The Fell Sword

Chapter Ten





The Squash Country – Ota Qwan

Their march back through the Wild was rapid, and made the trip out look easy.

They sighted Crannog People each day. The giants didn’t move cautiously – indeed, they tended to leave a path of destruction wherever they went, whether in the woods, across a marsh, or along the edge of a trail, as if they visited destruction on plants and rocks as easily as on animals or creatures of the Wild. Ota Qwan sent his best trackers out on wide sweeps, and moved them from one cover to the next with the canny precision of a soldier.

Ta-se-ho shook his head after the third day. ‘I’ve never seen so many Ruk,’ he admitted. ‘Something has kicked their nest.’

The going was slow because of the heavy, sticky, ungainly buckets of honey, which the warriors carried on long yokes. A strong man could carry four buckets all day on a clear trail, but as soon as they left the main paths, the difficulty of negotiating the narrower capillaries of the Wild with yokes on their shoulders began to remind Nita Qwan of his days as a slave in the mountains east of Albinkirk.

By the time they reached their village they’d seen twenty giants, and they hadn’t lost a man, and Ota Qwan’s reputation as a leader had reached new heights. They had harvested almost fifty bark buckets of Wild honey, and they hadn’t lost one on the dangerous journey back.

Any sense of triumph was immediately overturned by the obvious sense of crisis that pervaded the village. Ruk had devastated a pair of villages at the eastern corner of the Sossag holdings. Only a few of the People had been killed – the Ruk enjoyed general devastation too much to focus on small prey – but the survivors became refugees at the edge of winter, and the trickle of new faces threatened to consume any surplus the Sossag had gathered after a spring spent at war.

The matrons met and talked, and summoned the Horned One, the old shaman who knew the lore of the land, and his apprentice, Gas-a-ho, passed the rumour that he had been asked about the Sacred Island.

‘What about it?’ Nita Qwan asked his wife.

She looked around as if others might be listening in on their conversation. ‘I shouldn’t know – I’m not a matron yet,’ she said, and patted her belly. ‘Although I expect you’ll see that status changed soon enough.’

‘Shouldn’t know isn’t the same as don’t know,’ he said.

She wriggled her toes. ‘To the east, just at the border of our hunting lands and those of the Huran, there is an island in the sea. On the island is a lake at the top of a mountain. In the centre of the lake is an island. It is sacred to all the peoples and creatures of the Wild.’

‘Sacred?’ he asked.

‘No one Power is allowed to hold it,’ she said, and would say no more.

The next day he asked Gas-a-ho while he and Ota Qwan mended nets, and the youth, puffed up with self-importance, said, ‘That is a matter for the shaman.’

They were repairing nets because the matrons had decided to send a fishing expedition out onto the lake to gather as many fish as they could. Their plan was to salt them against winter need. Another party of men would sweep the woods to the north and west for deer – and for early warning of Crannog People.

When the boy was gone, Ota Qwan finished a repair carefully, wrapping the bark thread again and again with practised ease. When he was done, he raised his eyes. ‘It’s Thorn,’ he said.

‘You can’t know that,’ Nita Qwan said with some annoyance. Ota Qwan’s endless sense of his own superiority was more than a little grating, despite his successes.

‘My wife’s mother told her, and she told me,’ Ota Qwan said. ‘Thorn has taken this place of power which I didn’t even know we had.’ He shrugged. ‘I didn’t expect the wilderness to be so small.’

‘What do we do?’ Nita Qwan asked. Thorn was more a name than a threat, but he understood that the sorcerer had been the Power behind their spring campaign. ‘He can’t force us to war in the winter – or can he?’

‘I’ve learned one thing in my years with the People,’ Ota Qwan said. ‘Let the matrons decide. You can shape the decision by influencing the information on which the matrons act, but after that you have to accept their word.’

‘And have you?’ Peter asked.

‘Have I what?’ Ota Qwan asked, biting off a length of bark twine.

‘Have you influenced the matron’s information?’ Peter asked. He wasn’t sure exactly why his brother annoyed him, but he was growing angry.

Ota Qwan spread his hands. ‘Don’t make me the bad guy. All hell is about to break loose on us, brother. There are giants out there, smashing villages. If they hit us we’ll spend the winter in the woods, and most of the children and old people will die. That’s not my opinion. That’s the way it is.’

‘So what do we do – talk to Thorn? Is this his doing?’ asked Peter.

Ota Qwan frowned. ‘The matrons think so. I don’t know what I think. ’

Nita Qwan smiled. ‘That’s a first.’

Ota Qwan shook his head. ‘I don’t want to quarrel, brother. The matrons think we should send for allies. Allies can lead to tangles.’

‘And the Huran?’ asked Nita Qwan.

‘The Southern Huran make war on the Northern. Nothing new there. Who knows who started it? The Southerners get trade goods from the Empire, and now the Northerners get trade goods from the Etruscans. They make war over beaver pelts and honey. The matrons say that this year the Etruscans haven’t come.’ He shrugged and sat back. ‘These are the sorts of things my family used to watch and understand. When I was another man – with another life. Why did I think life among the Sossag would be simple? It is life!’

The matrons debated for three days. It was the longest debate that any of them could remember, and the work of the village all but came to a stop. Rumours flew – that they would pick up their belongings and move until the giants were gone, that they would launch a great raid on the Huran for food and slaves, that they would send an embassy to Thorn . . .

In the end the senior matron, Blue Knife, the tallest woman in the village, called them to council.

‘Thorn has moved to the Sacred Island.’ She looked around with the calm dignity that characterised the matrons in all their dealings. Rumour said they fought like dogs when alone, but if there were any cracks in their unity they never showed to the rest of the People.

‘The Horned One, our shaman, has made his castings. He has confirmed it is Thorn on the Sacred Island, and that it is his workings that send the Crannog People into our lands.’ She looked around, and Peter felt as if her eyes came to rest on him. ‘We lack the strength to fight Thorn without allies,’ she said. ‘We have discussed sending to Tapio Haltija at N’gara, and we have discussed sending to Mogon and her people. It was Thorkhan, Mogon’s brother, who claimed these lands. But he died facing Thorn, and Thorn may well feel that he is now lord here.’

Again her eyes passed over the crowd. Again, Peter felt singled out.

‘We want this conflict to end. The warriors have been consulted. They say that every Ruk we kill does no hurt to Thorn, but will cost us ten men. They say Thorn can bring fire and death in the depths of winter when even men on snowshoes can do little to strike back. So had Tadaio made a decision for all the People: to ignore Thorn’s demands and go our own way. He thought we were strong enough. Perhaps we were – if Thorn had not chosen to become our neighbour. Now we must find another path. Tadaio is dead. We have lost two villages. So the matrons have decided to send an embassy to Thorn.’ She bowed to Ota Qwan. ‘We have chosen our brother Ota Qwan to lead that embassy.’


Ota Qwan rose and bowed. ‘I accept the task and the pipe of peace. I will attempt to bring Thorn to a happier disposition.’

Blue Knife frowned slightly. ‘Promise him anything he requires. Surrender anything but our bodies. Offer warriors in his wars.’

Ota Qwan was clearly displeased. ‘This is craven surrender!’

‘The matrons have seen the rise and fall of many Thorns. We lack the strength to face him. So we will lend him the least aid we can manage without incurring his wrath. We will offer songs to his pride. We will aid him.’

‘And then, when he is weak, we will strike!’ said Ota Qwan.

Blue Knife shook her head. ‘No. When he is weak, someone else like him will strike, and we will rejoice quietly, and grow our corn.’

The People sang three songs – all songs of the harvest season, and then they filed out. Peter was near the door, but a small hand on his arm blocked him as effectively as a giant, and he stepped aside to let others pass. Blue Knife stood there, with Small Hands and the other matrons.

‘You will not accompany Ota Qwan,’ Blue Knife said.

Peter had very little experience of dealing with the matrons. They did not issue orders – no one among the Free People issued orders. So he was taken aback by her tone, and he looked around. His wife was standing behind him and she nodded sharply in agreement.

‘He will not like that,’ Peter said.

Small Hands nodded gravely. ‘He will have other followers and friends. You must not go. Please – we ask this of you.’

Peter bowed. ‘I will not go.’

The next week was one of the most difficult Peter had experienced since becoming a Sossag. Ota Qwan lost no time in asking him to come, and then, once the invitation had been declined, became increasingly angry about it.

‘Don’t let your woman turn you into a coward,’ he said in his third attempt.

Peter shrugged. ‘She won’t.’

‘I need you. Men follow me for my skills – but they also follow me because you follow me. Ta-se-ho has declined to come. You know what he said? He said, Nita Qwan isn’t going.’ Ota Qwan was growing red, and his voice rose, and heads were turning all along the village street. It was a cold, windy day – a presage of autumn. There was rain in the air, and two Ruk had been spotted in the beaver meadow south-east of the village, which had everyone on edge.

‘I’m not coming this time,’ Peter said, as calmly as he could manage.

‘Why? Give me one reason. I led the honey gathering well. I have done nothing to offend you. I am polite to your bitch of a wife—’

The two men looked at each other. Peter was quite calm. ‘Please walk away,’ he said.

Ota Qwan put his hands on his hips. ‘I’m doing this all wrong. I’m sorry – I don’t think your wife is a bitch. Or rather, I do, but I assume you see something in her that I don’t. Listen, brother. I appeal to you. I admit that we have only known each other this summer. But I need you.’

Peter knew in his heart that the admission – that he needed Nita Qwan – had a cost.

He tried to smile. ‘I’m flattered—’ he began.

‘F*ck your patronising shit,’ Ota Qwan said with sudden rage. ‘Stay here and rot.’ He turned on his heel and walked away.

Peter suspected he’d just lost his friend. And his brother.

Why are the matrons putting me in this position?

Ota Qwan left the next day, with six men, all seasoned warriors from the summer campaign. The six of them – three chosen from the neighbouring village at Can-da-ga – were considered the finest warriors the People had to offer – all hot-blooded, all highly skilled.

Ota Qwan left the village carrying his best spear, wearing a sword, with a magnificent wolf cloak over his shoulders and a tunic of deerskin carefully decorated along every seam with a stiff border of porcupine quillwork and moose-hair embroidery. He looked like the Alban notion of an Outwaller king, and he walked with pride. He didn’t glance to the right or left, he refused Peter’s embrace, and then he was gone.

As soon as he was gone the matrons gathered in the street. There was a flare of temper from Amij’ha, and her mother spoke sharply to her.

‘You have sent my husband to his death!’ she shouted, and ran into her cabin.

Blue Knife set her face like stone and beckoned to Peter. ‘Nita Qwan,’ she called. He walked to her. Ta-se-ho followed.

He came to a stop. All the matrons were gathered in front of Amij’ha’s house – among the Sossag, the woman owned the house.

‘Nita Qwan, the last week must have been hard for you. But we have chosen your brother for a lesser errand. He will fail. He will go to Thorn, and Thorn will seduce him with the offer of war. This is the way of men.’

The sound of Amij’ha’s sobs echoed in the cabin.

‘We will send you to Mogon. She liked you – she spoke to you. You must leave immediately and travel very fast. Her people are strong, and have strong powers and many allies. Tell her the truth – that Thorn comes for us, and that we are too weak to do anything but blow in the wind.’

Nita Qwan sighed with understanding. ‘It is unfair. My brother—’ He paused. The women’s eyes were deep with understanding, with unspoken knowledge. He lowered his voice, and found that he was angry; in the way that Ota Qwan had never made him angry. ‘If you had sent my brother to Mogon, he would have stood tall for the people. If you had sent me to Thorn, I would have crawled for the people. By sending Ota Qwan to Thorn, you condemn him.’

Blue Knife looked down her nose at him. ‘This is as it must be. War will be his own choice – and that will blind Thorn to our intentions. All the men we sent were warlike, like Ota Qwan.’

‘My brother could have been better than that,’ Nita Qwan spat. ‘Indeed, he had been trying—’

‘We have sent your brother as a sacrifice to Thorn,’ Blue Knife said. ‘He is the husband of my daughter and the father of my granddaughter. Do not imagine that this was not much debated and discussed.’

Nita Qwan breathed in his rage, and breathed out, as his father had taught him five thousand leagues ago. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I will go. But you are no different than kings and chiefs and tyrants the world over if you send men to die like this, without giving them a chance.’

Small Hands shook her head. ‘You are angry and your head is big with tears, Nita Qwan. When you are on the trail, smoking your pipe in the darkness with the flames of your campfire before you, think on this: is the life of one man worth the life of all? Or this: we will not be there to choose for Ota Qwan. If he plays the part we told him to play he will return unharmed, and we will apologise and tell him how we used him.’

Blue Knife looked away. ‘But he will not. He will choose Thorn. Of his own free will.’ She turned back and her eyes locked with Nita Qwan’s. ‘Go to Mogon and beg for us. Yesterday, Thorn sent many creatures – some sort of bird or bat or moth – to kill people south of Can-da-ga. He will not end with that.’

Nita Qwan left the next morning, after some passionate lovemaking from his wife and a tearful farewell.

‘Am I being sacrificed like Ota Qwan?’ he asked her. ‘Would you know? Would you tell me?’

She leaned over, breasts brushing his chest, and licked his nose. ‘I might not know, but I’d always tell you. The matrons are all bitches. They don’t like me.’ She licked his nose again. ‘What they did to Ota Qwan, lover, he . . . I’m sorry. He had it coming. He is too much about himself. He wanted to be warlord and he said so. He was not like you. You have become one of us while he was a Southerner pretending to be a Sossag.’


Nita Qwan took the comfort offered and decided not to have a fight with his wife before leaving.

He took only Ta-se-ho who knew the way, and the shaman’s boy, Gas-a-ho. They took bows and pemmican and little else. Nita Qwan declined to carry the elaborate fur robe of an ambassador, and he rolled the quillwork belt that the shaman prepared for the matrons in his Alban snapsack with a blanket, and the three of them, having bowed to the matrons and kissed their women, left the village at a run, like hunters or warriors, and not at a walk like ambassadors.

For the first three days on the trail, it rained. The wind blew harder and harder, the temperature dropped, and the three men built big fires and huddled close under their brush shelters and were cold and wet most of the time. They ran almost all day – faster on the third day, as Gas-a-ho’s muscles hardened. He was young and not as strong as other boys, mostly because he’d chosen the way of the shaman and didn’t spend as much time hunting and fighting.

They passed south of the beaver country, right to the shore of the Inner Sea, and they spent a fruitless morning – their fourth on the trail – looking for a canoe.

‘We always sink them in this pool,’ Ta-se-ho said. He prodded the bottom of a deep pool in a feeder stream for an hour while the other two sat in the water sun and enjoyed being only a little damp. He didn’t find a canoe.

He didn’t find a canoe sunk in the deep bay of the Inner Sea, either. He shook his head. ‘Now we have to make a boat,’ he said.

Nita Qwan had not truly absorbed that this was alternative, and he shook his head. ‘I don’t even know how to make a boat.’

The other two men looked at him and laughed.

The boy gathered spruce root. Nita Qwan watched him for a little while, and all the boy did was wander from spruce to spruce, dig down to the wispy surface roots, and pull. When he had a good length, he’d cut the roots with his neck knife, and go to the next. He didn’t strip a single tree – not even a scrubby little tree at the edge of a meadow. He simply took one length of root from each tree.

Ta-se-ho watched him for a while, too. ‘He’s good. The Horned One is a fine teacher. Let’s go find a tree.’

Finding a tree led to hours of walking in the deep woods. It was hard to make sense of this – they were in a hurry, rushing to take a message to the powerful wardens, and yet they were wandering from tree to tree in the woods. Peter was overwhelmed with frustration for several hours, until Nita Qwan decided that this was a matter for careful deliberation.

Ta-se-ho confirmed this view. ‘If the bark opens like a flower while we are on the sea, we die,’ he said. ‘It is worth the time to choose a good tree.’

They hadn’t found it yet, but they found other things – a pair of twisted spruces that years of wind had bent almost over. Ta-se-ho cut both of them down with a light axe – a fine tool, dark steel with a white edge, from Alba.

He tapped many trees with the butt of the same axe – yellow birch, white birch, paper birch – and pulled at the bark on elm and pine and birch alike. As he walked among them, he sang.

‘White birch is best,’ he said.

Nita Qwan felt entirely useless, but somehow, as the day progressed, he learned – almost wordlessly, because Ta-se-ho was a silent teacher – what it was they wanted. They searched for a dead tree – recently dead – with the bark ready to peel away. They found several, all together in the afternoon. They were all a little too small, but the way that his silent companion handled them, and peeled the elm bark back from the trunks, told Nita Qwan most of what he needed to know.

The sun had come out quite strong, and the day was more like late summer than autumn. The two men were stripped to their breechclouts by afternoon, and walking through the magnificent trees was more beautiful than anything Nita Qwan had done – except perhaps make love – for many days. He savoured the smell of the leaves, and the magnificent royal dazzle of red and gold.

As the sun began to sink, he saw a pond, and along the pond a dozen enormous birch trees like white maidens standing over a forest pool. He walked that way, confident that he could find Ta-se-ho, or that the older man could find him, and he reached the first tree – already excited to see that the crown was dead. The bark had the loose feel he thought might be correct, and he turned to raise his voice and saw the doe standing, head turned to watch him, within easy bowshot.

He thought that she was small enough to carry, and he took his bow from its sheath and strung it while she drank warily and watched him.

Then she turned her head, ignoring him. Her ears swivelled like a horse’s ears.

He loosed an arrow, and missed entirely in his hurry. The fall of his spent shaft startled her, and she whirled, white tail shooting up, and he realised that there was another animal, a small buck, even closer to him that he hadn’t seen. He got a second shaft onto his string – the buck turned, and then looked back, and then leaped along the edge of the pond.

He loosed at point-blank range and his shaft went home to the feathers. The deer fell in a tangle of its own hooves, life extinguished almost instantly, and the doe swerved and ran on, ignoring him as she bounded away.

He stood there, flush with deer fever, and realised that the fading hoof beats of the doe were not the only large animal sounds he was hearing.

The hastenoch came down to the edge of the pool along the same path the doe had taken, its long obscene head and enormous antler rack sending a sharp jolt through his body as he realised what had actually panicked the deer.

He found that his fingers had put an arrow on his string.

A horn blew – raucous and long. The four-hoofed monster raised its snout and looked east, towards the other end of the pond – and charged. There was no warning; it went from standing still to full gallop and it screamed its uncanny cry.

Nita Qwan loosed and missed – it was too fast. He had time to loose three more shafts as the great thing raced along the far shore, and his third shaft hit it squarely just behind the armoured plates of its head and upper neck, and the shaft went deep.

Ta-se-ho shot it twice, but both shafts glanced off the bony plates of its head.

Then he seemed to disappear. It was like magic. He was there – and then he was gone.

The horned thing slammed, head first, into the tree next to which Ta-se-ho had been standing. The crash echoed off the trees standing by the pond, and again off the rock face that rose in granite splendour into the afternoon sunlight.

The great beast reared, backed, and slammed into the tree again. Now the monster had an arrow standing upright between his shoulders, like a crest, and then another.

Nita Qwan loosed again. He was shooting the length of the pond, now.

It was too far to see cause and effect, but the monster suddenly sat. It trumpeted its rage, and got its back feet under it.

It sprouted three more arrows – tick, tick, tick.

Nita Qwan’s hands were shaking so hard he had to pause and breathe. But the thing seemed to be down, and he got another arrow – the one he thought of as his best, with a heavy steel head and a heavy shaft and a deep nock he’d carved himself – on the string and then ran at the monster. It was struggling to rise again.

Tick. It now had seven shafts in it.

Ta-se-ho dropped from the tree that the monster had rushed. He landed lightly, bounced to his feet and drew his long knife – and the hastenoch rolled to its feet, antlers lowered.

It rushed him – an explosion of sinew and antler – its rack caught him and he was tossed as Nita Qwan stepped in close, drew his bow to the ear, and put his heaviest shaft through its withers from so close that its carrion smell was like death incarnate in his nostrils.


It whirled on him and he fed it his bow, right into the tentacled mouth. The horn tip of the bow bit deep and then the bow bent and snapped and it was on him and he was on the ground amidst the cold leaves – a great weight on his chest – a sense of slipping – away, away—

It was dark, and he was cold.

He opened his eyes, and the stars were cold and very far, and he was small and very cold himself.

He opened his mouth and a grunt escaped – and suddenly there was movement.

Gas-a-ho had a canteen to his lips. ‘Drink!’ he said. ‘Are you hurt?’

It seemed a foolish question. Until you spoke, I thought I was dead, Nita Qwan thought. He took a deep breath, and smelled only wet fur and carrion. His hand touched something cold and very slimy – a tentacle – and he flinched. And his feet moved.

‘I can’t get it off you,’ Gas-a-ho said. The boy was fighting panic.

‘Where’s Ta-se-ho?’ Nita Qwan asked.

‘I thought he was with you,’ said the boy. ‘When dark was coming, I gave up that you two were coming back. I stashed my roots and followed your tracks. This thing was still twitching when I came.’

Nita Qwan could feel the marks of the tentacles on his face and arms. ‘Trying to eat me,’ he said aloud. ‘Even while it was dying.’ His memory of the last moments of the fight was skewed, and he tried as best he could to piece it together. ‘Ta-se-ho was here – he got tossed by the beast.’

The boy had a fire. He could see it, and the promise of its warmth trickled through his injured spirit. He dug into the ground with his elbows – there was a shallow puddle under the small of his back – and he pushed, wriggling his feet.

The dead monster was soft and hard, and the armour plates of its head were resting just below his groin. He couldn’t feel his legs, but he seemed to be able to make them move.

He fought down panic. ‘Get my spear, Gas-a-ho. Is it here?’ he asked.

‘I have it!’ the boy said proudly. He went out of Nita Qwan’s field of vision and then came back.

Wolves howled. They were right across the pond devouring the buck he’d shot.

The boy came back. ‘I’ve cast a working on my arms to make them stronger,’ he said. And then, ‘I hope.’

‘Put the spear under the head. Put a log under the spear, and use it as a lever – no, under the head – good. Careful – don’t break the spear . . . there, it moved!’

In a moment, he dragged his right leg free. He had to use his hands, but his legs were bare, and that made them slippery and, although he lost his moccasin, he got the leg out.

The wolves howled. They sounded closer.

‘Hurry,’ he said. There was no pain in his right leg, but neither was there any feeling in it. He wriggled, getting his back out of the pool of water, and set his hands. The boy dug the spearhead into the earth, and pulled.

The wolves bayed, shockingly close, and provided them both with an additional incentive. He got his left foot to move – an inch, another, and then a third. They were sticky, slimy inches, but once it started to move, he wouldn’t stop – not to wait for the wave of pain, the crippling sick ache of a broken bone or ripped muscle. Instead, he felt nothing but a vague slipping, as if the limb was not his but the dead beast’s.

And then he was free.

He crawled fifty feet to the fire, and lay full length in its warmth, heedless of the slavering wolves.

Before the warmth could lull him, the return of life to his lower limbs struck like ice and fire and the pangs of love and being eaten alive all together. He grunted, rolled, thrashed, and grunted again.

The boy looked terrified, and Nita Qwan tried to force a smile. ‘I’m fine,’ he muttered, sounding foolish. ‘No – really – very lucky – ah!’ he said.

But shortly after, when he had some control of his feet, he listened to the wolves and turned to the boy. Gas-a-ho had gathered all their kit and made a small shelter, built a fire – even butchered part of the deer he’d shot, and cooked a haunch of the meat. Nita Qwan got his short sword from his pack and hobbled to the fire.

Gas-a-ho was by him like a swift arrow. ‘I made torches,’ he said proudly. ‘I was going to try and get you out if the wolves came – or at least fight them off.’

‘I think the whole pack fed on deer meat, and now they will sleep,’ Nita Qwan said. ‘But we must find Ta-se-ho if we can. He may be dead. But if he is not, a night this cool could kill him.’ He took a torch and went back to the corpse of the monster, which in flickering torchlight looked almost as terrifying as it had alive.

There was something to the glistening pile of its tentacles that made his stomach turn.

He forced himself to breathe, in and out, and walked past the massive rack of antlers that had miraculously not fallen on his face and killed him.

As usual, everything was bigger at night. He couldn’t find the tree that Ta-se-ho had been in – he had no moccasins and his feet were being crucified by the sharp gravel and sticks.

He stepped on the older hunter in the dark – a soft resistance, a yielding—

Something grabbed his leg and threw him to the ground – he rolled on his shoulder and turned, torch lost. He must have shouted out as he fell.

Ta-se-ho sat up. ‘You almost killed me,’ he said, and managed a weak laugh.

They took turns keeping the hunter warm. He had a badly broken collarbone, and he couldn’t use his left arm at all. He was also in shock, and despite his attempts to fend off their help, he needed every hot cup of tea, and every blanket they had. As the feeling returned to Nita Qwan’s feet, he became more mobile, and he and the boy scrounged for firewood in the damp dark.

But in the morning, the sun rose. Nita Qwan had feared rain, but it was a beautiful day. Until the effort of downing a standing dead tree in the dawn light showed that he had cracked ribs.

He returned to camp to find Ta-se-ho coaching the boy on extracting all the best parts of the deadly hastenoch. By daylight the monster was smaller and less terrifying than Nita Qwan could have imagined, and as the boy meticulously removed its head plates and its tendons for sinew, it became first pitiful and then merely meat.

Ta-se-ho took tobacco from his pouch, cast it over the dead thing and sang a song for its spirit. When he was done, he sipped tea. ‘You up to making a boat?’ he asked, and coughed.

Nita Qwan thought of protesting about his ribs, or his inexperience. But the other two seemed untroubled by the debacle. So he tried to shrug it off, too. ‘Sure,’ he said.

‘We will have many strong things from papa here,’ said Ta-se-ho. ‘They eat us. We use them.’ He laughed. ‘Is it different, down south?’

Nita Qwan piled up his cut firewood and then sat by the wounded man, who was laboriously lighting a pipe. Nita Qwan knelt and lit his char cloth and passed a lit taper of paper birch to the other man, who sat back in what appeared to be complete contentment.

‘I was never really in the south,’ he said. ‘I’m from beyond the sea.’

‘Etrusca?’ asked the old hunter. He took a deep draught of smoke and handed the pipe to Nita Qwan.

‘No, Ifriqu’ya.’ He took smoke himself.

‘Is everyone there as dark as you?’ the other man asked. ‘I have always wanted to ask how you came to be so dark, but it seemed rude.’

Nita Qwan remembered Peter’s youth, and smiled. ‘Everyone is,’ he said.


‘Very handsome. Good in the woods, too.’ Ta-se-ho nodded, as if this defined what was good. ‘You saved my life.’

‘Perhaps you drew the creature to yourself.’ Nita Qwan passed the pipe back.

‘Hah! I was a fool. I thought I had it – a trap, a trick, and my bow.’ He shook his head. ‘It should be a saying: never try to fight a monster by yourself.’ He grunted, took smoke, and handed the pipe back. ‘Of course there is another saying: there’s no fool like an old fool.’

Greatly daring, the boy reached out for the pipe. Nita Qwan handed it to him. ‘Truthfully, we both owe our lives to this boy,’ he said.

The older man smiled at the boy and ruffled his hair. ‘Ah – it will only make him insufferable,’ he said. He pointed with the pipe’s reed stem at the white birch standing at the water’s edge. ‘Were those what brought you here?’ he asked.

‘Yes – the nearest one. I thought it might make a good boat.’ Nita Qwan shrugged.

Ta-se-ho nodded. ‘I may make a hunter of you yet. Listen – this is what we should do. Today, you two cut firewood. Lots of it. Yes? Then, tomorrow, we cut the tree and take the bark. Next day I’ll be better – we move camp to the sea. Then we build the boat.’

‘How many days before we are on our way?’ Peter asked.

The hunter gave him an impatient look. ‘However many it takes,’ he said.

Liviapolis – Ser Thomas Lachlan

The defeat of the Etruscans was a three-day wonder. Within the company, they knew that the victory was not as good as it seemed, and Bad Tom was rapidly coming to regret accepting the task of hunting spies.

The company – with a hundred Morean shipwrights and labourers – had built three heavy galleys in a week – or rather, the new ships were framed on the quays, waiting for the long work of nailing planks. The planks had to be adzed to shape, and the trees had to be felled before that, and it seemed that Andronicus, the former Duke of Thrake, controlled most of the long, straight spruce and oak in Morea. Ser Jehan took twenty men-at-arms and as many archers into the hills with orders to fetch in enough lumber to complete ten row-galleys. He went with good grace. The second day after he left, he sent a report of an attempted ambush.

In the city, Tom chased phantoms.

Every archer received a handbill written out carefully by a scribe who’d never read Alban, announcing that every man who deserted from the company would receive fifty gold nobles and a free pass to Alba – or higher wages in the armies of the true Duke of Thrake, fighting for the true Emperor.

Whoever had written the handbills had mistaken the archers for men who cared which side was in the right. A great deal of ink had been spent on describing the Princess Irene as a scheming usurper and Duke Andronicus as a loyal supporter of the Emperor.

Bad Tom sat in his ‘office’, a table in the guardroom where the senior officers stood watches, and read it carefully. Across the table, Cully sat with his hands folded.

‘Cap’n – which I mean the Duke – won’t think I want to run, would he?’ Cully asked. The Captain’s temper had been sour since they left Lissen Carrak and now verged on poisonous.

Bad Tom shrugged. ‘If he does, he’s f*cked in the head. Where would you go? Who’d take you?’

Cully struggled to decide whether he should defend his status as a master archer or his loyalty.

Tom threw the bill back at him. ‘Anyone tempted?’ he asked. Long Paw had brought him the same bill, and now sat with his feet up.

Long Paw made a face. ‘There’s the usual awkward sods. We don’t have enough choir boys, that much I can tell ye. And skipping a pay parade – well that started some mutters.’ Long Paw had a low, gravelly voice that utterly belied his gentle nature and correctly warned the listener of his danger, too. He cleared his throat – half of them had colds. ‘No one will run now. Miss two or three more pay days; someone will run then.’

Bad Tom nodded his agreement.

Bent came in to the guardroom, spoke briefly to the officer of the day, Ser George Brewes, who sat with his armoured feet on a table and drank wine. Brewes was, in many ways, the worst soldier imaginable – he was a terrible example and he was bad for discipline.

The men loved him, so he got away with it.

Bent tossed a casual salute to Ser George and came up to Bad Tom’s table. He reached into the breast of his doublet and withdrew a crumpled handbill.

Bad Tom passed his eyes over it and nodded. ‘Sit,’ he muttered. ‘How would you three like to desert?’

Bent narrowed his eyes. ‘They’d never buy it. We’re master archers. Well, some of us are.’ Bent shot a glance at Cully, who rolled his eyes.

Bad Tom sighed. ‘I need to get a more private place to meet. For the nonce, I am assuming that everyone in the company is reliable. But listen. Whoever’s up to this ain’t ten feet tall. They think we care whose side we’re on. They don’t know us. Stands to reason we can feed them a few archers.’

Bent flexed his hands.

Long Paw studied his nails the way a woman might. ‘What’s in it for us?’ he asked.

‘A good fight?’ asked Bad Tom. ‘Money?’ he tried.

All three men brightened up.

‘Shares? Man-at-arm’s shares?’ Long Paw leaned forward.

Tom rolled his eyes. ‘As long as you three realise I’ve never made one thin clipped silver leopard from my share.’

They all four shook hands on it.

Long Paw went to the taverna that was listed on his handbill. He was the only archer who spoke the Morean version of Archaic, and he dressed in a heavy linen overshirt and a broad straw hat and walked all the way around the city – outside the walls – to enter at the Vardariot gate driving a small pig.

Either his disguise was excellent or no one was watching him. He scouted the taverna, behind the Academy and in a seedy slum of small tenements and three-storey stuccoed houses with flat roofs, and returned without incident.

When he came back, the whole company was turned out in armour, standing at attention in the Outer Court. Bad Tom had already taken twenty lances to the Navy Yard.

Someone had torched their new ships on the stocks, and someone else had poisoned a great many of the company’s horses.

The Captain – whose beautiful new horse was dead – walked up and down in front of his company, obviously deep in rage.

Long Paw slipped into the guardroom. Wilful Murder was the duty archer – he was leaning in the doorway of the guardroom watching the fun.

‘Christ on the cross – you’ll catch it,’ Wilful said. He was delighted to see someone so senior as Long Paw so deeply in the shit.

‘Heh,’ Long Paw grunted. ‘What’s the Cap’n on about?’

‘We turned out for the alarm, and there ain’t forty horses fit to ride. Turns out he ordered the stables guarded, but they weren’t. Ser Jehan ain’t here to say one way or another, see?’ Wilful shook his head. ‘Ser Milus said – right on parade, in front of everybody – that the Cap’n clean forgot to order the stables guarded.’

Long Paw grunted, slipped into the barracks and had a nap.

The next day, a maid, one of the Princess Irene’s servants and a pretty thing already chased by half a dozen Scholae, two Nordikans, and Francis Atcourt, died of poison in the palace kitchen. Bad Tom ran through the palace to get to her corpse as soon as he heard, but by the time he reached the kitchens she had been taken for burial and all of the people who might have had something to say were gone to their duties.


He did find Harald Derkensun and his pretty whore Anna. The two men clasped arms. They spoke briefly, and Anna nodded several times.

That night Bad Tom reported to his Captain, who had lines on his face and dark circles under his eyes and was sitting drinking wine with Ser Milus, who looked as bad or worse.

‘Sorry, Captain – er, my lord Duke.’ Bad Tom paused in the doorway of the Captain’s outer office.

Ser Milus rose stiffly. ‘I should go,’ he said.

‘You can hear anything Tom has to say. Milus – I’m sorry. My temper got the best of me.’ The Duke put a hand on his standard bearer’s shoulder, but the older knight simply bowed and withdrew – gracefully enough that it was hard to see if he was angry or not.

‘You must hae’ cocked up proper. Ne’er heard you speak so small to any man.’ Tom grinned.

‘I was an arse of the first water, and the worst of it, Tom, is that I feel as if I’m losing my mind. Nay – forget I said that. Anything saved on the docks?’ The Duke mixed something into his wine with the tip of his fighting knife.

‘Master Aeneas thinks we can save one hull out of the three,’ Tom said. ‘I doubled the guard and put him to it. For what it’s worth, I accept that it’s my fault and ye can do as ye like.’

There was a silence.

‘Well, I accept that it was my fault too, so we can both sulk together. You won’t be rid of this job so easily.’ The Duke tossed off a cup of wine.

‘Ye’r drinking hard these days.’ Tom poured some for himself. Toby was making himself scarce – he looked like he was going to have a prime black eye, too.

‘Yes, well, some days it is like I have a f*cking voice inside my head and I’m never alone! ’ He spat.

Tom laughed. ‘Nah, that’s just Sauce.’

The Captain spat out some of his wine. ‘You make me laugh, Tom,’ he said. ‘I wonder if that means I’ve lost my mind.’

‘Like eno,’ said Tom. ‘Listen, Cap’n – I’d like to send Bent and Cully to pretend to be deserters. Long Paw will cover them.’

The Captain sighed. ‘We can ill afford to lose three of our best men. But – yes. It’s your command. Any word from Jehan?’

‘His guides mislead him and he thinks it was done a-purpose. He killed one.’ Tom shrugged.

‘We could be so unpopular here, Tom.’ The Duke shrugged. ‘But Jehan knows what he’s doing. We need that wood.’ He looked up. ‘Any word from Sauce?’

‘She’s chatting with people; people she knew here.’ Tom shrugged. ‘She’s a strange one. She was a whore, here?’

‘Right here in this city,’ the Red Knight said.

‘Aweel. She’s off tonight to talk to an armourer. Says that this man witch was one of his father’s apprentices, fifty years back.’ Tom didn’t sound very interested. ‘She’s also found me some useful people.’

‘Paid informants?’ the Red Knight asked. ‘Spies? Whores? Tavern ruffians?’

Bad Tom nodded. ‘Aye.’

The Red Knight grimaced. ‘We are living in the very annals of chivalry, ain’t we?’