‘It’s called Barden.’ Tinder cleared his croaky throat, desperate to get his hand on the axe again but not sure how he could do it without the big man noticing. ‘Ain’t much there, though.’
‘I was not planning a visit. But thank you.’ The big man looked at him, mouth half-open as though he’d say something more. Then he turned and trudged off, shoulders hunched like he had a great weight on him. Greater even than all the weight of steel he was wearing. He sat down on the stump of that old fir Tinder had a bastard of a time cutting down in the spring. The one that nearly fell on him when he finally got through the trunk.
‘What did he want?’ came Riam’s voice in his ear.
‘By the dead, can’t you stay out of sight?’ Tinder nearly puked on the words, his throat was so tight, struggling to bundle his daughter away from the door with one arm.
But the big man showed no sign of ordering Tinder’s goat seized, or his children, either. He pulled some papers from his satchel, placed them on the wood between his legs, uncorked a bottle of ink, dipped a pen in and wrote something. He took a sip of his milk – or Tinder’s milk, in fact – frowned over towards the trees, then up at the sky, then towards the scarcely moving column of horses and carts, dipped his pen again and wrote something else.
‘What’s he doing?’ whispered Riam.
‘Writing.’ Tinder worked his mouth and spat. It galled him a little, for no good reason, to have some big, sparrow-voiced Union bastard sitting on his stump, writing. What the hell was the use of writing when the world was so full of problems to be solved? But no doubt there was far worse he might be doing. And what could Tinder do about it anyway?
So he stood there, the mostly empty milking pail still gripped pale-knuckle tight in his fist, and watched the Union ruin his crop.
‘Colonel Gorst?’
‘Yes?’
There was absolutely no getting used to that voice, however much one might admire the man. It was like a lost little girl’s.
‘I’m Lieutenant Kerns. I was on the same ship as you coming over, was it … the Indomitable? The Invincible? The Insomething, anyway.’ Gorst sat in silence, a few sheets of paper spread out on the tree-stump between his legs, ink bottle open beside them, pen held with strange delicacy in one ham of a hand and what looked to be a small cup in the other. ‘I saw you training, more than once, on deck, in the mornings.’ Many of the men had gathered to watch. None of them had ever seen anything like it. ‘A most impressive spectacle. We spoke a little … at one point.’ Kerns supposed that was true in the strictest sense, though it had, in fact, been him who had done virtually all of the speaking.
It was the same routine this time around. Gorst stared up in stony silence all the while, deep-set eyes appraisingly narrowed, and that caused Kerns to start to blather, words coming faster and faster while he said less and less. ‘We talked about the reasons for the conflict, and so forth, and who was along, and who was in the right and wrong of it, and the whys and wherefores, you know.’ By the Fates, why couldn’t he shut up? ‘And how Marshal Kroy would handle the campaign, and which division would fight where, and so forth, you know. I think then, perhaps, we discussed the virtues of Styrian steel as opposed to Union mixtures, for blades and armour, and so on. Then it started to rain, so I retired below decks.’
‘Yes.’
How Kerns wished he could retire below decks now. He cleared his throat. ‘I’m in charge of the guards on this section of the supply column.’ Gorst swept the column with his glare, causing Kerns to cough ashamedly. For all his hard work, its order was hardly something a sensible man would take pride in. ‘Well, I and Lieutenant Pendel are in charge of them, and I saw you here writing, and I thought I might reintroduce myself … I say, is that a letter to the king?’
Gorst frowned. Which was to say, he frowned even more deeply, and shifted his mass of armoured body as if to conceal his papers. ‘Yes.’
‘It’s quite a thing, to think, you know, his Majesty, and all, reading those very words, along with his breakfast, or possibly his lunch. Can’t imagine what his Majesty has for lunch—’
‘It varies.’
Kerns cleared his throat. ‘Of course. Of course it does. I was wondering, if it wouldn’t be too much of an imposition, if it might be possible for me to borrow from you a sheet of paper? I received a letter from my wife this morning and I’m terribly keen to reply. Our first child was born just before we left, you see.’
‘Congratulations.’
‘Indeed. He’s beautiful.’ From what Kerns could remember, he had thought his son remarkably ugly, fat and prone to screaming, but fathers always said their children were beautiful, so he resolved to follow suit, and had practised that faraway smile you were supposed to make along with it. He flashed it now. ‘A beautiful, beautiful boy. Anyway, if I could—’
Gorst thrust a sheet of paper at him.
‘Yes. Exactly. Thank you so much. I will make sure to replace it in due course. Wouldn’t dream of—’
‘Forget it,’ grunted Gorst, hunching his heavy shoulders as he turned back to his own letter.
‘Yes.’ Kerns cleared his throat again. ‘Yes, of course.’
‘Enough of this bloody nonsense.’ Pendel pulled the shovel from the side of the cart and set off through the flattened crops, wet earth squelching under his feet each step.
‘What are you doing?’ came Kerns’s niggling squawk. That voice was starting to scrape at Pendel’s nerves like a blunt razor at a sore neck. And always with the stupidest damn questions.
‘What do you think I’m doing?’ Pendel waved the shovel at him. ‘I’m going to dig a tunnel back to Adua!’ He turned towards the trees, adding under his breath, ‘You bloody moron.’
‘You sure you should be going over there?’ Kerns shouted after him, waving, for some reason, a sheet of paper. ‘What if—’
‘You can manage without me for a minute, I’m sure!’ And Pendel added a quiet, ‘You bloody moron,’ to that, too. Probably he could’ve excused himself for the whole day and found the column no more than a few strides advanced for all of Kerns’s silly fretting. It was always the same way with new officers. Rulebook, duty, honour, rulebook. If Pendel had wanted to be beaten over the head with the rules he could have stayed at headquarters and had Colonel bloody Felnigg belabour his undeserving skull with them every morning. Well, he could have stayed if it hadn’t been for that little oversight of his and the subsequent disciplinary action, but that was beside the point. The fact was he needed to crap, and he wasn’t going to do it with dozens of men and animals watching. Who wants to crap with an audience?
‘What if there are Northmen near the—’
‘Then I’ll bloody crap on them!’ And he left Kerns to kiss Gorst’s great big useless squeaking royal observer arse and first trotted, and then, when the trotting made him short of breath, strolled through the crops towards the welcoming darkness of the trees.
‘There they are.’
‘Oh, aye,’ muttered Pale-as-Snow around his pellet of chagga. ‘No doubt.’
You couldn’t very well miss the bastards. Dozens of carts and wagons, stretched out through the trampled wreckage that had once been some poor fool’s crops, some cargoes covered under canvas, but quite a few without even that much care taken. Bare hay bales waiting invitingly for a passing torch. Bundles of flatbow bolts practically begging to be carried off and shot back at their owners later. All kinds of things to steal and things to break. Not much movement down there. Way too much gear and nowhere near enough road, the story of the Union invasion of the North, far as Pale-as-Snow could tell. Horses shifted and pawed. Drivers slumped bored in their places. Not many guards, though, and those there were struck him as more ready for a nap than a fight.
‘Looks good, Chief,’ whispered Ripjack.
Pale-as-Snow glanced sideways at his Second, narrow-eyed. ‘Don’t put the curse
on it, eh?’ Plenty were the times he’d come more’n a little unstuck in a good-looking situation. There was no such thing as too careful, even when it was the Union you were trying to creep up on.
Pale-as-Snow long ago lost count of the raids he’d had charge of. A lifetime of ’em, and he was still waiting for one that went exactly as he’d hoped. Still waiting for that perfect raid. However careful his planning, there was always some little splinter of bad luck. Some overeager fool on his side, or some over-watchful stickler on the other, a loose strap, or testy horse, or some wrinkle of the weather or the light, or a bloody dry twig in the wrong place. But that’s war, Pale-as-Snow supposed. You get luck of all kinds, and the winner’s the one who makes the best of his share.
But who knew? As he took in that flat field full of trampled crops with its one little house and its one little shed, and the great mass of unready, unruly men and supplies at the end of it, he started to get the tickly, eager feeling in the palms of his hands that this could be the day, and the corner of his mouth slowly twitched up.
Then he could go back and tell Scale that it had been a real beauty of a raid. A peach. His men all laughing and showing off their booty and telling ever less believable lies about their high deeds on the day. Scale clapping him on the back instead of giving him another rage to wince his way through. Honestly, Pale-as-Snow was getting a little sick of being raged at. He was a leader you could respect, was Scale. Just as long as he didn’t open his mouth.
Pale-as-Snow gave his chagga a long, slow chew as he scanned the field again, then he nodded. A good fighter has to be careful, but sooner or later he has to fight. The moment comes up smiling and offers its hand, you got to grab it.
‘All right. Let’s get the boys ready.’ He turned and started giving signals to the others, open hand pointing left and right through the trees to start ’em moving to where he wanted ’em, quicker at talking with his hands than he was with his mouth. Bows close to the treeline, Carls in two wedges to deal with the guards, Thralls in the centre, ready to rush the column and do as much damage as men could in the time it took for more guards to arrive. You’d be surprised how much damage men could do in that time, if they were good and ready for it. Just a little more of the right kind of luck and this might be the raid they measured all future raids against. A real beauty. A real—
‘Chief,’ hissed Ripjack.
‘Uh?’
The Named Man held a finger over his mouth for quiet, his eyes all big and round, then shifted that finger to point off through the undergrowth.
Pale-as-Snow felt his heart sinking. There was someone coming across the field towards ’em. A Union man, his polished helmet gleaming, a shovel over his shoulder, not a care in the world. Pale-as-Snow twisted around, hissing hard between his teeth to get the lads’ attention, then waving ’em frantically down. All together they dropped into the bushes, behind trees, found boulders, and like a trick of sorcery in a moment left the woods peaceful quiet and empty-looking.
The Southerner hadn’t stopped, though. He ducked under the branches and crashed through the undergrowth a few steps, coming straight at them, whistling tunelessly to himself like he was on his way to market rather’n wrapped up in a war. They were bloody idiots, these Union men. Bloody idiots, but if he kept on walking he’d see ’em sure, and soon, however much of an idiot he was.
‘Always something,’ mouthed Pale-as-Snow, putting his hand on his sword, the other one flat out behind him, palm up, to keep the rest of the lads quiet. Beside him he felt Ripjack very slowly slide out his knife, the blade of it gleaming murder in the shadows. Pale-as-Snow watched the Southerner come closer, a little itch making his eyelid twitch, his muscles tensing up all tight and ready to sweep his sword out and set to—
The Southerner stopped no more’n four strides away, dug his shovel down in the earth, took his helmet off and tossed it on the ground beside him, wiped his forehead on the back of his arm, turned around, then started undoing his belt.
Pale-as-Snow felt himself smile. He looked at Ripjack, took his hand gently from his sword, put his forefinger gently to his lips to say quiet, pointed it at the squatting Southerner busy getting his trousers down, then drew it gently across his throat.
Ripjack winced and pointed at his chest.
Pale-as-Snow grinned wider and nodded.
Ripjack winced more, then shrugged, then started to ease ever so very gently forward through the brush, twisting himself around the plants, eyes darting over the ground for anything might give him away. Pale-as-Snow settled back, watching. They’d sort this little piece of business, then they’d get the lads in place and everything ready, then they’d make a raid about which songs would be sung for a hundred years. Or they’d have a stab at it, anyway.
You get luck of all kinds in a war. The winner’s the one who makes the best of his share.
Pendel wriggled down into his heels, trying to get comfortable, one hand on the shovel and the other on his knee. He grunted, gritted his teeth. That was the bloody army life for you, always too hard or too runny, never a happy medium. There was no happy medium in war. He sighed and was shifting his weight for another effort when he felt a sharp pain across his backside.
‘Ah!’ He twisted around, cursing. One of those monstrous bloody nettles they had up here had leaned in, as if on purpose, and stung his left buttock, damn it.
‘Bloody North,’ he hissed, rubbing furiously at the affected area and making it sting all the worse. ‘Damn this fucking country.’ They’d been marching for what felt like months and he’d yet to see an acre of the place that was worth one man’s snot, let alone hundreds of lives, and he very much doubted—
Beyond the nettle, no more than a couple of strides away, a man was kneeling in the brush, staring at him.
A Northman.
A Northman with a knife in his hand.
Not a big knife. No more than average-sized.
But certainly big enough.
They stared at each other for what felt like a very long moment, Pendel squatting with his trousers around his ankles, the Northman squatting with trousers up but jaw down.
They moved together, as if on a signal firmly agreed and long prepared for. The Northman leaped forward, knife going up. Without conscious thought Pendel spun around, swinging the shovel, and its flat caught the Northman crisply on the side of the head with a metallic ping and sent blood, Northman and shovel all flying through the air.
With a girlish whoop, Pendel staggered away in the direction he’d come from, tripped, heard what he thought might be an arrow swish through the air beside him, rolled through a great patch of nettles and lurched to his feet, struggling to run, scream and pull his trousers up all at once with death breathing on his bare arse.
My darling wife Silyne,
I was overjoyed to receive your letter and the news of our son, though it took three weeks to reach me. Damn army post, you know. Glad to hear your mother is better. I wanted to tell you
Kerns leaned back, staring wistfully off across the field. Wanted to tell her what? It was ever this way. Desperate to write, but when he sat down, no words. None worth a damn, anyway. He was not really even sure he wanted to write, just felt that he should want to. His wife would be left with the most bland and uninteresting collection of waste paper if he was ever to die in battle, that was certain. No poetic professions of his deep love, no sage advice to his infant son on how to be a man, no secrets of his innermost self. He was, in all honestly, unsure that he had an innermost self. Certainly not one with any profound revelations to make.
It was hardly as though anything of the faintest interest ever happened here, anyway. They barely moved, let alone fought. Kerns did not want to be a hero, just to do his part. To test his mettle against an enemy rather than fighting mud, horses and Pendel’s incompetence every day. He had volunteered for action, not tedium. To distinguish himself. To win honour on the
battlefield. To be celebrated, rewarded, toasted, admired. All right, he wanted to be a hero. And here he was, among the baggage, where the bravest deed done was greasing an axle.
He gave a long, tired sigh, frowned at his empty page and then over at Colonel Gorst, perhaps hoping to find inspiration there. But the colonel had put his pen down and was staring towards the trees with the most striking intensity. Kerns thought he heard a faint cry, high with a note of panic. It came again, louder, and Gorst shot to his feet, cup tumbling from his hand, milk spilling. Kerns looked towards the trees, his mouth dropping open. Pendel was there, bounding back through the crops towards them, trying to run and hold his open trousers up and shout all at the same time.
He managed to yell one audible word, voice shrill with terror.
‘Northmen!’
As if to add drama to his exclamation, an arrow looped over from behind him, narrowly missing his shoulder and vanishing into the crops. Kerns felt his face go hot. Time seemed perceptibly to slow. He stood as if in a dream, his limbs heavy, his mind sluggishly struggling to catch up with reality. He gawped at Pendel. He gawped at the column. He gawped at Gorst, who was already rushing forwards, drawing his heavy steels. He gawped at the treeline, from which men had now started to appear, running, shrill cries echoing over the silent field.
‘Bloody hell,’ Kerns whispered, flinging his pen away and tearing at his sword hilt. Bloody thing wouldn’t come free. He realised the securing thong was looped over the grip, started fumbling with it, failed, ripped his gloves off in a fury, fumbled again, finally loosening the hilt. He looked up. Northmen, undoubtedly Northmen, some of them with painted shields on their arms, bright weapons in their fists, whooping and shouting as they bounded towards the largely unguarded wagons.
He cast about for his helmet, knocking his ink bottle over and sending a spray of black across his banal fragment of a letter. Probably should’ve had his helmet on all the time but his men had mocked him mercilessly, and when he found it filled with dung that morning it had been the final straw. If he ever discovered who—
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