have taken the king’s own troops weeks to achieve all that. By full dark the barbarians were settled in fully to their new home.
One woman, her face painted like a skull, broke open a series of barrels and let the men fill horns and leather cups with thick mead, which made them laugh so brightly Tarness could hear it on his ridge. Morg himself stood on a crude platform and gave a speech, and received a great cheer.
Morg’s son, whose face was painted like a berserker, broke off from the rest and went to stand outside the Hunter’s Gate of Ness. He simply stood there while darkness fell and lights came on inside the city. Stood and stared at the wall, as if he could bring it down by sheer effort of concentration. Perhaps he was waiting for someone up on the wall to call down to him, to make some effort at communication. He waited in vain, if that was the case.
He was still there when Tarness indicated that the scouts should withdraw. He’d seen enough. Rising stiffly from their perches, the men headed back down the side of the ridge to where they’d left their horses.
Tarness had a lot to think about. What he’d seen had been instructive enough-but what he hadn’t seen was far more troubling. Hood should have offered some resistance, surely. He should have at least shown the colors of Ness in defiance of the siege. “Something, anything, to show he was unwilling to give up,” Tarness muttered. Unless Hood had betrayed him and struck a deal with Morg, to open the gates and let the barbarians move inside. But no, that was impossible. Tarness had picked Hood for his zeal and his utter hatred of anyone who didn’t worship the Lady. And furthermore, Morg had set up camp exactly as if he expected a protracted siege.
What in the sacred name of the Lady was going on?
“We’ll ride back to headquarters at once,” one of the scouts said, in that deferential way the Free Men had. They’d learned not to ask Tarness directly for an order, but instead to state what they expected him to say as if they’d come up with it themselves. Then he would approve or disapprove as if offering counsel only, and not an actual command. Tarness nodded and the scouts mounted up.
Another of the men leapt up onto his horse and drew his sword. “In two days we can be back here with the Free Men, every one of them ready to die to relieve the Free City. We’ll show them what they get for picking a fight with Ness!”
The others looked to Tarness. They seemed ready to cheer the idea but needed his approval first.
Sadly, he couldn’t give it. He sighed and climbed up into his own saddle. “Yesterday,” he said, “I watched our men drilling at pike squares.”
The scouts looked at each other as if wondering what he was getting at.
“Most of them,” Tarness said, “have figured out how to march in a straight line. They can even turn when they’re ordered to. Though some of them still have to put down their weapons to look at their hands and remember which direction is left and which is right. Half of them are stricken with camp fever, and the other half with the sailor pox from all those camp followers I told you to drive off. Their armor is rusty, their weapons are falling apart. Not a single one of them has ever fought in an actual battle.”
One of the scouts shook his head. “They’ve got heart, though-they love their city and will be fierce in its defense.”
Tarness smiled at the man. In his experience that did count for something-but not as much as soldiers who knew how to shoulder arms or brace for a cavalry charge. “You know that my ancestor, Juring Tarness, was a great general. He had a saying that has been passed down through the generations. ‘If one wants to be renowned for one’s great victories, the best thing to do is not fight any battles where one might lose.’ ”
Tarness glanced back in the direction of Ness, though it was hidden now by the side of the ridge. He didn’t need to see it to remember what it looked like. “No, I advise we hold off for now. Keep drilling the men, make them as ready as we can. But it would be suicide right now to take on an army that well organized and blooded. Ness will have to hold out on its own awhile longer.”
“How much longer?” a scout asked, his eyes wide in the moonlight. He looked almost angry at what Tarness had suggested.
Tarness smiled. “Until some miracle occurs, and we actually have a chance. But don’t worry.” He flicked his reins and got his horse moving. “The Lady is on our side.”
Chapter Eighty-One
North of Helstrow, Croy took to the road.
It was risky, but it meant they covered far more ground every day. The barbarians seemed wholly uninterested in the land beyond the royal fortress. He had not seen any sign of patrols or even pickets for days. For that matter, he hadn’t seen any sign of life at all. The farmland that passed by on either side of the road was frozen solid, and if there were peasants still living in that cold region, they wisely stayed indoors. He was a bit worried by the fact that he hadn’t seen a smoking chimney for some time, but he assumed the locals were just being careful.
He should have followed their example.
Bethane had fallen asleep against his back, and he was paying more attention to making sure she didn’t fall off the horse than to the road. He was vaguely aware they were about to enter a copse of trees that narrowed the road on either side, but gave it little thought-until he heard someone cough.
He pulled up sharply on the reins. His horse bridled but dragged to a stop, just as Croy heard a taut rope being cut with a twang. A heavy log shot down from the treetops, swinging on the end of a line so it arced directly across the road at the height of Croy’s chest. Had he not stopped in time, it would have knocked him clear off the horse and left him sprawling and broken in the road.
Instead it collided with the rearing horse’s neck. Croy heard bones shatter and the horse scream, its hot breath lancing upward in the air. Beneath him he felt the animal falter and begin to collapse.
Ghostcutter jumped into his hand as he leapt to the ground, dancing backward to avoid the falling horse. Bethane, wakened by the horse’s pitiful cry, slid down and was nearly crushed by the dying animal. Croy had no time to get her clear as three monstrous shapes came rushing toward him out of the trees.
They were bundled so heavily in furs he could not get a sense of how big they really were or if they were even men. They wielded hatchets and hay forks with wickedly sharpened tines. One jabbed at him before he was fully ready, and he felt metal pierce his flesh.
Perhaps thinking they had him, the other two men moved in for the kill. Croy swung wildly with Ghostcutter and sheared through the haft of a fork. A hatchet came swinging down toward his face but he kicked out and caught its owner in the chest, knocking him back and off his feet.
The bloody fork swung low for another attack and Croy smashed it aside with the flat of his blade. His side sang with agony as he twisted at the waist to block another blow, but he ignored the pain and swung hard for the opponent who had wounded him. Ghostcutter bit deep through layers of fur until it found flesh and laid open the veins of the man’s neck.
The man let out a gurgling scream and dropped to his knees. Perhaps realizing that Croy was not such easy prey as they’d believed, the other two turned and ran for the trees.
Croy was breathing heavily as he stepped back toward the horse, intent on making sure Bethane was all right. His heart raced when he saw she was not there.
Casting about wildly, he saw a fourth man running away across an open field. Bethane was over the man’s shoulder, kicking and punching at him. He probably couldn’t even feel the blows through all that padding.
Croy gave chase but the kidnapper had a long lead on him, and the wound in his side slowed him so that he couldn’t sprint. He followed as best he could, desperately trying to keep his quarry in sight.
He nearly lost them-but then heard Bethane scream his name, and he raced toward the sound. The kidnapper had hurried toward a leafless orchard a quarter mile away. Croy pressed one hand against his side and ran into the trees. It could easily have been another trap, but he didn’t care. He would fight his way through whatever they sent him, or die in the attempt. He could not let them have the queen.
In the middle of the orchard stood a humble croft, a low house with a thatched roof that descended to within a foot of the ground. The entrance was more hatch than door. Croy found it locked, but he bashed in the latch with Ghostcutter’s pommel, threw open its panels and stumbled inside.
