they were expecting the order. The rest of the Menin would not be far away, and if they didn’t escape now they’d be the ones on the receiving end of a charge.
‘Run, you fuckers!’ Daken roared, staring after the fleeing cavalry, ‘run and tell your lord I’ll do the same ta him!’
‘General!’ Dassai yelled.
Daken whirled around, and for a moment his eyes were filled with blind fury, then it subsided and the white-eye gave him a bloody grin, sweat and blood running from his bald head. There was still a stub of arrow protruding from his left arm and a shallow cut running along his cheek.
‘Dassai,’ he laughed, raising his axe, ‘first blood to us!’
‘It’s who gets the last I’m worried about,’ Dassai said, only half-joking as he watched the advancing Menin.
‘Oh, piss on you, that was the best fun I’ll have all year,’ the general said, slapping Dassai on the shoulder as he passed. Daken paused and leaned close to Dassai’s ear. ‘Now shift yourself, ya bastard!’ he roared at the top of his voice, and with that, the white-eye set off towards the abandoned horses, laughing mightily all the way.
Dassai spared one last look at the rest of the Menin Army, looming large on the moor ahead.
That’s the last we’ll run, he promised them silently. Next time, it’s to the death.
CHAPTER 35
Doranei watched the grainy light of dawn creep over Tairen Moor, his hand never leaving his sword. The Menin were out there, a dark smear in the distance - both nebulous and threatening. He couldn’t help wondering if the fears of the many had come true and they truly were an unstoppable force led by an invincible warrior.
He tried to find the fear inside him, but it wouldn’t come. The King’s Man looked down at the discarded jug of wine at his feet. The contents spilled red, soaking into the earth and wood of the rampart. The wine had tasted like ashes in his mouth - like the pyres of Scree, or the shattered streets of Byora where Sebe had died. He didn’t crave alcohol, not this morning. The feeling thrumming through his bones was something else, an angry impatience.
‘This is another man’s war,’ he said dully, nudging the jug with his toe. ‘Let them come, and quickly.’
‘It’s our war now,’ Veil reminded Doranei as he drank from a waterskin. ‘It weren’t the Farlan brought this plague upon the kingdom; it were coming sure enough anyway.’
Doranei didn’t reply. He didn’t want to speak what was on his mind, to hand the burden on to his friend, but it was there at the back of his mind. He was tired of this all, tired of the years of struggle and seeing precious little victory from it.
Maybe all that drinking’s finally paid off, he thought sourly, it’s finally managed to numb what’s inside.
The Menin had made camp a few miles away, not close enough to contain the Narkang Army, but still a threat. General Daken had arrived mid-afternoon with the news of one final engagement: one little piece of hurt delivered for the thousands murdered in their advance. His scouts had confirmed the scryers’ intelligence: their baggage train was small and their supplies were dwindling.
Doranei leaned forward over the rampart wall, looking past the fire-dampening charms inscribed on the outside and down to the ditch below it. In a few hours he would be killing men at this very spot, spilling their blood and battering them back into the ditch. This was the heart of the army’s defences; a fortress of earth and fresh-cut logs a hundred yards across, intended to meet the crashing wave of Menin infantry and hold firm.
Behind him was the mound of earth where Endine and Cetarn had been hammering stakes into the ground. Only Isak and Mihn went there now, sometimes accompanied by the witch of Llehden or Legana, but Doranei couldn’t imagine what they were up to. The company of guards was still stationed there, to keep all others away, but he’d never seen the three do anything remotely of interest. Isak had stood there for several hours yesterday, just staring into the distance as the ghost hour came and went.
He turned and looked past the squat central tower of the fort. Cetarn had inexplicably chained the mound to the ground, which was now the centre point of a dozen or so buried tendrils, each one a hundred feet or more in length. It was dark now, but Doranei could make out the