A Time of Blood (Of Blood and Bone #2) - John Gwynne Page 0,158

right now.”

“The people that killed Sig are up there,” Cullen growled, his face pale, a look in his eyes Drem hadn’t seen before. “I’ve spent the last few moons running from them, when all I’ve wanted to do is turn around and carve some vengeance in their hides. And now they’re right there. I can’t be doing with this waiting.” He looked at them both. “When I close my eyes at night, all I see is Sig, telling us to strap her to a post.” A tear filled his eye, ran down his cheek. Then his lips twisted. “They’re going to pay for what they did to her.”

He wiped the tears from his face, sniffed.

“Besides, they have the high ground, so they’re not going to be obliging and march down here to fight us,” Cullen said. “So we might as well just walk up there and get on with it.”

“You’re not the only one that wants to avenge Sig,” Keld said. “There’s not a warrior of the Order whose life Sig didn’t touch.” He squeezed Cullen’s shoulder. “Won’t be long, lad.” At Cullen’s words there was a new fire in his eyes, too.

He held a hand up over his eyes. “I can see loads of those shaven-haired bastards, but where’s Gulla and his brood?”

That was a good question, and Drem was wondering where Morn was, too. He’d seen her in the sky many times over the last three days, ever since they’d left the wasteground that had been Dalgarth behind them. But now she was nowhere to be seen.

Absently, his hand went to his neck and checked his pulse.

Two crows flew away from the ridge top, sweeping back down the slope towards Byrne. They circled above her; a flapping of wings and they were alighting on Byrne’s saddle. Drem could hear squawking, saw Byrne’s head nodding. She looked to Balur and Ethlinn, more words passing between them.

“Here we go,” Cullen said.

Byrne twisted in her saddle and said something to a warrior behind her, who raised a horn to his lips and blew.

Ethlinn and Balur rode their bears back to the giants on the right flank.

Men and women dismounted and moved into the open space before Byrne, shrugging their round shields from their backs. They formed into three groups, each one around two hundred swords strong. Another horn blast and those shields came together with a crack, and suddenly they were solid shield walls.

Byrne signalled, and more horns rang out.

Keld looked at Drem and Cullen. “Be seeing you soon,” he said, dismounted and handed his reins to Drem.

Other huntsmen made their way forwards, threading between the shield walls and forming a row before them.

A horn signal, and the huntsmen and shield walls began to walk up the hill.

Byrne raised an arm and then pointed at the ridge, touched her heels to her mount and followed them.

Drem and all those warriors of the Bright Star still mounted rippled into movement behind Byrne. With a jangling and creaking of bridles and harness, they began to move up the slope, hooves a thudding drumbeat pounding a slow, steady time on the turf. To the right Drem could feel the rumble of three hundred bears and giants following suit.

He felt his heart thumping in his chest, a blend of fear and excitement filling him, all around him. He rolled his shoulders. He was more used to the weight of his mail shirt now, after riding, eating and sleeping in it for four days and nights. Even if the skin of his shoulders had been chafed red raw. The one thing that set him apart from most of the warriors of the Order was the lack of a shield slung across his back. Cullen and Keld had big round shields with the four-pointed white star emblazoned upon them. Drem wanted to embrace the Order, felt he’d learned so much in the short time that he’d spent there, but to use a shield in battle felt like a step too far at the moment.

“A shield’ll save your life,” Cullen had said to him, and Drem didn’t doubt it, but the more he’d trained, the more he’d realized he gravitated to fighting with two weapons in his hands, preferably his seax and axe.

“The best defence is to attack,” Keld had said to him. “You’ll be one of us huntsmen before your training’s over.”

“I’ll have to make do with this mail shirt, for now,” Drem had answered.

Seeing their foe lined up along the crest of the ridge, though, he