where we’ll find her this morning, and that’s where we’ll kill her—’
There was a roar, coming from ahead of them. The band of Etxelur folk had broken into a run.
Shade had no doubt his Pretani warriors would be able to bring down these wall-builders and ditch-scrubbers in an open fight - but this wasn’t an open fight, and wasn’t the kind of encounter Bark had trained them for. Suspended between ocean on one hand and a steep drop on the other, with warriors closing on him, he suddenly felt extraordinarily vulnerable.
‘Those aren’t all Etxelur,’ Zesi said now, peering ahead at the approaching warriors. ‘I recognise those twisted skulls. Those are snailheads. So Etxelur is calling on its friends to fight for them.’
‘We Pretani don’t need friends,’ Shade said.
‘Just as well, as you don’t have any. And, look! The man on the right - the tattoo around his thigh.’
The man, short, squat, yelling and stabbing his spear into the air, was still a good way from Shade, but he could see the tattoo. It was an eel, wrapped around the man’s leg.
Furious, Shade stepped forward and punched True’s shoulder. ‘That man’s of the Eel folk! You promised the slaves would rise against Etxelur, not fight the Pretani!’
True turned and faced Shade. Then he broke into a savage grin. ‘I lied. For my children!’ And he roared, raised his own stabbing spear, and drove it down with two hands into Shade’s shoulder.
Shade staggered back, stunned, the spear sticking out of this shoulder, its heavy mass tearing at him, the pain coming in waves.
Zesi lunged forward and with all her strength drove her own spear up into the soft flesh beneath True’s chin, through the man’s skull and up into his brain. True’s body fell away, shuddering in death, and slid down the wall and into the ocean water.
Shade’s men supported him to keep him from falling. But the world seemed to freeze around him, the sea, the wall, all icy clear, as the pain washed out from the hot wound. Was this his last moment of life?
Without warning Zesi yanked the Eel man’s spear from his shoulder. He felt his flesh rip, and he had to work hard to keep from screaming at the blistering pain.
‘You’ll live,’ she growled. She ripped a handful of cloth from her own tunic, wadded it up and pressed it against the wound. ‘Hold this. You’ve still got one good hand.’
‘Just as well.’ For the charging Etxelur warriors were about to close. Shade pushed away his support, stood alone, and braced, spear in his good hand, hunching over his injured shoulder. To Zesi he muttered, ‘They were expecting us.’
‘Obviously. This is a trap.’ She hefted her weapons. ‘But whatever it takes, however many lives I have to waste, I’m coming for you, little sister—’
‘Be ready! Here they are!’
The first man to come at Shade was a heavy snailhead. Shade got his good shoulder down and used the man’s own charge to shove him off the wall and into the sea. The second man stabbed but missed, and Shade managed to grab the shaft of his spear and shove him back. But then came the third, and the fourth.
And then a woman, tall and dark, called to them. ‘Hello, Zesi. Remember me?’
‘Ice Dreamer? Aren’t you dead yet?’ Zesi screamed and lunged, but the woman, tall, muscular and dark, fended her off easily.
Shade, dizzy with pain and loss of blood, battling for his own life against snailheads and estuary folk and former slaves, could offer her no protection or help.
Bark led the Pretani charge across the floor of the Bay Land, heading straight for the heap of flint at the foot of the eastern barrage. When they got the chance they smashed down houses and stands on which hides cured and fish dried, and kicked over hearths to start fires. In places the Etxelur folk and their allies stood and fought, and blood yells and screams echoed across the bowl of a landscape. But mostly the Etxelur folk jabbed, fell away and scattered, to regroup further back.
Hollow was hot and already out of breath. He was a trader, not a fighter. But he seemed determined to keep up with the rest. ‘Not far now. We’re cutting through this Etxelur rabble like a flint knife through a calf’s scrotum.’
Bark wished he had somebody more experienced with him; he wished he was at Shade’s side. ‘It’s too easy.’
‘What?’
‘It’s too easy! These Etxelur folk are barely putting up a fight at all.’