Raeh engages in a brief conversation with Haldenfrond. She learns that his wife's name was Irilia, and she died of a sickness several years ago, when Lilya was ten. To hear Guildain's description, she was as wonderful a person as one could ever hope to meet - he clearly still feels her absence deeply. Guildain and Lilya generally go out to visit her grave together about once a month; on this particular occasion Guildain was unable to come due to urgent business in his shop, to Lilya went out alone. It's about an hour out of town, in a glade near the river which Irilia always loved. You bring up the possibility that someone knew they would be going and had gone ahead of you, but Guildain says they only even started talking about it when they saw the weather that morning.

Haldenfrond admits that some of his competitors might be a bit annoyed at him for undercutting them, but he thinks it's very unlikely any of them would stoop to this. And if Lilya has been meeting new people, she certainly hasn't mentioned it. He does, again, bring up the bandits he mentioned before. The Black Hunters. You've all heard about them before; not least from Haldenfrond's own tavern stories. They were known for kidnapping relatives of wealthy people and demanding ransoms. But they were defeated a couple of years ago, when they pushed their luck and kidnapped the husband of a retired adventurer. She sent messages to her old party, and they turned out not to be quite so retired as all that. The bandits were believed wiped out, and became just another tavern story. Haldenfrond seems worried that they've somehow survived, and moved to the vicinity of Oakhelm.

As you go, Haldenfrond checks whether you want him to go and pay the ransom, or whether you think it would be better to hold off for now. He points out that if he's going to, it would be a good idea to be accompanied - the designated location is a good way out of town and rather isolated.