued. “They attacked me and tried to kill me. I barely escaped with my life.”

For the first time, the elder became aware that the traveller was hurt. A bandage could be seen within the folds of his cloak, crusted with dried blood that had soaked through the material. The traveller stood prone in the middle of the hut and for a moment you could see the calculation in the elder’s eyes. His fingers briefly tightened on the handle of the cudgel. Outside, the small girl squirmed uncomfortably where she crouched. Time hung on a knife edge.

The elder eyes flicked between the swaying man before him and the pack on the table.

And then he smiled.

“Then we need to get you patched up. We have a healer in the village. She makes her home on the outskirts. Just follow the smell of lavender and rosemary. You can’t miss her. Oh…” and here he lay a protective hand on the traveller’s pack “… please unburden yourself of your pack. I’ll keep it here safe with me.”