Eamon knew something was amiss before he opened the door to their cottage in Rowan Fell. He smelled pig manure, even though their own pig had already been slaughtered and salted, and muttered under his breath about the smith not securing the gate on his garden.
Jeannie had complained the entire way back to the village, faulting the hospitality of the Silver Wolf and bemoaning their diminished status. To her thinking, it was apparently inevitable that they should be left to starve in the forest. Eamon wished she would fall silent and he tired of arguing with her. He had drunk a little too much ale and only wanted his pallet, preferably drawn close to the fire.
“Such a stench,” Jeannie said, her tone waspish. “The smith’s pig should be dead and salted by now, but they would linger over the
