Unhappy the land that 3 page

The Northman stepped up to the table and snapped out a vibrating salute. ‘Marshal Kroy, sir!’ A joke, of course, since he was an ally rather than an underling.

‘If we march for Carleon in force, is it likely that Black Dow will finally offer battle?’

The Dogman rubbed a hand over his stubbled jaw. ‘Maybe. He ain’t the most patient. Looks bad for him, letting you tramp all over his back yard these past few months. But he’s always been an unpredictable bastard, Black Dow.’ He had a bitter look on his face for a moment, as if remembering something painful. ‘One thing I can tell you, if he decides on battle he won’t offer nothing. He’ll ram it right up your arse. Still, it’s worth a try.’ Dogman grinned around the officers. ‘’Specially if you like it up your arse.’

‘Not my first choice, but they say a general should be prepared for anything.’ Kroy traced a road to its junction, then tapped at the paper. ‘What is this town?’

The Dogman leaned over the table to squint at the map, considerably inconveniencing a pair of unhappy staff officers and giving the impression of not caring in the least. ‘That’s Osrung. Old town, set in fields, with a bridge and a mill, might have, what … three or four hundred people in peacetime? Some stone buildings, more wood. High fence around the outside. Used to have a damn fine tavern but, you know, nothing’s how it used to be.’

‘And this hill? Near where the roads from Ollensand and Uffrith meet?’

‘The Heroes.’

‘Odd name for a hill,’ grunted Mitterick.

‘Named after a ring of old stones on top. Some warriors of ancient days are buried beneath ’em, or that’s one rumour, anyway. You get quite a view from up there. I sent a dozen to have a look-see the other day, in fact, check if any of Dow’s boys have shown their faces.’

‘And?’

‘Nothing yet, but no reason there should be. There’s help nearby, if they get pressed.’

‘That’s the spot, then.’ Kroy craned closer to the map, pressing the point of his stick into that hill as though he could will the army there. ‘The Heroes. Felnigg?’

‘Sir?’

‘Send word to Lord Governor Meed to abandon the siege of Ollensand and march with all haste to meet us near Osrung.’

That got a few sharp in-breaths. ‘Meed will be furious,’ said Mitterick.

‘He often is. That cannot be helped.’

‘I’ll be heading back that way,’ said Dogman. ‘Meet up with the rest o’ my boys and get ’em moving north. I can take the message.’

‘It might be better if Colonel Felnigg carries it personally. Lord Governor Meed is … not the greatest admirer of Northmen.’

‘Unlike the rest of you, eh?’ The Dogman showed the Union’s finest a mouthful of sharp yellow teeth. ‘I’ll make a move, then. With any luck I’ll see you up the Heroes in what … three days? Four?’

‘Five, if this weather gets no better.’

‘This is the North. Let’s call it five.’ And he followed Bayaz out of the low sitting room.

‘Well, it might not be the way we wanted it.’ Mitterick smashed a meaty fist into a meaty palm. ‘But we can show them something, now, eh? Get those skulking bastards out in the open and show them something!’ The legs of his chair shrieked as he stood. ‘I will hurry my division along. We should make a night march, Lord Marshal! Get at the enemy!’

‘No.’ Kroy was already sitting at his desk and dipping pen in ink to write orders. ‘Halt them for the night. On these roads, in this weather, haste will do more harm than good.’

‘But, Lord Marshal, if we—’

‘I intend to rush, General, but not headlong into a defeat. We must not push the men too hard. They need to be ready.’

Mitterick jerked up his gloves. ‘Damn these damn roads!’ Gorst stood aside to let him and his staff file from the room, silently wishing he was ushering them through into a bottomless pit.

Kroy raised his brows as he wrote. ‘Sensible men … run away … from battles.’ His pen scratched neatly across the paper. ‘Someone will need to take this order to General Jalenhorm. To move with all haste to the Heroes and secure the hill, the town of Osrung, and any other crossings of the river that—’

Gorst stepped forwards. ‘I will take it.’ If there was to be action, Jalenhorm’s division would be first into it. And I will be at the front of the front rank. I will not bury the ghosts of Sipani in a headquarters.

‘There is no one I would rather entrust it to.’ Gorst grasped the order but the marshal did not release it at once. He remained looking calmly up, the folded paper a bridge between them. ‘Remember, though, that you are the king’s observer, not the king’s champion.’

I am neither. I am a glorified errand boy, here because nowhere else will have me. I am a secretary in a uniform. A filthy uniform, as it happens. I am a dead man still twitching. Ha ha! Look at the big idiot with the silly voice! Make him dance! ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Observe, then, by all means. But no more heroics, if you please. Not like the other day at Barden. A war is no place for heroics. Especially not this one.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Kroy let go of the order and turned back to peer at his map, measuring distances between stretched-out thumb and forefinger. ‘The king would never forgive me if we were to lose you.’

The king has abandoned me here, and no one will care a stray speck of piss if I am hacked apart and my brains splattered across the North. Least of all me. ‘Yes, sir.’ And Gorst strode out, through the front door and back into the rain, where he was struck by lightning.

There she was, picking her way across the boggy front yard towards him. In the midst of all that sullen mud her smiling face burned like the sun, incandescent. Delight crushed him, made his skin sing and his breath catch. The months he had spent away from her had done not the slightest good. He was as desperately, hopelessly, helplessly in love as ever.

‘Finree,’ he whispered, voice full of awe, as in some silly story a wizard might pronounce a word of power. ‘Why are you here?’ Half-expecting she would fade into nothing, a figment of his overwrought imagination.

‘To see my father. Is he in there?’

‘Writing orders.’

‘As always.’ She looked down at Gorst’s uniform and raised one eyebrow, darkened from brown to almost black and spiked to soft points by the rain. ‘Still playing in the mud, I see.’

He could not even bring himself to be embarrassed. He was lost in her eyes. Some strands of hair were stuck across her wet face. He wished he was. I thought nothing could be more beautiful than you used to be, but now you are more beautiful than ever. He dared not look at her and he dared not look away. You are the most beautiful woman in the world – no – in all of history – no – the most beautiful thing in all of history. Kill me, now, so that your face can be the last thing I see. ‘You look well,’ he murmured.

She looked down at her sodden travelling coat, mud-spotted to the waist. ‘I suspect you’re not being entirely honest with me.’

‘I never dissemble.’ I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you …

‘And are you well, Bremer? I may call you Bremer, may I?’

You may crush my eyes out with your heels. Only say my name again. ‘Of course. I am …’ Ill in mind and body, ruined in fortune and reputation, hating of the world and everything in it, but none of that matters, as long as you are with me. ‘Well.’

She held out her hand and he bent to kiss it like a village priest who had been permitted to touch the hem of the Prophet’s robe—

There was a golden ring on her finger with a small, sparkling blue stone.

Gorst’s guts twisted so hard he nearly lost control of them entirely. It was only by a supreme effort that he stayed standing. He could scarcely whisper the words. ‘Is that …’

‘A marriage band, yes!’ Could she know he would rather she had dangled a butchered head in his face?

He gripped to his smile like a drowning man to the last stick of wood. He felt his mouth move, and heard his own squeak. His repugnant, womanly, pathetic little squeak. ‘Who is the gentleman?’

‘Colonel Harod dan Brock.’ A hint of pride in her voice. Of love. What would I give to hear her say my name like that? All I have. Which is nothing but other men’s scorn.

‘Harod dan Brock,’ he whispered, and the name was sand in his mouth. He knew the man, of course. They were distantly related, fourth cousins or some such. They had sometimes spoken years ago, when Gorst had served with the guard of his father, Lord Brock. Then Lord Brock had made his bid for the crown, and failed, and been exiled for the worst of treasons. His eldest son had been granted the king’s mercy, though. Stripped of his many lands, and his lofty titles, but left with his life. How Gorst wished the king was less merciful now.

‘He is serving on Lord Governor Meed’s staff.’

‘Yes.’ Brock was nauseatingly handsome, with an easy smile and a winning manner. The bastard. Well-spoken of and well-liked, in spite of his father’s disgrace. The snake. Had earned his place by bravery and bonhomie. The fucker. He was everything Gorst was not.

He clenched his right fist trembling hard, and imagined it ripping the easy-smiling jaw out of Harod dan Brock’s handsome head. ‘Yes.’

‘We are very happy,’ said Finree.

Good for you. I want to kill myself. She could not have given him sharper pain if she had crushed his cock in a vice. Could she be such a fool as to not see through him? Some part of her must have known, must have delighted in his humiliation. Oh, how I love you. Oh, how I hate you. Oh, how I want you.

‘My congratulations to you both,’ he murmured.

‘I will tell my husband.’

‘Yes.’ Yes, yes, tell him to die, tell him to burn, and soon. Gorst kept the rictus smile clinging to his face while vomit tickled at his throat. ‘Yes.’

‘I must go to my father. Perhaps we will see each other again, soon?’

Oh, yes. Very soon. Tonight, in fact, while I lie awake with my cock in my hand, pretending it’s your mouth …‘I hope so.’

She was already walking past. For her, a forgettable encounter with an old acquaintance. For him, as she turned away it was as if night fell. The soil is heaped upon me, the grit of burial in my mouth. He watched the door rattle shut behind her, and stood there for a long moment, in the rain. He wanted to weep, and weep, and weep for all his ruined hopes. He wanted to kneel in the mud and tear out the hair he still had. He wanted to murder someone, and hardly cared who. Myself, perhaps?

Instead he took a sharp breath, squeaking slightly in one nostril, and squelched away through the mud, into the gathering dusk.

He had a message to carry, after all. With no heroics.

Black Dow

The stable doors shut with a bang like a headsman’s axe, and it took all of Calder’s famous arrogance not to jump clean in the air. War meetings had never been his favourite style of gathering, especially ones full of his enemies. Three of Dow’s five War Chiefs were in attendance and, as Calder’s ever-worsening luck would have it, they were the three that liked him least.

Glama Golden looked the hero from his scalp to his toes, big-knuckle brawny and heavy-jaw handsome, his long hair, his bristling moustache, his eyelashes to their tips all the colour of pale gold. He wore more yellow metal than a princess on her wedding day – golden torc around his thick neck, bracelets at his thick wrists and fistfuls of rings on his thick fingers, every part of him buffed to a pretty shine with bluster and self-love.

Cairm Ironhead was a very different prospect. His scar-crossed face was a fortress of frown you could’ve blunted an axe on, eyes like nails under a brow like an anvil, cropped hair and beard an uncompromising black. He was shorter than Golden but wider still, a slab of a man, chain mail glinting under a cloak of black bear-fur. The rumour was he’d strangled that bear. Possibly for looking at him wrong. Neither Ironhead nor Golden had much beyond contempt for Calder, but luckily they’d always despised each other like night hates day and their feud left no hatred in the quiver for anyone else.

When it came to hatred, Brodd Tenways had a bottomless supply. He was one of those bastards who can’t even breathe quietly, ugly as incest and always delighted to push it in your face, leering from the shadows like the village pervert at a passing milkmaid. Foul-mouthed, foul-toothed, foul-smelling, and with some kind of hideous rash patching his twisted face he gave every sign of taking great pride in. He’d made a bitter enemy of Calder’s father, lost to him in battle twice, and been forced to kneel and give up everything he had. Getting it back only seemed to have worsened his mood, and he’d easily shifted all his years of bile from Bethod to his sons, and Calder in particular.

Then there was the head of this mismatched family of villains, the self-styled Protector of the North, Black Dow himself. He sat easy in Skarling’s Chair, one leg folded under him while the other boot tapped gently at the ground. He had something like a smile on his deep-lined, hard-scarred face but his eyes were narrowed, sly as a hungry tomcat that just now spied a pigeon. He’d taken to wearing fine clothes, the sparkling chain that Calder’s father used to wear around his shoulders. But he couldn’t hide what he was, and didn’t want to either. A killer to the tips of his ears. Or ear, since the left one was no more than a flap of gristle.

As if Black Dow’s name and his grin weren’t threats enough, he’d made sure they were shored up with plenty of steel. A long, grey sword leaned against Skarling’s Chair on one side, an axe on the other, notched with long use, in easy reach of his dangling fingers. Killer’s fingers – scuffed, and swollen, and scarred at the knuckles from a lifetime of the dead knew what dark work.

Splitfoot stood in the gloom at Dow’s shoulder. His Second, meaning his closest bodyguard and chief arse-licker, stuck to his master tight as his shadow with thumbs hooked in his silver-buckled sword-belt. Two of his Carls lurked behind, armour, and shield-rims, and drawn swords all agleam, others dotted about the walls, flanking the door. There was a smell of old hay and old horses, but far stronger was the reek of ready violence, thick as the stink in a marsh.

And as if all that wasn’t enough to make Calder shit his well-tailored trousers, Shivers still loomed at his shoulder, adding his own chill threat to the recipe.

‘Well, if it ain’t brave Prince Calder.’ Dow looked him up and down like the tomcat at the shrub it was about to piss on. ‘Welcome back to the good fight, lad. You going to do as you’re fucking told this time around?’

Calder swept out a bow. ‘Your most obedient servant.’ He smirked as if the very words didn’t burn his tongue. ‘Golden. Ironhead.’ He gave each a respectful nod. ‘My father always said there weren’t two stouter hearts in all the North.’ His father always said there weren’t two thicker heads in all the North, but his lies were no more use than money down a well in any case. Ironhead and Golden did nothing but glower at each other. Calder felt a burning need for someone who liked him. Or at least didn’t want him dead. ‘Where’s Scale?’

‘Your brother’s out west,’ said Dow. ‘Doing some fighting.’

‘You know what that is, do you, boy?’ Tenways turned his head and spat through the gap in his brown front teeth.

‘Is it … the thing with all the swords?’ Calder took a hopeful look around the stable but no allies had crept in, and he ended up glancing at Shivers’ ruined frown, which was even worse than Dow’s smile. However often he saw that scar, it was always more hideous than he remembered. ‘How about Reachey?’

‘Your wife’s daddy’s a day or so east,’ said Dow. ‘Putting on a weapontake.’

Golden snorted. ‘I’d be surprised if there’s a boy can grip a blade isn’t pressed already.’

‘Well, he’s scraping up what there is. Reckon we’ll need every ready hand when it comes to a battle. Yours too, maybe.’

‘Oh, you’ll have to hold me back!’ Calder slapped the hilt of his sword. ‘Can’t wait to get started!’

‘You ever even drawn the fucking thing?’ sneered Tenways, stretching his neck out to spit again.

‘Just the once. I had to trim your daughter’s hairy cunt before I could get at it.’

Dow burst out laughing. Golden chuckled. Ironhead gave the faintest of grins. Tenways choked on his spit and left a string of glistening drool down his chin, but Calder didn’t much care. He was better off scoring points with those who weren’t quite a lost cause yet. Somehow he needed to win at least one of these unpromising bastards over to his side.

‘Never thought I’d say this.’ Dow sighed and wiped one eye with a finger, ‘but I’ve missed you, Calder.’

‘Likewise. I’d much rather be trading horseshit in a stable than back at Carleon kissing my wife. What’s to do?’

‘You know.’ Dow took the pommel of his sword between finger and thumb, turning it this way and that so the silver mark near the hilt glinted. ‘War. Skirmish here, raid there. We cut off some stragglers, they burn out some villages. War. Your brother’s been hitting fast, giving the Southerners something to think about. Useful man your brother, got some sting in him.’

‘Shame your father didn’t have more’n one son,’ growled Tenways.

‘Keep talking, old man,’ said Calder, ‘I can make you look a prick all day.’

Tenways bristled but Dow waved him down. ‘Enough cock-measuring. We’ve a war to fight.’

‘And how many victories, so far?’

A brief, unhappy pause. ‘No battle,’ grunted Ironhead.

‘This Kroy,’ sneered Golden back across the stable, ‘the one in charge o’ the Union.’

‘Marshal, they call him.’

‘Whatever they call him, he’s a cautious bastard.’

‘Baby-stepping coward fuck,’ growled Tenways.

Dow shrugged. ‘Naught cowardly about stepping careful. Wouldn’t be my style with his numbers, but …’ And he turned his grin on Calder. ‘Your father always used to say, “In war it’s the winning counts. The rest is for fools to sing about.” So Kroy’s going slow, hoping to wear out our patience. We Northmen ain’t known for it, after all. He’s split his army in three parts.’

‘Three big bloody parts,’ said Ironhead.

Golden agreed, for once. ‘Might be ten thousand fighting men each, not even counting all the fetchers and carriers.’

Dow leaned forwards like a grandfather teaching a child about fish. ‘Jalenhorm to the west. Brave but sluggish and apt to blunder. Mitterick in the centre. Sharpest of the three by all accounts, but reckless. Loves his horses, I hear. Meed to the east. Not a soldier, and he hates Northmen like a pig hates butchers. Could make him short-sighted. Then Kroy’s got some Northmen of his own, spread out scouting mostly, but a fair few fighters too, and some good ones among ’em.’

‘The Dogman’s men,’ said Calder.

‘Fucking traitor that he is,’ hissed Tenways, making ready to spit.

‘Traitor?’ Dow jerked forwards in Skarling’s Chair, knuckles white on its arms. ‘You dumb old rashy fuck! He’s the one man in the North who’s always stuck to the same side!’ Tenways looked up, slowly swallowed whatever scum he’d been about to spit and leaned back into the shadows. Dow slid down limp again. ‘Shame it’s the wrong side, is all.’

‘Well, we’re going to have to move soon,’ said Golden. ‘Meed may be no soldier, but he’s put Ollensand under siege. Town’s got good walls but I ain’t sure how long they can—’

‘Meed broke off the siege yesterday morning,’ said Dow. ‘He’s heading back north and most o’ the Dogman’s lot are with him.’

‘Yesterday?’ Golden frowned. ‘How d’you know—’

‘I’ve got my ways.’

‘I didn’t hear anything.’

‘That’s why I give the orders and you listen to ’em.’ Ironhead smiled to see his rival cut down a peg. ‘Meed’s turned back north, and in quite the hurry. My guess is he’ll be joining up with Mitterick.’

‘Why?’ asked Calder. ‘Slow and steady all these months, then they just decide to take a rush?’

‘Maybe they got tired o’ cautious. Or maybe someone who has the say-so did. Either way, they’re coming.’

‘Might give us a chance to catch ’em off guard.’ Ironhead’s eyes were sparkling like a starving man just saw the roast brought in.

‘If they’re set on looking for a fight,’ said Dow, ‘I’d hate not to give ’em one. We got someone down at the Heroes?’

‘Curnden Craw’s there with his dozen,’ said Splitfoot.

‘Safe hands,’ muttered Calder. He almost wished he was down at the Heroes with Curnden Craw, rather than here with these bastards. No power, maybe, but a lot more laughs.

‘Had word from him an hour or two back, as it goes,’ said Ironhead. ‘He ran into some o’ the Dogman’s scouts up there and seen ’em off.’

Dow looked down at the ground for a moment, rubbing at his lips with one fingertip. ‘Shivers?’

‘Chief?’ Whispered so soft it was hardly more than a breath.

‘Ride down to the Heroes and tell Craw I want that hill held on to. Just might be one or other o’ these Union bastards try to come through that way. Cross the river at Osrung, maybe.’

‘Good ground for a fight,’ said Tenways.

Shivers paused a moment. Long enough for Calder to see he wasn’t happy playing messenger boy. Calder gave him the barest look, just a reminder of what was said in the hallway at Carleon. Just to give whatever seeds were planted a little water.

‘Right y’are, Chief.’ And Shivers slid out through the doorway.

Golden gave a shiver of his own. ‘That one gives me the worries.’

Dow only grinned the wider. ‘That’s the point of him. Ironhead?’

‘Chief.’

‘You’re leading off down the Yaws Road. Point o’ the spear.’

‘We’ll be in Yaws evening tomorrow.’

‘Make it sooner.’ That got a deeper frown from Ironhead and a matching grin from Golden. It was as if the two sat on a pair of scales. You couldn’t nudge one down without hoisting the other up. ‘Golden, you take the Brottun Road and join up with Reachey. Get him on the way soon as his weapontake’s done, that old boy sometimes needs the spur.’

‘Aye, Chief.’

‘Tenways, bring your foragers in and get your lot ready to move, you’ll be bringing up the back with me.’

‘Done.’

‘And all of you march your lads hard, but keep your eyes open. Be nice to give the Southerners a shock and not the other way around.’ Dow showed even more of his teeth. ‘If your blades ain’t sharpened already, I reckon now’s the time.’

‘Aye,’ the three of them chimed in, competing to sound the most bloodthirsty.

‘Oh, aye,’ said Calder on the end, and giving his best smirk to go with it. He might not be much with a sword, but there were few men in the North who could handle a smirk better. It was wasted this time, though. Splitfoot was leaning down to mutter something in Dow’s ear.

The Protector of the North sat back frowning. ‘Send him in, then!’

The doors were hauled open, wind sighing through and whisking loose straw across the stable floor. Calder squinted into the evening outside. Had to be some trick of the fading light, because the figure in the doorway seemed to fill it almost to the beam above. Then he took the step up. Then he straightened. It was quite the entrance, the room silent as he strode slowly to its centre except for the floor groaning under his every step. But then it’s easy to make the big entrance when you’re the size of a cliff. You just walk in and stand there.

‘I am Stranger-Come-Knocking.’

Calder knew the name. Stranger-Come-Knocking called himself Chief of a Hundred Tribes, called everything east of the Crinna his land and all the people who lived on it his property. Calder had heard he was a giant but hadn’t taken it too seriously. The North was full of swollen men with swollen opinions of themselves and even more swollen reputations. More often than not you found the man a good deal smaller than the name. So this came as a bit of a shock.

When you said the word ‘giant’, Stranger-Come-Knocking was pretty much what you thought of, stepped straight out from the age of heroes and into this petty latter time. He towered over Dow and his mighty War Chiefs, head among the rafters, black hair streaked with grey hanging around his craggy, bearded face. Glama Golden looked a gaudy dwarf beside him, and Splitfoot and his Carls a set of toy soldiers.

‘By the dead,’ Calder whispered under his breath. ‘That is a big one.’

But Black Dow showed no awe. He sprawled in Skarling’s Chair easily as ever, one boot still tapping the straw, killer’s hands still dangling, wolf grin still curled around his face. ‘Wondered when you’d … come knocking. Didn’t think you’d come all this way your own self, though.’

‘An alliance should be sealed face to face, man to man, iron to iron and blood to blood.’ Calder had been expecting the giant to roar every word like the monsters in children’s stories, but he had a soft sort of voice. Slow, as if he was puzzling out every word.

‘The personal touch,’ said Dow. ‘I’m all for it. We’ve a deal, then?’

‘We have.’ Stranger-Come-Knocking spread one massive hand, put the web between thumb and forefinger in his mouth and bit into it, held it up, blood starting to seep from the marks.

Dow slid his palm down his sword, leaving the edge gleaming red. Then he was out of Skarling’s Chair in a flash and caught the giant’s hand with his own. The two men stood there as blood streaked their forearms and started to drip from their elbows. Calder felt a little fear and a lot of contempt at the level of manliness on display.

‘Right y’are.’ Dow let go of the giant’s hand and slowly sat back in Skarling’s Chair, leaving a bloody palm-print on one arm. ‘Reckon you can bring your men over the Crinna.’

‘I already did.’

Golden and Ironhead exchanged a glance, not much caring for the idea of a lot of savages crossing the Crinna and, presumably, their land. Dow narrowed his eyes. ‘Did you, indeed?’

‘On this side of the water they can fight the Southerners.’ Stranger-Come-Knocking looked slowly about the stable, fixing each man with his black eyes. ‘I came to fight!’ He roared the last word, echoes ringing from the roof. A ripple of fury passed through him from his feet to his head, making his fists clench, and his chest swell, and his monstrous shoulders rise, seeming in that moment more outsize than ever.

Calder found himself wondering what fighting this bastard would feel like. How the hell would you stop him, once he was moving? Just the sheer weight of meat. What weapon would put him down? He reckoned everyone else in the room was thinking the same thing, and not much enjoying the experience.

Except Black Dow. ‘Good! That’s what I want you for.’

‘I want to fight the Union.’

‘There’s plenty to go round.’

‘I want to fight Whirrun of Bligh.’

‘Can’t promise you that, he’s on our side and has some odd notions. But I can ask if he’ll give you a bout.’

‘I want to fight the Bloody-Nine.’

The hairs on the back of Calder’s neck prickled. Strange, how that name still weighed heavy, even in company like this, even if the man was eight years dead. Dow wasn’t grinning any more.

‘You missed your chance. Ninefingers is back in the mud.’

‘I hear he is alive, and standing with the Union.’

‘You hear wrong.’

‘I hear he is alive, and I will kill him.’

‘Will you now?’

‘I am the greatest warrior in the Circle of the World.’ Stranger-Come-Knocking didn’t boast it, puffed up and pouting as Glama Golden might have. He didn’t threaten it, fists clenched and glowering as Cairm Ironhead might have. He stated the fact.

Dow scratched absently at the scar where his ear used to be. ‘This is the North. Lot of hard men about. Couple of ’em in this room. So that’s quite a claim you’re making.’

Stranger-Come-Knocking unhooked his great fur cloak and shrugged it off, stood there stripped to the waist like a man ready to wrestle. Scars had always been almost as popular in the North as blades. Every man who reckoned himself a man had to have a couple of both. But Stranger-Come-Knocking’s great expanse of body, sinew-knotted like an ancient tree, was almost more scar than skin. He was ripped, pocked, gouged with wounds, enough to make a score of champions proud.

‘At Yeweald I fought the Dog Tribe and was pierced with seven arrows.’ He pointed out some pink blobs scattered across his ribs with his club of a forefinger. ‘But I fought on, and made a hill of their dead, and made their land my land, and their women and children my people.’

Dow sighed, as if he had a half-naked giant at most of his war meetings and was getting tired of it. ‘Maybe it’s time to think about a shield.’

‘They are for cowards to hide behind. My wounds tell the story of my strength.’ The giant jerked his thumb at a star-shaped mass that covered one shoulder, and his back, and half his left arm with flesh lumped and mottled as oak-bark. ‘The dreaded witch Vanian sprayed me with a liquid fire, and I carried her into the lake and drowned her while I burned.’

Date: 2015-12-18; view: 565