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He looked around wildly, spotted her and reached for his arrow sheath. She felt for another knife. He teased out a bolt and notched it. She drew back her arm. He pulled on the bow. She lobbed the blade. He loosed the arrow. It sailed over her right shoulder. Serrah could swear she felt its plume tickle her as it passed.

The archer still stood. But she realised that was just temporary. The hilt of her knife stuck out of his collarbone. A red patch was spreading across his grey tunic. He swayed, then toppled.

She goaded her frightened horse towards the wagon. Somebody on foot rushed over and tried to pull her down. Kicking out, she booted him back into the scrum. At the wagon, she scrambled onto the driving board. The bow was there, along with the quiver. Serrah took it and looked to the brawl going on all around her.

In the thick of it, Caldason was facing two opponents. He had a mounted paladin alongside and a militiaman on foot harrying him with a mace. His defence had to be alternate, swiping at the rider one minute, the mace-man the next. He was holding them off but making no progress.

Then an arrow came out of nowhere and struck the paladin in his back. As the man fell, Reeth glimpsed Serrah standing on the wagon, directing bolts into the fracas. His attention went back to the man with the mace and he disarmed him with a couple of downward strokes. Caldason’s next swing proved a killer blow.

A moment’s lull, as strangely happened in even the most furious of engagements, allowed Reeth to snatch an overview. He judged that his side had the better of it. There were fights everywhere still, but the tide seemed to be running in the ambushers’ favour.

He noticed one of the remaining paladins, on foot and moving away from the convoy. In his hand was an object that looked very much like a distress glamour. That was something they could do without. Reeth headed for him.

Serrah had one arrow left. She singled out a likely target. It winged the man, spun him off his feet and dumped him in the road. She dropped the bow, took up her sword and leapt into the battle.

Reeth’s duel with the paladin was frenzied and short. Wrenching his sword from the body, he looked around for the glamour. He found it in the long grass at the road’s edge and ground it under his boot. It gave off blue sparks and wisps of orange smoke as it died.

He turned and saw that all but six or seven of the convoy’s escort had been downed. The holdouts were bunched together, on foot, in front of one of the lane’s shabby buildings. They were retreating in the face of an advancing semi-circle of band-members. As Caldason made his way over, the beleaguered group had their backs to the wall.

In the short time they had to plan the ambush, Caldason and Serrah had thought about speed. They had a contingency to help overcome the guards as quickly as possible. Reeth signalled the men on the roof and set it in motion.

The fading light obscured what was happening up there. Something was tossed from the roof – for a second it looked like a mottled black cloud. Instantly it descended, dome-shaped as it fell.

A large weighted fishing net came down on the surviving escorts. They yelled and flailed in the tangle. The band rushed forward and subdued them with sword butts and clubs. They disarmed them and secured the net with rope. So many flies in a giant spider’s web.

Serrah was at Caldason’s shoulder. ‘Seems like letting them off lightly.’

‘Would you rather we tethered them to a team of horses and sent them off over a cobbled road?’

She smiled. ‘It’s no more than they deserve.’

‘Maybe. But I’ve always tried not to stoop to their level. I reckon you feel the same.’ Before she could answer, he went on, ‘We need to move fast now. Let’s go.’

The band gathered their wounded, and their dead, and lashed them to horses. Some were put into the wagons. All hands set to hauling clear the tree blocking the way ahead. The other was left where it was, to hinder any pursuit. They weren’t brutal with the enemy wounded, which might not have been the case if things had gone the other way. The prisoners were simply left, securely bound, to await rescue; and no doubt punishment for allowing their consignment to fall into Resistance hands.

A rendezvous had been fixed a mile or two on, where the spoils would be loaded onto smaller vehicles and dispersed.

Caldason took the reins on the lead wagon himself. Serrah sat beside him.

‘Our first successful mission,’ she said.

‘Think so?’ His voice was suddenly cold.

‘Don’t you?’

He didn’t answer, and they made the rest of the journey in a stiff silence.

All the while, Caldason’s eyes were on the city’s glittering splendour and phoney rainbows.

22

A fiery streak sliced the heavens. It could have been a shooting star. More likely it was somebody flaunting their wealth.

Seen from the summit of an outlying hill, Valdarr met the horizon and appeared to blend seamlessly into the night sky. The powdering of stars above silently mirrored the rippling colours and bursts of radiance below.

Two people sat on a pallid, long-dead tree trunk. They had little interest in the view.

‘What do you mean,

not good enough

?’ Serrah demanded.

‘We lost three men,’ Caldason reminded her.

‘And twice that many got wounded. I’m aware of that. It’s tragic, but they knew what they were signing up for. There are always casualties.’

‘You were the one so concerned about losing lives.’

‘I was worried about them being lost

recklessly

.’

‘Didn’t you feel bad when you lost members of your team, back in Merakasa?’

Serrah looked pained at that.

‘Sorry, of course you did.’ He added, ‘I didn’t mean it to be a dig about what happened to you, either.’

‘All right.’

‘But it’s a question of responsibility and -’

‘Yes, I know. Naturally I felt responsible if any of my band got killed or hurt. That even goes for the fool who landed me in this mess, although I’ve no reason to blame myself. But I have to say that for a man so used to combat you seem pretty troubled about this.’

‘You don’t understand. It’s to do with… I suppose you’d call it control.’

‘You’re right, I don’t understand.’

‘When the Qaloch were being cleared from their land, when we were being massacred, I was helpless. Not just for myself; I couldn’t help anybody else. People I was honour-bound to stand by and protect were slaughtered in front of me. I had no control.’

‘How could you? I don’t know the details of what happened to your people, but I do know the odds against you were crushing. And you were taken unawares, stabbed in the back.’

‘You sound like somebody who knows about betrayal.’

‘I wouldn’t be here without it, trying to adjust to everything that’s changed in my life.’

‘Exactly. Betrayal’s a form of powerlessness too.’

‘In the sense that I had no control over what happened, yes. But in the end it might be liberating, for all the pain involved. It made me see the world in a different way. Made me realise the true nature of the system I was serving.’

It seemed to Reeth that she was trying to make the best of it. He kept the thought to himself. ‘I’ve never been blind to the order of things,’ he said. ‘Or been part of it.’

‘Then you should be perfect for the Resistance.’

‘So everybody tells me.’

‘At least freedom’s more than just a word to them, Reeth.’

‘In the end they’re only another kind of system.’

‘But a much better one than anything we’ve got. Potentially, anyway.’

‘So you’re a prime candidate for the Resistance too?’

‘As long as it suits me.’

‘That’s more or less the way I see it. Not that I’m finding it easy, and today didn’t make it any easier.’