“Hill is too steep for the horses to haul up the wagon carrying the stage timbers without risking that they hurt themselves. We’ll unhook the team from the kitchen wagon and double up, though it means a late supper.” “They need the horses to cook?” Rowan erupted in laughter, and he thumped Bryan on the back hard enough to make the young man stagger. “You should be on stage,” he said. “I’m getting an idea for a new sort of play, without a script. We’ll just put you up there and you can ask the audience members questions about how they live. Do they need the horses to cook—I’ve never heard anything so funny.” Bryan laughed along with the others this time, hoping to pass his question off as an intentional joke. He hadn’t really thought that the horses contributed to the food preparation, but the question had come reflexively. It seemed to him that Hadrixia’s translation magic had interfered with his internal filter that prevented every thought from being spoken, but as Meghan pointed out, the healer hadn’t charged for her services.
