[Durelin]

Raken chuckled, he knew she couldn't turn down half the profit of an Ainereg flower. Like she's gonna get it, he thought, smiling to himself. "Well," he said, "If you'll follow me you can meet the boys. They don't have much brains, but they do their job." He turned right down the little muddy street, Mara following at a fair distance. He walked quickly and silently staring straight ahead with a blank look on his face. Raken was going home, it was second nature. Soon there were no more buildings, as shabby as they had been, and the road began to shrink. They were moving out of the village, if it could be called one, and the land on either side of the road was covered in distorted dry grass and shrubs. There were numerous spots of black, desolate ground and piles of rotted wood, remnants of buildings. After almost a quarter of an hour, Raken stopped to point at something far off the side of the muddy road, now little more than a narrow pathway. "There, our shack," he said. Mara looked and saw a large square wooden shack covered in moss and vines and surrounded by trees and shrubs. No one would have noticed it standing up on the small slope if they had not been looking for it. "Come on!" Raken was already heading up the sloping ground through the high brown grass. She followed him reluctantly, what was she getting into with these bums!. Raken was waiting for her at the doorway of the building, covered by the large hide of a beautiful golden horse. "A beauty," Raken remarked about it, "You'll meet it's former master soon."

Mara was pushed inside a dimly lit room with a dirt floor. It smelled of old alcohol, horse, sweat, and something far worse than all of those combined. Rotting flesh. Mara's eyes were drawn to the left wall, the most brightly-lit part of the room with the single candle sitting on a bench next to it. There were strange skin-colored tapestry-like things on the wall. Skin colored tapestries? More like skin! Human skin, it had to be. Mara's stomach lurched. They skinned a human. Raken saw where she was looking and laughed, "Yep, we got a guy who'll put somethin' on it to preserve it. It turned out nice, cutting it into squares to hang. We didn't do 'im alive, so it turned out a lot better than the one over there." He pointed to a mauled version of the squares of skin on the wall. The pieces were in all different shapes and sizes and had large gashes in them. "But my favorite thing that makes this whole place seem so much better is our friend of 'dem Rohan," Raken said pointing to the right wall. Mara followed his finger. A head pinned up on the wall. The skin egg - white and glossy, bloody holes where the eyes once were, blond hair clotted with blood streaming wildly around it, its mouth open, slack. Mara felt she needed to vomit. A man of Rohan, but a man. Then a hot, deathly loathing of the Rohirrim rose up in her. A loathing of all. She threw back her head and laughed long and hard. "It is the best!" she said. Raken laughed too, "I told you you'd meet the master of that pretty horse. You'll do nicely." He grinned wolfishly and licked his lips, staring at the mounted head. "Here's the boys," he said motioning to twenty-one men drinking and playing dice. Mara hadn't even noticed them. "Oi!" he called to them, "We get up at dawn! Tomorrow, we go to Rohan!" They all jumped up, dropping tankards and dice on the dirt floor, some growling and some laughing gleefully. Raken turned back to Mara. "We raid a village tomorrow at first light. We'll see if you can earn your half of the profit."