‘We don’t plan to surrender,’ he said.
‘But we must seem to. And anyway.’ Skara set her thin shoulders under the weight of her mail, narrowing her eyes against the glare. ‘I mean to look Bright Yilling in the face when he dies.’
Raith could’ve told her there were no secrets worth learning in the face of a dying man, not even your bitterest enemy. Only pain and fear. A glimpse of the pain and fear you’d feel when your turn came. And everyone’s turn would come soon enough. But those who knew it didn’t want to hear it, and those who didn’t had to learn it for themselves. So Raith kept silent.
The gate stood wide open, now, the boot-scarred, wreckage-strewn, arrow-wounded ground stretching away, cold and empty, dew glittering in the grass. Far off, just showing in the dawn haze, were the sharpened stakes that marked the High King’s lines.
Blue Jenner cleared his throat. ‘We sure about this plan?’
‘Bit late to think up another,’ said Rulf.
‘We have waded into the swamp to our necks,’ Mother Scaer snarled through clenched teeth, and she twisted her head in a circle and made her neck-bones click. ‘The only way out is through.’
‘We are sure.’ Father Yarvi showed no sign of second thoughts, the tapping of his staff echoing from the elf-stone walls as he set off down the entrance passage. Strolling towards the Last Door with elf-magic their only hope of victory. Everything gambled on one last, mad cast of the runes. The gods knew Raith had never been much for prayers, but he mouthed a quick one then.
‘Stay close,’ he muttered over his shoulder.
Skara’s eyes were fixed ahead. ‘I know where to be.’
As they stepped into the dawn they spread out to make an arrowhead. Father Yarvi went at the point, head high. Raith, Jenner and Rulf took the left, Gorm, Soryorn and Hunnan the right, all six of them carrying the biggest shields they could find and wishing they were bigger. Skara and Mother Scaer walked behind. Dosduvoi came last, a dove prow-beast mounted on a pole and held high above them, to show they came in peace.
Even if there’d never been a bigger lie.
Koll stood above the gate, frowning into the wind. Frowning down at the ten tiny figures creeping out across no-man’s land. Frowning at the few men of the South Wind’s crew scattered on the walls, clinging to the relics they brought out from Strokom. Frowning towards the High King’s army, surrounding Bail’s Point on every side, like the jaws of a world-swallowing wolf about to snap shut.
Everywhere the glint of metal caught the dawn. The banners of heroes stirred in the breeze. The greatest warriors of Yutmark, Inglefold and the Lowlands. The fiercest of the Shends. The most ruthless mercenaries, dragged from every corner of the world by the promise of plunder. All the High King’s matchless power, gathered by Grandmother Wexen in one place and with one purpose. The greatest host assembled since the elves made war on God, and fixed on Koll’s destruction.
Well, not just his, but if things went ill for Father Yarvi the future for his apprentice did not exactly burn bright.
Koll realized he was clutching tight at the battlements and made his aching hands unclench. He hadn’t felt this scared since … the last time he felt this scared. Not long ago, now he thought about it. There had been Strokom, and before that Prince Varoslaf, and before that the climb up the walls not far from where he stood.
‘Gods,’ he muttered to himself, watching those ten little figures halt on a hump of ground to await the inevitable. ‘I need to learn courage.’
‘Or better yet,’ murmured Skifr, ‘avoid danger.’
He glanced down at the old woman, sitting cross-legged, her head tipped back against the chill stone, her hood of rags drawn over her face so all he could see was her mouth, twisted faintly in a smile.
‘Can we really beat all these men?’ he whispered, tugging nervously at one hand with the other.
Skifr unfolded her long limbs and stood, twitching back her hood. ‘All these? Hah!’ She rummaged in her nose with one long finger, then neatly flicked the results over the walls towards the High King’s men. ‘I almost wish there were more.’ She held out her hand and, ever so gingerly, as though afraid it might burst into flames, which indeed he was, Koll handed her the first of the drums. ‘No host of men can stand against the power of the elves.’ Skifr tapped the drum against the side of her head then slotted it into the blunt elf-relic she carried, knocked it home with a click, spun it so it gave a whirring rattle and the letters written upon it became a blur. ‘You will see.’