The Heroes

by Abercrombie, Joe

  ‘Just keep calm!’ Hansul shouted from further back. ‘Your father always kept calm!’

  ‘Shit on what my father did,’ Calder snapped over his shoulder. He was enjoying not having to think and just letting the fury carry him. Sweep him up onto the hill’s flat top and between two of the great stones. Fires burned inside the circle, flames tugged and snapped by the wind, sending up whirls of sparks into the black night. They lit up the inside faces of the Heroes in flickering orange, lit up the faces of the men clustered around them, catching the metal of their mail coats, the blades of their weapons. They clucked and grumbled as Calder strode heedless through them towards the centre of the circle, Pale-as-Snow and Hansul following in his wake.

  ‘Calder. What are you about?’ Curnden Craw, some staring lad Calder didn’t know beside him. Jolly Yon Cumber and Wonderful were there too. Calder ignored the lot of them, brushed past Cairm Ironhead as he stood watching the flames with his thumbs in his belt.

  Tenways was sitting on a log on the other side of the fire, and his flaking horror of a face broke out in a shining grin as he saw Calder coming. ‘If it ain’t pretty little Calder! Help your brother out today, did you, you—’ His eyes went wide for a moment and he tensed, shifting his weight to get up.

  Then Calder’s fist crunched into his nose. He squawked as he went over backwards, boots kicking, and Calder was on top of him, flailing away with both fists, bellowing he didn’t even know what. Punching mindlessly at Tenways’ head, and his arms, and his flapping hands. He got another good one on that scabby nose before someone grabbed his elbow and dragged him off.

  ‘Whoa, Calder, whoa!’ Craw’s voice, he thought, and he let himself be pulled back, thrashing about and shouting like you’re supposed to. As if all he wanted to do was keep fighting when in fact he was all relief to let it be stopped, as he’d run right out of ideas and his left hand was really hurting.

  Tenways stumbled up, blood bubbling out of his nostrils as he snarled curses, slapping away a helping hand from one of his men. He drew his sword with that soft metal whisper that somehow sounds so loud, steel gleaming in the firelight. There was a silence, the crowd of curious men around them all heaving a nervous breath together. Ironhead raised his brows, and folded his arms, and took a pace out of the way.

  ‘You little fucker!’ growled Tenways, and he stepped over the log he’d been sitting on.

  Craw dragged Calder behind him and suddenly his sword was out too. Not a moment later a pair of Tenways’ Named Men were beside their Chief, a big bearded bastard and a lean one with a lazy eye, weapons ready, though they looked like men who never had to reach too far for them. Calder felt Pale-as-Snow slide up beside him, blade held low. White-Eye Hansul on his other side, red-faced and puffing from his trek up the hillside but his sword steady. More of Tenways’ boys sprang up, and Jolly Yon Cumber was there with his axe and his shield and his slab of frown.

  It was then Calder realised things had gone a bit further than he’d planned on. Not that he’d planned at all. He thought it was probably bad form to leave his sword sheathed, what with everyone else drawing and him having stirred the pot in the first place. So he drew himself, smirking in Tenways’ bloody face.

  He’d felt grand when he’d seen his father put on the chain and sit in Skarling’s Chair, three hundred Named Men on their knee to the first King of the Northmen. He’d felt grand when he put his hand on his wife’s belly and felt his child kick for the first time. But he wasn’t sure he’d ever felt such fierce pride as he did in the moment Brodd Tenways’ nose-bone broke under his knuckles.

  No way he would’ve said no to more of that feeling.

  ‘Ah, shit!’ Drofd scrambled up, kicking embers over Beck’s cloak and making him gasp and slap ’em off.

  A right commotion had flared up, folk stomping, metal hissing, grunts and curses in the darkness. There was some sort of a fight, and Beck had no idea who’d started it or why or what side he was supposed to be on. But Craw’s dozen were all piling in so he just went with the current, drew his father’s sword and stood shoulder to shoulder with the rest, Wonderful on his left with her curved blade steady, Drofd on his right with a hatchet in his fist and his tongue stuck out between his teeth. Wasn’t so difficult to do, what with everyone else doing it. Would’ve been damn near impossible not to, in fact.

  Brodd Tenways and some of his boys were facing ’em across a windblown fire, and he had a lot of blood on his rashy face and maybe a broken nose too. Might be that Calder had been the one to do it, given how he’d come stomping past like that and now was standing next to Craw with sword in hand and smirk on face. Still, the whys didn’t seem too important right then. It was the what nexts that were looming large on everyone’s minds.

  ‘Put ’em away.’ Craw spoke slow but there was a kind of iron to his voice said he’d be backing down from nothing. It put iron in Beck’s bones, made him feel like he’d be backing down from nothing neither.

  Tenways didn’t look like taking any backward steps himself, though. ‘You fucking put ’em away.’ And he spat blood into the fire.

  Beck found his eyes had caught a lad’s on the other side, maybe a year or two older’n him. Yellow-haired lad with a scar on one cheek. They turned a little to face each other. As if on an instinct they were all pairing off with the partner who suited ’em best, like folk at a harvest dance. Except this dance seemed likely to shed a lot of blood.

  ‘Put ’em up,’ growled Craw, and his voice had more iron now. A warning, and the dozen all seemed to shift forwards around him at it, steel rattling.

  Tenways showed his rotten teeth. ‘Fucking make me.’

  ‘I’ll give it a try.’

  A man came strolling out of the dark, just his sharp jaw showing in the shadows of his hood, boots crunching heedless through the corner of the fire and sending a flurry of sparks up around his legs. Very tall, very lean and he looked like he was carved out of wood. He was chewing meat from a chicken bone in one greasy hand and in the other, held loose under the crosspiece, he had the biggest sword Beck had ever seen, shoulder-high maybe from point to pommel, its sheath scuffed as a beggar’s boot but the wire on its hilt glinting with the colours of the fire-pit.

  He sucked the last shred of meat off his bone with a noisy slurp, and he poked at all the drawn steel with the pommel of his sword, long grip clattering against all those blades. ‘Tell me you lot weren’t working up to a fight without me. You know how much I love killing folk. I shouldn’t, but a man has to stick to what he’s good at. So how’s this for a recipe …’ He worked the bone around between finger and thumb, then flicked it at Tenways so it bounced off his chain mail coat. ‘You go back to fucking sheep and I’ll fill the graves.’

  Tenways licked his bloody top lip. ‘My fight ain’t with you, Whirrun.’

  And it all came together. Beck had heard songs enough about Whirrun of Bligh, and even hummed a few himself as he fought his way through the logpile. Cracknut Whirrun. How he’d been given the Father of Swords. How he’d killed his five brothers. How he’d hunted the Shimbul Wolf in the endless winter of the utmost North, held a pass against the countless Shanka with only two boys and a woman for company, bested the sorcerer Daroum-ap-Yaught in a battle of wits and bound him to a rock for the eagles. How he’d done all the tasks worthy of a hero in the valleys, and so come south to seek his destiny on the battlefield. Songs to make the blood run hot, and cold too. Might be his was the hardest name in the whole North these days, and standing right there in front of Beck, close enough to lay a hand on. Though that probably weren’t a good idea.

  ‘Your fight ain’t with me?’ Whirrun glanced about like he was looking for who it might be with. ‘You sure? Fights are twisty little bastards, you draw steel it’s always hard to say where they’ll lead you. You drew on Calder, but when you drew on Calder you drew on Curnden Craw, and when you drew on Craw you drew on me, and Jolly Yon Cumber, and Wonderful there, and Flood – though he’s gone for a wee, I think, and also
this lad here whose name I’ve forgotten.’ Sticking his thumb over his shoulder at Beck. ‘You should’ve seen it coming. No excuse for it, a proper War Chief fumbling about in the dark like you’ve nothing in your head but shit. So my fight ain’t with you either, Brodd Tenways, but I’ll still kill you if it’s called for, and add your name to my songs, and I’ll still laugh afterwards. So?’

  ‘So what?’

  ‘So shall I draw? And you’d best keep always before you that if the Father of Swords is drawn it must be blooded. That’s the way it’s been since before the Old Time, and the way it must be still, and must always be.’

  They stood there for a moment longer, the lot of ’em, all still, all waiting, then Tenways’ brows drew in, and his lips curled back, and Beck felt the guts dropping out of him, because he could feel what was coming, and—

  ‘What the fuck?’ Another man stalked up into the firelight, eyes slits and teeth bared, head forwards and shoulders up like a fighting dog, no want in it but killing. His scowl was crossed with old scars, one ear missing, and he wore a golden chain, a big jewel alive with orange sparks in the middle.

  Beck swallowed. Black Dow, no question. Who beat Bethod’s men six times in the long winter then burned Kyning to the ground with its people in the houses. Who fought the Bloody-Nine in the circle and nearly won, was left with his life and bound to serve. Fought alongside him then, and with Rudd Threetrees, and Tul Duru Thunderhead, and Harding Grim, as tough a crew as ever walked the North since the Age of Heroes and of which, aside from the Dogman, he was the last drawing breath. Then he betrayed the Bloody-Nine, and killed him who men said couldn’t die, and took Skarling’s Chair for himself. Black Dow, right before him now. Protector of the North, or stealer of it, depending on who you asked. He’d never dreamed of coming so close to the man.

  Black Dow looked over at Craw, and he looked an awful long way from happy. Beck weren’t sure how that pickaxe of a face ever could. ‘Ain’t you supposed to be keeping the peace, old man?’

  ‘That’s what I’m doing.’ Craw’s sword was still out but the point had dropped towards the ground now. Most of ’em had.

  ‘Oh, aye. Here’s a peaceful fucking picture.’ Dow swept the lot of ’em with his scowl. ‘No one draws steel up here without my say so. Now put ’em away, the lot o’ you, you’re embarrassing yourselves.’

  ‘Boneless little fucker broke my nose!’ snarled Tenways.

  ‘Spoil your looks, did he?’ snapped Dow. ‘Want me to kiss it better? Let me frame this in terms you fucking halfheads can understand. Anyone still holding a blade by the time I get to five is stepping into the circle with me, and I’ll do things like I used to ’fore old age softened me up. One.’

  He didn’t even need to get to two. Craw put up right away, and Tenways just after, and all the rest of that steel was good and hidden almost as swift as it had come to light, leaving the two lines of men frowning somewhat sheepishly across the fire at each other.

  Wonderful whispered in Beck’s ear. ‘Might want to put that away.’

  He realised he still had his steel out, shoved it back so fast he damn near cut his leg. Only Whirrun was left there, between the two sides, one hand on the hilt of his sword and the other on the scabbard, still ready to draw, and looking at it with the smallest curl of a smile to his mouth. ‘You know, I’m just a little tempted.’

  ‘Another time,’ growled Dow, then threw one arm up. ‘Brave Prince Calder! I’m honoured all the way to fuck! I was about to send over an invitation but you’ve got in first. Come to tell me what happened at the Old Bridge today?’

  Calder still had the fine cloak he’d been wearing when Beck first saw him up at Reachey’s camp, but he had mail underneath it now, and a scowl instead of a grin. ‘Scale got killed.’

  ‘I heard. Can’t you tell? I’m weeping a sea o’ tears. What happened at my bridge is what I’m asking.’

  ‘He fought as hard as he could. Hard as anyone could.’

  ‘Went down fighting. Good for Scale. What about you? Don’t look like you fought that hard.’

  ‘I was ready to.’ Calder slid a piece of paper out from his collar and held it up between two fingers. ‘Then I got this. An order from Mitterick, the Union general.’ Dow snatched it from his hand and pulled it open, frowning down at it. ‘There are Union men in the woods to our west, ready to come across. It’s lucky I found out, because if I’d gone to help Scale they’d have taken us in the flank and there’s a good chance the lot of you would be dead now, rather than arguing the toss over whether I’ve got no bones.’

  ‘I don’t think anyone’s arguing you’ve got bones, Calder,’ said Dow. ‘Just sat there behind the wall, did you?’

  ‘That, and sent to Tenways for help.’

  Dow’s eyes slid sideways, glittering with the flames. ‘Well?’

  Tenways rubbed blood from under his broken nose. ‘Well what?’

  ‘Did he send for help?’

  ‘Spoke to Tenways myself,’ piped up one of Calder’s men. An old boy with a scar down his face and the eye on that side milky white. ‘Told him Scale needed help, but Calder couldn’t go on account of the Southerners across the stream. Told him the whole thing.’

  ‘And?’

  The half-blind old man shrugged. ‘Said he was busy.’

  ‘Busy?’ whispered Dow, face getting harder’n ever if that was possible. ‘So you just sat there and all, did you?’

  ‘I can’t just move soon as that bastard tells me to—’

  ‘You sat on the hill with Skarling’s Finger up your arse and fucking watched?’ Dow roared. ‘Sat and watched the Southerners have my bridge?’ Stabbing at his chest with his thumb.

  Tenways flinched back, one eye twitching. ‘There weren’t no Southerners over the river, that’s all lies! Lies like he always tells.’ He pointed across the fire with a shaking finger. ‘Always some fucking excuse, eh, Calder? Always some trick to keep your hands clean! Talk of peace, or talk of treachery, or some kind of bloody talk—’

  ‘Enough.’ Black Dow’s voice was quiet, but it cut Tenways off dead. ‘I don’t care a runny shit whether there are Union men out west or if there aren’t.’ He crumpled the paper up in his trembling fist and flung it at Calder. ‘I care whether you do as you’re told.’ He took a step towards Tenways, and leaned in close.

  ‘You won’t be sitting watching tomorrow, no, no, no.’ And he sneered over at Calder. ‘And nor will you, prince of nothing fucking much. Your sitting days are over, the pair o’ you. You two lovers’ll be down there on that wall together. That’s right. Side by side. Arm in arm from dawn to dusk. Making sure this shitcake you’ve cooked up between you don’t start stinking any worse. Doing what I brought you idiots here for – which, in case anyone’s started wondering, is fighting the fucking Union!’

  ‘What if they are across that stream?’ asked Calder. Dow turned towards him, brow furrowed like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. ‘We’re stretched thin as it is, lost a lot of men today and we’re well outnumbered—’

  ‘It’s a fucking war!’ roared Dow, leaping over to him and making everyone shuffle back. ‘Fight the bastards!’ He tore at the air as if he was only just stopping himself from tearing Calder’s face apart with his hands. ‘Or you’re the planner, ain’t you? The great trickster? Trick ’em! You wanted your brother’s place? Then deal with it, you little arsehole, or I’ll find a man who will! And if anyone don’t do his bit tomorrow, anyone with a taste for sitting out…’ Black Dow closed his eyes and tipped his face back towards the sky. ‘By the dead, I’ll cut the bloody cross in you. And I’ll hang you. And I’ll burn you. And I’ll make such an end of you the very song of it will turn the bards white. Am I leaving room for doubts?’

  ‘No,’ said Calder, sullen as a whipped mule.

  ‘No,’ said Tenways, no happier.

  Beck didn’t get the feeling the bad blood between ’em was anywhere near settled, though.

  ‘Then this is the fucking end o’
this!’ Dow turned, saw one of Tenways’ lads was in his way, grabbed hold of his shirt and flung him cringing onto the ground, then stalked back into the night the way he came.

  ‘With me,’ Craw hissed in Calder’s ear, then took him under the armpit and marched him off.

  Tenways and his boys found their way back to their seats, grumbling, the yellow-haired lad giving Beck a hard look as he went. Time was Beck would’ve given him one back, maybe even a hard word or two to go with it. After the day he’d had he just looked away quick as he could, heart thumping in his ears.

  ‘Shame. I was enjoying that.’ Whirrun of Bligh pulled his hood back and scrubbed at his flattened hair with his fingernails. ‘What is your name, anyway?’

  ‘Beck.’ He thought he’d best leave it at just that. ‘Is every day with you lot like this?’

  ‘No, no, no, lad. Not every day.’ And Whirrun’s pointed face broke into a mad grin. ‘Only a precious few.’

  *

  Craw had always had rooted suspicions that one day Calder would land him in some right shit, and it seemed this was the day. He marched him down the hillside away from the Heroes, through the cutting wind, gripping him tight by the elbow. He’d spent a good twenty years trying to keep his enemies to a strict few. One afternoon as Dow’s Second and they were sprouting up like saplings in a wet spring, and Brodd Tenways was one he could have very well done without. That man was as ugly inside as out and had a bastard of a memory for slights.

  ‘What the hell was that?’ He dragged Calder to a halt a good way from fires or prying ears. ‘You could’ve got us all killed!’

  ‘Scale’s dead. That’s what that was. Because that rotting fucker did nothing, Scale’s dead.’

  ‘Aye.’ Craw felt himself softening. Stood there for a moment while the wind lashed the long grass against his calves. ‘I’m sorry for that. But adding more corpses ain’t going to help matters. ’Specially not mine.’ He stuck a hand on his ribs, heart thumping away behind ’em. ‘By the dead, I think I might die just o’ the excitement.’