‘Yon got a splinter in his hand and it’s made him pissier’n ever, but he’ll live.’
‘Good. That’s … good. That everyone’s all right, that is, not … not the splinter.’
Her brows drew in, guessing something was wrong, which wasn’t too difficult since he was making a pitiful effort at hiding it. ‘What did our noble Protector want?’
‘He wanted …’ Craw worked his lips for a moment, wondering how to frame it, but a turd’s a turd however it’s framed. ‘He wanted to offer me Splitfoot’s place.’
He’d been expecting her to laugh her arse off, but she just narrowed her eyes. ‘You? Why?’
Good question, he was starting to wonder about it now. ‘He said I’m a straight edge.’
‘I see.’
‘He said … I remind him of Threetrees.’ Realising what a pompous cock he sounded even as the words came out.
He’d definitely been expecting her to laugh at that, but she just narrowed her eyes more. ‘You’re a man can be trusted. Everyone knows that. But I can see better reasons.’
‘Like what?’
‘You were tight with Bethod and his crowd, and with Threetrees before him, and maybe Dow thinks you’ll bring him a few friends he hasn’t already got. Or at any rate a few less enemies.’ Craw frowned. Those were better reasons. ‘That and he knows Whirrun’ll go wherever you go, and Whirrun’s a damn good man to have standing behind you if things get ugly.’ Shit. She was double right. She’d sussed it all straight off. ‘And knowing Black Dow, things are sure to get ugly … What did you tell him?’
Craw winced. ‘I said yes,’ and hurried after with, ‘just while the battle’s on.’
‘I see.’ Still no anger, and no surprise either. She just watched him. That was making him more nervy than if she’d punched him in the face. ‘And what about the dozen?’
‘Well …’ Ashamed to say he hadn’t really considered it. ‘Guess you’ll be coming along with me, if you’ll have it. Unless you want to go back to your farm and your family and…’
‘Retire?’
‘Aye.’
She snorted. ‘The pipe and the porch and the sunset on the water? That’s you, not me.’
‘Then … I reckon it’s your dozen for the time being.’
‘All right.’
‘You ain’t going to give me a tongue-lashing?’
‘About what?’
‘Not taking my own advice, for a start. About how I should keep my head down, not stick my neck out, get everyone in the crew through alive, how old horses can’t jump new fences and blah, blah, blah…’
‘That’s what you’d say. I’m not you, Craw.’
He blinked. ‘Guess not. Then you think this is the right thing to do?’
‘The right thing?’ She turned away with a hint of a grin. ‘That’s you an’ all.’ And she strolled back up towards the Heroes, one hand resting slack on her sword hilt, and left him stood there in the wind.
‘By the bloody dead.’ He looked off across the hillside, desperately searching for a finger that still had some nail left to chew at.
Shivers was standing not far off. Saying nothing. Just staring. Looking, in fact, like a man who felt himself stepped in front of. Craw’s wince became a full grimace. Seemed that was getting to be the normal shape to his face, one way and another. ‘A man’s worst enemies are his own ambitions,’ Bethod used to tell him. ‘Mine have got me in all the shit I’m in today.’
‘Welcome to the shit,’ he muttered to himself through gritted teeth. That’s the problem with mistakes. You can make ’em in an instant. Years upon years spent tiptoeing about like a fool, then you take your eye away for a moment and …
Bang.
Escape
Finree thought they were in some kind of shack. The floor was damp dirt, a chill draught across it making her shiver. The place smelled of fust and animals.
They had blindfolded her, and marched her lurching across the wet fields into the trees, crops tangling her feet, bushes clutching at her dress. It was a good thing she had been wearing her riding boots or she would probably have ended up barefoot. She had heard fighting behind them, she thought. Aliz had kept screaming for a while, her voice getting more and more hoarse, but eventually stopped. It changed nothing. They had crossed water on a creaking boat. Maybe over to the north side of the river. They had been shoved in here, heard a door wobble shut and the clattering of a bar on the outside.
And here they had been left, in the darkness. To wait for who knew what.
As Finree slowly got her breath back the pain began to creep up on her. Her scalp burned, her head thumped, her neck sent vicious stings down between her shoulders whenever she tried to turn her head. But no doubt she was a great deal better off than most who had been trapped in that inn.
She wondered if Hardrick had made it to safety, or if they had ridden him down in the fields, his useless message never delivered. She kept seeing that major’s face as he stumbled sideways with blood running from his broken head, so very surprised. Meed, fumbling at the bubbling wound in his neck. All dead. All of them.
She took a shuddering breath and forced the thought away. She could not think of it any more than a tightrope walker could think about the ground. ‘You have to look forward,’ she remembered her father telling her, as he plucked another of her pieces from the squares board. ‘Concentrate on what you can change.’
Aliz had been sobbing ever since the door shut. Finree wanted quite badly to slap her, but her hands were tied. She was reasonably sure they would not get out of this by sobbing. Not that she had any better ideas.
‘Quiet,’ Finree hissed. ‘Quiet, please, I need to think. Please. Please.’
The sobbing stuttered back to ragged whimpering. That was worse, if anything.
‘Will they kill us?’ squeaked Aliz’ voice, along with a slobbering snort. ‘Will they murder us?’
‘No. They would have done it already.’
‘Then what will they do with us?’
The question sat between them like a bottomless abyss, with nothing but their echoing breath to fill it. Finree managed to twist herself up to sitting, gritting her teeth at the pain in her neck. ‘We have to think, do you understand? We have to look forward. We have to try and escape.’
‘How?’ Aliz whimpered.
‘Any way we can!’ Silence. ‘We have to try. Are your hands free?’
‘No.’
Finree managed to worm her way across the floor, dress sliding over the dirt until her back hit the wall, grunting with the effort. She shifted herself along, fingertips brushing crumbling plaster, damp stone.
‘Are you there?’ squeaked Aliz.
‘Where else would I be?’
‘What are you doing?’
‘Trying to get my hands free.’ Something tugged at Finree’s waist, cloth ripped. She wormed her shoulder blades up the wall, following the caught material with her fingers. A rusted bracket. She rubbed away the flakes between finger and thumb, felt a jagged point underneath, a sudden surge of hope. She pulled her wrists apart, struggling to find the metal with the cords that held them.
‘If you get your hands free, what then?’ came Aliz’ shrill voice.
‘Get yours free,’ grunted Finree through gritted teeth. ‘Then feet.’
‘Then what? What about the door? There’ll be guards, won’t there? Where are we? What do we do if…’
‘I don’t know!’ She forced her voice down. ‘I don’t know. One battle at a time.’ Sawing away at the bracket. ‘One battle at a…’ Her hand slipped and she lurched back, felt the metal leave a burning cut down her arm.
‘Ah!’
‘What?’
