 Much falls into a forester s trap and is badly wounded. Trying to find a village with a physician, the outlaws seem to get lost, finally ending up at Cromm Cruac, a small village none of them has ever heard of before. At Cromm Cruac nothing at first seems out of the ordinary. Soon, however, it dawns on them that there are no children in the village, everything seems "too sweet", and that Much - too quickly recovered to be normal - appears to have been brain-washed. When Will in addition run into his long-dead wife Elena, the outlaws conclude that something is seriously wrong at Cromm Cruac.