A Little Hatred (The Age of Madness #1) - Joe Abercrombie Page 0,147

and gibbers and his own growls and the smashing and cracking of metal and flesh.

‘Die!’ Glaward roared in his ear. ‘Die!’

The archers had no armour and Leo’s sword thudded into them like a butcher’s cleaver into meat, opening great spitting and spurting wounds. One man fell screaming with his side laid right open. Leo broke a man’s bow as he tried to block his sword with it and took his arm off, too, tottered past all off balance, bounced off Antaup as he stabbed a man on the ground with his spear. He fell, rolled, saw an archer with a knife ready to spring on him, lifted a clumsy arm to fend him off, then he was smashed out of the way by a great mace. Whitewater Jin, and he grabbed Leo’s wrist and dragged him up.

The archers were running, being hacked down, floundering into the stream, and Leo wobbled on towards the bridge.

A man was stumbling away, clutching at his shoulder, blood bubbling between his fingers, and Leo hit him across the side of the head with his sword, caught him with the flat and knocked him sprawling, trampled over him.

His chest was on fire now, his limbs numb and floppy. Every step was a mountain.

Onto the bridge. He could feel the stones slippery with mud and blood, slick with the falling rain.

There were Carls here, desperately trying to organise a shield wall. A Named Man with a fox-fur around his shoulders pointed with a thick finger. Leo didn’t so much charge at him as fall onto him, his weary swing clattering harmlessly off the Named Man’s shield. He caught his chin on the rim, mouth filling with the salt taste of blood.

The Northman lurched back a pace but didn’t fall, and they twisted into an awkward, exhausted embrace, shuffling, snarling, wrestling, shouldering and elbowing while armoured men clobbered away at each other around them.

Leo heard the Northman’s desperate, whistling breath in his ear, grunted and clawed at him, wet fur in his mouth. His sword was tangled with something, couldn’t move it. He managed to draw his dagger with his other hand, stabbed, but the blade only scraped uselessly on mail. No room. No breath. No strength, the dagger twisted from his grip, fell in the mud.

They lumbered about in a pawing circle, bounced off the bridge’s parapet, enough room for Leo to force his free hand up under the man’s chin, push his gauntleted thumb into his mouth, shove it through so he caught a fistful of his cheek, ripping his lip open, tearing his face open, and the man screamed and grabbed Leo’s wrist, letting Leo’s sword loose. With a last growling effort, Leo shoved him away, smashed him on the side of the head, flinched as blood spotted his face, something bouncing off his cheek. A tooth, maybe. The man went reeling over the mossy parapet and splashed into the stream with the other corpses. Bloody thing was more corpse than river now. No corpses, no glory.

Leo flopped down on all fours, clawed up his sword along with a fistful of mud. Up to one knee, with a groan to his feet and he stood swaying, grasping at the slick stones, every muscle throbbing, dragging in air in great wheezing gasps, like a fish hooked and hauled helpless from the river.

‘Have … to pull back.’ It was Jurand, with hardly the breath to talk. Helmet off and his face spotted with blood. He hugged Leo, half holding him up, half leaning on him. ‘Get you to safety.’

‘No,’ growled Leo, gripping him tight, their wet armour scraping, then trying to struggle free, to press on. ‘We fight.’

The rain was hammering down, pinging and spattering. The empty bridge stretched away, a rutted hump scattered with arrow-pricked and spear-pierced corpses, sprawled beside the parapets, heaped against them, draped over them. And at the far end, beneath that wolf standard, more Northmen were gathered.

A group as muddy, bloody and sodden as Leo, teeth bared with hate but weapons drooping from weariness. They faced each other across the rain-drenched bridge, Leo and his friends at one end, this knot of Named Men at the other, and in their midst a tall man, long hair plastered to his snarling face by the rain.

‘Leo dan Brock!’ he shrieked, wet eyes wild with battle-madness, and Leo knew from the gold on his sword and the gold on his belt and the gold on his armour who he had to be.

‘Stour Nightfall!’ Leo roared