on account of their stores.
The five men scattered. Renald stood in the farmyard for a moment, then went into the barn to fetch his lightweight forge and pull it out into the sunlight. It wasn't just an anvil, but a full, compact forge, made for moving. He had it on rollers; you couldn't work a forge in a barn. All that dust could take fire. He heaved the handles, wheeling it out to the alcove set off to the side of the yard, built from good bricks, where he could do minor repairs when he needed to.
An hour later, he had the fire stoked. He wasn't as skilled as Thulin, but he'd learned from his father that being able to handle a little of your own forgework made a big difference. Sometimes, you couldn't squander the hours it would take to go to town and back just to fix a broken hinge.
The clouds were still there. He tried not to look at them as he left the forge and headed into the barn. Those clouds were like eyes, peeping over his shoulder.
Inside the barn, light sprinkled down through cracks in the wall, falling on dust and hay. He'd built the structure himself some twenty-five years back. He kept planning to replace some of those warped roofing planks, but now there wouldn't be time.
At the tool wall, he reached for his third-best scythe, but stopped. Taking a deep breath, he took the best scythe off the wall instead. He walked back out to the forge and knocked the haft off the scythe.
As he tossed the wood aside, Veshir—eldest of his farmhands—approached, pulling a pair of goats. When Veshir saw the scythe blade on the forge, his expression grew dark. He tied the goats to a post, then trotted over to Renald, but said nothing.
How to make a polearm? Thulin had said they were good for yanking a man off his horse. Well, he would have to replace the snath with a longer straight shaft of ashwood. The flanged end of the shaft would extend beyond the heel of the blade, shaped into a crude spearpoint and clad with a piece of tin for strength. And then he would have to heat the blade and bang off the toe about halfway, making a hook that could tug a man off his horse and maybe cut him at the same time. He slid the blade into the burning coals to heat it, then began to tie on his apron.
Veshir stood there for a minute or so, watching. Finally, he stepped up, taking Renald by the arm. "Renald, what are we doing?"
Renald shook his arm free. "We're going north. The storm is coming and we're going north."
"We're going north for just a storm? It's insanity!"
It was nearly the same thing Renald had said to Thulin. Distant thunder sounded.
Thulin was right. The crops... the skies... the food going bad without warning. Even before he'd spoken to Thulin, Renald had known. Deep within, he'd known. This storm would not pass overhead then vanish. It had to be confronted.
"Veshir," Renald said, turning back to his work, "you've been a hand on this farm for... what, fifteen years now? You're the first man I hired. How well have I treated you and yours?"
"You've done me well," Veshir said. "But burn me, Renald, you've never decided to leave the farm before! These crops, they'll wither to dust if we leave them. This ain't no southerner wetfarm. How can we just go off?"
"Because," Renald said, "if we don't leave, then it won't matter if we planted or not."
Veshir frowned.
"Son," Renald said, "you'll do as I say, and that's all we'll have of it. Go finish gathering the stock."
Veshir stalked away, but he did as he was told. He was a good man, if hotheaded.
Renald pulled the blade out of the heat, the metal glowing white. He laid it against the small anvil and began to beat on the knobby section where heel met beard, flattening it. The sound of his hammer on the metal seemed louder than it should have been. It rang like the pealing thunder, and the sounds blended. As if each beat of his hammer was itself a piece of the storm.
As he worked, the peals seemed to form words. Like somebody muttering in the back of his head. The same phrase over and over.
The storm is coming. The storm is coming...
He kept on pounding, keeping the edge on the scythe, but straightening the blade and making