‘Dow was a fighter,’ Bayaz was murmuring. ‘Calder is a politician. He realises we are keen to leave, and that when the troops go home we will have nothing to bargain with. He knows he can win far more by sitting still and smirking than Dow ever did with all the steel and fury in the North…’
Shivers turned the ruined side of his face away as he spoke to Calder, the unburned side moving into the sun … and Gorst’s skin prickled with recognition, and his mouth came open.
Sipani.
That face, in the smoke, before he was sent tumbling down the stairs. That face. How could it be the same man? And yet he was almost sure.
Bayaz’ voice faded behind him as Gorst strode around the table, jaw clenched, and onto the Northmen’s side of the Children. One of Calder’s old retainers grunted as Gorst shouldered him out of the way. Probably this was extremely poor, if not potentially fatal, etiquette for peace negotiations. And I could not care less. Calder glanced up, and took a worried step back. Shivers turned to look. Not angry. Not afraid.
‘Colonel Gorst!’ someone shouted, but Gorst ignored it, his hand closing around Shivers’ arm and pulling him close. The War Chiefs about the edge of the Children were all frowning. The giant took a huge step forwards. The man with the golden armour was calling out to the body of Carls. Another had put his hand to the hilt of his sword.
‘Calm, everyone!’ Calder shouted in Northern, one restraining palm up behind him. ‘Calm!’ But he looked nervous. As well he should. All our lives are balanced on a razor’s edge. And I could not care less.
Shivers did not look as if he cared overmuch himself. He glanced down at Gorst’s gripping hand, then back up at his face, and raised the brow over his good eye.
‘Can I help you?’ His voice was the very opposite of Gorst’s. A gravelly whisper, harsh as millstones grinding. Gorst looked at him. Really looked. As though he could drill into his head with his eyes. That face, in the smoke. He had glimpsed it only for a moment, and masked, and without the scar. But still. He had seen it every night since, in his dreams, and in his waking, and in the twisted space between, every detail stamped into his memory. And I am almost sure.
He could hear movement behind him. Excited voices. The officers and men of his Majesty’s Twelfth. Probably upset to have missed out on the battle. Probably almost as keen to become involved in a new chapter of it as I am myself.
‘Colonel Gorst!’ came Bayaz’ warning growl.
Gorst ignored him. ‘Have you ever been …’ he hissed, ‘to Styria?’ Every part of him tingling with the desire to do violence.
‘Styria?’
‘Yes,’ snarled Gorst, gripping even harder. Calder’s two old men were creeping back in fighting crouches. ‘To Sipani.’
‘Sipani?’
‘Yes.’ The giant had taken another immense step, looming taller than the tallest of the Children. And I could not care less. ‘To Cardotti’s House of Leisure.’
‘Cardotti’s?’ Shivers’ good eye narrowed as he studied Gorst’s face. Time stretched out. All around them tongues licked nervously at lips, hands hovered ready to give their fatal signals, fingertips tickled at the grips of weapons. Then Shivers leaned close. Close enough almost for Gorst to kiss. Closer even than they had been to each other four years ago, in the smoke.
If they had been.
‘Never heard of it.’ And he slipped his arm out of Gorst’s slack grip and strode out of the Children without a backward glance. Calder swiftly followed, and the two old men, and the War Chiefs. All letting their hands drop from their weapons with some relief or, in the case of the giant, great reluctance.
They left Gorst standing there, in front of the table, alone. Frowning up towards the Heroes.
Almost sure.
Family
In many ways the Heroes hadn’t changed since the previous night. The old stones were just as they had been, and the lichen crusted to them, and the trampled, muddied, bloodied grass inside their circle. The fires weren’t much different, nor the darkness beyond them, nor the men who sat about them. But as far as Calder was concerned, there’d been some big-arsed changes.
Rather than dragging him in shame to his doom, Caul Shivers followed at a respectful distance, watching over his life. There was no scornful laughter as he strolled between the fires, no heckling and no hate. All changed the moment Black Dow’s face hit the dirt. The great War Chiefs, and their fearsome Named Men, and their hard-handed, hard-hearted, hard-headed Carls all smiled upon him as if he was the sun rising after a bastard of a winter. How soon they’d adjusted. His father always said men rarely change, except in their loyalties. Those they’ll shrug off like an old coat when it suits them.
In spite of his splinted hand and his stitched chin, Calder didn’t have to work too hard to get the smirk onto his face now. He didn’t have to work at all. He might not have been the tallest man about, but still he was the biggest in the valley. He was the next King of the Northmen, and anyone he told to eat his shit would be doing it with a smile. He’d already decided who’d be getting the first serving.
Caul Reachey’s laughter echoed out of the night. He sat on a log beside a fire, pipe in his hand, spluttering smoke at something some woman beside him had said. She looked around as Calder walked up and he nearly tripped over his own feet.
‘Husband.’ She stood, awkward from the weight of her belly, and held out one hand.
He took it in his and it felt small, and soft, and strong. He guided it over his shoulder, and slid his arms around her, hardly feeling the pain in his battered ribs as they held each other tight, tight. For a moment it seemed as if there was no one in the Heroes but them. ‘You’re safe,’ he whispered.
‘No thanks to you,’ rubbing her cheek against his.
His eyelids were stinging. ‘I … made some mistakes.’
‘Of course. I make all your good decisions.’
‘Don’t leave me alone again, then.’
‘I think I can say it’ll be the last time I stand hostage for you.’
‘So can I. That’s a promise.’ He couldn’t stop the tears coming. Some biggest man in the valley, stood weeping in front of Reachey and his Named Men. He would’ve felt a fool if he hadn’t been so glad to see her he couldn’t feel anything else. He broke away long enough to look at her face, light on one side, dark on the other, eyes with a gleam of firelight to them. Smiling at him, two little moles near the corner of her mouth he’d never noticed before. All he could think was that he didn’t deserve this.
‘Something wrong?’ she asked.
‘No. Just … wasn’t long ago I thought I’d never see your face again.’
‘And are you disappointed?’
‘I never saw anything so beautiful.’
She bared her teeth at him. ‘Oh, they were right about you. You are a liar.’
‘A good liar tells as much truth as he can. That way you never know what you’re getting.’
She took his bandaged hand in hers, turning it over, stroking it with her fingertips. ‘Are you hurt?’
‘Nothing to a famous champion like me.’
She pressed his hand tighter. ‘I mean it. Are you hurt?’
Calder winced. ‘Doubt I’ll be fighting any more duels for a while, but I’ll heal. Scale’s dead.’
‘I heard.’
‘You’re all my family, now.’ And he laid his good hand on her swollen belly. ‘Still—’
‘Like a sack of oats on my bladder all the way from Carleon in a lurching bloody cart? Yes.’
He smiled through his tears. ‘The three of us.’
‘And my father too.’