Wilmot left the garrison with time to spare, his hands still tingling from the weight of Bertram’s gaze. The city greeted him not with ceremony but with chaos: a blur of carts and clangs, shouts and sudden laughter, and the clatter of hoofbeats against stone. He followed no map, only the broad press of foot traffic and the tug of curiosity. The buildings grew taller here, their windows narrow and hooded, their walls streaked with soot and moss. Chimneys smoked above every roofline, and bells rang discordantly from chapels and market towers.
He passed through a narrow arcade hung with drying herbs and wool, past beggars with empty bowls and women selling ribbons to passing children. Vendors hawked salted fish, cracked bones for broth, and saints' teeth likely carved from turnip. For every moment of wonder, there was another of unease. Wil had never seen so many faces etched with hunger.
The alleys smelled of tallow, ash, and urine. A woman chased a thief with a ladle. A dog barked from a second-story window, furious and absurd. Yet Wil couldn’t help but feel drawn onward into the pulse of the city, toward its unknowable heart.
A square opened at the end of a narrow street, fronting St. Peter’s. The church loomed as if carved from storm cloud, its stones darkened by weather and smoke. Gargoyles peered down like saints turned wardens. In front of it, a stone platform held a bell and a pulpit of carved wood—where a town crier now spoke in a clipped, nasal tone.
“By order of His Majesty King John: Let no man enter the royal forest without writ or coin! All poachers shall be marked and branded! No fire, no felling, no foraging—not even kindling! The king’s wood is not for thieves or beggars!”
The crowd half-listened, half-ignored, but Wil watched the crier carefully. Behind the flourish of official speech, the tone was iron. This was not law. It was warning. The forest, to the city, was not wild—it was property.
At the edge of the square stood a stall of tapers and beeswax candles beneath a crooked canvas. Behind it worked the candlemaker’s apprentice, her sleeves rolled to the elbow, a small knife in one hand and a box of freshly poured wax in the other. Her dark hair was tied in a rough braid. The corners of her mouth bore the calm earned through heat and patience.
Wil approached with the awkward resolve of someone acting before thinking.
“Hello,” he said. “I saw you once… at the gate. With the donkey cart.”
She looked up briefly, one brow lifted. “Did you?”
Then, after a pause, her gaze sharpened. “You’re the boy who rides with the Warden. Hal, wasn’t it?”
Wil nodded, suddenly unsure. “You… sell candles.”
She didn’t laugh, though a smile tugged one corner of her mouth. “Is that why you’re here? To announce my trade?”
“No. I mean… yes. But I wanted to buy one.” He fumbled for his coin pouch.
The apprentice set a pale beeswax taper on the table. She didn’t speak, but the price was clear in her eyes.
Wil paid—perhaps too much—but dared not ask.
She passed him the candle and turned back to her work. The exchange, complete.
But Wil lingered, awkwardly turning the candle in his hands. “You, uh… have nice hands,” he blurted.
She glanced sideways at him, eyebrow raised.
“For candle work,” he clarified. “Steady. And clean. You… shape things.”
“And you,” she replied, “have a gift for saying nothing with a lot of effort.”
Flushing, Wil pressed on. “Do you ever walk the forest trails? There’s a spring out past the ridge. Coldest water you’ll ever taste. I could… show you. If you ever needed… cold water.”
She shook her head, the smile still playing. “I don’t have time for trails. And even if I did, I wouldn’t drink where the law forbids it.”
A sharp voice cut through the moment. “Girl. The wicks are burning.”
The candlemaker’s wife, older, broad-shouldered, and stern, stood at the rear of the stall. Her expression could curdle beeswax.
“We’re not here to flirt with boys. Off with you.”
Wil stepped back quickly, nearly bumping the table.
“Yes, ma’am. Sorry. I—”
The apprentice gave him a small shrug. “Next time, try something better than ‘You sell candles.’”
He offered a sheepish smile, but she was already returning to her molds.
He nodded, flustered, and turned away, her quiet laughter following him into the crowd.
As he stepped into the lane beyond the square, something glinting caught his eye. Nestled in a crack between cobbles lay a small pewter thimble, dull but intact. Wil picked it up, turned it in his fingers, and smiled.
“For Arrow,” he murmured. “Something bright for his nest.”
He slipped it into his pocket and did not notice the boy watching from behind the statue of St. Oswald nearby.
***
Wilmot walked the plaza in front of St. Peter’s, his face still flushed from the exchange at the candle stall, the sound of the apprentice’s quiet laughter echoing behind him. The square stretched wide and uneven, its cobblestones worn smooth by centuries of boots and wagon wheels. Buildings leaned into the space like aging onlookers, their faces stained with smoke and time. A dry fountain sat at the center, its basin holding nothing but windblown leaves and a single green-patinated coin. Braziers hissed and popped along the arcade, giving off thin curls of fragrant smoke that tangled with the air.
Vendors were packing up now, their voices quieter but still bartering—cloth scraps, roasted chestnuts, combs carved from bone. A group of children dashed past, shouting rhymes, while two dogs circled near the church wall in a slow, growling dance. A town crier’s voice echoed faintly from another street, lost in the push and pull of foot traffic. Pigeons bobbed between feet, pecking at crumbs, and an old man leaned against a post muttering proverbs to no one at all.
Above it all loomed the dark façade of the church, its spire jutting like a blade against the clouds.
Near the base of the steps, Wil’s gaze caught on a man in a worn green cloak. He sat apart from the others, still as a stone, with a wooden bowl before him and a harp resting at his side.
Harrow Jack.
A small girl approached the man in green. Her dress was torn at the hem, her hair tangled in sun-bleached strands. She leaned close, cupped her hand to his ear, and whispered something too soft for Wil to hear. Jack nodded slowly, his expression unchanged. The girl slipped away into the crowd like smoke vanishing between shutters.
Wil watched her go, uncertain whether she had spoken a prayer, a secret, or a warning.
As he did, a brush against his hip made him freeze. The pouch at his belt was gone. In that single blink of distraction, it had vanished—lifted cleanly. He spun, eyes scanning the crowd with growing urgency.
Jack remained motionless, but something in the air changed. Wil saw it then: not just the boy who had taken his pouch, but three others nearby, pretending to beg, playing dice, adjusting crates. None looked directly at Jack. None had to.
Jack sat at the center of it all, blind and unmoving, but attentive. A spider in the middle of his web, catching secrets like flies. Though blind, it was clear Harrow Jack pulled the strings of more than just his harp.
There. A boy stood at the harpist’s side and dropped something into the wooden bowl.
The fox token.
Wil stepped forward, his voice tight. “That—he took that from me!”
The man in the cloak reached into the bowl, lifting the token between his fingers. He examined it slowly, turning it as though deciphering an inscription.
“You’ve a weak grip, boy,” he said, his tone dry and measured. “And poorer instincts, carrying this in plain reach.”
Wil flushed. “It was in my pouch. The Warden—Halward—he found it near the old cedar. I… I kept it. He doesn’t know.”
The man raised an eyebrow. “Halward. Still standing guard at that crumbling threshold between crown and canopy?”
“You know him?” Wil asked.
“I know of him. Men like that are more legend than flesh—long shadows that forget how to move.”
Wil shifted, uncertain. “I named my raven Arrow. After the song. After Harrow Jack.”
At that, the man’s mouth curved—something between a smile and a wince.
“Harrow Jack is just a song, lad. Nothing more. But ravens... ravens. Treat him well. He may yet repay the favor.”
“I like your harp,” Wil said, floundering for connection. “Will you play something?”
The man shook his head. “Not here. Not now. But if I ever pass Woodgate again, I might play a tune—for the trees, if not the men who walk beneath them.”
He turned his face slightly, his blind gaze unerring. “Much,” he said, not raising his voice.
The boy who had vanished into the crowd now reappeared at the man’s side, grinning with crooked confidence. He held Wil’s pouch in one hand, already lighter than before, and extended it without shame.
“One of mine,” Jack said calmly, as if that explained everything. “He’s quick, and mostly honest. You’ve met his fingers—now meet the rest of him.”
Then, without ceremony, Harrow Jack placed the fox token back into Wil’s palm.
“Keep it,” he said. “But understand what you hold. It’s not a keepsake. It’s a key. A token of recognition—for those who no longer speak above ground. If the forest ever turns silent to your call, if the gate stands open and no voice welcomes you, return it to the roots of the cedar. The woods remember those who owe and those who are owed.”
Wil opened his mouth to respond, but the phrasing caught him. “Wait… what does that mean?”
Jack tilted his head. “The river doesn’t ask where the stone has been, only if it can bear the weight.”
Wil blinked. “I… I don’t understand.”
From Jack’s side, Much chuckled softly. Not unkindly—more like a brother watching a younger sibling puzzle out a riddle. “That’s alright,” he said. “None of us did, at first. The old man only speaks in riddles.”
Jack said nothing. He only smiled, the same knowing curl of his mouth that seemed to say more than words ever could.
Wil nodded, his throat tight. The token seemed heavier now, the wood warm against his skin.
“Thank you,” he murmured.
The man inclined his head. “Mind yourself, boy. You’re nearer the edge than you realize.”
Wilmot turned and stepped away. He didn’t look back. Not because he wasn’t curious, but because he understood—instinctively—that whatever Harrow Jack watched with those unseeing eyes, it wasn’t him alone.
As he walked, Wil reached for his pouch and took quiet inventory. The coin was lighter, as expected. But the fox token remained. The pewter thimble for Arrow still nestled safely beside it. His candle—slightly bent now—was intact. But there was something else.
A second wooden token.
He held it close to this chest and looked. It was carved from a lighter wood, softer, worn at the edges. The mark etched into its surface was not a fox, but a hare, mid-leap.
Wil turned it over in his fingers, then looked back toward the square, though Jack and Much were nowhere to be seen. The plaza seemed quieter now, as though something had passed through it and left a silence in its wake.
A gift, he realized. Not a theft, but a sign. A signature.
Much’s mark.
He smiled despite himself. Perhaps they were friends after all. Or perhaps this too was part of the web.
Either way, he walked on—toward the gate, toward the storehouse and the barracks, toward home.
***
Wilmot returned to the garrison as the sky began to pale with the hint of winter dusk. The guards posted at the outer wall leaned against their spears, uninterested, their mailshirts dulled with wear. One of them gave a grunt as Wil passed—less a greeting than a formality offered without conviction. These were Sheriff’s men, and their allegiance ran not to honor but to coin. Their laughter, coarse and unguarded, followed Wil into the gatehouse courtyard.
Inside, two soldiers stood near the quartermaster’s post, speaking in low tones that grew louder as Wil entered.
“Chipstone’s getting another levy,” one said. “New roof for the keep. Royal timber straight from the king’s groves. Paid for in gold, too.”
“Should be,” the other replied. “That town’ll be the jewel of the shire once it’s dressed proper. King wants it ready before spring. They're calling it the Queen's Mirror. Sheriff says the queen herself might stop through. Wants it to shine like a mirror when she does—roof gilded, banners hung, the whole keep smelling of rosemary and coin. And the queen doesn’t travel alone, neither. Maidens aplenty, I hear. Silk veils, flutes, late feasts.”
The first soldier laughed. “A good place to find yourself if you’ve got the coin—or the charm. Better than standing guard at this muddy outpost with ghosts and goats.”
“Meanwhile, the Warden of sticks and stones still hoards his forest pennies like it means something.”
Their laughter came sharp, and neither man bothered to lower his voice when Wil approached.
The quartermaster looked up from a parchment with the dull weariness of a man long past the habit of courtesy.
“You’re the Warden’s boy?”
“Yes, sir.”
He shoved a folded writ across the table. “There’s your tally. Cart’s loaded. Provisions in full.”
Wil picked it up and began to skim.
“Oh—and the ass goes with it.”
Wil blinked. “The donkey?”
The man smirked. “Bertram’s orders. Said it was only fitting.”
There was a snicker from the corner.
Wil paused. “Does she have a name?”
The quartermaster scoffed. “It’s a donkey, lad. Not a knight.”
Outside, Wil reached for the rope tied to the donkey’s halter. The animal looked at him once, then returned its gaze to nothing in particular. She was small, slate-grey, and bore a scar along one ear that looked old but clean. Wil exhaled through his nose and started walking.
The donkey followed.
***
They passed out of Nottingham before the bells called Sext, the city slowly falling away behind them in a haze of chimney smoke and steeples. The road ahead was muddy and lined with hedgerow. It narrowed as it climbed, shouldered by bare-branched trees and the occasional watchful crow.
The cart creaked with each jolt, the barrels shifting slightly but holding. The donkey plodded forward with no complaint and no urgency.
Wil walked in silence, one hand on the rope, the other tucked in his cloak. He didn’t speak—not to the donkey, not to himself. But he listened: to the wind in the trees, to the clink of tack, to the shifting weight of what he carried.
Just past the turn near the stone well, the donkey stopped. Wil turned to find her tugging at a patch of green by the roadside.
A small clutch of clover.
Wil watched her chew. Her jaw moved slow and steady, each bite deliberate.
“You like that, do you?” he murmured.
The donkey flicked one ear, but kept eating.
“Alright then,” he said, brushing her neck. “Clover it is.”
The name settled easily.
He tugged gently on the rope. She looked up, blinked, and followed.
Together they walked the winding road home.