Geralt Snakewater came after. The big man was too ashamed to look Gabe’s way, but he spared a respectful nod for Ganelon, who was standing on the carcass of the flying centipede with one eye on the sky.
Next came a whole host of bands Clay didn’t recognise, though many of them announced themselves to Gabriel as they went by. The men of Giantsbane were big blonde northerners, each wielding an axe almost as huge as Syrinx; Courtney and the Sparks bore southern scimitars and red silk skirts; the Silent Sons were ashen faced, mute as corpses as they marched into line; the Banshees ran past screaming; the Dustgalls shouted greetings in a language Clay had never heard; the Renegades sported an array of black eyes, bloodied noses, and gap-toothed smiles, as though they’d already been in a scrap that morning and were eager for more.
Mercenaries were announced by their bards as they emerged from the portal: Layla Sweetpenny, Jasper the Creep, Brother Sandman, Hasdrubal Doomflayer. There was a man called the Blind Tiger who might actually have been blind, and another named Ben the Stalactian who looked as though there was giant’s blood in his veins.
Plenty of old names showed up as well—Tushino the Wicked, Jorma Mulekicker, Queen-Killer Lysanthe—and a great many bands Clay was surprised to see still touring: the Dreamers, the Locksmiths, the Wheat Kings, Slade and the War-Dancers. Red Bob strode proudly toward the front, trailed by a frightened bard that looked as if he were contemplating a sudden retirement. Neil the Young hobbled by, leaning heavily on a gnarled staff, prompting Clay to wonder if the grey-bearded wizard went by Neil the Old these days.
They kept on coming, streaming from the Threshold like a river delta flooding into the sea. Here came Deckart Clearwater and his double-hafted hammer, followed by Hank the Beholder, whose shield, due to an elaborate contraption built into the grip, could spout fire from the red eye painted on its face. Here came the Black Puddings, the People Eaters, the Shewolves. Five men jogged past wearing the livery of Fivecourt guardsmen. Each one waved at Clay as if they knew him.
Here came the Sisters in Steel, barrelling toward the wing on sleek white horses. They looked considerably more deadly and significantly less glamourous than they had during the parade back in Conthas. Here came the Stormriders as well, one of which stopped to shake Gabriel’s hand and mutter an apology for, as he rather flippantly put it, that whole business with the chimera.
Clay felt a prickle on his skin and caught some kid glaring at him. It took him a moment to place where he’d seen that scowl before, but he finally did.
“The fuck you looking at?” he asked the platinum-haired frontman of the Screaming Eagles—the one who’d managed to provoke Ganelon into a fight in the Riot House back in Fivecourt. The young man bore a crooked nose as a memento of that illfated confrontation.
“A legend, apparently,” said the kid, waving his bandmates by.
“Same here,” Clay told him. The frontman nodded, obviously heartened, and trotted off.
Truth be told, Clay didn’t even know the kid’s name, but it never hurt to bolster someone’s confidence before a fight, and who said Gabriel had a monopoly on kick-ass pep talks? Clay was watching the boy go when Gabe took his shoulder and turned him round.
Barret had taken Vanguard to the front already, and Kit was watching the endless stream of wild-eyed warriors still arriving from the fair-grounds in Kaladar, which left Clay and his bandmates alone for the first time since they’d raided Kallorek’s compound more than a month before—something each of them seemed to apprehend at once.
Moog and Matrick put an arm around each other. The wizard slung his other behind Clay’s back, while Matty reached up and placed a hand on Ganelon’s broad shoulder. The southerner shifted uncomfortably but didn’t shrug him off, nor did he shy away when Gabriel clasped his left wrist to complete the circle.
Clay had no idea how long the five of them stood like that, though afterward he thought it might have been an absurdly long time, considering the fact that the Heartwyld Horde was now bearing down on them. For a while no one spoke, because in the roundabout course of thirty-some years they had said just about all there was to say to one another, until finally Clay could bear the silence no longer and cleared his throat.
“I love you guys,” he said, and gods-be-damned if his voice didn’t sell him out at the end and crack like a boy of twelve summers.
Moog nearly choked on a sob himself. “I love you guys, too,” he said, unashamed by the tears rolling over his cheeks.
“Me too,” Matty croaked.
“I love you,” said Gabriel, matching gazes with each of them one by one. “All of you.”
Ganelon remained silent, but when the rest of them looked his way he rolled his eyes and loosed a sympathetic growl. “Okay, fine. You’re the last four people I’d ever kill.”
A smile slipped onto Gabe’s face for the length of a long breath, before it slid like a sickle moon behind a wisp of sombre cloud. “For Rose,” he said.
“For Rose,” they echoed, and by then the first horns of war were blowing, loud and long and clear across the sky.
The battle for Castia was about to begin.
A battle, as relayed by a poet, is a glorious thing, full of heroic stands, daring charges, and valiant sacrifice. But a battlefield, as experienced by some poor bastard mired in the thick of it, is something different altogether.
The word clusterfuck came to mind.
At least it’s clear who the enemy is, thought Clay, using Blackheart to deflect the spear of a charging centaur as Gabriel took its front legs off at the knee. The centaur’s wailing face-plant might have been amusing were there not several hundred more of his kind galloping behind.
Although they hadn’t seen Lastleaf or his wyvern matriarch as of yet, there was clear evidence of a mastermind behind the Horde’s tactics thus far. A detachment of centaurs and mounted wargs had circled to the north in an attempt to flank Grandual’s mercenaries.
Gabriel, exerting what little influence he could over his ragtag army, sent the Sisters in Steel, along with every other rider at his disposal, out to meet them. Their orders had been to break off as soon as possible, while Saga led a few hundred mercs on foot behind. Centaurs could mount a devastating charge, but once engaged, especially in the close-quarters chaos of a battlefield, they were pushovers. Unlike typical cavalry, where if you injured a horse you still had to deal with its rider, the horse-men presented huge targets, and if you hamstrung one it was fairly easy to finish it off.
Once Saga and the others had locked down their foes, the Sisters and their mercenary cavalry rushed back in from the rear. Before long the centaurs were dead or put to rout, while the wargs, enraged by bloodlust, began to turn on friend and foe alike.
A fair start, Clay was forced to admit, but that was the last manoeuvre Gabe could hope to make. By now the two forces—the horde of monsters and the host of mercenaries—had crashed together into a brawling morass that sounded to Clay’s ears like an ocean filled with several hundred thousand drowning people all screaming for help at once.
“This way,” yelled Gabe. He slipped through a knot in the fighting and led Saga toward the centre. Clay followed as close as he could. His left arm was mending but was far from healed. It was still in its sling, leaving him little choice but to stay on Gabe’s heels and weather whatever blows he could on behalf of his friend. Matrick skulked after them like an urchin, slicing open foes like they were purse bottoms in a market square. Ganelon hacked his way alongside them with Syrinx, and Moog, who had strapped a quartet of bandoliers to his chest, was lobbing vial after vial of volatile explosives into the enemy ranks.